Drone worry as SA is controlled from afar

UNPRECEDENTED moral quandaries have been created by the deployment of unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs) or “drones” in military conflict. Drones do not need cockpits, protective armour, ejection seats or oxygen systems. This allows them to carry bigger payloads over longer ranges. UAVs were initially developed for nonmilitary uses. Controversy has surrounded their increasing use in military operations, particularly in US “antiterrorist” interventions in Afghanistan, Pakistan, Somalia and Yemen.

International law obliges participants in war to distinguish between combatants and noncombatants and to minimise civilian casualties. Drone systems therefore include a “ground controller” responsible for authorising weapons release. Despite claims that they carry “precision weapons”, however, drone use has resulted in numerous civilian deaths and generated resentment among target populations.

Jennifer Gibson, of the human rights group Reprieve, observes that the US “has set a moral precedent. A state can declare someone a terrorist and just go out and kill them.” There are also fears that UAVs will be used by despots to put down civilian uprisings.

For such reasons, US President Barack Obama last week imposed tight new controls on drone deployment. Amid concerns about Saudi Arabia’s human rights record, the Obama administration has also refused to sell Predator or Reaper missile-firing UAV systems to the kingdom.

SA’s state-owned Denel Dynamics has stepped into the gap. According to Paris-based Intelligence Online and the Washington Free Beacon, Denel Dynamics is working covertly with the Saudis to develop and deploy new drone technologies. Denel’s Seeker-400 UAV has a 250km range and it can be equipped with Denel’s air-to-ground missiles.

Denel last year established a joint venture with an Abu Dhabi-based company to develop and manufacture “precision-guided weapon systems” for the United Arab Emirates. A Denel Dynamics statement celebrated the company’s “unique ability to offer turnkey armed surveillance UAVs (eg Seeker400) equipped with its in-house missile solutions (eg Mokopa)”. For a state-owned company to supply such weapons to authoritarian regimes that are fearful of civilian uprisings may or may not be well advised.

More clear-cut ethical hazards are thrown up by President Jacob Zuma’s latest extension of SA’s secretive strategic drone export programme. During the recent celebrations of the 50th anniversary of the Organisation of African Unity in Addis Ababa, diplomats from Francophone countries complained that SA has covertly transported an advanced precisionguided battle system to the African Union’s headquarters. Controlled remotely from Beijing and Johannesburg, this system was described by one French observer as “the most offensive instrument of diplomacy the continent has ever seen…. Nkosazana Dlamini-Zuma has already caused massive and unjustifiable collateral damage.”

After a series of drawn-out meetings with Zuma, the Chinese Communist Party has meanwhile designated the entire South African government a “pilotfree vehicle”. Beijing already runs SA’s nuclear reactor procurement programme using remote satellite guidance systems. Soon a new “passenger-free” high-speed rail transit system will be built by Chinese engineers. It will run either from Clanwilliam to Port Nolloth or from Johannesburg to Durban, depending on the findings of an “independent” feasibility study announced by deputy director-general for integrated transport planning Mawethu Vilana.

The Durban route may well be favoured in order to alleviate episodic airport congestion at OR Tambo International Airport. On Friday afternoons, in particular, large numbers of VVIPs (very very important people) are denied access to presidential, state or parastatal aircraft, and are packed instead, like sardines, into gold- and silver-class departure lounges. They are then forced to sit in unyielding businessclass seats for the long flight down to Durban. Zuma (or rather Beijing) is determined to stamp out such human rights abuses.

Butler teaches politics at the University of Cape Town.