As aircraft and weapons have become more precise, human beings have become less essential to the conduct of war. The rise of unmanned aerial vehicles, more commonly known as drones, promises to push human beings further out of the loop.
Drones are becoming autonomous, capable of taking off, flying to a target, and returning to base without much human direction. Although military officials insist that the United States will never deploy drones that can select targets and fire weapons on their own, history and the military's own current research suggest otherwise.
