The
car
heads
across
the
scorched
desert
of
the
Arabian
peninsula,
a
suspected
terrorist
mastermind
at
the
wheel,
while
just
out
of
sight,
his
nemesis
circles
above
in
the
form
of
small
robot
plane.
In
an
air-conditioned
room
on
the
US
eastern
seaboard,
a
man
in
shirtsleeves
sips
his
coffee
and
presses
a
key
on
his
laptop
computer,
dealing
out
death
half
a
world
away.
The
drone
unleashes
its
Hellfire
missiles,
blasting
the
car
to
pieces,
then
banks
and
heads
for
home,
coldly
oblivious
to
the
receding
ball
of
flame.
That,
or
something
like
it,
may
have
been
the
scenario
for
the
killing
of
an
al-Qaeda
operative
and
five
associates
in
Yemen
on
Sunday,
reportedly
by
the
US
Central
Intelligence
Agency
(CIA).
The
assassination
marks
a
new
step
in
a
trend
towards
unmanned
warfare,
in
which
expensively
trained
pilots
and
frontline
troops
will
be
increasingly
taken
over
by
cheap
robots.
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