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Who?
Sen. Mark Kelly (D-AZ) — Astronaut; Armed Services Committee
LISTEN: Laslo & Kelly
Ask a Pol asks:
We were struck by your questioning the other day to Joint Chiefs of Staff Chair Gen. Charles Brown on the intrusion of US airspace above sensitive military sites. This came up with Langley recently and Sen. Tim Kaine (D-VA) explained the quandary with rules of engagement in suburban areas.
Arizona’s got open spaces, has that ever come up — the rules of engagement — out there? Or does the Pentagon not even know what they’re looking at?
Key Kelly:
“So often we don’t know who these drones belong to. My suspicion is a lot of its hobbyists,” Sen. Mark Kelly tells Ask a Pol. “But some of it is also very likely to be foreign nationals that are doing surveillance with low-cost systems that are somewhat expendable. And it's hard to track ‘em. It's also hard to take them down.”
Background:
Caught our ear:
“You could do a lot with a cheap drone. We see that in Ukraine every single day. So we need to get a better system in place and also deter people from flying around military bases. So myself and Sen. [Chuck] Grassley have legislation to do that,” Kelly tells us. “And so we'd like to get that legislation passed that would provide penalties if you're found going into airspace above a military installation, and that would deter some of it. It's probably not going to deter our adversaries, but at least then you could bring the numbers down and you could more effectively and aggressively go after the remaining drone incursions.”
Quick comercial drone observation:
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Below find a rough transcript of Ask a Pol’s exclusive interview with Sen. Mark Kelly (D-AZ), slightly edited for clarity.
TRANSCRIPT: Sen. Mark Kelly
Matt Laslo: “Hey, how are you, sir?”
Mark Kelly: “Hi.”
ML: “I was struck by your questioning the other day on the persistence of — intrusion of the US airspace above sensitive military sites — were you pleased with the response?”
MK: “With drones around bases?”
ML: “Yeah.”
MK: “Yeah.”
ML: “How’d that get on your radar? Are you guys having those? Like I heard…”
MK: “We’ve had this problem in Arizona around Luke [Air Force Base in Maricopa County] and on the Barry Goldwater Range. Y’know, it’s one of the bigger restricted airspaces.”
ML: “Cause [Sen. Tim] Kaine brought it up with Langley. Here…”
ICYMI — Ask a Pol’s exclusive w/ Sen. Kaine
MK: “Yeah, that happened too recently.”
ML: “…and he was saying the rules of engagement in suburban areas would be different. It seems like — has that ever come up, the rules of engagement out there? Or do they not even know what they’re looking at?”
MK: “So often we don’t know who these drones belong to.”
ML: “Yeah?”
MK: “Y’know, my suspicion is a lot of it’s hobbyists.”
ML: “Yeah?”
MK: “But some of it is also very likely to be, y’know, foreign nationals that are doing surveillance with low-cost systems that are somewhat expendable. And it's hard to track ‘em. It's also hard to take them down.”
ML: “How do you know they’re drones and low-cost? Like, have they retrieved some of those?”
MK: “In some cases they have.”
ML: “Yeah?”
MK: “Yeah. And you could do a lot with a cheap drone. We see that in Ukraine every single day. So we need to get a better system in place and also deter people from flying around military bases. So myself and Sen. [Chuck] Grassley have legislation to do that. It's got multi-jurisdictions.”
ML: “Yeah.”
MK: “And so we'd like to get that legislation passed that would provide penalties if you're found going into airspace above a military installation, and that would deter some of it. It's probably not going to deter our adversaries, but at least then you could bring the numbers down and you could more effectively and aggressively go after the remaining drone incursions.”
ML: “Yeah. Have you seen any of the images? Have you — in a classified setting? Have you asked for it?”
MK: “No. I mean — images of drones flying around bases?”
ML: “Well, I mean, [Sen. Kirsten] Gillibrand — she was just in Nevada, and said she’s gonna fight in this year’s NDAA [National Defense Authorization Act] for more sensors, ‘cause, she says, right now they don’t even what is above them.”
ICYMI — Ask a Pol’s exclusive w/ Sen. Gillibrand
MK: “Drones are pretty small, right? And typically a US installation — we’ve always benefitted as a country from having, y’know, on either side we’ve got a big ocean.”
ML: “Yeah.”
MK: “So we generally don’t worry about being attacked domestically. So our military bases are not well — they’re not well-defended.”
ML: “Yeah?”
MK: “You know, we’re not on the frontline in any kind… in any kind of way. But, y’know, now with these small drones with sophisticated detection systems, cameras, they can do a lot of surveillance, so…”
ML: “I’ll leave you to my colleagues, thank you.”
MK: “Yeah.”
Reporter: “I was curious, do you think it’s okay for the State Department to have issued a travel visa to Iran’s foreign minister to come to the US?”
Also hops off tram and whispers to senator and his aide.
ML: “Thank you again. Preciate ya.”
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