Pink and blue lighting fixtures blink within the Danish sky. Is it a aircraft, a satellite tv for pc, or a drone soaring overhead? Over the last few weeks, increasingly more Danes were scanning the skies for mysterious flying gadgets, stuck between interest and unease as sightings around the nation spark contemporary worry.
Drones were sighted over airports and army bases in all places Denmark. Air site visitors has been behind schedule, politicians have accumulated for disaster conferences, and Nato has been referred to as directly to act.
We discuss drones in our espresso breaks, exchanging newly received professional wisdom about flight heights and battery energy. We communicate to our kids about “hybrid warfare”. And many people stroll round with a odd and eerie feeling that one thing within the sky is gazing us.
Even supposing Russia’s function within the fresh drone incidents stays unconfirmed, the sightings come in opposition to a backdrop of escalating tensions between the 2 international locations, and simply after Copenhagen introduced it will gain long-range precision guns, drawing sharp threats from Moscow. Certainly, analysts have prompt the drone flyovers would possibly shape a part of a much broader Russian technique to sow worry, check Nato’s defences, and erode Danish fortify for Ukraine.
That monstrous stare
As a professor of tradition and era, my analysis specializes in surveillance, drones and the way we speak about warfare. On this sense, surveillance from above is a story as previous as time. Bring to mind that godly “eye in the sky”, discussed by way of the Previous Egyptians and within the Bible. That celestial all-seeing entity with superhuman powers to come to a decision whether or not you must reside or die, just like the drone itself.
This connection isn’t just highlighted in pop culture, reminiscent of within the name of the 2015 movie Eye within the Sky about army drone moves, but in addition by way of the army trade itself.
There’s, as an example, a US army drone, Gorgon Stare, named after a monstrous determine from Greek mythology, maximum famously represented by way of the 3 sisters Stheno, Euryale and Medusa. The latter is understood for turning somebody who seems to be at her into stone. The Gorgon Stare is provided with many cameras and armed with Hellfire missiles.
Trailer for 2015 movie, Eye within the Sky.
But it surely’s no longer most effective the assumed drone’s energy of hypervision that provides us the creeps. It’s additionally exactly its reverse function: its invisibility. Even supposing we may see some dots and shadows within the sky, the drone pilot remains invisible. Who steers this Unmanned Aerial Car (UAV)? Who controls it – or does it even keep watch over itself? It’s deeply rooted in our human instincts that after we really feel noticed by way of an invisible pressure, we really feel alarm and our frightened device enters defence mode.
On this context, some other Greek fantasy involves thoughts: Gyges. The Greek thinker Plato wrote concerning the shepherd Gyges, who found out a mystical ring that would make him invisible. Armed with this new energy, Gyges turned into king and ruler over the rustic. Drones function in a similar fashion to Gyges’s technique, as their pilots additionally stay hidden within the shadows.
Threatening sky
People have a tendency to thrive on eye touch. However drones don’t seem to be about seeing each and every different. In relation to preventing, there’s no duel anymore. Drones don’t announce themselves. They overlook world treaties, wreck regulations of warfare, and fly underneath the radar.
The drone flyovers in Denmark reveal our vulnerabilities and erode the sanctity of our airspace. Many were left questioning if we’re ready for this new form of conflict. However, inside of all this hype about drones, we need to take into account that aerial reconnaissance has been round for hundreds of years. Bring to mind kites, scorching air balloons and secret agent planes.
Who’s controlling the drone within the sky above you?
Gorodenkoff/Shutterstock
It’s additionally necessary to show that new applied sciences incessantly spark public unease. The primary automobiles have been met with nice anxiousness and worry. Electrical energy used to be observed as one thing supernatural. Those examples don’t intention to normalise the prime ranges of drone process we’ve observed over Denmark, or the emotions of worry and uncertainty those aerial automobiles have prompted.
However by way of taking a look at how new applied sciences were seen traditionally, it opens up house for important and nuanced discussion about their societal implications and the way we navigate their presence in our on a regular basis lives.
The historical past of surveillance from above presentations us that human unease with aerial reconnaissance is not anything new. However in lately’s local weather of geopolitical stress, drones are greater than symbols of technological exchange – they’re markers of the delicate steadiness between visibility, energy, and consider. And at the moment, that steadiness feels extra precarious than ever.
This text used to be commissioned with Videnskab.dk as a part of a partnership between it and The Dialog. The Danish model of the thing is right here.
