Drone Pilots go from carnage to dinner table

Drone operators return to combat amid growing research they can suffer emotional strain, PTSD
Associated Press
Article by: JULIE WATSON
September 29, 2014

Then they might analyze the carnage and damage from bombings before driving home to eat dinner with their families and maybe play soccer with their children — a jarring shift that may contribute to stress, mental health experts say.

SAN DIEGO — President Barack Obama has assured Americans he opposes sending U.S. ground troops to crush Islamic extremists in Iraq and Syria — well aware the country is not ready to return to the battlefield with its war wounded still recovering from a decade of conflict.

But airmen have been sent back into combat in the region with the focus on airstrikes, divided between fighter pilots and drone operators.

While drone operators are not physically in harm's way — they do their work at computer terminals in darkened rooms far from the actual battlefield — growing research is finding they too can suffer some of the emotional strains of war that ground forces face.

"It can be as impactful for these guys as someone in a foxhole," said Air Force spokesman Tom Kimball.

The Bush and Obama administrations have both used the 2001 authorization of force against al-Qaida to justify drone strikes against terror targets in Pakistan, Yemen and Somalia.

During the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, drone operators pulled long shifts at U.S. bases, watching full-motion video across multiple screens. Some would follow the daily life of locals for months to assess threats before an airstrike was ordered.
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