Friday, June 3, 2011

Less Drones, Please

An interesting story two days ago (yes, yes, it's been a busy week . . .) by Eli Lake of the Washington Times on a report by the Defense Science Board urging the military to rely less on drones for intelligence, and more on open-source collection. 

The report notes that although technology helps pinpoint and kill enemy combatants and to detect cellphone conversations on the battlefield, it has created "a crisis in processing, exploitation, an dissemination" of the information.  Indeed, General James Cartwright, Vice Chair of the Joint Chiefs, noted last year that the data from a single sensor ball on a predator drone required 19 analysts to process, and that more sophisticated drones soon available would increase that number nearly tenfold!

Consequently, the Defense Science Board recommended the Pentagon devote more resources to developing expertise in anthropology, sociology, and human-terrain mapping.  Although this study was specifically looking at the problem of intelligence in counterinsurgencies, I think the finding also applies to the problem of strategic manhunts as well.

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