Nicholas West
Activist Post
Apparently many of the civilian deaths by drones in Afghanistan are not attributed to the U.S. military being there on false pretenses, but rather to limitations in surveillance technology. The video below opens with this assertion in its coverage of DARPA’s latest mega-surveillance package known as ARGUS – Autonomous Real-time Ground Ubiquitous Surveillance Imaging System.
The new sensor system can instantly see an area roughly the “size of a small city” with an “all-seeing”eye according to retired Lieutenant, David A. Deptula. The next generation of surveillance tech sees the landscape through a 1.8 billion pixels camera, the highest resolution yet created.
War profiteer BAE Systems is the creator of the DARPA-funded technology which is slated for use inside pods attached to drone aircraft, both unarmed and armed, although deployment details are classified.
Using a touchscreen interface that can produce up to 65 windows for analysis, military observers can see down to the individual object level to track the movements of vehicles and people. Beyond the real-time surveillance, the system can store everything for future review right down to the minutes and seconds.
Now that Congress is set to fully open U.S. skies to drone aircraft in late 2015, unless we witness more resistance at the state level, American citizens could soon be in the cross-hairs on American soil. Regardless, as technology expands at an exponential rate, it is doubtful that it will be long before the field of vision expands to the global level from nearly any position, possibly negating any single protest from a country or state against surveillance by its own government.
Drones stationed beyond the border, and highly classified due to national security, could be coupled with solar powered UAVs and a laser-energy based systems to keep systems aloft indefinitely. With nearly unlimited funding, our electronic tracking regardless of innocence or guilt is becoming a permanent fixture to the skies above.
Other sources:
http://www.wired.com/dangerroom/2012/01/army-helicopter-cross-eyed/#more-68398
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