What are Drones?

I am posting this in World affairs as I often see them mentioned in WA stories especially those about Pakistan.

Simple Definition: They are unmanned aircraft. Piloted remotely from somebody on the ground.

There are two primary types used by the US military. the majority are flown by enlisted men in the army and are essentially flying TV cameras the army uses to do observations over an area either to find targets or to find an escape route. They are small, low cost and normally considered expendable and for one time usage. They are currently being issued to quite a few ground soldiers.

The larger "Predator" is an unmanned bomber, capable of carrying a number of bombs they are flown by commissioned officers, have a long range and are used very similar as a manned bomber and do fly many missions returning to be refueled and reloaded. I do not know how many are flown by US pilots or if any have been given out to other military forces. It is possible some are flown by the Pakistan and Turkish Air forces.

There has been some squabble about them by disabled American Veterans who flew in Korea, WW2 and Vietnam that have not had a cost of living increase for 2 years, while the pilots of the drones are drawing combat pay while sitting at a desk thousands of miles from any danger and flying them on a computer screen. Yet this is probably the future for what will become the standard combat aircraft of the Air Force. Looks like the day of the combat pilot is over and is being replaced by computer nerds sitting safely in luxury hotel rooms.

The "drones" flying over Pakistan are no different from manned bombers, except there is no pilot at risk of being shot down. The plane can be shot down, but there is no crew on board. The crew most likely is sitting in a nice comfortable room thousands of miles away, sipping on their fresh made cappuccino and flying on a computer screen, like they are on a computer action game.