Combat Air Branch

RPAS are expected to become a significant component within any class of airspace, presently dominated by manned aviation. Consequently, the safe integration of RPAS into non-segregated airspace is currently a key issue in the military and civil aviation community.

Integrating RPAS in non-segregated airspace is a complex topic, which includes airworthiness standards, pilot certifications, aviation regulations and procedures as well as technical challenges unique to remotely controlled aircraft. This document highlights two of these challenges, assessing them to be crucial for the way ahead and to be addressed first and foremost.

The number of unmanned systems in NATO nations’ military inventories has grown rapidly and is still increasing throughout all domains. Unmanned Aircraft Systems (UAS) currently represent the largest share of those systems. At the same time, the level of automation built into these unmanned systems has not only increased significantly but has also reached a level of sophistication at which they are seemingly capable of performing many tasks ‘autonomously’ and with no necessity for direct human supervision. Although it is a common understanding within NATO that autonomous capabilities should not be integrated into lethal weapon systems, there are systems already in service which can be considered to almost have approached that limit, e.g., highly automated cannon-based air defence systems such as Skyshield or Close-In Weapon Systems (CIWS) such as Phalanx. These systems are capable of firing at incoming targets automatically, within seconds of detection of a target, assuming this mode of operation has been activated.

Under the umbrella of the ‘Convention on Prohibitions or Restrictions on the Use of Certain Con­ventional Weapons Which May Be Deemed to Be ­Excessively Injurious or to Have Indiscriminate Effects,’ the United Nations (UN) conducted informal expert meetings on the topic of Lethal Autonomous Weapon Systems (LAWS) in 2014, 2015 and 2016. Succeeding a Multinational Capability Development Campaign (MCDC) on the ‘Role of Autonomous Systems in Gaining Operational Access’, Allied Command Transformation (ACT) is currently working on a ‘Counter Unmanned Autonomous Systems’ concept for the Alliance.5 However, international law, as well as NATO doctrine, does not currently address the potential legal and ethical issues which may arise from the use of highly automated weapon systems.