The British military may now shoot down drones in the UK. Defence secretary John Healey is set to make the announcement as a speech in the city of London. He will link the move to a claimed increase in Russian drone attacks in Europe.

But scratch the surface and you’ll discover a story of intensifying British militarisation.

Healey is expected to say:

We are developing new powers – to be put into law through our armed forces bill – to shoot down unidentified drones over UK military sites.

There’s an element of truth to Healy’s words. Drones are proliferating in Europe and around the world. But this lacks a LOT of context. Not least that the UK and US have been unleashing drones around the world for decades. Often against civilians.

Our drones good. Their drones bad.

Head of the UK watchdog Drone Wars Chris Cole advised caution:

While its perfectly possible that these are drones flown carelessly by hobby pilots as their numbers rapidly increase, there has been speculation by some that these sightings are connected to a co-ordinated campaign by adversaries seeking intelligence or to simply to test military and security responses.

Importantly, he added:

No evidence for such a claim, however, has been presented.

And it’s important to understand that the UK government has been hyping the threat of war recently. Including by urging Brits to adopt a ‘pre-war’ mentality:

The sightings, along with a number of cases of drones straying across borders from the war in Ukraine, have been taken up but those arguing that the UK is facing grave security threats now from state adversaries rather than terrorist groups and that the UK needs to rapidly increase military spending and accept that it is in a ‘pre-war situation’. However, calm heads need to prevail.

Drone contradiction

Cole said there was a major contradiction at the heart of the drone question. The UK and her allies have been using drones for decades. This has had serious impacts on people in occupied countries. But the UK has always dismissed these:

While ordinary people living under drones around the world constantly feel threatened and suffer real physical and psychological harm from military drones flying overhead, British politicians have regularly dismissed such fears, arguing that the drones are there in fact to create peace for the people on the ground.

So our drones are good, and other country’s drones are bad, seems to be the long and short of it:

It is ironic then, not to say hypocritical, that fear and apprehension about possible drone incursions within the UK is met with strong government response including ordering the military to shoot such drones down.

Defence investment plans

Next month, the government will release it’s Defence Investment Plan. Drone Wars predicts this will “likely to see further spending on drones and counter-drone technology”:

Rather than spending vast sums on new military technology which will simply proliferate and make the world – and ourselves – much less safe, we need to be investing in building global co-operation and common security, accepting that no nation can be truly secure unless all feel secure.

They added:

…we should be investing much more in diplomacy and conflict prevention structures; we should be investing in our health and social care; investing in greening the economy and focusing our extremely talented engineers and scientists on help to tackle climate changes rather than developing new war technology.

Drones are a standard part of national military arsenals in 2025. Existing regulation remains “fragmented“. At the heart of this debate, is the question of applying some kind of universal principles about this kind of technology. A principle – or set of principles – which apply to every equally.

Featured image via Unsplash/Alessio Soggetti

By Joe Glenton

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