Homeland Predator Drones Hunt Far Beyond Border -- Deep into Mexico, Central America, and Carribbean

CBP presentation to National Defense Industrial Association

Published by TruthOut, May 18, 2013

http://truth-out.org/opinion/item/16422-drones-over-the-homeland-from-border-security-to-national-security

Tom Barry

The Department of Homeland Security (DHS) says it is the "leading edge" of drone deployment in the United States. Since 2005, DHS has been purchasing Predator drones - officially called unmanned aerial systems (UAS) - to "secure the border," yet these unarmed Predator drones are also steadily creeping into local law enforcement, international drug-interdiction and national security missions - including across the border into the heart of Mexico.

DHS will likely double its drone contingent to two-dozen unmanned UAS produced by General Atomics as part of the border security component of any immigration reform.  The prominence of border security in immigration reform can't be missed.  The leading reform proposal, offered by eight US senators, is the Border Security, Economic Opportunity, and Immigration Modernization Act of 2013 - which proposes to spend $6.5 billion in additional "border security" measures, mostly high-tech surveillance by drones and ground surveillance systems.

Most of the concern about the domestic deployment of drones by DHS has focused on the crossover to law-enforcement missions that threaten privacy and civil rights, and that, without more regulations in place, the program will accelerate the transition to what critics call a "surveillance society." Also alarming is the mission creep of border drones, managed by the DHS' Customs and Border Protection (CPB) agency with increasing interface between border drones, international drug interdiction operations and other military-directed national security missions.

The prevalence of military jargon used by US Customs and Border (CBP) officials - such as "defense in depth" and "situational awareness" - points to at least a rhetorical overlapping of border control and military strategy. Another sign of the increasing coincidence between CBP/Office of Airforce and Marine (OAM) drone program and the military is that the commanders and deputies of OAM are retired military officers. Both Major General Michael Kostelnik and his successor Major General Randolph Alles, retired from US Marines, were highly placed military commanders involved in drone development and procurement.

Kostelnik has been involved in the development of the Predator by General Atomics since the mid-1990s and was an early proponent of providing Air Force funding to weaponize the Predator. As commander of the Marine Corps Warfighting Laboratory, Alles was a leading proponent of having each military branch work with military contractors to develop their own drone breeds, including near replicas of the Predator manufactured for the Army by General Atomics.

In promoting - and justifying - the DHS drone program, Kostelnik has routinely alluded to the national security potential of drones slated for border security duty. On several occasions Kostelnik has pointed to the seamless interoperability with Department of Defense (DOD) Unmanned Aerial Vehicle (UAV) forces. At a moment's notice, Kostelnik said, that OAM (Office of Airforce and Marine) could be "CHOP'ed" - meaning undergo a Change in Operational Command from DHS to DOD.

DHS has not released operational data about CBP (Customs and Border Protection)/OAM drone operations. Therefore, the extent of the participation of DHS drones in domestic and international operations is unknown. But statements by CBP officials and media reports from the Caribbean point to a rapidly expanding participation of DHS Guardian UAVs in drug-interdiction and other unspecified operations as far south as Panama. CBP states that OAM "routinely provides air and marine support to other federal, state and local law enforcement agencies" and "works with the US military in joint international antismuggling operations and in support of National Security Special Events [such as the Olympics]."

According to Kostelnik, CBP planned a "Spring 2011 deployment of the Guardian to a Central American country in association with Joint Interagency Task Force South (JIATF-South) based at the naval station in Key West, Florida." JIATF-South is a subordinate command to the United States Southern Command (USSOUTHCOM), whose geographical purview includes the Caribbean, Central America and South America. In mid-2012, CBP/OAM participated in a JIATF-South collaborative venture called "Operation Caribbean Focus" that involved flight over the Caribbean Sea and nations in the region - with the Dominican Republic acting as the regional host for the Guardian operations, which CBP/OAM considers a "prototype for future transit zone UAS (drone) deployments."

CBP has been secretly deploying Predators into Mexican territory. In its description of the OAM operations, CBP states, "OAM works in collaboration with the Government of Mexico in addressing border security issues." But it has never publicly specified the form and the objectives of this collaboration.  Nor has it publicly acknowledged that its Predator drones have entered Mexican territory.

As part of the US global drug war and as an extension of border security, the US Northern Command acknowledged that the military was deploying - with the approval of the Mexican government - the $38 million Global Hawk drone into Mexico as part of the joint US-Mexico attempt to suppress the Mexican drug cartels. 

CBP says that OAM drones have not been deployed within Mexico, but notes that "OAM works in collaboration with the Government of Mexico in addressing border security issues, "without specifying the form and objectives of this collaboration." As part of the US global drug war and as an extension of border security, unarmed drones are also crossing the border into Mexico. The US Northern Command has acknowledged that the US military does fly a $38-million Global Hawk drone into Mexico to assist the Mexico's war against the drug cartels.

An April 28 Washington Post article by Dana Priest raises new questions and concerns about the increasing mission creep of homeland drones into foreign missions involving the U.S. military, CIA and Drug Enforcement Administration (DEA). 

President Felipe Calderón began requesting US drone flights into Mexico on targeted killings missions soon after he became president in December 2006. However, it wasn't until the July 2009 killing of a US Border Patrol agent by suspected Mexican drug smugglers that the US government began deploying unarmed Predator drones.

According to Washington Post reporter Priest, "[H]ours after Mexican smugglers shot and killed a U.S. Border Patrol agent while trying to steal his night-vision goggles, U.S. authorities were given permission to fly an unarmed Predator drone into Mexican airspace to hunt for suspects. Intelligence from the flights was passed to the Mexican army. Within 12 hours, the army brought back more information, according to two U.S. officials involved in the operation. Eventually, four suspects were captured. Three pleaded guilty, one is awaiting trial and a fifth remains at large."

 "That first flight dispelled Mexican fears that U.S. authorities would try to take control of drone operations,” noted the Washington Post article, "An agreement was reached that would temporarily give operational control to Mexican authorities during such flights. U.S. pilots sitting in the states would control the planes remotely, but a Mexican military or federal police commander would be able to direct the pilot within the boundaries of a Mexico-designated grid. By late 2010, drones were flying deeper into Mexico to spy on the cartels ..."

CBP has never stated for the public record that its Predators are being deployed over Mexican territory. In an attempt to clarify the nature and extent of Predator surveillance in Mexico, Truthout asked CBP to confirm that OAM drones stationed along the border were indeed being deployed into Mexico and whether CBP maintained operational control of these missions or whether CBP drones were piloted by nonagency personnel from the military or intelligence sector.

CBP officials declined to speak for attribution. Instead, a CBP official responded anonymously and ambiguously, stating:

"As part of the bilateral security cooperation, the Government of Mexico has asked the US government - in certain instances - for the support of unmanned aircraft to gather specific intelligence, particularly along the border region, in order to achieve concrete security goals. When such operations take place, Mexican authorities have the operational authorization, oversight and supervision.

"In 2009, the United States requested approval from the Mexican government to fly in Mexican airspace to support law enforcement officers assigned to search and apprehend Agent Rosas' murder suspects who fled into Mexico.

"During the current administration, the emphasis on the collaboration of information sharing has assisted in the fight of criminal organizations that affects populations on both sides of the border. Within this framework, information and greater intelligence gathering capabilities have been made available to both governments, to include support of unmanned aircraft."

Left hanging was the question about the role of DOD and the intelligence sector in piloting CBP drones and in analyzing the resulting surveillance data. It also remains unclear whether the Mexican government interacts directly with DHS and CBP/OAM or, in making its requests for drone surveillance, it bypasses DHS entirely.

Increased border security funding and more drones are a core part of all immigration reform proposals being introduced in Congress. However, because of the secrecy and lack of transparency and accountability that is systemic in the DHS border agencies, it is likely neither the Congress nor the US public understands that increasing the number of border security Predators also likely increases the foreign deployment of these drones in nonborder missions over foreign nations and international waters.

Communities, state legislatures and even some congressional members are proceeding to enact legislation and revise ordinances to decriminalize or legalize the consumption of drugs, especially marijuana, targeted by the federal government's drug war of more than four decades. At the same time, DHS has been escalating its contributions to the domestic and international drug war - in the name of both homeland security and national security. Drug seizures on the border and drug interdiction over coastal and neighboring waters are certainly the top operative priorities of OAM. Enlisting its Guardian drones in SOUTHCOM's drug interdiction efforts underscores the increasing emphasis within the entire CBP on counter-narcotic operations.

CBP is a DHS agency that is almost exclusively focused on tactics. While CBP, as the umbrella agency, the Office of the Border Patrol and OAM all have strategic plans, these plans are marked by their rigid military frameworks, their startling absence of serious strategic thinking and the diffuse distinctions between strategic goals and tactics. As a result of the border security buildup, south-north drug flows (particularly cocaine and more high-value drugs) have shifted back to marine smuggling, mainly through the Caribbean, but also through the Gulf of Mexico and the Pacific.

Rather than reevaluating drug prohibition and drug control frameworks for border policy, CBP/OAM has rationalized the procurement of more UAVs on the shifts in the geographical arenas of the drug war - albeit couching the tactical changes in the new drug war language of "transnational criminal organizations" and "narcoterrorism." The overriding framework for CBP/OAM operations is evolving from border security and homeland security to national security, as recent CBP presentations about its Guardian deployments illustrate.

Shortly before retiring after seven years as OAM's first chief, Major Gen. Kostelnik told a gathering of military contractors: "CPB's UAS Deployment Vision strengthens the National Security Response Capability." He may well be right, but the US public and Congress need to know if DHS plans to institute guidelines and limits that regulate the extent of DHS operational collaboration with DOD and the CIA.

Copyright, Truthout. May not be reprinted without permission.

The North American Neighborhood -- Changing Perspectives of U.S.-Mexico Relations

Border fence in West Texas / Tom Barry

May 2, 2013

Tom Barry

Published by NACLA at: https://nacla.org/news/2013/5/2/changing-perspectives-us-mexico-relations

TransBorder Project Policy Report

It’s unfortunate that the two presidents chose to hold their May 2-3 summit in Mexico City. Both nations and Presidents Barack Obama and Enrique Peña Nieto would have been better served by a meeting at the border—where the grim reality of neighborly relations would not be masked by the pomp and circumstance of the grand presidential residence of Los Pinos.

A meeting at the customs building in Ciudad Juárez—the site of the first Mexico-U.S. presidential meeting in 1909 between Porfirio Díaz and William Taft—would have likely resulted in a more memorable and productive summit of the current heads of state, Enrique Peña Nieto and Barack Obama. As it is, this meeting will likely be soon forgotten—lost in protocol, predictable rhetoric about interdependence, and the photogenic smiles of the two presidents.

A century ago the Rio Grande/Río Bravo clearly marked the divide between El Paso and Juárez, the border twins that were jointly known as El Paso del Norte—the pass to the north. Today, however, it’s unlikely that the presidential delegations and the accompanying media would now passes for a river—really just an alarmingly greenish trickle of pesticides, fertilizer runoff, and human waste.

Instead of news photos from the bilateral meeting depicting two smiling presidents, we would be witnessing images of the stark divide between the two neighbors: the formidable border security infrastructure, the smog rising from the long lines of vehicles waiting to cross, the beggars and street vendors taking advantage of the stalled south-north traffic, the ravages of the drug wars, the miles of low-slung factories called maquiladoras, the sprawling colonias of Mexico’s expanding, but still largely poor, middle class (those families earning at least $7,500 annually), and still-poorer squatter settlements that spread out into the Chihuahuan Desert.

The lead items of the Los Pinos meeting are ones that have long dominated U.S.-Mexico presidential meetings: immigration, border control, economic integration, and drug-related security. The presidents will achieve some camaraderie chatting about the domestic political obstacles that complicate their plans for national and international progress. In the pleasant, climate-controlled setting of Los Pinos, it’s unlikely that Peña Nieto and Obama will address in any depth, if at all, what will soon become the top agenda item of most binational and multilateral meetings: the scourge of climate change.

Climate Change

If Obama and Peña Nieto were to talk about common concerns while on the border instead of in sitting rooms of the White House and Los Pinos, they would see a common future in the river that divides the two nations. Climate change-aggravated drought has reduced the Río Bravo to a viscous, milky green trickle. Groundwater reserves in the greater borderlands are being quickly depleted, and farmers, ranchers, and city planners on both sides of the border are battling over rapidly diminishing supplies in the first skirmishes of the water wars that will surely soon overshadow the drug wars as the main threat to regional stability.

A common commitment by Obama and Peña Nieto for each government to do its part to mitigate and mutually adjust to climate change—which doesn’t respect border lines or border security fortifications—would be a sign that binational relations can move beyond being merely economic partners and fighting on the same side of the drug war.  The sad plight of the once glorious Río Bravo should not further divide the two nations, but bring the communities to the north and those to the south together as neighbors and part of the larger North American community with shared interests and responsibilities.

Immigration

Obama comes to Mexico buoyed by an increased personal popularity among U.S. Latinos and Mexicans, largely because of his deepened commitment to reform U.S. immigration policy, but also due to his more assertive stance on behalf of the poor and middle class. The improved (although faltering) prospects for immigration reform will not be well served if Obama continues to use the support for immigration reform as a political crutch.

At the Mexico City meeting, and during all policy discussions about immigration, President Obama should sketch out a new vision of regional immigration that is just, sustainable, and mutually beneficial, delink his support for immigration reform from the wasteful U.S. border security buildup, and administratively suspend the immigrant detention and deportation practices of the Department of Homeland Security until immigration reform is passed and instituted.

Immigration flows from Mexico have nearly zeroed out as the Mexican economy continues to expand at the relatively high rate of more than 3.5% annually since 2009. A reliable and easily used system of employee verification should be the guarantor of a sustainable immigration policy, rather than the proposed billion-dollar yearly increases in border security operations and infrastructure.

Border Security

The near-fortification of the border during the Bush and Obama administrations has greatly stymied regional trade and the once-vibrant crossborder culture. In highly urbanized areas such as the El Paso-Juárez metroplex, some level of border fencing makes for good neighborly relations, but the 3,169-kilometer border the “secure border fence” is not only a multibillion waste of scarce U.S. revenues, it’s also a shameful monument to U.S. xenophobia and political opportunism.

President Obama should shed the “border security” framing of U.S.-Mexico border policy adopted by the Bush administration and tell President Peña Nieto and the U.S. public that Mexico and Mexicans present no security risk to the borderlands or the U.S. homeland. Terrorism is a palpable threat to U.S. public safety and national security, but this threat is best met by better U.S. intelligence about potential foreign and domestic terrorists and by a common regional security perimeter—not by continuing or increasing military-like measures of border control including drones and militarized border patrols.

Economic Integration

Both presidents will likely commit their governments to facilitating cross-border commerce and improving the infrastructure necessary for vibrant, profitable trade and investment. That’s important, but Obama and Peña Nieto will be remiss if they do not first situate their discussion about economic integration within the context of the entire region.

The North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA) of 1994 fell far short of delivering the broadly shared economic development and employment gains promised by its promoters. It was little more than a trade and investment agreement, whose labor and environmental side accords and associated institutions had little enforcement power and limited reach. Even before NAFTA, the economies of Canada, United States, and Mexico were increasing their structural integration not just in trade but also in such now highly integrated sectors as energy resources, electricity, agriculture, and manufacturing (including highly integrated automotive and aviation production). Since 1994 regional trade has tripled and foreign investment increased six times. Mexico is the second largest importer of U.S. goods, following Canada; moreover, the United States is by far the leading market for Mexican exports.

Both Mexico and the United States are currently engaged in another economic liberalization initiative called the Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP), involving more than a dozen other nations, mostly Asian but also including Chile and Canada. Many of the concerns and criticisms about the corporate-driven character of NAFTA are also highly relevant to the TPP negotiations. However, the main problem of the new, Asia-oriented focus of U.S. and Mexican trade/investment initiatives is the failure to appreciate, leverage, and improve the highly integrated North American economy. The Obama and Peña Nieto trade teams should recognize the mutual benefits of including Canada in talks about smart borders, trade infrastructure, educational visas, security perimeters, immigration, and further economic liberalization—as should the Canadian government.

Presidents Obama and Peña Nieto should embrace the concept—and the reality—of a North American community (a concept heralded by Robert Pastor and other scholars and visionary policy analysts) shaped by demographic trends and economic integration. Whether structured or not by new regulations and institutions, the emergence of a North American community is evident in existence of some 30 million Mexican Americans in the United States.

The NAFTA institutions such as the North American Development Bank and the North American Commission for Environmental Cooperation as well as such important bilateral initiatives as Border 2020 (which emerged from the 1983 La Paz environmental agreement) should not be left to wither away, but seized upon as the building blocks of a more sustainable regional community that extends beyond economic liberalization. Such institutions are among the first steps of recognizing and shaping the south-north community. Focusing on Asia is looking away from our own region’s complementarity and common future.

Both governments will surely point to fundamental importance of the two nations as trading partners. Yet the trade and investment numbers fall far short in defining the identity, advantages, and challenges of the U.S.-Mexico relationship. More than economic partners, the United States and Mexico are next-door neighbors and all that this proximity implies for the future welfare of both nations. Governance measures on such issues as energy, environmental standards, immigration flows, weapons, illegal drugs, and labor standards need to follow and shape economic integration. If there is to be a sustainable North American community, the framework of economic integration must necessarily address the stark regional imbalances in Mexico’s economic growth and development—with Mexico’s southern states left further and further behind. Similarly, cheaper consumer goods made possible by liberalized trade and investment do not compensate for stagnation of Mexican wages—averaging just over $2 an hour.

Not to be missed is the growing militancy of teachers, students, and agricultural workers in southern Mexico, which was the defining theme of the May 1 marches in Mexico City and elsewhere. Casting a long shadow over the summit will be the intensifying teacher-led protests over the federal reforms of labor and education policy. Centered in Mexico’s poorest southern states, especially Guerrero, the anti-government opposition is protesting the labor, energy, and education reforms of the Peña Nieto government and the Pact for Mexico, which has brought together Mexico’s leading political parties over a package of long-overdue reforms.

Drugs and Guns

Drug trafficking and related violence have largely shaped the binational relationship over the past six years. During his first term, President Obama correctly identified the “shared responsibility” of the United States for the horrific drug-related violence in Mexico. But the Obama administration abysmally failed in shouldering its responsibility. By continuing the military-oriented aid of the Bush administration’s Mérida Initiative, the Obama administration contributed to the increase of drug-related violence and human rights violations in Mexico. By encouraging and largely directing the Calderón government’s military-directed drug war, the Obama administration—along with the Calderón government and Mexico’s security forces—turned large parts of Mexico into killing grounds where assault weapons, not the rule of law, are the only instruments of governance and control.

Despite the Obama administration’s assessment that Mexican drug trafficking organizations constitute a security threat not only to Mexico but also to the United States and to the nations of Central America, President Obama has failed to take sufficient measures to stop the flow of military-grade weaponry to organized criminal organizations and bandits in the region.

The failure to stand up for gun control until the Newtown massacre is emblematic of President Obama’s lead-from-behind posture in many controversial domestic issues, including immigration. In truly addressing the shared responsibility of the United States for violence in Mexico—which has led to the killing or disappearance of nearly 100,000 Mexicans (overwhelmingly civilians) since 2006—President Obama needs to take the lead in finally ending the drug prohibition era and the related U.S.-supported drug wars.

Similarly, President Peña Nieto must, as part of his declared commitment to “crime prevention” and ending the military-led drug war, call for drug legalization in the United States, joining other Latin American leaders as well as Javier Sicilia and the Movement for Justice with Peace and Dignity.  Although not yet calling for the end to the drug-prohibition induced drug wars, Peña Nieto has rightly ended the wholesale drug-interdiction campaigns and drug-kingpin targeting initiated by Calderón and the U.S. government and instead committed his administration to a violence-reduction and law-enforcement strategy.

While the shape of the strategy remains unclear, dramatically reducing the pervasive and proactive military presence throughout much of Mexico has been an appropriate first step. The Mexican president has narrowed the window of U.S. involvement in intelligence, counternarcotics operations, and Mexican military affairs—a clear rebuff to the U.S. government. The Obama administration may be justifiably concerned about the ability of the new government to diminish the power and reach of criminal organizations built largely on drug-trafficking, yet President Obama should, in a gesture of solidarity and shared responsibility, acknowledge the systemic flaws in U.S. counternarcotics and anti-organized crime strategies.

Pervasive patterns of human rights violations, impunity, and police and judicial corruption/reform should be top among U.S. concerns at the presidential meeting. At the same time, however, President Obama should acknowledge that the United States’ four-decade strategy of attempting to reduce the flow of illicit drugs has not only failed, but also led to a raft of adverse consequences.

The Political Economy of Drones

Ceremonial unveiling of new homeland security drone at General Atomics.

Published in Counterpunch, May 1, 2013

The Pentagon, military, intelligence agencies and military contractors are longtime proponents of UAVs for intelligence, surveillance and reconnaissance (ISR) missions. Following President Bush’s declaration of a “global war on terrorism,” the White House became directly involved in expanding drone deployment in foreign wars – especially in directing drone strikes.

The most unabashed advocates of drone proliferation, however, are in Congress. They claim drones can solve many of America’s most pressing problems – from eliminating terrorists to keeping the homeland safe from unwanted immigrants. However, there has been little congressional oversight of drone deployments, both at home and abroad.

Since the post-9/11 congressional interest in drone issues – budgets, role in national airspace, overseas sales, border deployment and UAVs by law enforcement agencies – drone boosterism in Congress has prevailed of any incipient oversight or governance role. Drones made an appearance in the Senate in the first foray to implement immigration reform, when on January 28, 2013 a bipartisan group of senators argued their proposal legislation would “increase the number of unmanned aerial vehicles and surveillance equipment….”

Drone promotion by U.S. representatives and senators in Congress pops up in what at first may seem the unlikeliest of places. Annually, House members join with UAS manufacturers to fill the foyer and front rooms of the Rayburn House Office Building with displays of the latest drones – an industry show introduced in glowing speeches by highly influential House leaders, notably Buck McKeon, the Southern California Republican who chairs the House Armed Service Committee and co-chairs the Congressional Unmanned Systems Caucus (CUSC).

Advances in communications, aviation and surveillance technology have all accelerated the coming of UAVs to the home front.  Yet drones aren’t solely about technological advances. Money flows and political influence also factor in.

Congressional Caucus on Unmanned Systems

At the forefront of the money/politics nexus is the Congressional Caucus on Unmanned Systems (CCUS). Four years ago, the CCUS (then known as the House Unmanned Aerial Vehicle Caucus) was formed by a small group of congressional representatives – mainly Republicans and mostly hailing from districts with drone industries or bases.

By late 2012, the House caucus had 60 members and had changed its name to encompass all unmanned systems – whether aerial, marine or ground-based. This bipartisan caucus, together with its allies in the drone industry, has been promoting UAV use at home and abroad through drone fairs on Capitol Hill, new legislation and drone-favored budgets.

CCUS aims to “educate members of Congress and the public on the strategic, tactical, and scientific value of unmanned systems; actively support further development and acquisition of more systems, and to more effectively engage the civilian aviation community on unmanned system use and safety.”

In late 2012, the caucus comprised a collection of border hawks, immigration hardliners and leading congressional voices for the military contracting industry. The two caucus co-chairs, Howard “Buck” McKeon, R-California, and Henry Cuellar, D-Texas, are well positioned to accelerate drone proliferation. McKeon, whose southern California district includes major drone production facilities, notably General Atomics, is the caucus founder and chair of the House Armed Services Committee. Cuellar, who represents the Texas border district of Laredo, is the ranking member (and former chairman) of the House Subcommittee on Border and Maritime Security.

Other caucus members include Brian Bilbray (R-Calif.), who heads the House Immigration Reform Caucus; Candice Miller (R-Minn.), who heads the Homeland Security subcommittee that reviews the air and marine operations of DHS; Joe Wilson (R-SC); Jerry Lewis (R-Calif.); Dana Rohrabacher (R-Calif.); Loretta Sanchez (D-Calif.); and Duncan Hunter (R-Calif.). Eight caucus members were also members of the powerful House Appropriations Committee in the 112^th Congress.

The caucus and its leading members (along with drone proponents in the Senate) have played key roles in drone proliferation at home and abroad through channeling earmarks to Predator manufacturer General Atomics, prodding the Department of Homeland Security to establish a major drone program, adding amendments to authorization bills for the Federal Aviation Administration and Department of Defense to ensure the more rapid integration of UAVs into the national airspace, and increasing annual DOD and DHS budgets for drone R&D and procurements.  To accelerate drone acquisitions and deployment at home, Congress has an illustrative track record of legislative measures (see accompanying box).

Congressional support for the development and procurement of Predators dates back to 1996, and is reflected in the defense and intelligence authorization acts. An Air Force-sponsored study of the Predator’s rise charted the increases mandated by the House Armed Service and the House Intelligence committees over the Predator budget requests made by the Air Force in its budgets requests. Between 1996 and 2006 (ending date of study), “Congress has recommended an increase, over and above USAF requests, in the Predator budget for nearly 10 years in a row.  This has resulted in a sum total increase of over a half a billion dollars over the years.”

Association of Unmanned Vehicle Systems

CCUS cosponsors the annual drone fete with the Association of Unmanned Vehicle Systems International (AUVSI), an industry group that brings together the leading drone manufacturers and universities with UAV research projects. AUVSI represents the interests in the expansion of unmanned systems expressed by many of the estimated 100 U.S. companies and academic institutions involved in developing and deploying the some 300 of the currently existing UAV models.

The drone association has a $7.5-million annual operating budget, including $2 million a year for conferences and trade shows to encourage government agencies and companies to use unmanned aircraft.

AUVSI also has its own congressional advocacy committee that is closely linked to the caucus. The keynote speaker at the drone association’s annual conference in early 2012 was Representative McKeon. The congressman was also the featured speaker at AUVSI’s AIR Day 2011, in recognition, says AUVSI’s president, that Congressman McKeon “has been one of the biggest supporters of the unmanned systems community.”

The close relationship between the congressional drone caucus and AUVSI was reflected in a similar relationship between CBP/OAM and AUVSI. Tom Faller, the CBP official who directed the UAV program at OAM, joined the AUVSI 23-member board-of-directors in August 2011, a month before the association hosted a technology fair in foyer of the Rayburn House Office Building.  OAM participated in the fair.  Faller resigned from the unpaid position on Nov. 23, 2011 after the Los Angeles Times queried DHS about Faller’s unpaid position in the industry association. Faller is currently subject of a DHS internal ethics-violation investigation.

Contracts, contributions, earmarks and favors

Once a relatively insignificant part of the military-industrial complex, the UAV development and manufacturing sector is currently expanding faster than any other component of military contracting. Drone orders from various federal departments and agencies are rolling in to AUVSI corporate members, including such leading military contractors as General Atomics, Lockheed Martin and Northrop Grumman. (Unlike most major military contractors, General Atomics is not a corporation but a privately held firm, whose two major figures are Linden and Neal Blue, both of whom have high security clearances)

U.S. government drone purchases – not counting contracts for an array of related UAV services and “payloads” – rose from $588 million to $1.3 billion over the past five years. The FY2013 DOD budget includes $5.8 billion for UAVs, which does not include drone spending by the intelligence community, DHS or other federal entities. The Pentagon says that its “high-priority” commitment to expenditures for drone defense and warfare has resulted in “strong funding for unmanned aerial vehicles that enhance intelligence, surveillance, and reconnaissance capabilities.”

While the relationship between increasing drone contracts and the increasing campaign contributions received by drone caucus members can only be speculated, caucus members are favored recipients of contributions by AUVSI members. In the 2010 and 2012 election cycles, political action committees associated with companies that produce drones donated more than $2.4 million to members of the congressional drone caucus.

The leading recipient was McKeon, with Representative Silvestre Reyes, the influential Democrat from El Paso (who lost his seat in the 2012 election), coming in a close second. General Atomics counted among McKeon’s top five contributors in the last election. (See Figure 1) Frank W. Pace, the director of General Atomics Aeronautical Systems, contributed to two candidates – Buck McKeon and Jerry Lewis – during the 2012 electoral campaign. (See Figure 2)

Who were the top recipients of the General Atomics campaign contributions in the 2012 cycle? Four of the top five recipients were not surprising – Buck McKeon, Jerry Lewis, Duncan Hunter and Brian Bilbray – given their record of support for UAVs and all manner of military contracts and their position among the most influential drone caucus members. (See Figure 3)

The relationship that has been consolidating between General Atomics and the U.S. Air Force since the early 1990s has been mediated and facilitated in Congress by influential congressional representatives, led by southern Californian Republican Rep. Jerry Lewis, a member of the House Appropriations Defense Committee and vice-chairman of the House Permanent Select Committee on Intelligence.

Lewis, a favored recipient of General Atomics campaign contributions, used his appropriations influence to ensure that the Air Force gained full control of the UAV program by 1998. Lewis, a prominent member of the “Drone Caucus,” has received at least $10,000 every two years in campaign contributions from General Atomics’ political action committee – $80,000 since 1998, according to OpenSecrets.org. During the 2012 campaign cycle, General Atomics was the congressman’s top campaign donor.

The top ranking recipient of General Atomics campaign contributions isn’t a CUSC member. Senator Diane Feinstein’s (D-Calif.) contributions from General Atomics easily placed her at the top of the list. Feinstein, who chairs the powerful Senate Intelligence Committee, was also favored in the campaign contributions by Linden Blue, the president of General Atomics. (See Figure 4)

Senator Feinstein has been a highly consistent supporter of the intelligence community and military budgets. Her failure to oppose the clandestine drone strikes ordered by the White House and CIA have sparked widespread criticism by those who argue the strikes are unconstitutional, illegal under international law and counterproductive as a counterterrorism tactic.

In 2012, General Atomics was Feinstein’s third largest campaign contributor, while other leading contributors were the military contractors General Dynamics (from which General Atomics emerged), BAE Systems and Northrup Grumman. Feinstein’s connections to General Atomics extend beyond being top recipient of their campaign contributions. Rachel Miller, a former (2003-2007) legislative assistant for Feinstein, has served as a paid lobbyist for General Atomics, both working directly for the firm (in 2011) and as a General Atomics lobbyist employed by Capitol Solutions (2009 – present), one of the leading lobbying firms contracted by General Atomics.

And did you know that Linden Blue plans to marry Retired Rear Adm. Ronne Froman? Few others knew about the engagement of this high-society San Diego couple until Senator Feinstein announced the planned marriage at a mid-November 2012 meeting of the downtown San Diego business community – news that quickly appeared the Society pages of the San Diego Union-Tribune. There has been no explanation offered why Feinstein broke this high-society news, but the announcement certainly did point to the senator’s likely personal connections to Blue and Froman (who was hired by General Atomics as senior vice-president in December 2007 and has since left the firm).

Campaign contributions and personal connections create goodwill and facilitate contracts. General Atomics also counts on the results produced by a steady stream of lobbying dollars – which have risen dramatically since 2003, and been averaging $2.5 million annually since 2005. In 2012, General Atomics spent $2,470,000 lobbying Congress.

Congressional earmarks were critical to the rise of the Predator, both its earlier unarmed version as well as the later “Hunter-Killer.” The late senator Daniel K. Inouye, the Hawaii Democrat who chaired the Senate Appropriations Committee, told the New York Times that if the House ban on commercial earmarks that was introduced in 2010 had been in effect earlier, ”we would not have the Predator today.”

Tens of millions of dollars in congressional earmarks in the 1990s went to General Atomics and other military contractors for the early development of what became the Predator program, reported the New York Times. Inouye was a source of a number of these multimillion earmarks for General Atomics, whose large campaign contributions to the influential Hawaii senator from 1998 to 2012 ($5000 in this last campaign) could be regarded as thank-you notes since Inouye faced insignificant political opposition.

Figure 1

Buck McKeon, Campaign Contributions (2012 cycle)

Top Contributors

Lockheed Martin $65,750

General Dynamics                       $60,000

Northrup Grumman                      $50,500

General Atomics                       $38,800

Boeing                                            $31,750

___________________________________________

Source: OpenSecrets.org (includes corporate PACs and company officers, employees, and family members)

Figure 2

Frank W. Pace, President of General Atomics Aeronautical Systems

Campaign Contributions (2012 cycle),

Top Individual Recipients

Buck McKeon (R)   $4,000

Jerry Lewis (R)   $1,000

________________________________________

Source: OpenSecrets.org

Figure 3

General Atomics, Campaign Contributions (2012 cycle)

Top Individual Recipients

Diane Feinstein (D)     $54,750

Buck McKeon (R)                      $38,800

Jerry Lewis (R)                           $22,400

Duncan Hunter (R)     $16,450

Brian Bilbray (R)     $13,250

________________________________

Source: OpenSecrets.org

Figure 4

Linden Blue, President of General Atomics

Campaign Contributions (2012 cycle)

Top Individual Recipients

Buck, McKeon $7,100

Duncan Hunter $3,950

Diane Feinstein $3,500

Mitt Romney   $2,450

Jerry Lewis $1,000

_______________________________________

Source: OpenSecrets.org

Besides campaign contributions, General Atomics routinely hands out favors to congressional representatives thought likely to support drone proliferation. A 2006 report by the Center for Public Integrity identified Jerry Lewis as one of two congressional members and more than five dozen congressional staffers who traveled overseas courtesy of General Atomics. The center’s report, The ‘Top Gun’ of Travel, observed this “little-known California defense contractor [has] far outspent its industry competitors on travel for more than five years — and in 2005 landed promises of billions of dollars in federal business.” Most of this business was in the form of drone development and procurement by the Pentagon and DHS.

Questioned about this pattern of corporate-sponsored trips, Thomas Cassidy, founder of General Atomics Aeronautical Systems, said, “[It's] useful and very helpful, in fact, when you go down and talk to the government officials to have congressional people go along and discuss the capabilities of [the plane] with them,” A follow-up investigation by the San Diego Union-Tribune reported, “Most of that was spent on overseas travel related to the unmanned Predator spy plane made by General Atomics Aeronautical Systems, an affiliated company.”

Looking Desperately for Oversight

In practice, there’s more boosterism than effective oversight in the House Homeland Security Committee and its Subcommittee on Border and Maritime Security, which oversees DHS’s rush to deploy drones to keep the homeland secure. The same holds true for most of the more than one hundred other congressional committees that purportedly oversee the DHS and its budget. Since DHS’ creation, Congress has routinely approved annual and supplementary budgets for border security that have been higher than those requested by the president and DHS.

CCUS member and chair of the House Border and Maritime Security subcommittee, Representative Candice Miller, R-Michigan, is effusive and unconditional in her support of drones. Miller described her personal conviction that drones are the answer to border insecurity at the July 15, 2010 subcommittee hearing on UAVs.

“You know, my husband was a fighter pilot in Vietnam theater, so—from another generation, but I told him, I said, ‘Dear, the glory days of the fighter jocks are over.’”

“The UAVs, the Unmanned Aerial Vehicles are coming,” continued Miller,  “and now you see our military siting in a cubicle sometimes in Nevada, drinking a Starbucks, running these things in theater and being incredibly, incredibly successful.”

The uncritical drone boosterism in Congress was underscored in aWashington Post article on the use of drones for border security.  In his trips to testify on Capitol Hill, Kostelnik said he had never been challenged in Congress about the appropriate use of homeland security drones. “Instead, the question is: ‘Why can’t we have more of them in my district?’” remarked the OAM chief.

Since 2004, the DHS’ UAV program has drawn mounting concern and criticism from the government’s own oversight and research agencies, including the Congressional Research Service, the Government Accountability Office and the DHS’s own Office of Inspector General.

These government entities have repeatedly raised questions about the cost-efficiency, strategic focus and performance of the homeland security drones. Yet, rather than subjecting DHS officials to sharp questioning, the congressional committees overseeing homeland security and border security operations have, for the most part, readily and often enthusiastically accepted the validity of undocumented assertions by testifying CBP officials. The House Subcommittee on Border and Maritime Security has been especially notorious for its lack of critical oversight.

As part of the budgetary and oversight process, the House and Senate committees that oversee DHS have not insisted that CBP undertake cost-benefit evaluations, institute performance measures, implement comparative evaluations of its high-tech border security initiatives, or document how its UAV program responds to realistic threat assessments.  Instead of providing proper oversight and ensuring that CBP/OAM’s drone program is accountable and transparent, congressional members from both parties seem more intent on boosting drone purchases and drone deployment.

As CBP was about to begin its first drone deployments in 2005 as part of the Operation Safeguard pilot project, the Congressional Research Service observed: “Congress will likely conduct oversight of Operation Safeguard before considering wider implementation of this technology.” Unfortunately, Congress never reviewed the results of Operation Safeguard pilot project, and CBP declined requests by this writer to release the report of this UAV pilot project.

Congress has been delinquent in its oversight duties. In addition to the governmental research and monitoring institutions, it has been mainly the nongovernmental sector – including the American Civil Liberties Union, Electronic Frontier Foundation, Center for Constitutional Rights, and the Center for International Policy – that has alerted the public about the lack of transparency and accountability in the DHS drone program and the absence of responsible governance over the domestic and international proliferation of UAVs.

In September 2012, the Senate formed its own bipartisan drone caucus, the Senate Unmanned Aerial Systems Caucus, co-chaired by Jim Inhofe (R-Okla.) and Joe Manchin (D-W.Va.). “This caucus will help develop and direct responsible policy to best serve the interests of U.S. national defense and emergency response, and work to address any concerns from senators, staff and their constituents,” said Inhofe.

It is still too early to ascertain if the Senate’s drone caucus will follow its counterpart in the House in almost exclusively focusing on promoting drone proliferation at home and abroad. It is expected, however, that caucus members will experience increased flows of campaign contributions from the UAS industry. While Senator Manchin just won his first full-term in the 2012 election, Senator Inhofe has been favored by campaign contributions from military contractors, including General Atomics ($14,000 in 2012), since he took office in 2007. His top campaign contributor was Koch Industries.

For its part, AUVSI, the drone industry association, gushed in its quickly offered commendation. “I would like to commend Senators Inhofe and Manchin for their leadership and commitment in establishing the caucus, which will enable AUVSI to work with the Senate and stakeholders on the important issues that face the unmanned systems community as the expanded use of the technology transitions to the civil and commercial markets,” said AUVSI President and CEO Michael Toscano. “It is our hope to establish the same open dialogue with the Senate caucus as we have for the past three years with the House Unmanned Systems Caucus,” the AUVSI executive added.

There is rising citizen concern about drones and privacy and civil rights violations. The prospective opening of national airspace to UAVs has sparked a surge of concern among many communities and states – eleven of which are considering legislation in 2013 that would restrict how police and other agencies would deploy drones. But paralleling new concern about the threats posed by drone proliferation is local and state interest in attracting new UAV testing facilities and airbases for the FAA and other federal entities.

FAA and industry projections about the number of UAVs (15,000 by 2020, 30,000 by 2030) that may be using national airspace – the same space used by all commercial and private aircraft – have sparked a surge of new congressional activism, with several new bills introduced by non-drone caucus members in the new Congress that respond to the new fears about drone proliferation. Yet there is no one committee in the House or the Senate that has assumed the responsibility for UAV oversight to lead the way toward creating a foundation of laws and regulations establishing a political framework for UAV use going forward.

At this point, there is no federal agency or congressional committee that is providing oversight over drone proliferation – whether in regard to U.S. drone exports, the expanding drone program of DHS, drone-related privacy concerns, or UAV use by private or public firms and agencies. Gerald Dillingham, top official of the Government Accountability Office, testified in Congress about this oversight conundrum. When asked which part of the federal government was responsible for regulating drone proliferation in the interest of public safety and civil rights, the GAO director said, “At best, we can say it’s unknown at this point.”

Tom Barry directs the TransBorder Project at the Center for International Policy and is the author of Border Wars from MIT Press and numerous books on U.S.-Latin American relations. He is also the author of a new policy report Drones Over the Homeland.