A/HRC/23/47 • The US Counter Rocket, Artillery and Mortar (C-RAM) system can automatically destroy incoming artillery, rockets and mortar rounds. 18 • Israel‟s Harpy is a “Fire-and-Forget” autonomous weapon system designed to detect, attack and destroy radar emitters. 19 • The United Kingdom Taranis jet-propelled combat drone prototype can autonomously search, identify and locate enemies but can only engage with a target when authorized by mission command. It can also defend itself against enemy aircraft.20 • The Northrop Grumman X-47B is a fighter-size drone prototype commissioned by the US Navy to demonstrate autonomous launch and landing capability on aircraft carriers and navigate autonomously.21 • The Samsung Techwin surveillance and security guard robots, deployed in the demilitarized zone between North and South Korea, detect targets through infrared sensors. They are currently operated by humans but have an “automatic mode”. 22 46. Military documents of a number of States describe air, ground and marine robotic weapons development programmes at various stages of autonomy. Large amounts of money are allocated for their development. 23 47. It seems clear that if introduced, LARs will not, at least initially, entirely replace human soldiers, but that they will have discretely assigned tasks suitable to their specific capabilities. Their most likely use during armed conflict is in some form of collaboration with humans,24 although they would still be autonomous in their own functions. The question should therefore be asked to what extent the existing legal framework is sufficient to regulate this scenario, as well as the scenario whereby LARs are deployed without any human counterpart. Based on current experiences of UCAVs, there is reason to believe that States will inter alia seek to use LARs for targeting killing. 48. The nature of robotic development generally makes it a difficult subject of regulation, especially in the area of weapons control. Bright lines are difficult to find. Robotic development is incremental in nature. Furthermore, there is significant continuity between military and non-military technologies.25 The same robotic platforms can have civilian as well as military applications, and can be deployed for non-lethal purposes (e.g. to defuse improvised explosive devices) or be equipped with lethal capability (i.e. LARs). Moreover, LARs typically have a composite nature and are combinations of underlying technologies with multiple purposes. 49. The importance of the free pursuit of scientific study is a powerful disincentive to regulate research and development in this area. Yet “technology creep” in this area may 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 See http://www.dtic.mil/cgi-bin/GetTRDoc?AD=ADA557876 See http://www.israeli-weapons.com/weapons/aircraft/uav/harpy/harpy.html See http://www.baesystems.com/product/BAES_020273/taranis See http://www.as.northropgrumman.com/products/nucasx47b/assets/X47B_Navy_UCAS_FactSheet.pdf See http://singularityhub.com/2010/07/25/armed-robots-deployed-by-south-korea-in-demilitarizedzone-on-trial-basis United States Air Force, “UAS Flight Plan 2009-2047” (Washington, D.C., 2009) p. 41, available from http://www.scribd.com/doc/17312080/United-States-Air-Force-Unmanned-Aircraft-SystemsFlight-Plan-20092047-Unclassified Ronald Arkin “Governing Lethal Behaviour: Embedding Ethics in a Hybrid Deliberative/Reactive Robot Architecture” Technical Report GIT-GVU-07-11 p. 5, available from http://www.cc.gatech.edu/ai/robot-lab/online-publications/formalizationv35.pdf Anderson and Waxman (see note 8 above), pp. 2 and 13 and Singer (see note 3 above), p. 379. 9