Talk:Unmanned aerial vehicle/Archive 1

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Archive 1 Archive 2 Archive 3

Amateur UAVs

Considering the growing number and sophistication of amateur UAV makers (students, hobbyists, contests etc), it seems that a few sentences on them would be welcome in this article. Rather than me simply adding external links, BillCJ suggested I bring the subject up here. Any objections to my adding that? —Preceding unsigned comment added by Zlite (talk • contribs) 13:28, 17 December 2007 (UTC)

Zlite here: Having heard no objections, I'll edit that in. I will add a journalistic (Economist) reference to the amateur trend, and and an external link to one or two amateur UAV community sites. —Preceding unsigned comment added by Zlite (talk • contribs) 23:18, 26 December 2007 (UTC)

Second and Third

The Second and Third Gulf Wars involved US/Coalition vs Middle East forces. Don't forget the First, involving no US forces (which is why most not clued-in Westerners ignore it in counting), but several Middle East countries, I don't remember the specifics at this point, this needs fixing.—Preceding unsigned comment added by 217.75.196.21 (talk • contribs) 20:52, 10 July 2005 (UTC)

Phoenix UAV

66.167.136.12 05:49, 10 Apr 2005 (UTC):There's no article on the Phoenix UAV used by the British Army (see Operation Telic order of battle)...

Removed mention of the Israeli air force using the term UAV since english is not the official language of Israel thus the mention of the usage of the translated term is irrelevant—Preceding unsigned comment added by 82.76.30.78 (talk • contribs) 21:58, 28 August 2005 (UTC)

Commercial military UAVs

Where in the article should I place information about such UAVs? Under the country of origin? Specifically I wanted to talk about the Snark, built by New Zealand-based commercial helicopter manufacturer TGR Helicorp[1]. Jacoplane 11:38, 29 October 2005 (UTC)

Needs editing

Typo here: "More sophisticated verions may h..." ('versions')

Also needs links to waypoint navigation etc.

Will try to edit this once I get some time, but if anybody else wants to jump in, then go for it.—Preceding unsigned comment added by 210.55.245.26 (talk • contribs) 23:24, 14 February 2006 (UTC)

Pages needing attention

Can someone who knows about this stuff please take a look at Top I Vision casper 250 and Casper mini uav, which appear to be about the same thing, but need some pretty heavy editing. Many thanks, ::Supergolden:: 09:47, 23 May 2006 (UTC)

Done. New article is now Casper 250. Akradecki 20:46, 15 August 2006 (UTC)

Rewriting and merging

I posted this over on the talk page for History of unmanned aerial vehicles. There is a lot of duplication of articles on the subject of UAVs, with History of unmanned aerial vehicles being the most superfluous. I am proposing to integrate most of the data on that page into the appropriate already-existing pages. It makes sense that Unmanned aerial Vehicle be the main general page on the subject, so some of the material will be integrated here. What will be left over there is a general history page, essentially an expansion of the History section on this page. Comments on the project are welcomed. Akradecki 18:10, 1 August 2006 (UTC)

UAV definition and distinction

Some of the lines between a UAV and a missle can get blurred, especially when talking about vehicles like the ADM-20. I'd like to propose including a definition like this in the article: "For the purposes of this article, and to distinguish UAVs from missles, a UAV is defined as being capable of controlled, sustained level flight and powered by a jet or reciprocating engine." This will, of course mean that cruise missles are included as UAVs, but things like Sidewinders are not. Comments? Akradecki 14:56, 9 August 2006 (UTC)

No objections having been raised, definition has been added here and on the history page. Akradecki 19:15, 5 September 2006 (UTC)

Disambig

I see no real reason we need to have a disambig statment at the top that's a red link, and another that is a fictitous land vehicle. If there's no objections, I'll delete in a day or two. Akradecki 15:03, 28 September 2006 (UTC)

That's cool with me; I only added it because I couldn't stand having UAV be a disambiguation page showing a red link, a fictitous land vehicle, and the vastly-more-common meaning. ➥the Epopt 15:47, 28 September 2006 (UTC)
BTW...I totally agree with what you did. I always found that disambig page an annoyance. Akradecki 15:55, 28 September 2006 (UTC)

TOC location consensus needed

I'm seeking input for the folks who frequent this page so a consensus can be reached regarding layout. Because of the large white space created, I floated the TOC to the right (see this diff [2] for sample). However, User:Netoholic says that it is improper to do this. However, Help:Section#Floating the TOC says "A floating TOC should be used when it is beneficial to the layout of the article, or when the default TOC gets in the way of other elements." Seems to me that, in this case, it is indeed beneficial to the layout, and having the large white space gets in the way of the article. To me, the article looks better with the TOC on the right. How does everyone else feel? Akradecki 04:39, 9 October 2006 (UTC)

Eliminate the concern by moving the extraordinarily long list of vehicles to its own page (List of unmanned aerial vehicles). -- Netoholic @ 05:18, 9 October 2006 (UTC)
I agree, moving that information to a list is the easiest way to shorten the number of headings. This article would be pretty lean on information in that case, so perhaps the history page could be merged here. Salad Days
Agreed as well. Take the entire list to a new page, and replace the existing catagories with "main article at..." and maybe a little bit of summary text of the whole thing. --KPWM_Spotter 22:19, 9 October 2006 (UTC)
Sounds like a plan. I've done the first step, moving the list to the List. Eventually, I'll move the history section over to here like has been suggested, but there's still a lot of work to pare down first (see the To Do list on that article's talk page; all the subpages need to be merged into their relevant model articles...please be patient.) Akradecki 03:40, 10 October 2006 (UTC)
Both pages look great! Salad Days 03:46, 10 October 2006 (UTC)

Included hurricane tag

...because there have been recent flights of UAVs into tropical cyclones. Thegreatdr 15:33, 9 December 2006 (UTC)

I removed the tag, as UAVs have nothing to do with cyclones. →James Kidd (contr/talk/email) 01:19, 18 January 2007 (UTC)

pilotless drones

What about pilotless drones? ;) Otto1970 05:25, 7 February 2007 (UTC)

Needs A List

There needs to be a list of UAVs page to supplement this article. I did not see a link to one on here if it exists already. --Dave1g 09:06, 2 April 2007 (UTC)

There is a list, see the section in the article titled "Models". Akradecki 15:44, 2 April 2007 (UTC)

"the Air Force" - which one?

"Currently the Air Force is promoting research.........." - which one?—Preceding unsigned comment added by 80.3.44.9 (talk • contribs) 00:37, 26 June 2007 (UTC)

Categories of development

This part of the article has several items that are somewhat debatable, out of date, and confuses several terms used in the uav industry, using them to refer to other activities. I've attempted to fix several of the mis-used terms, but I'm afraid it's still innaccuate. Is this part really necesary, or can we remove it. [[Community editor 16:31, 19 July 2007 (UTC)]

3RR

It has now stopped, however some users were on the verge of violating the rule. Before starting an edit war, please discuss on the talk page and arrive at a Consensus --Statsone 01:11, 23 September 2007 (UTC)

Deletion of content

Is there a specific reason why a lot of content has been removed? No discussion, just removal. I don't want to revert, so some comments are welcome. --Statsone 20:40, 24 September 2007 (UTC)

Me and Cyrius both deleted redundant sections that looked like sloppiness in copying and pasting. I don't think anybody will protest these deletions. More to your point, I've been doing a lot of deleting of Breighnk's additions which were beginning to overwhelm the article with references to AAI's Shadow. I felt the Shadow images and text were too rah-rah; too much like a PR puff piece. I especially didn't like the Shadow stuff that crept into the History section which should be kept very short since it links to a larger article.
Hope that explains my stance. Binksternet 21:00, 24 September 2007 (UTC)

Move request

The following discussion is an archived discussion of the proposal. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made in a new section on the talk page. No further edits should be made to this section.

The result of the proposal was no consensus to move this page from Unmanned aerial vehicle to "Remotely piloted vehicle", per the discussion below. Dekimasuよ! 09:40, 22 October 2007 (UTC)

UAV is a newer term. RPV covers more ground & is more likely to be known by more people. Also, I have never heard an undewater vehicle called an RPV, so a redirect to ROV is mistaken. Trekphiler 16:31, 18 October 2007 (UTC)

  • Oppose. I've heard the term UAV but never RPV. In fact, I read an article about UAVs just today: [3]. Google turns up 248,000 links for "Unmanned aerial vehicle" but only 20,700 for "Remotely piloted vehicle". I would support changing RPV to redirect to this page, but not retitling this page.--Father Goose 10:31, 19 October 2007 (UTC)
  • Comment You've lost the "aerial" part of the whole thing -- or is this article supposed to cover fullsize RC trucks and such? (And aren't those already covered elsewhere?) Ewlyahoocom 07:48, 20 October 2007 (UTC)
  • Oppose - RPVs were remotely piloted for the entire flight in most cases, while modern UAVs can and do operate autonomoulsly, and are capable of making decisions without human input. Not quite the same thing. UAV is thus a broader term covering today's range of unmanned aircraft, and RPVs. - BillCJ 08:12, 20 October 2007 (UTC)
  • Oppose - UAV and UAS are the industry standard terms. Proposer should demonstrate through sources that his version is the predominant term. For instance, the term RPV never shows up at NASA, here, here, at DoD, at this USAF site, etc, etc. I could go on and on and on. The proposer's statement that RPV "covers more ground" clearly is in error, as Bill mentioned it actually covers less ground (since many UAVs are semi- or fully-autonomous) and further, that his statement "is more likely to be known by more people" is also clearly in error as it can easlily be sen that UAV is the predominant industry and media term. AKRadeckiSpeaketh 15:52, 20 October 2007 (UTC)
The above discussion is preserved as an archive of the proposal. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made in a new section on this talk page. No further edits should be made to this section.

Control of UAVs; tactical

We've all seen images of soldiers controlling UAVs on the ground (tactically, rather than in a control room). I know very little about them, however, and I think this article would benefit from a section detailing the methods used to control UAVs on a tactical level. Racooon (talk) 17:55, 11 October 2008 (UTC)

Which is correct?

I have also heard the initialism "UAV" expanded to "Uncrewed Aerial Vehicle" and "Uncrewed Air Vehicle" -- which is correct, which source is considered the authority, and is it being debated to any extent and for what reason -- for example, gender neutrality?

C
13.XI.2008

A brief search turned up references for this, such as this letter to the editor, but the overwhelming majority of google hits are for "Unmanned aerial vehicle". "Uncrewed Aerial Vehicle", while it gets some hits in the scholarly literature, gets far fewer. I think this would be worth briefly mentioning on the page, but not used as the main term/name on the page--it seems to be an alternative term proposed due to feminist considerations...it doesn't seem that this term has caught on (yet), but it's certainly verifiable. Cazort (talk) 02:57, 30 July 2009 (UTC)

Image copyright problem with File:NISHANT UAV Flight.jpg

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link cleanup

I made a bold edit and cleaned up the external links. There were a few that might be worth integrating into inline citations:

Basically, I tried to keep the most general and neutral links. The ones above tend to be in-depth or very specific studies. I also removed a large number of links that were dead or related to one specific product. tedder (talk) 01:11, 18 February 2009 (UTC)

unmanned aircraft system

The article is best moved to "unmanned aircraft system (UAS)", as a ua "vehicle" suggests it is to transport people (which too is possible; however these are special UAS's eg for recovery of wounded soldiers behind enemy lines). The aircraft discussed here focuses on combat (UCAS), monitoring of fires, ....

also mention the insitu group UAS's (integrator, eagleEye, ...) —Preceding unsigned comment added by 81.246.171.68 (talk) 09:48, 24 March 2009 (UTC)

Arguemnts Against?

Are there any counter-arguments to using unmanned vehicles in the battlefield? —Preceding unsigned comment added by 76.200.228.164 (talk) 04:47, 16 April 2009 (UTC)


Control Link Safety/Reliability

Anybody knows what level or reliability radio control links have? Can they be jammed? Do they have some autonomy programs for such a case? Can they even be hijacked? —Preceding unsigned comment added by 212.106.58.251 (talk) 18:41, 31 May 2009 (UTC)

drone attacks often kill civilians

Shortly after I added the brief remark "Drone attacks often kill civilians." together with two sources, it was removed by an anonymous user in this edit. I think Wired and New York Times qualify as reliable sources for this remark. The remark also very closely matches what is written in both of those sources--the two sources do not delve into why the drone attacks kill civilians--they merely observe/remark that they do. The sources do not mention anything about the cause of civilians deaths--and attributing them to policy or to any other cause without a reliable source would constitute original research, something to be avoided. Perhaps, if you object to the wording, it could be made more specific to make clear that it is talking about a particular instance of drone attacks--those in the certain region of Pakistan in question. However, I think the other sources on other instances also point towards drone attacks killing civilians. This source: [4] references 90 civilians, including 60 children, killed in drone attacks in Afghanistan. Here's yet another article discussing the extensive controversy around this issue: [5]. Cazort (talk) 23:39, 18 June 2009 (UTC)

How can you say "often"? On which statistics do you rely on? This is completely untrue. There are hundreds of UAV flight each months. They don't "often" kill civilians. Yes, there are some accidents. But that's all. Furthermore, that has nothing to do in the first paragraph.

The comments I added are verifiable in numerous reliable sources, which I gave above. Cazort (talk) 16:23, 24 July 2009 (UTC)

Further Justification

I feel the need to further justify my inclusion of material on drone attacks killing civilians, as now, in addition to several anonymous users removing that material, User:BilCat has removed this material, with the remark "unnecessary, POV":

  • WP:NPOV states: All Wikipedia articles and other encyclopedic content must be written from a neutral point of view, representing fairly, and as far as possible without bias, all significant views that have been published by reliable sources.
  • The material about drone attacks killing civilians has been published in numerous articles in reliable sources. See this search: [6]
  • There are articles written in detail about the issue of drone attacks killing civilians: [7], [8].
  • The issue of drone attacks killing civilians is one of the biggest points of tension in the current relations between the U.S. and Pakistan, see: [9].

With such overwhelming volume of sources covering this issue, I cannot interpret removal of this material in any way other than an attempt to sanitize this page. I see the accusation that the material I added is POV as completely baseless--it is the repeated attempts to remove this material, without providing any justification, that is POV. In my opinion, removal of my material is no different from removing well-sourced discussion of side-effects from a page on a drug, or well-sourced material about environmental impacts from the page on an herbicide. Personally, I think this topic deserves an extensive section in this article and probably a page of its own--there is certainly more than enough material in reliable sources to back this up. Removing a single comment at this point borders on absurdity. I will return to create such a section rather than engaging in a silly edit war over a single small sentence. Cazort (talk) 19:34, 29 July 2009 (UTC)

There...a section is created...I've barely scratched the surface of the sources available out there. Let's focus on improving the material rather than attempting to sanitize it. Cazort (talk) 20:34, 29 July 2009 (UTC)

Fusions Group Pakistan

I did a google news archive search and found 0 hits for "Fusions Group Pakistan" or even "Fusions Group". Under google scholar I only found unrelated scientific articles, not written about the subject. This seems clearly spam/promotional material as it is promoting a company, is not sourced, and I was unable to find any independent sources. On these grounds, I am going to remove this spammy material and take Fusions Group to deletion. Cazort (talk) 20:11, 10 July 2009 (UTC)

Development costs not relevent?

Explain this one to me please. It does not matter how much it costs to develop each type of UAV because the Pentagon has an infinite budget? Hcobb (talk) 06:12, 31 July 2009 (UTC)

No, it's irrelevant because there is no context. Not everthing the GAO publishes needs to ne repeated in WP just because you've read it somewhere. - BilCat (talk) 06:19, 31 July 2009 (UTC)
I find the material to be (1) highly relevant (2) well-sourced, and (3) appropriately placed in context under the "Design and development considerations" heading. I am restoring it on these grounds, thanks for adding it, Hcobb. Cazort (talk) 14:10, 31 July 2009 (UTC)
However, if we get an article on American Military UAV programs in general then I'd be the first one to move this there, assuming that other countries did not suffer from these problems. (Fat chance that.) Hcobb (talk) 14:30, 31 July 2009 (UTC)
Yes, I agree. I think this brings up an interesting point too, which is that wikipedia tends to have very detailed material on specific military vehicles, as well as technical/technological constraints of developing the vehicles...but less material on the political processes and economic constraints involved in developing and procuring them. I think there are many sources on this topic, as people are constantly debating and discussing where money goes and how it could be used wisely. Cazort (talk) 15:47, 31 July 2009 (UTC)

POV/NPOV Discussion

I reverted User:ViperNerd's removal of 3 sections; I consider them NPOV. I encourage you (or anyone) to discuss your reasons here rather than removing entire sections which in my opinion are reasonably well-cited/written. Brianrusso (talk) 00:26, 1 August 2009 (UTC)

It's the media (AJ spawned it, but the WMSM took it up) that has made the point of tying the deaths to robots. Rather than taring all UAVs with the same feathers, why not go to the specific types in question and add to their combat histories? Hcobb (talk) 01:03, 1 August 2009 (UTC)
Well-cited and well-written does not equal NPOV. I'm wondering why an encyclopedic article about unmanned flying craft even has a special section discussing civilian deaths related to the military use of such machines. Does an article about tracked land vehicles need its own section relating to how many civilians have been killed by tanks throughout history? How about the article dealing with rockets? And if we're going to keep this article neutral with regard to the military use of UAVs, then where is the section dealing with successful missions resulting in deaths of combatants? Basically, neither section has any place in an article of this sort, they are both examples of blatant POV-pushing. ViperNerd (talk) 06:20, 1 August 2009 (UTC)
I didn't say they were NPOV because they were well-cited/well-written. What POV is being pushed? I don't find anything anti-military about the article and the section does mention combatant deaths as well. Can you explain what is POV about them other than the fact that you feel they don't belong in this article? If you think they should go elsewhere then it seems more reasonable to perhaps split this article into one about military application of UAVs or something of that sort. Remember that this is always a work in progress and at any one given point in time certain content will not be in the "right" place. That doesn't mean deleting it is a reasonable action when superior alternatives exist. Brianrusso (talk) 01:52, 2 August 2009 (UTC)
The reason I put the material here is that I read articles in the NY Times and other sources that directly linked drones/UAV attacks to civilian deaths. Your analogy about tanks raises a good point. I haven't found any sources (see this search) that directly discuss tanks per-se in relation to civilian deaths. Why did these sources cover things this way? This is a subtle question and I don't have an easy answer for you. Perhaps it's human psychology: the prospect of an unmanned vehicle killing civilians is absolutely terrifying to most people; it's like something from a horror film, and makes other types of war seem somehow more mundane (if that's possible), and that alone may explain why people (and the media) links the deaths to UAV's as opposed to examining the detailed contexts in which they were used. It's a little like a Nuclear weapon. That page has in the intro, a statement about civilians killed by those weapons, and that seems appropriate. Why? For some reason, it was considered (and documented as) a big deal when civilians were killed by such weapons. UAV's, for some reason, have drawn a similar media response. Why? This is totally my own speculation, but I suspect it's because they elicit a similar kind of fear. Maybe it's because some people see them as inherently more unethical--both of them involve an increased distancing/alienation/impersonality between the person doing the killing and the person being killed. But that's all irrelevant to the article. The bottom line is, there are sources directly discussing the relationship between UAV use and civilian deaths, and the sources directly support the text I've added to this page. If you don't like that, then you might influence the world more by writing letters to the editors of those newspapers criticizing how they chose to cover the events, than by trying to make a rather far-fetched argument of POV here. Cazort (talk) 21:13, 1 August 2009 (UTC)

So far, this looks like a pure textbook NPOV exercise to me, though I am open to arguments why it might not be.

The media have been making a point of tying deaths to robots, rightly or wrongly. It is then NPOV to state that those particular media outlets (ref: AJ, WMSM, etc.) have been making a point of tying deaths to robots. The decision about whether the media are right or wrong can then be left up to the reader. It is not normally NPOV to remove mention of the fact that the media are doing so.

Can you provide any arguments why we should deviate from the "textbook" here? --Kim Bruning (talk) 11:10, 1 August 2009 (UTC)

I too am having trouble understanding accusations of POV. As I made the point above, I don't see the difference between a section on civilian deaths in this article, and the section on side-effects of a drug or environmental and human health impacts of a pesticide. Most endeavours that humans undertake have unintended consequences, and WP:NPOV involves incorporating those into an article when they are well-documented in multiple reliable sources, as is the case here. I also have done my best to represent different perspectives, for example, pointing out that HRW actually supports UAV use as a way of reducing civilian deaths, but merely objects to the ways in which they have been used in certain situations. Cazort (talk) 11:32, 1 August 2009 (UTC)
(It might be wise to stop reverting now ;-) ) --Kim Bruning (talk) 11:35, 1 August 2009 (UTC)


It is now 24 hours later, with no further activity. My final position on this is that the removed section *does* comply fully with the attribution and substantiation requirements of NPOV. Does anyone view this differently? --Kim Bruning (talk) 11:55, 2 August 2009 (UTC)

I'm still not convinced that this section is either necessary for an article with as broad coverage as this one, or that it meets the requirements of NPOV to begin with, specifically WP:UNDUE. It would be like having a section detailing civilian deaths (due to military use) in the article about Airplanes or Rockets, when this is a minor aspect of the overall subject. Just because the media has fixated on this one particular aspect of the war in Afghanistan/Pakistan (due to its novelty) does not mean that it is particularly noteworthy, especially given the fact that many of the claims of civilian deaths cannot be substantiated with any degree of accuracy. ViperNerd (talk) 12:11, 2 August 2009 (UTC)
Ok, so for UNDUE, you want to present an argument that shows that these media outlets are a minority, holding a minority viewpoint. I think this might be tricky, seeing as they represent the 4th estate, which is generally considered to be a fairly important actor. Do you want to give it a try anyway? --Kim Bruning (talk) 12:23, 2 August 2009 (UTC)
The viewpoint being expressed by the fairly small number of media outlets cited in this article (Al Jazeera? Seriously?) is most definitely in the minority of the overall mass media, otherwise we'd be reading about it in many more newspapers/magazines, and hearing about it from more televised news outlets. Funny how the Fourth Estate never reports on the thousands of airline flights that take off and land safely every single day, but anytime there's a crash or emergency landing, it's news...so should we have a section in the Airplane article detailing how unsafe it is to fly and list accident after accident simply because that's what the media reports on most often regarding air travel? Also, the entire section is of minor importance to the overall subject of the article. Most offensive military use of UAVs is currently carried out by about 2-3 different models. This article deals with the overall category of vehicle that this minority belongs to, so having an entire section that quotes a few news articles which contain little if any factual information (just look at the language in the section..."claimed," "supposedly," "possibility," and so on and so forth) on collateral damage caused by this minority is out of place. Have civilians been killed by the military use of a few UAV models? I'm certain this has occurred. Do we have any idea to what extent this is a problem, or indeed if it's anything out of the ordinary for a war being fought in which one group of combatants hides among the civilian population? No one has hard facts either way. ViperNerd (talk) 12:47, 2 August 2009 (UTC)
I see coverage of the issue of drones/UAV's linked to Civilian deaths in the New York Times, Christian Science Monitor, and from the Associated Press. Here's another article from Reuters: [10] from Human Rights Watch. These are all mainstream outlets. Al Jazeera, whether you like its perspective or not, is a major, mainstream media outlet, and it is the only independent media outlet in the middle east. It reperesents an important viewpoint if we want to maintain NPOV. About the content as it relates to this article, you raise a lot of interesting questions/issues, but I think the appropriate action here is to research this material, find sources that discusses it, and incorporate it into the page--not to delete already well-sourced material. Cazort (talk) 13:22, 2 August 2009 (UTC)
Well, the use of the words "I think..." indicates that you have an opinion in this matter, but not necessarily one supported by Wikipedia guidelines and policies, which is what is under discussion here. Also, "well-sourced material" is not at issue, material can be well-sourced and still violate NPOV. Furthermore, there is already an entire article (Drone attacks in Pakistan) where the subject you'd like to push into this article is covered at length. In fact, that article is linked in this article, so not only is the material you're trying to add here tangential (at best) to the subject, it's redundant as well. Finally, Human Rights Watch is not a media source. Just FYI. ViperNerd (talk) 13:35, 2 August 2009 (UTC)
I use the words "I think" because I do not want to make the bold claim that my perspective is truth or fact. I use language in this way out of respect for other editors whose opinions differ from mine. All of my opinions here are based on my understanding of wikipedia's policy and guideline, and if you note, I referenced the page on WP:NPOV above. It sounded to me like you were objecting to the sources which is why I focused on addressing that issue. Now it sounds to me like you are not objecting to the sourcing, but rather, to where the material should be placed. I agree that detailed discussion of the situation in Pakistan belongs on the Drone attacks in Pakistan page; but the issue of civilian deaths are not limited to this situation; they've also occurred in Afghanistan, Palestine, and Somalia, and possibly more places if we would do more research. Furthermore, some sources draw analogies between these different uses--such as the AP source I cited, which quotes David Kilcullen and Andrew Exum: they are writing about the effect of drone use on terrorist recruitment, in terms of some of the issues of human psychology I discussed above. If you think the material is good, but want to discuss moving all or some of it, then maybe we can do that--but up until now you have been simply deleting the material and also raising questions about sourcing, so it's not clear to me exactly how to move this discussion forward. Cazort (talk) 14:20, 2 August 2009 (UTC)
(ec 2*) Wikipedia is run by consensus, with policy being a reflection of that consensus. "I think" is a common and valid way to start one's statement of one's consensus position.
You have not, so far, shown how existing consensus (that is to say: Policy) supports your position as to why the data should not be included here; while there is sufficient consensus (once again, counting policies, guidelines, and essays) to keep. While reviewing your position, and the relevant pages, I do not believe you will be able to show or obtain a consensus to support the removal you advocate on those grounds.
Now as to there being a different article where the data might be best moved to, you may yet be able to convince people that that is a valid option.
And that concludes the formal analysis so far.
I get the impression you're a US citizen; and I think you probably vote conservative. Am I correct?
If I am, that means that your biases are clearly showing, or at least sufficiently for someone to actually determine your nationality and voting preference ;-)
While we can't ask people to check their biases at the door (else no-one could edit), we do ask that people work towards a neutral point of view. You know that you have succeeded when people can no longer figure out where you are from.
--Kim Bruning (talk) 14:22, 2 August 2009 (UTC)
Sorry to burst your bubble of presumed authority, but nothing "concludes" simply because YOU say it does. And where I live and how I vote is none of your damn business with regard to the Wikipedia project. I could assume that the editor who added this section is liberal and anti-American by virtue of the fact that they apparently believe that Human Rights Watch is an unbiased source of news, but that's also irrelevant to the issue here, and your attempt to muddy the waters by dragging politics into the matter is unwelcome and unconstructive. ViperNerd (talk) 23:12, 2 August 2009 (UTC)
No news sources are unbiased. Certainly HRW is biased. But it is important/influential (see [11], [12]). I also think it is important to be open about one's biases (although it's not always constructive to accuse others' of bias). WP:BIAS outlines this in more detail. Particularly, the "Why it matters and what to do" section is relevant here. My biases can be found at User:Cazort/biases. What is my motivation in this instance? I agree with the military analysts David Kilcullen and Andrew Exum who argue that civilian deaths are used as a recruitment tool. I want to draw attention to the deaths, because I want to ultimately influence our military policy so that the civilian deaths stop, so that terrorist recruitment is curbed. That was my motivation for adding the material--because I believe in the long-run that putting the truth out there is one of the most effective ways to prevent violence--both by Americans and against Americans. My goal here is to promote peace and safety for all people by making people aware of a complex problem. Cazort (talk) 13:19, 3 August 2009 (UTC)
I sympathize with your goal. I sympathize a lot. But... you do realize that wikipedia cannot support your objectives without losing its neutrality, right? --Kim Bruning (talk) 02:04, 4 August 2009 (UTC)
As part of the discussion above, note that we do list all aircraft accidents: It's heavily subcategorized, but here's the example for US only: Category:Accidents and incidents on commercial airliners in the United States. --Kim Bruning (talk) 13:47, 2 August 2009 (UTC)
Is any of that covered in a separate section in Airliner or Fixed-wing aircraft? Thank you. ViperNerd (talk) 13:54, 2 August 2009 (UTC)
Does this question mean that you (now) hold the position that this data does not fall afoul of WP:UNDUE, but you think that it is merely in the wrong article? --Kim Bruning (talk) 14:27, 2 August 2009 (UTC)
No, the material still posesses undue weight in this article (and calling it "data" stretches the definition of that word beyond belief). Also, I've thought of a better example than accidents. Having a civilian deaths section in the UAV article would be like having one in the Airliner article and listing the cases where an airliner was used as a weapon to kill civilians. I think you can see where I'm going with this. Would a section mentioning the 9/11 terrorist attacks be NPOV if added to the Airliner article in this manner? Would it have due weight to the subject of the article? ViperNerd (talk) 23:12, 2 August 2009 (UTC)
If it can be tied to specific models of UAVs then list with those models. We wouldn't list incidents of health impacts on the Chemistry page, we'd push those to the pages for the various chemical compounds. If the reports are based on rumors of UAV activity with no actual models identified then that's just rumors and shouldn't be listed anyway. Hcobb (talk) 12:12, 2 August 2009 (UTC)
The issue is that the articles directly link drones to civilian deaths, which is why I chose this page and not some other ones. The sources directly support the text I've added and other editors seem to support me here. Cazort (talk) 13:22, 2 August 2009 (UTC)
I can find dozens (if not hundreds) of articles that "directly link" terrorist use of explosives to civilian deaths, so should there be a section detailing these in the Explosive material article? ViperNerd (talk) 23:12, 2 August 2009 (UTC)

Assistance requested

I just posted a request for assistance here: Wikipedia:Neutral_point_of_view/Noticeboard#assistance_requested_on_Unmanned_aerial_vehicle, on the NPOV Noticeboard. Hopefully this can move us more towards some sort of consensus instead of continuing the edit war. Cazort (talk) 14:03, 2 August 2009 (UTC)

Dont think it is a matter of POV, I am not sure the civilian deaths sections should be in a general summary article like this, they are used by the military and they kill things as do lots of stuff the military use but we dont give a list. Other military hardware doesnt have civilian deaths section (for example AK47) probably because it is pretty obvious military hardware kills people (civilian or military). You dont hang missiles and bombs on a UAV because they look pretty. If it needs mention it should be in the related conflict article if it is notable, not in a general UAV summary. MilborneOne (talk) 14:14, 2 August 2009 (UTC)
It's been undue weight rather than NPOV all along. Hcobb (talk) 14:21, 2 August 2009 (UTC)
I haven't seen any valid arguments along the lines of undue weight yet. Mainstream media outlets are not typically considered a fringe minority.
The argument that we should move descriptions of collateral damage to a different and more specialized article does appear to have some merit.
--Kim Bruning (talk) 14:31, 2 August 2009 (UTC)
I'm open to a discussion of a move. How about moving to Unmanned combat air vehicle? I actually think that would be a better/more relevant place for the material. Also, that page already contains an interesting and related topic, legal issues, with this source: [13]. Maybe it would be better to move the bulk of the text to that page, and leave a brief sentence here. Since this main page already has extensive discussion of combat vehicles However, I want to point out that this edit war began when I added a single brief sentence--which was repeatedly removed with accusations of POV and not belonging here: [14], [15]. The whole way I got involved in this was that I read an article on "drone attacks" and typed "drone" into wikipedia, and came here...and thought--"oh, this is not discussed on the page", so I added it. Cazort (talk) 17:35, 2 August 2009 (UTC)
So if I'm reading an article about 9/11 conspiracy theories, and type "World Trade Center" into Wikipedia and think "oh, this is not discussed on the page," I should feel free to add it? ViperNerd (talk) 23:12, 2 August 2009 (UTC)
Pretty much, yes. --Kim Bruning (talk) 00:21, 3 August 2009 (UTC)
...after which someone comes along and moves it to a more appropriate location.
Are you interested in moving the civilian casualties information off of this page and over to somewhere where it might be more appropriate? --Kim Bruning (talk) 01:29, 3 August 2009 (UTC)
What did you think of my suggestion about Unmanned combat air vehicle? The more I think about it the more I think the text belongs there with only perhaps a sentence or so on this page. Cazort (talk) 04:04, 3 August 2009 (UTC)
So you want to remove the stuff about civilian deaths and the phrase 'precision strike' should continue to be used???- (User) Wolfkeeper (Talk) 13:16, 3 August 2009 (UTC)
I don't want to remove that section but I'm open to moving it...I would like to hear other editors' opinions about where they think it is most appropriate though. So far, the editors who seem most concerned with having the material here haven't chipped in and I would like to hear their perspective. About the phrase 'precision strike', I hadn't thought about that. I suppose one could argue that that is POV and one could use a more general term...ideas for that? That's not a high priority for me though, I'd just as soon leave that as is for now. Cazort (talk) 15:34, 3 August 2009 (UTC)
Employing smart weapons (in the case of US drones, laser-designated Hellfire missiles) on a given target is by definition a "precision strike" as opposed to the old-fashioned area or "carpet-bombing" method. The fact that the combatants being targeted in this manner just happen to purposefully base their operations among civilians means that collateral damage is unfortunately inevitable. No matter how precise the strike is in these circumstances, we're still talking about the application of high explosives, not a sniper's bullets. ViperNerd (talk) 16:03, 3 August 2009 (UTC)
Yes, but encyclopedia articles at their best talk about all aspects of the subject, and I think that how they are regarded is an aspect of the topic that needs to be represented, whereas removal of a link that states that they have been criticised for killing civilians goes directly counter to that. NPOV is the presence of all points of view, rather than removal of particular points of view.- (User) Wolfkeeper (Talk) 16:18, 3 August 2009 (UTC)

@Vipernerd: Are you interested in moving the civilian casualties information off of this page and over to somewhere where it might be more appropriate? --Kim Bruning (talk) 00:40, 4 August 2009 (UTC)

Moving the info somewhere where it might have relevant due weight would be acceptable, but I'm not sure why you're posing that question directly to me as though I'm the sole editor who has had an issue with the info being on this page. There have been several others who have objected either by removing the section from the article, or by voicing their opinion on this page. However, moving the info to Unmanned combat aerial vehicle doesn't appear to be the answer, as that article does not cover any of the UAVs that have seen combat action. ViperNerd (talk) 01:29, 4 August 2009 (UTC)
I'm asking you specifically, because you're the person who originally reverted my revert in the first place. You get my special attention as a "Most Interested Person" (see: WP:BRD).
But you only need to revert once to get such attention. Reverting more often than that is just overkill.
No one is going to ignore your position, seriously! :-)
Next to that, even if you hadn't reverted, you get attention because you voiced an opinion, and we're trying to reach a consensus that includes all opinions, including yours. You have the right to be heard, and I am obligated to take your views into account, just as you are obligated to do the same.
I think I can see why the UCAV article may not be entirely appropriate either. Would you be able to suggest another location? And how do you think the information should be linked, once we have moved it?
--Kim Bruning (talk) 01:56, 4 August 2009 (UTC)
As I've suggested before, most of the info that is under discussion here (except for the Israeli component) would seem to be a perfect fit for the existing article, Drone attacks in Pakistan, and indeed much of it may already be covered there. Also, as I pointed out, that article is already linked in this article, ahead of the "Precision strikes" section. That should be plenty of mention in a general article such as this, a pointer to another Wikipedia article where the topic is covered in-depth. ViperNerd (talk) 02:11, 4 August 2009 (UTC)
Cazort, what do you think of that suggestion? Will that cover your concerns? --Kim Bruning (talk) 02:29, 4 August 2009 (UTC)
No, this doesn't address my concerns. The section in question was last removed in this edit and has not been added back anywhere in spite of the fact that there seemed to be a consensus to keep the material. If you read through it, only a portion (less than half) of the material there is about the attacks in Pakistan. I have a new idea...how about push that section off as a page of its own, perhaps something called Civilian deaths in drone attacks, and then summarize the section in a paragraph and put it in a brief section on this page? Notice I use the word "drone" and not "UAV" because it gets far more hits: [16] = 158K vs [17] = 45K. But if ViperNerd is correct that the UCAV article doesn't cover/encompass the models of vehicles involved in the controversy (which is something I don't understand--aren't any attack drones by definition UCAV's??? that remark confuses me) then I would support restoring the material right here on this main page--it is not big enough yet to warrant spinning off into its own article so even though that is one possible solution, I would not prefer it. Cazort (talk) 20:53, 4 August 2009 (UTC)
Hmm, some of the material doesn't cover Pakistan though. The Checkuser who was checking around the article today did mention that he thought the UCAV article might be an appropriate location too. So either one might work. Would both of you be willing to work on moving the material? --Kim Bruning (talk) 04:02, 4 August 2009 (UTC)
The outcry against poor targeting of armed UAVs will have to appear wherever armed UAVs are discussed in Wikipedia. Shooing the information off to its own page will not work. Armed UAVs have a hot history, and that history is a part of the telling of their story. Binksternet (talk) 04:11, 4 August 2009 (UTC)
That might be taking things a bit too far in the other direction, don't you think? NPOV as a policy is still in full effect. Just because a user is blocked, doesn't mean they weren't (partially) right. We do need to retain NPOV, and we do want to make some editorial decisions on where the information needs to ultimately go. --Kim Bruning (talk) 12:10, 4 August 2009 (UTC)
No, I don't think I'm going too far in the other direction. What I'm strongly, very strongly in favor of is my NPOV, centrist position in which one paragraph lets the reader know that targeting practices have been questioned in two prominent conflicts. In this article, before my one paragraph inside the "Armed attack" heading, the other two edit war choices were a) nothing at all, and b) several new headings with a lot of civilian casualty information found elsewhere. I'm not advocating my NPOV position relative to any editor's block status. Binksternet (talk) 14:30, 4 August 2009 (UTC)
Hmmmm. Alright, let me ponder that. In the mean time, one small thing: What do you mean when you say something "your" NPOV position. Isn't there just one neutral point of view? Perhaps you're just wording things loosely or so. Could you explain what you mean? --Kim Bruning (talk) 15:40, 4 August 2009 (UTC)
You say that the other information was "a lot of civilian casualty information found elsewhere"...can you point to where? I added the material here because I searched for it and did not find it elsewhere on wikipedia. In particular, the "Public outrage & terrorist recruitment" subsection that I created seems to be new material, and it also discusses the topic in general: the AP source draws an analogy between drone attacks in Pakistan and in Somalia. I don't think that whole section needs to stay on this page but right now I don't know where else to put it--it is broader than belonging on Drone attacks in Pakistan and ViperNerd seemed to think that it didn't belong on the UCAV article, and it clearly belongs somewhere as people seem to agree that it is tightly sourced. Cazort (talk) 20:58, 4 August 2009 (UTC)
I've never participated at the Unmanned combat air vehicle page, so I was unaware of the fight by some editors to keep controversial targeting practices off the page. To me, a weapon's usage, controversial or not, should be described accurately and neutrally, even if the sources are charged, emotional responses. We don't hide our heads in the sand! We report what it was, how many, when it was, who said what—all while keeping the big picture in mind. An article such as Drone attacks in Somalia would be where further detail is placed. Another possible article mentioning practices found all over the globe might be UCAV targeting controversies. Binksternet (talk) 21:53, 4 August 2009 (UTC)

Armed attacks

I just added a five-sentence paragraph to the old heading "Precision strikes" and I renamed that section "Armed attacks", as the precision has been questioned. The five sentences I added are about the ratio of civilian to intended killings in Pakistan and in Gaza Strip. I want to keep this paragraph VERY SHORT because there are main articles on the subject which go into greater detail. Binksternet (talk) 17:09, 3 August 2009 (UTC)

Fair enough. And people should add or move further information to those main articles, right? --Kim Bruning (talk) 15:58, 4 August 2009 (UTC)
There are improvements that can be made. One contradiction that hasn't been addressed is the bit in the first paragraph of Unmanned_aerial_vehicle#Armed_attacks which says UAVs help avoid "diplomatic embarrassment" but later, in the third paragraph, a former ambassador is quoted saying that UAVs as deployed by the U.S. in Pakistan are a diplomatic detriment.
Another improvement would be to note any new articles of concern, similar to Drone attacks in Pakistan. For instance, if someone were to create a page about Drone attacks in the Gaza Strip then we could add it as a section hatnote, or wikilink to it. If new armed UAV attacks receive substantial news coverage, we can incorporate those, perhaps by shortening some existing detail. Binksternet (talk) 21:41, 4 August 2009 (UTC)

Page semi-protected

I have semi-protected the article, since someone thinks it a good idea to continue edit-warring using anonymous proxies. Let's not go down that road please. Constructive suggestions for the article, from new and unregistered editors, can be made below. Thanks. -- zzuuzz (talk) 18:17, 3 August 2009 (UTC)

COIN

I've got lots of links about UAVs in COIN so I'd like to make a new section on that and I think a lot of the "backlash press" falls under that. Hcobb (talk) 13:22, 5 August 2009 (UTC)

Unmanned Aircraft System

I've redirected Unmanned Aircraft System here. The content of that page, should anyone want to merge it into this article, was:

Unmanned Aircraft System (UAS) is the term introduced by The United States Department of Defense (DoD) and adopted by the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) to replace the term Unmanned Aerial Vehicle (UAV). A typical UAS consists of the Unmanned Aircraft (UA), the Control System, the Datalink, and other related support equipment. For example, the RQ-7 Shadow UAS consists of four Air Vehicles, two Ground Control Stations (GCS), one Launcher, one portable GCS, two Ground Data Terminals (GDT), one portable GDT, and one Remote Video Terminal. Certain military units are also fielded with a maintenance support vehicle.
In the UK, BAE Systems has recently announced that unmanned aircraft could be used for police and coastal patrol work on Britain’s south east coast from as soon as 2012, following the launch of new project that sees the company partnering with a range of government bodies.[1]
Beginning 2007, French based Dutch helicopter specialist Jan Verhagen [2] has successfully concluded test flights (assisted by Dutch research organisation TNO) with his Unmanned Aircraft System Verhagenx2. This system consists of a mini-helicopter (6ft - 22 kilo with wireless HD camera), a ground station with data link and automatic tracking antenna. The helicopters flight is fully automatic, from take off, through GPS-controlled waypoint flight pattern to safe landing (target landing accurate to 1 metre). Range: 100 km. Maximum speed: 100 km. Ceiling: more than 3000m. Fuel consumption: 1300 cc/hr. Electrical autonomy 8 hrs. Flight time depending on tank and pay load: approx. 6 hrs. During 2007 the system has made 260 fully automated flight hours.
The implications of this latest development for tactical and civil applications are important. A VerhagenX2 mini-helicopter can hover in place at a certain altitude for several hours, filming every movement on the ground (day or night), without being seen or (depending on surrounding sound and flight altitude) heard. Images are send to ground station for live viewing up to 40 km. Suitable for covert observation in tactical situations, or wild life tracking without disturbance.
Andy Mabbett (User:Pigsonthewing); Andy's talk; Andy's edits 23:35, 19 September 2009 (UTC)

Flown vs. based

I see that U.S. UAVs that are routinely used in war zones (e.g., Iraq, Afghanistan) are usually remotely piloted (flown) from military bases inside the United States. Do any such war-zone flights actually take off and land in the U.S.? If so, is this also routine? --71.174.166.181 (talk) 07:50, 3 October 2009 (UTC)

Archving

Does anyone object to me setting up automatic archiving for this page using MizaBot? Unless otherwise agreed, I would set it to archive threads that have been inactive for 60 days.--Oneiros (talk) 18:40, 24 December 2009 (UTC)

 Done--Oneiros (talk) 17:04, 31 December 2009 (UTC)

Afghani Perception

The Afghani perception of U.S.-operated UAVs in the War on Terror should be included somehow, for the sake of the anthropology/psychology factor at least. I know an anthropologist friend who states that the perception by Afghanis of American "honor" is severely damaged by the use of these machines, and a common saying in Afghanistan is "Common robbers at least have the courage to challenge their victims face-to-face/personally in a manly way, whereas [the Americans] have no such spirit"... —Preceding unsigned comment added by 75.52.186.148 (talk) 08:56, 18 November 2009 (UTC)

It was mentioned in an anthropological journal awhile back that throughout the indigenous cultures of South Asia -particularly so in Pakistan - attacks from armed UAV's are regarded as

"The absolute epitome of cowardice, such that it exceeds that which the soul can comprehend" an interesting footnote perhaps. War has modernized differently accross cultures. 64.222.117.53 (talk) 08:29, 18 March 2010 (UTC)

Antonyms

At my understanding, "piloted" and "unmanned" are antonyms. So I disagree with the definition that "an unmanned air vehicle is an RPV". I think it will be a good idea to follow the formal definitions of organizations like FAA and DoD.--Crodrigue1 (talk) 01:37, 23 June 2010 (UTC)

UAS Groups

The military and FAA are now using UAS groups based on weight, altitude, airspeed, etc. rather than the inconsistent Type I, II, etc. I understand there are 5 groups, but I have not been able to find their complete definition on the web (though I recently saw a table with the specs presented). Need help tracking this down and then this article should be updated. Jsauter (talk) 18:56, 25 June 2010 (UTC)

So many images!

The Unmanned aerial vehicle#UAV functions seems to have become a dumping-ground for images of UAVs from various vendors. Doesn't illustrate the idea of "UAV functions" since all we see in most are a full view of yet another UAV with no specific payload or attachments. The good example is the FLIR camera that I pushed back into the "Remote sensing" section. The RQ7/quickMEDS image might be good for the "Transport" section if it were a closeup of the payload area--oh, and if the article about that specific UAV didn't clearly say that this payload is only in the proposal/solicited-bids phase (WP is not a crystal ball). The others do not mention specific applications at all. Maybe move 'em to a gallery? Is there a free image of a UAV firing some sort of weapon? That would be a nice on-target (sorry:) addition to the "Armed attacks" section. What about one with a frame of weather sensors for the "Scientific research" section? DMacks (talk) 13:48, 27 September 2010 (UTC)

Robotics attention needed

  • UCAV - see note
  • Assess on B scale

Chaosdruid (talk) 22:12, 14 March 2011 (UTC)

UAV - UCAV problems

Hi all

There seems to be a lot of confusion over UAV and UCAV. Material relating to the UCAVs should really be at Unmanned combat air vehicle with a short summary of the development from UAV to UCAV left in here.

Chaosdruid (talk) 22:15, 14 March 2011 (UTC)

UAV title

Hi all

Just wondered if there were grounds for discussion on moving the title to UAV. The reason is that MoS states "Abbreviations and acronyms are generally avoided unless the subject is almost exclusively known by its abbreviation"

Google searches give:

  • UAV [18] 6,140,000
  • UAV -"unmanned aerial vehicle" [19] 3,710,000
  • unmanned aerial vehicle [20] 715,000
  • unmanned aerial vehicle -UAV [21] 396,000

I would say that as the acronym is close to a 10:1 usage that may be grounds for the move. Many pages still link to the UAV page as no-one fixed them after the redirect in January. Also it seems that the merge proposal was not fully discussed, only the proposer and one other editor made comments. Chaosdruid (talk) 07:09, 18 March 2011 (UTC)

A web search isn't going to be accurate in any respects. A better test is to go to Google Books. The search algorithm is going to guess (terribly) how many search results there are. You need to go to the very last search result to get the real number. In this case there are 48 pages for "unmanned aerial vehicle" and 49 for UAV. [22] [23] Google's search algorithm is really atrocious so everyone should double check their page moves using this method. Marcus Qwertyus 07:31, 18 March 2011 (UTC)
For the benefit of others who may be drawn to this discussion but have not followed the history of this set of articles, what is the redirect (that apparently was created in January?) and what is the merger (that apparently was discussed elsewhere?)? DMacks (talk) 08:11, 18 March 2011 (UTC)
The redirect was from UAV, a stub which was little used, the merge discussion is here Talk:UAV. The result was to merge leaving the UAV as a redirect to this article.
I do not think that common usage is limited to books. Also the statement "isn't going to be accurate" is not really valid unless you can show why google's search algorithm is so inaccurate. Using the exclusion parameter, and quotes for terms, seems to be fine for everybody else to be used in commonality discussions. Chaosdruid (talk) 08:15, 18 March 2011 (UTC)
I would most cerainly vote for "unmanned aerial vehicle". "UAV" is not a sort of abbreviation that is so well-established among laymen that the full name would be incomprehensible/weird/unhelpful. Compare to "DOS" or "PDF". For this reason, there is no need to count any google results; WP:Manual of style clearly says we should avoid the abbreviation in our case. --Kubanczyk (talk) 20:24, 28 March 2011 (UTC)

Lead rewrite

Someone has placed a {{lead rewrite}} tag on the article. I cannot find any discussion on the Talk page so will start one.

First off, it would be helpful if the editor who placed that tag would articulate their rationale for the tag.

Second, having nothing from the proposer, I'll just note that it does seem to make some assertions that are not true. For example, the end of the initial sentence says "...is an aircraft that is flown by a pilot or a navigator (called Combat Systems Officer on UCAVs) depending on the different Air Forces." This incorrectly places all UAVs into the class of [[|teleoperation|teleoperated]] UAVs and implies that an autonomous UAV cannot exist. Furthermore, by stating "(... called Combat Systems Officer on UCAVs) depending on the different Air Forces.", with the Air Forces comment outside the parentheses, it implies that perhaps only the military forces operate UAVs. Both of these are clearly wrong.

What improvements do others note are needed? N2e (talk) 21:59, 29 March 2011 (UTC)

I've placed this tag. Further improvements: lead section is self-contradictory in terms of UAV-vs-missile distinction. Per WP:MOS, let's start with simple and clear definition of the subject - without any "can carry a lethal or nonlethal" crap. --Kubanczyk (talk) 22:33, 29 March 2011 (UTC)

Link not working properly

The link "http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/RQ-7_Shadow#Quick-MEDS" (Armed attacks section under a picture) isn't going to a "#Quick-MEDS" (not scrolling down to where it's mentioned).

The Quick-MEDS is only a one liner should it be removed or a "id=Quick-MEDS" added to the RQ-7_Shadow page? —Preceding unsigned comment added by 142.139.0.55 (talk) 18:38, 28 April 2011 (UTC)

UAV killing humans

In 3 June 2011 Ilyas Kashmiri, a senior al-Qaeda member, was killed by a UAV. It is a "iconic event" of UAV history and cultural critique/reception of UAVs. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 189.103.31.154 (talk) 11:01, 5 June 2011 (UTC)

A mess of promotion

This article is a nightmare of promotion with too many unneeded examples given in places where generalities would suffice. Many of the mentions of a single model of UAV or of a UAV company can be taken out in favor of a less specific discussion of capabilities and use. This article is a magnet for promotion because other UAV designers see their competitor listed, and they want to be listed as well. Binksternet (talk) 19:40, 25 August 2011 (UTC)

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Soviet UAVs

Why aren't the Lavochkin La-17 and Tupolev Tu-123 mentioned? This article should be marked as not representative of a world view. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Alexkvaskov (talk • contribs) 00:23, 7 November 2011 (UTC)

Armed attacks

For an overview article on the world of UAVs it appears to be undue weight given in the article about the military use of UAVs and armed attacks. Can this be pruned and/or moved to a more specialist article rather than this article which should just be a brief summary. MilborneOne (talk) 19:51, 24 November 2011 (UTC)

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Now anyone can use a Drone, (I wonder if my wiki-critics will send it to my house)

Yeah, they been hacked, but I can't be bothered adding it to the article, maybe someone else is interested in this, it is very surprising, and the military attitude to it is also quite surprising, they're like 'meh' [24] Penyulap talk 05:45, 30 December 2011 (UTC)

potential resource

Here Come the Drones; These popular, unmanned aircraft will eventually fall into the hands of hostile nations and terrorists by John Villasenor (a Brookings Institute fellow) Scientific American January 5, 2012. 97.87.29.188 (talk) 01:28, 4 January 2012 (UTC)

Developments

Though I added 8 Domestic use and 8.1 Civilian aerial surveillance, I think the above remarks show that this article should be devoted to historical technology, and that developments beyond military usage should be only briefly mentioned, and directed to new, stand-alone articles. --Pawyilee (talk) 12:49, 8 January 2012 (UTC)

Ethics of the use of military drones?

I cant find this anywhere on the main page. My apologies if this has been discussed at length, I merely request direction to the appropriate article on the issue. 74.128.56.194 (talk) 10:25, 6 June 2011 (UTC)

I agree 100%, there is hardly a mention of criticism of use of military drones or the varied protests and movements that have occurred against their use. There have been extensive protests both in the US and abroad.--Metaldev (talk) 19:22, 2 December 2011 (UTC)
There definitely needs to be a post on the ethics of UAVs, particularly Military Drones in the Middle East. Edogmad (talk) 18:37, 8 January 2012 (UTC)
Not to mention North Dakota. --Pawyilee (talk) 14:40, 10 January 2012 (UTC)

NYT resource

Here is something more current; Spy Drone and Missile Sub Are on Military’s Budget-Cutting List by Christopher Drew January 26, 2012. 99.190.87.151 (talk) 01:03, 28 January 2012 (UTC)

frontpage WSJ resource

  • More Drones, Fewer Troops Jan 26, 2012; excerpt ...

    Marines, for example, will use a new base in Darwin, Australia, as a launch pad for Southeast Asia, while the U.S. is in talks to expand the U.S. presence in the Philippines—potential signals to China that the U.S. has quick-response capability in its backyard, defense officials said.

See Combat air patrol and MQ-9 Reaper in graphic. 97.87.29.188 (talk) 22:15, 27 January 2012 (UTC)

potential NYT resource

99.181.159.67 (talk) 01:08, 29 January 2012 (UTC)

Opinion resource, Democracy

See Oligarchy and Second Thoughts on James Burnham 99.35.12.74 (talk) 06:34, 31 January 2012 (UTC)

Drone swarms??

Blog entry on drone swarms. Fact or fiction? If basis in fact, should be in article to make more interesting. Of course, I don't think they made up the video of these dang things flying in formation and going after targets!! CarolMooreDC 16:44, 8 March 2012 (UTC)

Robotics project attention needed

  • Refs - large parts of the text are unrefd
  • Structure - check
  • Content - all topics covered?
  • Reassess

Chaosdruid (talk) 11:19, 24 March 2012 (UTC)

remote control infrastructure

It should be noted in the article that the US military UAV's can operate using their military satellite network. A simple hobbyist can not attain any significant range, though ranges up to 7km are possible (see UAVTeam Netherlands, ref = http://www.youtube.com/user/UAVTeamNetherlands/featured ) A standard amateur radio is able to give signals upto 1 mile away. Appearantly some systems use GPS and sensors instead to simply allow the airplane to fly autonomously to circumvent this limitation, see Maynard Hill TAM-5 ref http://tam.plannet21.com/FAQs.htm#electronics

Perhaps a possibility is to use radio repeaters along a path (look into this), but then only a specific route can be flown.

Perhaps also mention that remote controlled airplanes will also be used for the transportation of material for hospitals (medicine, blood samples, human organs, ...)and packet services, and for transporting wounded military personnel by the military. RC passenger airplanes[3] will also used in the near future.

91.182.172.157 (talk) 14:31, 30 March 2012 (UTC)

Ethical / moral section?

Rather surprising to find no such section regarding military use, given the amount that the issues and implications have been discussed in many media at many levels. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 86.167.19.166 (talk) 14:07, 4 June 2012 (UTC)

Such concerns are clearly expressed under the subcategory 'Armed attacks', as well as the related articles: Targeted killing, Unmanned combat aerial vehicle, and Drone attacks in Pakistan. KiloEchoNovember (talk) 08:29, 22 June 2012 (UTC)

Conservation

The World Wide Fund for Nature WWF recently announced its intention to use UAVs in Nepal, to combat poaching and aid conservation, following a successful trial of two aircraft in Indonesia. The project could be expanded to other countries, such as Tanzania and Malaysia. [4]

Should this be added under the category 'Uses'? KiloEchoNovember (talk) 08:29, 22 June 2012 (UTC)

Antidrone

U.S. anti-drone weapon unveiled http://www.spacewar.com/reports/US_anti-drone_weapon_unveiled_999.html

95.209.106.167 (talk) 00:45, 29 July 2012 (UTC)

Remotely piloted fighter aircraft

Do any remotely piloted fighter aircraft allready exist ? Remotely piloted ground attack aircraft allready exist (ie General Atomics MQ-1 Predator) yet fighter and fighter/ground-attack aircraft do not. I think a remotely operated version of the Dornier_Do_335 or even Yakovlev_Yak-3, Supermarine Spitfire or Mitsubishi A6M Zero would be beneficial and allow greater reductions in military spending (ie a Joint Strike Fighter costs 60,4 million dollar). RO-versions of these WW2 fighters might not be as good in dogfights, but for 60 million dollar, one can make a lot of RO WW2 fighters, and I'm not sure whether a huge group of these won't win against a single JSF. 91.182.37.177 (talk) 11:58, 7 September 2012 (UTC)

Theater of war

"This marked the first use of an armed Predator as an attack aircraft outside of a theater of war such as Afghanistan." What does thast mean? The Afghanistan war wasn't real? — Preceding unsigned comment added by 186.52.168.106 (talk) 15:57, 8 December 2012 (UTC)

Please see the related Wikipedia article concerning the theater of war. -- KiloEchoNovember (talk) 14:05, 31 December 2012 (UTC)

kinetic activity

Should kinetic activity redirect here?[25] OR to murder?[26] What about stealth-wear? —Pawyilee (talk) 03:14, 6 March 2013 (UTC)

Seriously, the proper place for "kinetic activity" is as an addition to Military terminology. As for technology with a broad military applicability, consider adding to List_of_established_military_terms#Technological. The section had been blank since 2010 until I started adding to it, one of which redirects here: Drone strike, term for use of unmanned aerial vehicle (UAV) for attack; or less often, for surveillance —Pawyilee (talk) 03:55, 6 March 2013 (UTC)

List_of_established_military_terms#Technological may now take care of it by changing "Drone strike" to Drone technology," linked to that article's topic "Vehicles: Unmanned"; and redirecting "Drone strike" from here to "Unmanned combat air vehicle". I'll worry about "kinetic activity later, and altogehter forget about "stealth-wear". —Pawyilee (talk) 06:27, 6 March 2013 (UTC)

Operation Storm

UAV named Mah 01, Mah 02 and Bojnik were used in Operation Storm in 1995 by HV in cooperation with US. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LIGJPtfZ4oU89.172.205.35 (talk) 00:00, 11 April 2013 (UTC)

Annoying "Worldview" Tag

Another editor reverted my removal of a several-month's-old tag, which I had undertaken because (1) I hate looking at these stupid things encrusting the tops of every other page (usually without substantive merit), (2) the "Worldview" tag is one of the most arbitrary and nebulous of all Wiki tags, and (3) I noticed nobody complaining about US-centric article bias in Talk (where, one would assume, either the person who originally added it four months ago, or the objecting editor, would have something to say about it).--Froglich (talk) 09:48, 30 April 2013 (UTC)

Uses

Perhaps following section can be added at "Uses"

Leisure

Miniature UAV design is becoming more and more popular as a leisure activity. Home builders are exchanging plans via websites such as DIYDrones.com and UAVSourceForge. [5]

Added a few mentions of FPV UAVs for leisure. Zedtwitz (talk) 15:07, 21 June 2013 (UTC)


Also, perhaps its intresting to mention multicopters. Several police forces allready have octocopters and there is gowing intrest for using multicopters in crowd management. Some police forces are also working on implementing minidrones on a large scale. For example England will be integrating a national drone plan by 2012.[6]


This encyclopedia for the general public

This is not a dictionary for employees of NATO's "air component". When I take a piece of paper and fold it, and make an airplane and throw it, then I have launched a UAV, but I have not launched what is commonly known as a drone.

The first sentence of the article might need a rewrite. Perhaps the article should be called "Drone", and the first line should say "... less commonly known as a unmanned aerial vehicle". --Aicarambole (talk) 11:24, 27 May 2013 (UTC)

I have reverted your change to the lead, the article is "Unmanned aerial vehicle" so really should be the first thing mentioned in the the lead. If you think that is wrong then you need to get some consensus on this talk page or perhaps request an article move. MilborneOne (talk) 12:29, 27 May 2013 (UTC)

Reorganisation of Domestic aerial surveillance, added Republic of Ireland section

I put the subsections in alphabetical order, just to make it easier to find a given section. I also added a section on the Republic of Ireland, which I'll probably expand a bit as there's a bit more that could go in.Autarch (talk) 18:37, 6 July 2013 (UTC)

External link to EPIC listed as spam

cyberbot II has tagged this link as being on one of two spam blacklists. I'm not sure which pattern matches the URL, so I'm not sure if it's a false positive. Anyone know how to check? Autarch (talk) 20:15, 26 August 2013 (UTC)

Presumably MediaWiki talk:Spam-blacklist#petition. DMacks (talk) 20:22, 26 August 2013 (UTC)

Potential for splitting out military vs non-military?

This article is now getting quite long and the way it jumps back-and-forth between general material and military specifics makes it hard to read. In particular, there are top-level section headings like "UAV operators", "Public opinion", "Morality" and "Legality" that deal exclusively with military uses. So the article could do with re-organization. But it might be more efficient to divide the article into a main UAV history/technology topic with short sections outlining the principal military and non-military uses, which could then be described in-depth in two or three separate articles. Civilian applications (which are set to increase significantly e.g. BBC story) in general use very different platforms and operating models. I appreciate that there is some overlap – maybe surveillance and policing would belong with military – but I'm sure we could work that out. What do you think? - Pointillist (talk) 06:56, 31 August 2013 (UTC)

I think it has been tried before but has been a bit of a dumping ground for everbody to add any bit of trivia about UAV, it should be just an overview of the subject the detailed and sometimes trivia "operation" or "use" stuff could be moved somewhere else as you suggest. Probably could do with moving the American-centric military detail somewhere else like Unmanned aerial vehicle use by the United States or similar. So I would say go for it you cant make it any worse. MilborneOne (talk) 08:53, 31 August 2013 (UTC)
Thanks. I'll print out a copy and start scratching my head.... - Pointillist (talk) 11:03, 31 August 2013 (UTC)
It's an unduly long article filled with side issues that are tangential to UAVs—the vehicles—themselves. I'd support breaking out as follows:
  • Separate article for "Uses" as this list will likely explode in size
  • Separate article for "Historical events" as it's more appropriate as a List article
  • Separate article combining "Legality" and "Morality" (and possibly "Public opinion") since these issues are tangential to UAVs per se
Just thoughts for consideration. — RCraig09 (talk) 15:39, 8 September 2013 (UTC)
Looks like a good idea, the "uses" appears to be a bit of a dumping ground for any mention of a UAV so could do with breaking out and organising. Some of the Legality and Morality stuff is more to do with military operations then the UAV and is undue weight in an overview. Some of the rest is just crap but that can be sorted if we unpick the breakout sections. Perhaps a History of unmanned aerial vehicles might be a good start, and perhaps Types of unmanned aerial vehicles then perhaps look at the operational/use side of things. MilborneOne (talk) 17:25, 8 September 2013 (UTC)

Firefighting

The Green Falcon solar UAV is a proposed UAV designed by Wessam Al Sabban and Dr Felipe Gonzalez for fire monitoring of forests in Australia. The UAv has a 2,5 metre wing span and is hand-launched. [7][8]

FYI, the HEBUST forestry unmanned aerial vehicle apparently is in use for this purpose today. Sincerely, DA Sonnenfeld (talk) 21:48, 14 September 2013 (UTC)

Civilian-victim POV edit in "Civilian casualties" section

Jgui's 27 Aug 2013 "Civilian casualties" contested edit is here. If I don't see convincing arguments to Keep, I will again Delete it as being unencyclopedic POV and unreliably sourced. RCraig09 (talk) 15:10, 8 September 2013 (UTC)

Prior discussion:
  • Keep. You reverted a change I had made to the https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Unmanned_aerial_vehicle page without letting me know on my talk page or discussing it in the article's talk page. Please show me the courtesy of complying with WP policy when you make reversions in the future. You stated in your edit summary that WP should be cited to WP:Reliable source, but I think you failed to see that the material I added was to a properly cited BBC News article. The addition I made was in the "Civilian casualty" section, and it is a description of civilian casualties from the point of view of one of the civilians. I therefore added it back since it is properly cited RS material, relevant to the topic. Thank you. Jgui (talk) 15:46, 30 August 2013 (UTC)
  • Delete. It is not generally required to discuss a reversion beforehand; discussion is the third step in the Bold-Revert-Discuss WP:BRD dispute resolution process (now, we're discussing). Critically: although the BBC may be a Reliable Source for quoting what the Yemenese mechanic/victim said, the mechanic/victim is not considered a reliable source for the facts he was portraying, especially since there is no BBC indication of independent corroboration. Reliability requires more than proper citation and relevance, and your edit summary's "POV of civilian" and the quote's drama and emotionality actually confirm unreliability in this context. This is part of why I suggested finding reliable source(s) with facts about civilian casualties in general as the rest of that section generally does, not just expressions of one family's tragedy. — RCraig09 (talk) 16:43, 30 August 2013 (UTC) Also consider WP:NOTNEWS. — RCraig09 (talk) 16:57, 30 August 2013 (UTC)
Other editors' comments are invited. — RCraig09 (talk) 15:20, 8 September 2013 (UTC)
  • Oppose addition (it is up to those proposing a challenged addition to gain consensus to add otherwise status quo) this is an overview article about Unmanned aerial vehicles and an individual casualty is just not notable in a sixty odd year history of UAVs, I would suggest it could go in a more particular article like Al-Qaeda insurgency in Yemen but possibly not even notable enough for that. MilborneOne (talk) 15:22, 8 September 2013 (UTC)
  • Action taken: I've deleted the contested content as being improperly non-objective and unreliably sourced, in the absence of any countervailing reasoning from submitter in two weeks. — RCraig09 (talk) 17:32, 15 September 2013 (UTC)

Future potential section - issues

Is this section in breach of WP:CRYSTAL? Autarch (talk) 14:32, 25 September 2013 (UTC)

Yesterday I modified the section to clarify that the statements about future UAV applications were made in a Congressional Research Service report; those statements weren't prognostications of the Wikipedia editor. RCraig09 (talk) 19:20, 22 November 2013 (UTC)

Pakistani govt update civilian drone-strike casualties

http://www.nytimes.com/2013/10/31/world/asia/pakistan-drone-strikes.html?_r=0 Pakistan govt, Oct 31, 2013: 3% [three] of drone-strike casualties were civilians since 2008. There were 317 drone strikes since then, and they killed 2160 terrorists, and 67 civilians. These figures are very similar to the CIA's. 74.60.161.158 (talk) 21:59, 6 December 2013 (UTC)

Links

[27](Lihaas (talk) 17:51, 22 November 2013 (UTC)).

http://www.faa.gov/about/initiatives/uas/media/uas_roadmap_2013.pdf started in 2012 by FAA and Congress. — Charles Edwin Shipp (talk) 22:58, 9 December 2013 (UTC)

Unmanned Aircraft Systems

The term 'Unmanned Aircraft Systems" is becoming the most popular, (UAS), but there is not a Wikipedia article with this title. Such an article does not redirect here. The FAA uses this term also. [28] — Charles Edwin Shipp (talk) 23:47, 9 December 2013 (UTC)

Legality of assassination

There is a rambling section on the legality of using drones to carry out assassinations. Aside from being hard to read it is referring only to one single alleged memo which supposedly says that such killings are legal. I am afraid that however POV is interpreted, that is not good enough and must be seen as unacceptable NPOV. It is one-sided and entirely lacking in independence, transparency or objectivity. It is like saying that Hitler didn't kill any Jews, and the proof is in a Nazi Party memo which I am afraid I cannot show you! Would anyone accept that at face value? The supreme irony is that the supposed memo actually does not support the CIA case - if it says that killing of "senior operational leaders of Al-Qaeda" is legal, the thousands of other people killed were not lawfully killed according to the memo!101.98.175.68 (talk) 07:23, 22 April 2014 (UTC)

First appearance in Star Trek orginal series

I am not a regular editor to the article and don't plan to be, but I was wondering, wouldn't the flying/hovering M4 device/robot from the February 14, 1969 episode of Star Trek "Requiem for Methuselah" be considered a drone? It had sensors, could fire an energy beam, could deactivate hand phasers, had autonomous flight, and also responded to Flint's voice commands and probably his handheld button pad. Pictures: 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6. If you think it should be included then go ahead in my opinion, as I likely won't be back here. 5Q5 (talk) 15:31, 7 May 2014 (UTC)

Not sure where/if this belongs

Not in US subsection, lobbying, classification?: http://www.dailytech.com/Commercial+Drones+to+Get+Privacy+Guidelines+Via+Executive+Order/article36285.htm comp.arch (talk) 14:01, 28 July 2014 (UTC)

Correction to link & suggestions for two more articles

In the sentence 

  "and development is underway on the still smaller US Navy-developed Spike missile.[83]"

the link to "Spike missile" in the above sentence points to the wrong article. It points to a much larger missile developed by the Israeli company Rafael Advanced Defense Systems, rather than to the US Navy Naval Air Weapons Station China Lake, Calif.-developed "world's smallest" missile, for which you have no article yet.

Here are two articles about the US Navy's Spike missile: 

  http://www.janes.com/article/33507/usn-spike-miniature-pgm-successfully-engages-fiac-targets

  http://www.navytimes.com/article/20140223/NEWS04/302230006/Navy-develops-world-s-smallest-guided-missile-

You also have no reference for the acronym "FIAC" -- "Fast Inshore Attack Craft" used in those articles about the USN Spike. Perhaps you can add a page for that; it took me a few minutes to find the definition elsewhere. 


  (apologies if I'm using the wrong procedure, I've never done this on Wikipedia before)

Jimcgreevy (talk) 23:52, 20 August 2014 (UTC)

Recommend Splitting Civilian and Military

This page is getting rather large and will become harder to manage as there will be a lot of development over the next few years. With the tremendous growth of the civilian uses developing now I think we should separate these topics to their own pages. --Ricochetintj (talk) 06:32, 13 March 2014 (UTC)

I don't think Civilian UAV, Military UAV nor UAV Laws are suitable article names. I think addressing that - and article scope - now might avoid any subsequent split discussion going off-track. Though in practice it would not be a split but hiving off content to daughter articles; a summary article would still be needed. GraemeLeggett (talk) 22:18, 13 March 2014 (UTC)
I agree that article scope is critical and should include some definitions, general history, and summary of more detailed topics. Please suggest alternate article names. Can you explain why you don't think Civilian UAV, Military UAV nor UAV Laws are suitable article names? Regarding splitting vs hiving off, in wikipedia terms splitting is the correct term. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Splitting --Ricochetintj (talk) 21:05, 14 March 2014 (UTC)
for article titles, Recognizability, Naturalness, Precision, Conciseness, and Consistency are the watchwords. I've had a look and I see that Military drone and combat drone already exists as a redirect to this article, but Unmanned combat air vehicle exists as an article with History of unmanned combat air vehicles as a daughter article of it (There is also History of unmanned aerial vehicles). which suggest spelling out the title.
There is also US battlefield UAVs - which is not a very good article title - though Non-US battlefield UAVs strikes me as worse.
As to the legal side, should there be sufficient notable content, it shouldn't be capitalized and should match in with Aviation regulations and aviation law. GraemeLeggett (talk) 22:36, 14 March 2014 (UTC)
Lots of good information. However I don't think you actually suggested anything that could be used. That is unless you are suggesting that much of this articles military content could be moved to Unmanned combat air vehicle and History of unmanned combat air vehicles. Regarding laws, there is more than sufficient content. In many cases some countries may require separate articles. For example in the United States there is a lot of history to cover, State level regulations, and case histories, in addition to the FAA regulations.--Ricochetintj (talk) 00:12, 15 March 2014 (UTC)
For the military use I would look to see what information in this article is
  1. already duplicated in the Unmanned combat air vehicle
  2. over-detailed for this article
  3. uncited
and thin this article down accordingly, either moving content to the unmanned combat air vehicle or "history of..." articles. GraemeLeggett (talk) 07:51, 15 March 2014 (UTC)
The article is really too long and long articles are really difficult to navigate. Splitting it into military and civilian articles and a separate legal article seems like a good idea. Χρυσάνθη Λυκούση (talk) 17:38, 26 March 2014 (UTC)
@Χρυσάνθη Λυκούση: @GraemeLeggett: @Ricochetintj:. I agree this article is so long and unwieldy, I'm prodding this debate again. There have been lots of recent legal issues (including this [29]) that will keep making this grow longer. -- Fuzheado | Talk 15:34, 2 May 2014 (UTC)
@Χρυσάνθη Λυκούση: @GraemeLeggett: @Fuzheado: @Bharshaw: This page is just getting worse. I have more time now and will put more effort in this. Would you guys be interested in setting up a sprint date to reworking this page? Ricochetintj (talk) 20:16, 17 October 2014 (UTC)
I agree it's long but I'd tentatively suggest also looking at the overall structure of articles related to aviation and airplanes (the latter of which has a nod towards drones). UAV's are a sub of heavy-than-air aircraft, and the issues of traffic control relate to all aviation (though there's different rules for civil, general, and military aviation. This week's series of 3 articles in the Washington Post on drones show the explosive growth of the field.Bill Harshaw (talk) 16:31, 28 June 2014 (UTC)

We currently have:

  1. Unmanned aerial vehicle, which tries to cover everything under the sun
  2. Unmanned combat aerial vehicle, which repeats almost everything in Unmanned aerial vehicle but places an emphasis on military
  3. Battlefield UAV (sic) and which has severe problems and adds very little
  4. Battlefield UAVs in the United States, and which also has severe problems and adds very little
  5. History of unmanned aerial vehicles
  6. History of unmanned combat aerial vehicles

I have placed a merge proposal on Battlefield UAV into Unmanned aerial vehicle
I propose we also merge Battlefield UAVs in the United States into Unmanned combat aerial vehicle
I have Moved titles with 'air vehicles' in them to aerial vehicles for consistency, so, there's no more air vehicles Perhaps we could break it into: Unmanned aerial vehicles and keep it rigorously civilian, Make Unmanned combat aerial vehicle military applications only and remove all the UAV repetitions or transclude. Carefully link sections to their Major Pages and keep very brief summaries. I am not sure about the title Unmanned combat aerial vehicle, maybe it's OK but this is the only place I've seen it, could it become Unmanned aerial vehicle - military and maybe Unmanned aerial vehicle - civilian? What think you? Ex nihil (talk) 17:52, 11 August 2014 (UTC)

UAV in sport

I think that the drone-related incident in UEFA Euro 2016 qualifying match between Serbia and Albania, played in Belgrade, shoud be put in the Sport section. --Ammar Tivari Talk! 14:29, 17 October 2014 (UTC)

This page has to much information already, I would not recommend adding those details here. What I would recommend is that we create a UAV Legal page with sections for Incidents by nation. Ricochetintj (talk) 20:20, 17 October 2014 (UTC)

Autonomous Vehicles

I would like to suggest that we change the nomenclature used in certain sections of this article. The would Autonomous or Autonomy is sometimes used in relation to unmanned vehicles but it is inappropriate. The correct word to use would be automated or automation. Autonomy is related to free will(free agency) and means the ability to take decisions which can be contrary to those pre-programmed into the vehicle. Unmanned vehicles may frequently do things we did not intend but it is not because they make a decision to disobey but because of errors in their automation.

Clough, Bruce.T (August 2002). "Metrics, Schmetrics! How The Heck Do You Determine A UAV's Autonomy Anyway". AIR FORCE RESEARCH LAB WRIGHT-PATTERSON AFB, OH. Retrieved 26 October 2014. {{cite journal}}: Cite journal requires |journal= (help)

Please see this paper for a good discussion. JPelham (talk) 16:15, 26 October 2014 (UTC)

Page move

Please comment on the page move decision at Talk:Drone attacks in Pakistan. Uhlan talk 21:38, 13 November 2014 (UTC)

Split

I suggest splitting this article into sections accessible from a disambiguation page as it has become too long to read, and has both Military and Non Military UAVs on the one page, which can be confusing to those who are not "experts" in the field of UAVs. 110.148.140.247 (talk) 01:21, 28 February 2015 (UTC)

This article has been a bit of a disaster for a few years, it should be just a few paragraph overview of the history and use of the UAV but it soon become a dumping ground for what is mainly trivia and junk and news of the day that just happens to be related to UAVs. Support any changes that bring it back to the original purpose, that is an overview, with a basic description, history and general usage. The rest could then be moved to better organised sub-articles, although I suspect most could be just culled. MilborneOne (talk) 14:48, 28 February 2015 (UTC)
I agree that sections of this article should be WP:SPLIT off to daughter articles, but converting this page to a dab might be going a bit too far (it would require a lot of links to UAV etc to be disambiguated). DexDor (talk) 17:39, 28 February 2015 (UTC)
Rather than a split, prune. We already have Unmanned combat aerial vehicle and Battlefield UAV. All military material which is not duplicated should be moved to Unmanned combat aerial vehicle, military use should be rduced to a short summary with a{{mainarticle|Unmanned combat aerial vehicle}} at its top. If a split is needed it need not be along civilian/military lines, e.g. a split along USA rest of the world lines.--KTo288 (talk) 11:57, 6 March 2015 (UTC)
We can't move "all military material" to the UCAV article as much military use of UAVs is for recce/surveillance, transport etc rather than combat. DexDor (talk) 23:20, 9 March 2015 (UTC)
I am against further splitting. Move pertinent content to the existing articles and link. I also agree, this needs pruning. 192.55.54.40 (talk) 11:28, 11 March 2015 (UTC)
Two sections that merit their own articles are Domestic aerial surveillance and other incidents and Regulation. The former is quite large and consists of many subsections and the latter is likely to evolve in the same manner as many jurisdictions introduce legislation. Autarch (talk) 23:42, 13 March 2015 (UTC)
I've split off the regulation section. Regarding the "...incidents" section - I think it makes more sense to arrange things by topic rather than by country (e.g. group all info about use of UAVs to smuggle things into prison into one article). DexDor (talk) 06:27, 14 March 2015 (UTC)

There's far too much overlap to split the article in two with a disambiguation page...that's not a proper way to handle a subject like this. Certain sections can be spun off to create daughter articles (see Wikipedia:Summary style), which is the proper way to handle such issues and appears to be what the other editor above are doing with some content in this article. I just came across this article while working on other Wikipedia content, so I don't have a full understanding of all the content on this subject to be able to provide a thorough suggested article hierarchy. I think that a daughter article can be created Military use of unmanned aerial vehicles (or a similar title...acronyms shouldn't be used). I don't think an article solely concerning civilian use is necessary.

Personally, I think a review of the hierarchy of all UAV-related articles needs to be examined. Many have proposed merges/splits and I think a review and discussion of the entire field of UAV-related articles is appropriate. I'm busy working on other content on WP, so I'm not willing to initiate/work on a complete proposal, but I think such a review would be very useful. AHeneen (talk) 02:36, 24 March 2015 (UTC)

  • There are a few possible problems with a split to Military use of unmanned aerial vehicles - (1) Military forces (like civilians) use UAVs for many separate purposes (target practice, reconnaissance, surveillance, ground attack, jamming/decoy, delivery etc some of which overlap with non-military use), (2) drawing a line between military and non-military use may be difficult (e.g. the Americans may consider the CIA to be civilian but for the rest of the world any organisation that drops LGBs is a military force) and (3) the UAV article would still need to mention UCAVs etc so there's a limit to how much material could be removed from the UAV article. Note: There's also an article at Battlefield UAV. DexDor (talk) 06:40, 24 March 2015 (UTC)
There are a number of areas in which UAVs could be used which are on the borderline between civil and military (e.g. intelligence gathering, border patrol, anti-piracy); it would probably be better (if there's sufficient material to warrant a split) to split to something like "Use of UAVs against piracy" than a civil/military split. DexDor (talk) 20:43, 29 March 2015 (UTC)

Domestic aerial surveillance and other incidents

Time we deleted this section I think, it is becoming a dumping ground for trivia that is not really important or notable in what is an overview on UAVs. MilborneOne (talk) 16:13, 6 April 2015 (UTC)

While not all incidents may be significant, certainly those that involve convictions, injuries, police investigations or flying in restricted areas (e.g. the White House incident) would be significant - at the very least they would influence government policy towards UAVs. Autarch (talk) 16:56, 6 April 2015 (UTC)
Then perhaps we should have a seperate article rather then burden what should be a top-level overview of the subject. MilborneOne (talk) 17:23, 6 April 2015 (UTC)
Excellent idea! Would the current subheading be suitable or would something like Domestic UAV surveillance and other incidents be better? Autarch (talk) 17:26, 6 April 2015 (UTC)
I would have thought Unmanned aerial vehicle accidents and incidents may be clearer. MilborneOne (talk) 17:37, 6 April 2015 (UTC)
Good name - is the aircraft near misses section also in need of splitting out or is that small enough? Autarch (talk) 18:38, 6 April 2015 (UTC)
No I think that would make a good addition to the accidents and incidents article. MilborneOne (talk) 19:04, 6 April 2015 (UTC)
 Definition and terminology

To distinguish UAVs from missiles, a UAV is defined as a "powered, aerial vehicle that does not carry a human operator, uses aerodynamic forces to provide vehicle lift, can fly autonomously or be piloted remotely, can be expendable or recoverable, and can carry a lethal or nonlethal payload".[6]

Therefore, cruise missiles are not considered UAVs because, like many other guided missiles, the vehicle itself is a weapon that is not reused, even though it is also unmanned and in some cases remotely guided.

The second sentence makes no sense following the first: "... cruise missiles are not considered UAVs because the vehicle itself is a weapon" but UAVs "can carry a lethal ... payload" and "not reused" but UAVs "can be expendable."

I would think one would simply say cruise missiles aren't considered UAVs because of their (hopefully) rarely used narrow mission profile and to prevent any ambiguity between this mission and common UAV missions. JetMec (talk) 04:59, 11 July 2015 (UTC)

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  1. ^ News Releases - BAE Systems
  2. ^ Unmanned mini helicopters for sale - autonomous flight
  3. ^ Wesley Randall
  4. ^ http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/science-environment-18527119
  5. ^ Kijk magazine, 3/2012
  6. ^ National drone plan
  7. ^ Gren Falcon
  8. ^ Green Falcon 2
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