The growing Italian investments in military drones have consequences that go beyond the economic ones
Manlio Dinucci
He landed at the US / NATO base in Sigonella in Sicily, After 22 hours of flight from Palmdale Air Base in California, the first drone of the Ags system (Alliance Ground Surveillance) of NATO, enhanced version of the US Global Hawk drone (Global Hawk). From Sigonella, main base of operations, this and four other remotely piloted aircraft of the same type, supported by several mobile land stations, will allow to "monitor", that is to spy, vast land and sea areas from the Mediterranean to Africa, from the Middle East to the Black Sea.
The NATO drones remotely controlled by Sigonella, able to fly for 16.000 km a 18.000 m in height, will transmit the collected data to the base. These, after being analyzed by the operators of over 20 workstations, will be placed on the encrypted network headed by the Supreme Allied Commander in Europe, always a US general appointed by the president of the United States.
The Ags system, which will become operational in the first half of 2020, it will be integrated with the Strategic Management Hub for the South: the intelligence center that, at the NATO headquarters in Lago Patria (Naples) under command Use, has the task of collecting and analyzing information functional to military operations, especially in Africa and the Middle East.
Main launch base for these operations, carried out mostly secretly with attack drones and special forces, is that of Sigonella, where US Reaper drones armed with missiles and laser and satellite guided bombs are deployed. Attack drones and special forces, while they are in action, are connected, through the Muos station in Niscemi (Caltanissetta), to the ultra-high frequency military satellite communications system that allows the Pentagon to control, through its command and communications network, drones and fighter-bombers, submarines and warships, military vehicles and land departments, while they are on the move wherever they are in the world.
In the same framework operate the 15 Predator and Reaper and the other drones of the Italian Air Force, remote-controlled from the Amendola base in Puglia. Even the Italian Reaper can be armed with missiles and laser-guided bombs for attack missions.
The Ags system, which enhances Italy's role in the "drone war", it is made with "significant contributions" by 15 Allies: United States, Italy, Germany, Norway, Denmark, Luxembourg, Poland, Romania, Bulgaria, Czech Republic, Estonia, Latvia, Lithuania, Slovakia, Slovenia. The system's main contractor is Northrop Grumman from the United States. The Italian Leonardo provides two transportable ground stations.
The Italian "contribution" to the AGS system consists, as well as in making the main operational base available, in the sharing of expenses initially with over 210 million euros. Others 240 millions of euros were spent on the purchase of the Predator and Reaper drones. Including the others already purchased and those that are expected to be purchased, Italian spending on military drones rises to about one and a half billion euros, to which are added the operating costs. Paid with public money, within the framework of a military expenditure which is about to pass from the current average of approx 70 million euros a day to about one 87 millions of euros a day.
The growing Italian investments in military drones have consequences that go beyond the economic ones. The use of war drones for secret operations under US / NATO command empties the parliament even more of any real decision-making power on military policy and consequently on foreign policy. The recent culling of an Italian Reaper (cost 20 million euros), flying over Libya, confirms that Italy is engaged in secret war operations in violation of Article 11 of our Constitution.
(the poster, 26 November 2019)