drones vs. hand to hand-combat

American drones are a fixture of the global skies now. Pakistan and Yemen know it well. Hundreds of drone-fired missiles have come down out of the sky there. Thousands have died.

American drone warfare took off after 9.11, and accelerated sharply under President Barack Obama.

It has been Obama’s weapon of choice against Al Qaeda. But is it really legal, as 9.11 recedes and drone use spreads? And what kind of precedent is the United States setting for the future, when many nations have drones?

This hour, On Point: the law, and American drones.

Cmdr. Jason Salata, a spokesman for the U.S. Navy's 5th Fleet, says all U.S. drones in the region are "fully accounted for." He also cast doubt on Iranian claims Tuesday that the U.S. ScanEagle drone entered Iranian airspace, saying U.S. operations in the Persian Gulf are "confined to internationally recognized water and airspace." He says that U.S. ScanEagles have been lost into the sea in the past, but none have gone down recently. Other nations in the Gulf, including the United Arab Emirates, have ScanEagle drones in service. The 5th Fleet is based in Bahrain.

THIS IS A BREAKING NEWS UPDATE. Check back soon for further information. AP's earlier story is below.

Iran's state TV said Tuesday that the country's Revolutionary Guard has captured a U.S. drone after it entered Iranian airspace over the Persian Gulf. The report quoted the Guard's navy chief, Gen. Ali Fadavi, as saying that the Iranian forces caught the "intruding" drone, which had apparently taken off from a U.S. aircraft carrier. Fadavi said the unmanned ScanEagle aircraft was now in Iran's possession. "The U.S. drone, which was conducting a reconnaissance flight and gathering data over the Persian Gulf in the past few days, was captured by the Guard's navy air defense unit as soon as it entered Iranian airspace," Fadavi said. "Such drones usually take off from large warships."

He didn't provide any further details nor said when the incident happened. The U.S. Navy's 5th Fleet, based in Bahrain, said it was "looking into" the Iranian claims but had no immediate comment beyond that. But Al-Alam, the Iranian state TV's Arabic-language channel, showed two Guard commanders examining what appeared to be an intact ScanEagle drone. It was not immediately clear if that was the same drone Iran claimed to have captured. In the footage, the two men then point to a huge map of the Persian Gulf in the background, showing the drone's alleged path of entry into Iranian airspace. "We shall trample on the U.S," was printed over the map, next to the Guard's coat-of-arms.

If true, the seizure of the drone would be the third reported incident involving Iran and U.S. drones in the past two years. Last month, Iran claimed that a U.S. drone had violated its airspace. Pentagon said the unmanned aircraft came under fire - at least twice but was not hit - and that the Predator was over international waters. The Nov. 1 shooting in the Gulf was unprecedented, and further escalated tensions between the United States and Iran, which is under international sanctions over its suspect nuclear program. Tehran denies it's pursuing a nuclear weapon and insists its program is for peaceful purposes only.

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I'm not sure how some of this is specifically drone-related. It's not as though we couldn't use manned planes to drop bombs if we really wanted to. Drones are a way to avoid casualties on our side (as well as other considerations I'm sure, cost probably being a big one). Unmanned vehicles and weapons were always inevitable, I think, as soon as they became viable. It does change the way battle is viewed and fought, but it's hard to argue that a country should put it's people in danger in manned vehicles rather than using drones.

drones can violate other country's airspace w/ less chance of being detected.