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two Russian navy ships engulfed in flames following a Ukrainian missile attack on a shipyard in Sevastopol in Russian-occupied Crimea, authorities said. Sevastopol’s Russia-installed governor, Mikhail Razvozhayev, said on the Telegram messaging app that Ukraine carried out the missile attack in the early hours of Wednesday, and Russian air defences attempted to repel the incoming projectiles. Russian ships at sea had also repelled a sea-borne drone attack. ...Russia’s Ministry of Defence said later that Ukrainian forces launched 10 cruise missiles at the shipyard and three unmanned sea drones at Russian ships in the Black Sea. “The Ukrainian armed forces launched...

The human race is on the brink of momentous and dire change. It is a change that potentially smashes our institutions and warps our society beyond recognition. It is also a change to which almost no one is paying attention. I’m talking about the coming obsolescence of the gun-wielding human infantryman as a weapon of war. Or to put it another way: the end of the Age of the Gun. ........................................................... The human race is on the brink of momentous and dire change. It is a change that potentially smashes our institutions and warps our society beyond recognition. It is...

US airspace could be crowded with some 7,500 commercial drones within the next five years, this is part of the Federal Aviation Administration's new roadmap unveiled on Thursday. The announcement is the latest step toward transitioning drones from military use in the war on terrorism to collecting survey and weather data to assisting rescues and law enforcement operations. "From advancing scientific research and responding to natural disasters to locating missing persons and helping to fight wildfires, drones can save time, save money and, most importantly, save lives," said a statement by Michael Toscano, president and CEO of the Association for...

The White House "kill list"--a regularly updated chart showing the world's most wanted terrorists used by President Barack Obama during kill or capture debates--may soon be getting a rule book to go with it. Until now, President Obama has had the "final moral calculation" overseeing the "kill list," the existence of which was first revealed in May in the wake of a drone strike that killed an al-Qaida leader. But according to the paper, administration officials are looking to curb the power of the commander in chief with the rule book:

DJIBOUTI CITY, Djibouti — Around the clock, about 16 times a day, drones take off or land at a U.S. military base here, the combat hub for the Obama administration’s counterterrorism wars in the Horn of Africa and the Middle East. Some of the unmanned aircraft are bound for Somalia, the collapsed state whose border lies just 10 miles to the southeast. Most of the armed drones, however, veer north across the Gulf of Aden to Yemen, another unstable country where they are being used in an increasingly deadly war with an al-Qaeda franchise that has targeted the United States....

American Women Marching into Tribal Pakistan: Obama 'Worse Than Bush' Anti-war activists head to Waziristan to protest drone strikes By STEVEN NELSON October 5, 2012 Thirty-two Americans associated with the feminist anti-war activist group Code Pink are in Pakistan for a march from Islamabad to that country's tumultuous tribal belt to protest American drone strikes that reportedly kill civilians along with their terrorist targets. ...snip... Alli McCracken, who said she was one of the 24 American women in the contingent, said via an E-mail that Obama is "worse than Bush in some respects; he uses drones significantly more than Bush...