The United Kingdom is studying the use of autonomous weapons that can fire without human intervention

London.- The United Kingdom is considering starting to use weapons systems that can, under certain circumstances, select a target and fire without human intervention in the decision, said the Secretary of State for the Armed Forces, Al Carns. "I always say there needs to be a human in the process. But you have to have the ability to take that human out of the loop if necessary, because our adversaries aren't going to care about having a human there," Carns told the Financial Times (FT). Carns, who expressed himself in this way during a forum of the military drone industry in Riga this week, implied that this is already happening, without specifying where or when. He explained that some British weapons already operate with great autonomy "where missile systems can target, identify their targets and strike them". It is not clear whether Carns' words represent an official shift in British policy.

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In a recent report to a UN body, the British Government explained that it did not possess autonomous weapons "that operate without the appropriate context of human involvement, or outside of human responsibility and decision-making, nor does it intend to develop them". However, the FT points out that within NATO there is a growing debate on the issue and more and more voices are in favor of introducing those automatic weapons. It is believed that Russia is using them in Ukraine, as Israel has done in Gaza and the US in Iran.