Predator Drones: The All-Seeing Eye

One of the fastest-growing sectors in defense contracting is drone technology, or unmanned aerial vehicles (UAV), led by General Atomics. 

Boeing and Lockheed Martin are following suit and aim to build insect-like drones that can be remotely piloted into tight locations.

A visit to General Atomics’ website will reveal that the defense contractor was founded in 1955 by General Dynamics with the mission of:

“[H]arnessing the power of nuclear technologies for the benefit of mankind. General Atomics’ basic research into fission and fusion has matured into competence in many technologies, making GA and its affiliated companies one of the world’s leading resources for high-technology systems development ranging from the nuclear fuel cycle to remotely operated surveillance aircraft, airborne sensors, and advanced electric, electronic, wireless and laser technologies.”

General Atomics Aeronautical Systems, Inc. (GA-ASI) is the affiliate of General Atomics, and it builds the Predator drones currently patrolling the airspace of Iraq and Afghanistan. This is the very same General Atomics that advanced the idea of Project Orion, a spacecraft that would have used staged nuclear explosions to propel itself into outer space. Naturally, nuclear fallout was a major issue, which led to the end of Project Orion.

Between 1970 and 1986, General Atomics was bought and sold by several oil corporations. First it was Gulf Oil, then Royal Dutch Shell, and finally Chevron. In 1986, Neil and Linden Blue, two brothers with a passion for chocolate, bananas, aviation, nuclear energy and making money, bought General Atomics for $50 million. The Blue brothers had spent a significant amount of time in Central American cocoa markets. Think of them as a couple of Willy Wonka venture capitalists. More on that later.

In 1991, GA bought Leading Systems, Inc., a floundering business specializing in drones.  Leading Systems ‘designs later became GA’s Predator drone.

According to an “Airport Journals” article, Neil Blue—CEO of GA-ASI—said the motivation to build drones was tied into helping their cocoa-producing friends in Nicaragua. What need might some Nicaraguan chocolate farmers have for a surveillance drone, you might ask? That is an excellent question.

If you will recall, Nicaragua in the mid to late 80s was infested with a governemnt of what the Tea Partiers would refer to as “commie bastards” known as the Sandinistas. (Yes, it’s not just the name of a Clash album.) 

A “Business Week” piece on GA’s Predator noted that the Blues operated a “cocoa-and-banana plantation in Nicaragua with the family of former President Anastasio Somoza.” Somoza was a playboy dictator notorious for the repression of civil liberties, media censorship and the embezzlement of funds intended for the Managua Earthquake victims and reconstruction efforts. This guy was such a prick that even the United States government suspended all military assistance to Somoza’s regime in 1978.

Reagan, of course, reversed Carter’s suspension of military support and allowed the CIA to fund the Contras: yes, the very same Contras of the Iran-Contra scandal. The Blues apparently wanted to build drones to aid in the crushing of the Sandinistas, who—despite their weaknesses—were able to lower their country’s illiteracy rate from 50% to 12%. 

The Sandinstas also made considerable gains in revolutionizing Nicaragua’s healthcare system, eliminating many diseases and lowering the infant mortality rate—something the Somoza government had never been able to achieve (as if it had ever been a consideration). These are just a few of the Sandinista reforms.

Who exactly the Blues’ Nicaraguan friends were remains a mystery. Maybe Nicaraguan capitalists, chocolate-banana conglomerates, Contras or Somoza loyalists. And where there’s Nicaragua and Contras, there’s Oliver North, George Bush the Elder and the CIA. It doesn’t really matter who the friends were because it all stinks to high hell.

With that in mind, should we not as a country be concerned with the Blues’ multi-billion dollar defense contracts to supply the Army and CIA with Predator drones, and a whole host of state-of-the-art UAV’s to come?

Ten years ago UAV’s were a joke, sputtering up in the skies above Bosnia and crashing into fields. Now they are a legitimate industry with the likes of Northrop, Boeing and Lockheed Martin jumping into the fray, eager to please intelligence folks by racing to build the smallest and most intrusive drones to combat terrorists in our war without end.

While the Predator drones are generally considered a success by the Blues, General Atomics, other defense contractors and the U.S. government, their missile-strike record is horrific.  According to the Brookings Institution’s Daniel Byman:

“Critics correctly find many problems with this program, most of all the number of civilian casualties the strikes have incurred. Sourcing on civilian deaths is weak and the numbers are often exaggerated, but more than 600 civilians are likely to have died from the attacks. That number suggests that for every militant killed, 10 or so civilians also died.”

But the statistics didn’t stop Neil Blue from stating the following after many buy-out rumors swirled about in the wake of GA’s success, “This is fun the way it is.”  What is so fun, Mr. Blue, about a 10-to-1 militant to civilian death ratio?  I suppose that sort of glee is expected from chocolate and banana farmers who were friends with a Nicaraguan dictator.

Reuters reported on August 30^th that the Department of Homeland Security has deployed four Predator drones to patrol the U.S.-Mexico border, with another two to be assigned under Obama’s $600 million bill. So the drones are no longer surveillance aircraft used abroad; they are now operating in America’s skies.

What is to stop law enforcement agencies, or the NSA and FBI from using next generation drone technology—little insect-like drones—here at home? Do you want to be the person to awaken to a hovering piece of metal staring you in the face?

The Blues don’t give two shits about civil liberties—it’s evident from their association with Somoza, and their early desire to interfere in the affairs of Nicaragua’s Sandinista government.  And these are the men who, through General Atomics, will lead us into the world of an all-seeing eye only glimpsed in dystopian fiction.