Drones in the Drug Wars

1Running head: DRONES IN THE DRUG WARS

Drones in the Drug Wars

Alyse Johnson

The Florida State University


Abstract

The “War on Drugs”, led by the United States, has been raging on for over the past forty years.

In efforts to combat the illicit activity that results, such as drug trafficking and violence from

drug cartels, countries as well as local law enforcement agencies have begun drafting drones into

the drug wars. Drones, or Unmanned Aircraft Systems (UAS) are considered to be ideal for their

advanced capabilities in conducting intelligence, surveillance, and reconnaissance missions.

While those in support of these programs believe that the UAS can do the actual drug

interdiction work in the future, critics argue their current efforts are neither effective nor as cost-

efficient as manned operations. Drug smugglers too, have been utilizing UAS technology as their

drug mules with the expectation that the person piloting the unmanned system will remain

anonymous. As the capabilities of UAS technologies evolve and the drug epidemic in the United

States worsens, perhaps some UAS programs will adopt new initiatives. Instead of searching for

smugglers they can search for victims of overdose to call for help, and instead of delivering

drugs that have the potential to take lives they can deliver drugs that have the potential to save

them.


The “War on Drugs”, led by the United States, has been raging on for over the past forty

years. In 1970, a bill typically referred to as the Controlled Substance Act was passed by

Congress. Although the bill was originally intended to promote drug education, rehabilitation,

and research, the law-and order climate of the time prioritized enforcement to an astonishing

degree (Goode, 1972). Since then, international drug control efforts have aimed to eliminate

patterns of drug production, trafficking and consumption. Illicit drug consumption was

criminalized, as was its production, which created an illicit drug market worth an estimated $320

billion dollars annually (Global Reform, n.d.). Despite these efforts consumption patterns remain

relatively stable. In addition, the U.S. accounts for twenty-five percent of the demand for drugs

globally, but it only comprises five percent of the total population. While the United States is

faced with a drug epidemic, its largest supplier, Mexico, faces a completely different kind of

epidemic in their own drug war. Violence and organized crime caused by drug cartels and the

fight against them has terrorized the country (Zedillo and Wheeler, 2012). With the

technological advances of today, leaders have begun using different types of weapons to advance

their initiatives. Drones or Unmanned Aircraft Systems (UAS), which made their infamous debut

to the public after September 11, 2001 when fighting the War on Terror, have now entered the

drug wars.

As of 2014, over 60,000 people have been killed in Mexico and tens of thousands others

have disappeared. The violence has led to increased migration to the United States with many

directly crossing the border. On top of the “War on Drugs” initiatives, Mexican President Felipe

Calderón declared a ‘war on drug cartels’ in late 2006 which resulted in a drastic increase in the

violence seen (Correa-Cabrera, Garrett, & Keck, 2014). To help combat this issue (and secure

the border), President Obama signed the Southwest Border Security Bill in 2010 which provided


the largest Federal outlay for border security programs in history at a figure of $600 million

dollars. The newest tactic employed by the US is the use of unarmed drones for gathering

intelligence on drug cartels in order to locate them as well as track their activities. With

Mexico’s approval, the high altitude Global Hawk UAS began being used for patrolling the US-

Mexico border as well as within Mexican territory (Correa-Cabrera et al., 2014).

Carrying a multitude of sensors, the United States Air Force’s unarmed Global Hawk

UAS can fly 60,000 feet in the air and at the speed of 357 miles per hour. Using imagery

intelligence (IMINT), signals intelligence (SIGINT), and moving target indicator (MIT) sensors,

the Global Hawk is able to provide reliable near-real-time coverage for day or night intelligence,

surveillance and reconnaissance (ISR) missions (RQ-4 Global Hawk, 2014). The Times reported

that the Global Hawk was responsible for helping to catch the killers of the special agent for U.S.

Immigration and Customs Enforcement service, Jaime Zapata, who was shot on the road

between Monterrey and Mexico City. Japan has also reaped benefits from the use of the Global

Hawk UAS during their tsunami- and earthquake- relief efforts. With expanded cooperation of

U.S. –Mexican efforts to combat the heightened violence seen by the drug cartels through the use

of UAS, it is safe to say that Defense Secretary Robert Gates was right about his sentiments that

the drone era will outlast the Iraq and Afghanistan wars (Ackerman, 2011).

American assistance in Mexico has largely been kept a secret due to political sensitivities

in Mexico as well as legal restrictions. However, some officials (of the Pentagon, State

Department, Homeland Security, and/or Mexican officials) stated anonymously that the two

countries increased cooperation is evidence of their heightened efforts to prevail over a common

threat. President Obama and President Calderón also agreed upon opening a “fusion” center for

counternarcotic efforts. It was not clear if the data gathered by the surveillance drones would be


released to this location. However, what is clear is that the improved intelligence technology will

certainly have an impact on the way the two countries deal with violence from the drug cartels.

Retired chief of international operations for the Drug Enforcement Administration (DEA), Mike

Vigil, noted the technological advances when stating the following:

“It wasn’t that long ago when there was no way the DEA could conduct the kinds

of activities they are doing now… And the only way they’re going to be able to

keep doing what they’re doing is by allowing Mexico to have plausible

deniability.” (2011)

A senior American administration official noted that the increase in counternarcotic

activities were at the request of the Mexican government. In the past, United States lawmakers

had expressed doubts over partnering with the Mexican government perhaps due to legal

foundation under which these activities would need to occur. The Mexican constitution strictly

prohibits foreign intervention except under very limited conditions so even Mexican officials

must admit the legality of the American interventions is highly questionable. In the end it seems

as if the notion of defeating a common enemy prevails. As an article published by the New York

Times reported the statements made by a Mexican official, “the two countries have recognized

the responsibilities shared by both governments in the fight against criminal organizations on

both sides of the border” (Thompson and Mazzetti, 2011).

The use of UAS in Mexico, for the time being, will continue to be shrouded in secrecy

for numerous reasons. Besides those already mentioned, officials mention that details regarding

drug investigations should remain in the dark as revealing those details could endanger those

American and Mexican officials on the ground. Another reason mentioned for the hush regarding


certain drone operations was stated by Homeland Security spokesperson, Matt Chandler, when

he said it would be “inappropriate to comment” about the use of drones in the Zapata case as it

was still under investigation at the time. The relationship between the United States and Mexico

during these activities to summarize, “... most Mexicans, especially in areas of conflict, would be

fine about how much the united states is involved in the drug war, because things have gotten so

scary they just want the bad guys to get caught,” Mr. Selee of the Woodrow Wilson International

Center for Scholars said.” But the Mexican government is afraid of the more nationalistic

elements in the political elite, so they tend to hide it” (Thompson & Mazzetti, 2011).

The US and Mexico are not alone in their stance of the use of drones in attempt to

eradicate drug trafficking and its associated harm. Venezuela is now patrolling with Iran-built

drones to hunt down drug traffickers. Venezuelan President Nicolás Maduro stated that the three

surveillance drones, which were equipped with small cameras, are to help fight crime and patrol

the country’s borders. Although crime is one of the greatest problems domestically in the

country, the president did not mention how the drones would be used to combat crime (Fox

News Latino, 2013).

Police in Rio de Janeiro on the other hand, are not shy in expressing how they have been

using their VANTs, which is the Portuguese Acronym for UAS, to control drugs and crime in

their city’s shanty towns. Brazilian Military Engineering Institute official, Montenegro

Magalhaes Neto, stated the following:

“When you send a VANT ahead, it will help you see what soldiers can’t see; we

believe the VANTs are going to help us save lives despite the fact they could be


downed by ‘enemy fire’ from these criminal groups some of which have heavy

weapons and have even attacked our armor plated helicopters.” (Neto, 2012)

There are roughly 600 shanty towns which are expected to be under the control of drug

related gangs which hide among the impoverished people who reside there. With the 2016

Olympics on the horizon, Rio authorities anticipate the continued use of the VANTS to help their

special forces ensure order and monitor gang activity (Merco Press, 2012).

El Salvador too, has paired up with the United States in a mission to determine whether

an unmanned aerial vehicle could be the future for tactical drug interdiction. In 2009

counternarcotic officials from the U.S. and El Salvador had been monitoring a ship on El

Salvador’s Pacific coast as they had suspected it might be ferrying drugs. In order to confirm

their suspicions, they deployed the Heron UAS which appropriately named is a wide-winged,

blue-grey aircraft (Padgett, 2009). Heron manufacturers, Israel Aerospace Industries (IAI),

describe their Heron TP as an advanced, multi-purpose Medium Altitude Long Endurance

(MALE) UAS with a high degree of reliability. Its main components include features such as

triple, fully redundant, state–of-the-art avionics, Satellite communication for extended range

(SATCOM), all weather capability, Automatic Takeoff and Landing (ATOL) for maximal safety,

as well as other advanced capabilities (Heron TP, n.d.). This stealth aircraft was chosen for

surveillance due to its ability to fly for over twenty hours while streaming high quality real-time

video at an altitude as high as 15,000 feet. They confirmed this was indeed a narco-ship, and

Navy Commander Kevin Quarderer of the Defense Department’s Southern Command

(Southcom) Innovation Program stated, “This was a historic first… using a UAV for maritime

counterdrug operations in a real-world setting with actual targets” (Padgett, 2009).


Although the Heron did not do the actual drug interdictions, Southcom believes that its

ability well suits their needs for their initiatives in combating illicit drug activity. A key reason

they state as an advantage that unmanned aircrafts have over manned aircrafts is endurance. A

UAS can fly roughly three times longer than those with pilots in the aircraft. Officer Quarderer

also noted an advantage of the Heron by stating, “The radar package is more capable of detecting

low-profile targets like semisubmersibles” (Padgett, 2009).

Senator Thad Cochran, the ranking Republican member on the Senate Appropriations

Committee’s Defense Subcommittee, is hopeful that the Heron can provide actual drug

interdiction work in the near future. In 2009 the Senator pushed for $ 3 million for Heron testing,

and he believes the drone has “operational readiness and potential to provide more persistent and

cost-effective intelligence, surveillance, and reconnaissance,” as stated by Margaret McPhillips,

the Senator’s spokesperson. A preliminary Southcom report reinforces his views of the potential

for the Heron, and they claim that drug-surveillance outlays provided by UAS can result in major

savings for the Federal Government (even though they provide no calculations to support that).

However, one could question the motives of Cochran’s major push for the drone industry with

the Heron UAS manufacturer Star Aerospace, the U.S. subsidiary of IAI, being based out of

Cochran’s home State of Mississippi. Putting the benefit of adding jobs to his state aside, it

would be hard for a member of the Senate Appropriations Committee’s Defense Subcommittee

to ignore the potential for cost savings by the use of UAS in the drug wars when it has been

shown in real wars (Padgett, 2009).

It is clear that Latin American governments, including their military and policing security

forces, have begun utilizing UAS for their operations to serve in intelligence, surveillance and

reconnaissance efforts. UAS have been utilized for missions that are said to be “dirty, dull, or


dangerous.” With field surveillance missions lasting hours on end, these unblinking, stealth-like

UAS may be the best “man for the job” with their complex high-resolution cameras, infrared

sensors, thermal imaging, GPS navigation, facial recognition, and other highly technical

capacities carried on board (Goldberg, Corcorcan, & Picard, 2013).

U.S. Military as well, are increasing the use of UAS along with the roles they play. As

more and more people begin questioning the cost-effectiveness of the war on drugs, the demand

for reducing the flow of marijuana, cocaine, heroin, and methamphetamine by use of drug

surveillance could become a new priority. If drones can find Taliban targets in the mountains

than it only seems obvious that the same technology can be used for finding drug processing labs

on land or go fast narco-submarines used by the drug cartels. The logic of using drug drones has

become more and more popular not just with the dull jobs but putting people out of the

dangerous ones as well. After the hostage situation of three U.S contractors who crashed in their

drug surveillance Cessna over the Colombian jungle in 2003, counterdrug operations will think

twice before putting their agents in danger of capture by Marxist Guerillas once again (Padgett,

2009).

In 2010, Michael Kostelnik, the assistant commissioner for the Office of Air and Marine

within US Customs and Border Protection (CBP), spoke before the House Committee on

Homeland Security (Subcommittee on Border, Maritime, and Global Counterterrorism) about the

roles of UAS in their initiatives. CBP is part of the Department of Homeland Security (DHS),

and UAS operations have been used as a tool for various DHS missions such as border security,

reduction in drug trafficking, and disaster response. For over five years CBP has operated the

UAS Predator B, and at the time of the meeting Kostelnik stated that six predator B aircrafts

were currently being operated by CBP with a seventh due by the end of the fiscal year.


Additionally, other Department of Homeland Security agencies such as the FBI, DEA,

and Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) are able to request the use of UAS which

was designated as a national asset by CBP. CBP was able to support the oil spill in 2010 when

the Deepwater Horizon exploded as well as respond to hurricanes or other large-scale natural

disasters. CBP has worked with the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) in order to gain

access to the National Airspace System (NAS). The FAA must grant Certificates of

Authorization (COAs) by meeting all of application requirements including those tailored for

individual certificates prior to flying in the NAS. Thirty-five out of Thirty-six COA requests had

been granted to CBP at the time of Kostelnik’s speech to the committee (Kostelnik, 2010).

A Fronteras Desk report outlined the expansion of the drone project on border patrolling

by beginning with a quote by Michael Kostelnik himself. “Today we form the world’s largest

law enforcement air force,” he stated. Since he spoke in 2010, Kostelnik’s fleet operated by the

Office of Air and Marine (OAM) within CBP has grown to 10 UAS alongside their 270

additional manned aircrafts. The attribute drone operations to the arrests of nearly 2,000 drug

smugglers and over 800,000 pounds of drug seized in 2010 alone. These eyes in the sky can

more quickly answer the calls to border control agents in determining if those spotted in the Rio

Grande are drug smugglers or simply fisherman (Rozemberg, 2012). Similarly, the same logic

follows for their maritime operations in detecting if the “go fast” boats are college students

fooling around or highly resourced drug traffickers.

These Predator B model UAS have been modified from their standard armed military

types used in strikes seen in Afghanistan as well as Pakistan, but instead are equipped with high

end radars. The Predator B maritime variant named the Guardian was developed to improve the

capacity for reconnaissance, surveillance, targeting, and acquisition missions operated within


maritime environments. This involved enhancements of the structural, avionics, and

communications systems from the standard Predator B UAS. A Raytheon SeaVue marine search

radar and an electro-optical/infrared sensor was added to allow crewmembers to maintain

awareness and optimize viewing conditions during maritime operations. Joint counter-narcotics

operations are conducted using the Guardian along the Gulf of Mexico and Southern California

coastal as well as at drug source and transit zones (Guardian UAS Maritime Variant Predator B

Fact Sheet, 2015).

Despite the growth of the drone program, the $18 million dollar a piece aircrafts may not

be giving the agency their money’s worth. A 2014 Homeland Security Inspector General audit

titled the report of their findings, U.S. Customs and Border Protection’s Unmanned Aircraft

System Program Does Not Achieve Intended Results or Recognize All Costs of Operations.

Because CBP has invested a significant amount of funding into the Unmanned Aircraft Systems

program, this audit was conducted to determine the cost effectiveness and overall performance of

the program. After eight years of the program, the audit determined that the program could not

prove that it had achieved its expectations for operational capacity or that it was a substantial

contribution to border security initiatives.

Expectations for UAS mission operations included 16-hour flights by four patrols every

day of the year, increased apprehensions at the border, reduced surveillance costs, as well as

improving the efficiency of USBP. First, according to OAM’s expected UAS flight hours, the

total number of hours according to their Concept of Operations (CONOPs) should be around

23,296. However, the UAS in the program flew about eighty percent less than what was

anticipated with the aircrafts logging only 5,102 flight hours combined. The OAM attribute the


shortcomings primarily to budgetary restraints with other contributing factors being ties to

weather conditions and flight restrictions.

Similarly, advocates of the UAS program like to aggrandize the contributions that

unmanned aircrafts demonstrate in the reported number of apprehensions made at the border. In

Fiscal year 2013, Arizona and Texas could only attribute 1.8 percent and .07 percent of their

total apprehensions to UAS respectively. What is more is that border patrol agents believe that

these apprehensions could have been made without their assistance. As for the OAM expectation

that as a result of the unmanned aircraft program, a twenty-five to fifty percent reduction in

border surveillance cost could be seen…The OAM performance expectation could not be

justified as they had never tracked that indicator.

Finally, the expectation of improved efficiency was determined to be unwarranted due to

their inability to measure performance as well as poorly conducted cost estimates that were

reported. In support of the 5,102 unmanned aircraft flight hours reported for 2013, the OAM

calculated a cost of $2,468 per flight hour whereas the audit report estimated that the cost per

hour would be around $12,255. The discrepancy reported by the Office of the Inspector

General’s (OIG) total cost estimation of $62.5 million and the OAM’s $12,591,736 calculation

can be attributed to numerous reasons. Whereas the OIG includes in their estimation and

attributes 80 percent of the program’s operation and support total to costs for personnel, contract

support, and equipment, (which includes about $7.6 million for depreciation) the OAM leaves

those cost types out of their calculation altogether.

The OAM has a long term plan of expanding the program to include the purchase of

fourteen more unmanned aircrafts, therefore drastically increasing the cost. Due to the results of


the audit, OIG provided four recommendations to CPB for improving their UAS program as well

as suggested that the $443 million proposed amount for the program’s expansion be used for

investing in better alternatives. One recommendation suggested that CBP should coordinate with

DHS Office of the Chief Readiness Support Officer (OCRSO) prior to acquiring additional

unmanned aircrafts to conduct an independent study in order to determine if obtaining the

additional aircraft is necessary and justified. The CBP concurred in principle of the

recommendation, but stated that obtaining additional unmanned aircrafts is not part of their

expansion plans at this time due to the need for elevating staffing, operations, and maintenance

of the existing fleet of UAS. The CBP responded to three out of the four recommendations by

stating they concurred in principle, but did not fully agree by generally stating that the OIG had

misinterpreted the findings somewhere down the line when drawing their conclusions. In fact,

the only recommendation that CBP could fully concur with was that the OAM needed to revise

its UAS CONOPs to include attainable goals with verifiable performance measures as necessary

components of the program (2014).

With the exponentially increasing technological advances of the time, it goes without

saying that any type of stakeholder of the war on drugs will use UAS as a means to accomplish

desired ends if it is feasible. Utilizing the Predator model UAS and other highly advanced UAS

for serving the motives of the United States military may be feasible, but it has yet to be shown

as a practicable initiative. Small UAS (sUAS) on the other hand, have the largest potential for the

continual growth of utilizing drones throughout the course of the drug wars. The drug cartels

have been profiting off drug trafficking for decades, and their newest drug mules are drones.

“With border security tight, drug traffickers have thought of every conceivable

method to move their drugs over, under and through the border… We have found


their tunnels, their Cessnas, their Jet Skis, their pangas, and now we have found

their drones.” – U.S. Atty. Laura Duffy

The DEA reported that an average of 150 trips was made in 2012 alone, crossing the

border from Mexico to the United States transporting drugs. Officials have questioned how

profitable these methods are due to the limited weight in which sUAS are able to carry. News

reports generally only mention the practice when they crash short of their destinations in parking

lots or backyards. Crashes have been witnessed with hauls of six pounds of crystal meth

(McVicker, 2015) and even up to twenty-eight pounds of heroin (Davis, 2015). Despite these

shortcomings, the heightened protections at the borders make the “unmanned” part of

transporting these illicit substances more and more appealing.

Fences at the U.S. and Mexico borders are not the only ones being crossed by drones for

drug deliveries. CNN reported that Ohio prisons have been seeing an influx of drone related

incidents. Seventy-five inmates broke out into a free-for- all during their recreational time after a

package was dropped by a sUAS in their courtyard according to the Ohio Department of

Rehabilitation and Correction’s incident report. Officers from Mansfield Correctional Institution

in Mansfield, Ohio, rushed to the scene of the brawl in the North yard and were forced to use

pepper spray to get the inmates under control. The package was reported to have contained 144.5

grams of tobacco, 65.4 grams of marijuana, and 6.6 grams of heroin. That amount could yield

around 140 individual doses if the heroin was half pure according to the news reports (Ferrigno,

2015).

Law enforcement agencies all over the country have been considering taking advantage

of the use of drones for certain operational activities. According to the FAA, eighty-seven public


safety organizations have received approval for training or operational use of drones, and at least

three law enforcement agencies in Florida have received such approval. The state allocated $1

million in funding for a drone pilot program to be ran by Palm Beach County Sheriff’s Office.

The budget outlined the nature of the program to be geared toward “search and rescue, disaster

assessment and assistance, interdiction of drug and human-trafficking activities and situational

awareness of a person whose life is in imminent danger.” Cost efficiency and savings is stated as

an expected advantage as a result of the program with manned aircraft missions costing the

Sheriff’s Office around $800 an hour. The agency however, has declined to go into detail about

the program initiatives because, as stated by sheriff’s spokeswoman Teri Barbera, it is

considered “operational in nature” (Swisher, 2016).

As the work of McDougal contends, local and state law enforcement agencies can be

expected to be the largest users of unmanned aerial vehicles in the near future corresponding to

the long-standing correlation between military technologies followed by the adoption by law

enforcement (2012). Even though there is a growing concern regarding the militarization of

policing, a law in North Dakota was passed which enabled the police’s unmanned aircrafts to no

longer be unarmed. The bill’s representative, Rick Becker, stated that the bill’s intent was to

require a warrant from a judge in order to search for evidence by use of UAS, and the original

draft would have banned all weapons on UAS operated by police. However, a lobbyist

representing law enforcement got involved, and subsequently an amendment to the bill was

proposed to prohibit only weapons which are lethal. The “less than lethal” weapons permitted on

their police drones now are rubber bullets, pepper spray, tear gas, sound cannons, and even

Tasers. It should be noted though, that in 2015, the same year the bill was passed, at least thirty-

nine people’s deaths were attributed to police Tasers (Glawe, 2015).


Despite the growing trend of law enforcement drone programs, their operational

surveillance capabilities entail necessary legal and ethical considerations before their information

can be used. The Freedom from Unwarranted Surveillance Act (2013) was passed into Florida

law in order to outline what law enforcers may do legally with the any drone data gathered

seeing as imagery captured without a warrant or a person’s consent is considered a violation of

such person’s reasonable expectation of privacy. Fourth Amendment protections are important to

take into consideration when acknowledging that UAS have advanced technology with their

unprecedented ability to provide unblinking eyes in the sky for considerable lengths of time

(West & Bowman, 2016). But to Sheriff Bob Rost from Grand Forks County in North Dakota,

unwarranted surveillance by police drones is warranted. The general consensus of those

opposing bills requiring search warrants is that “if you have nothing to hide, you have nothing to

fear.” The sheriff believes UAS surveillance is important because they can help them obtain a

warrant in the first place (Glawe, 2015). The security versus privacy tradeoff will likely be an

ongoing theme as legislators work to outline the rules governing drone surveillance by law

enforcers.

Still, the UAS industry is still relatively new in the eyes of the public for their use in civil

and commercial applications. As drone bombings from wars in Afghanistan and Iraq are no

longer reported on the news daily, the use of drones has become de-stigmatized and their

manufactures have changed who they market to. The Association for Unmanned Vehicle

Systems International (AUVSI) is the largest nonprofit in the world that aims to promote, foster,

and develop unmanned systems and robotics technologies. They projected in their report titled,

The Economic Impact of Unmanned Aircraft Systems Integration in the United States, that

integration will yield an economic impact greater than $13.6 billion, and over 70,000 jobs will be


created in the initial first three years (AUVSI, 2013). With figures like that it is easy to see how

many people will not even think to consider that unwarranted police surveillance could infringe

someone’s right to privacy, and especially when encouraging their use is good for the economy.

Although more and more law enforcement agencies have begun the procurement process

of their drone programs, critics argue (outside of the privacy concern debate) that in operation

these programs can produce much greater life cycle costs than the potential savings acquired

over the short term. The maintenance support and the required cost for the unmanned aircraft

pilot on the ground are expenses that have forced selected police departments not to fly their

aerial robots that they’ve acquired (Salter, 2014). In sum, “the drones most law enforcement

agencies can afford are currently less capable than their manned counterparts” (McNeal, 2014),

and “unmanned aircraft… are not economic or efficient in civilian law enforcement applications”

(Haddal & Gertler, 2010). But as the UAS industry continues to evolve, who’s to say that law

enforcers won’t find other ways they can be applied?

Drafting UAS into the drug wars, thus far, does not appear to be providing any solutions

to the problems which aroused their use in the first place. The United States’ heightened security

measures along the U.S. - Mexico border do not seem to have benefited the society or economy

for either country. Mexican Professor John M. Ackerman certainly doesn’t believe so as he

recognizes these policies are “short sighted and damaging to both countries… Instead of

militarization, the United States should be working with Mexico on creative ways to bring about

the social and economic development it needs” (Del Bosque, 2011). Indeed, the resources

allocated for cracking down on drug trafficking and drug violence by the use of UAS could

arguably have been better spent by attempting to alleviate other root causes for the problem as

well, such as the high demand for drugs by the United States.


As the United States faces an unprecedented drug epidemic involving opioids with

seventy-eight Americans dying every day from overdose on average (Centers for Disease

Control and Prevention [CDC], 2014), efforts should be focused on reducing the demand.

Although unfortunate, some will continue to promote enforcement such as Subcommittee

Chairman for the United Sates House Committee on Oversight and Government Reform John

Mica, when he stated at a hearing for addressing the epidemic, “Treatment is at the end of the

process- they’ve already been addicted. We have got to stop this stuff at our borders” (2016).

Taking out leaders of the drug cartels by drone strikes will not solve the problems of drug

violence or drug addiction. Maybe in the future the role of UAS in the drug wars that is reported

in the news will be about how they save lives rather than take them. They could be armed to

deliver a different kind of drug which has the ability to reverse lethal opioid overdoses called

Naloxone (Burris, 2001). The future of drone technologies, like the future of medical

technologies, will inevitably be shaped by human endeavor.

List of Abbreviations


AMO – Air and Marine Operations

ATOL – Automatic Takeoff and Landing

AUVSI - Association for Unmanned Vehicle Systems International

CBP – U.S Customs and Border Protection

CONOPs – Concept of Operations

DEA- Drug Enforcement Agency

DHS – Department of Homeland Security

DTOs – Drug Trafficking Organizations

FAA – Federal Aviation Administration

FBI – Federal Bureau of Investigation

FEMA – Federal Emergency Management Agency

IAI - Israel Aircraft Industries

IMINT – Imagery intelligence

ISR – Intelligence, Surveillance, and Reconnaissance

MALE- Medium Altitude Long Endurance

MTI – Moving Target Indicators

OAM – Office of Air and Marine

OCRSO - Office of the Chief Readiness Support Officer

OIG – Office of Inspector General

SATCOM – Satellite Communication for extended range

SIGINT – Signals intelligence

Southcom- Defense Department’s Southern Command Innovation Program

UAS – Unmanned Aircraft System

VANT – Vehículo aéreo no tripulado

References

https://www.google.com/url?sa=t&rct=j&q=&esrc=s&source=web&cd=1&cad=rja&uact=8&ved=0ahUKEwj8ooHq7-PLAhWCax4KHYSDDUMQFggcMAA&url=https%3A%2F%2Fes.wikipedia.org%2Fwiki%2FVeh%25C3%25ADculo_a%25C3%25A9reo_no_tripulado&usg=AFQjCNHONSJp17WHTXZlZtNOnzeivJM9sg&sig2=tGuKgaGrvg8eg4jzPRNOXg&bvm=bv.117868183,d.dmo


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Documents

Drones in the Drug Wars