In the mid-1800s Austria sent unmanned, bomb-filled balloons to attack Venice.

T
he drone seen today started innovation in the early 1900s and was originally use
d for target practice to train military personnel. It continued to be developed
during World War I, when the Dayton-Wright Airplane Company came up with a pilot
less aerial torpedo that would drop and explode at a preset time.[8] The earlies
t attempt at a powered unmanned aerial vehicle was A. M. Low's "Aerial Target" o
f 1916.[9] Nikola Tesla described a fleet of unmanned aerial combat vehicles in
1915.[10] A number of remote-controlled airplane advances followed during and af
ter World War I, including the Hewitt-Sperry Automatic Airplane. The first scale
RPV (Remote Piloted Vehicle) was developed by the film star and model airplane
enthusiast Reginald Denny in 1935.[9] More were made in the technology rush duri
ng World War II; these were used both to train antiaircraft gunners and to fly a
ttack missions. Nazi Germany produced and used various UAV aircraft during the c
ourse of WWII. Jet engines were applied after World War II in such types as the
Australian GAF Jindivik, and Teledyne Ryan Firebee I of 1951, while companies li
ke Beechcraft also got in the game with their Model 1001 for the U.S. Navy in 19
55.[9] Nevertheless, they were little more than remote-controlled airplanes unti
l the Vietnam Era.
In 1959 the U.S. Air Force, concerned about losing pilots over hostile territory
, began planning for the use of unmanned aircraft.[11] Planning was intensified
after a U-2 was shot down over the Soviet Union in 1960. Within days, the highly
classified UAV program was launched under the code name of "Red Wagon".[12] The
August 1964 clash in the Tonkin Gulf between naval units of the U.S. and North
Vietnamese Navy initiated America's highly classified UAVs (Ryan Model 147, Ryan
AQM-91 Firefly, Lockheed D-21) into their first combat missions of the Vietnam
War.[13] When the "Red Chinese"[14] showed photographs of downed U.S. UAVs via W
ide World Photos,[15] the official U.S. response was "no comment."
The Israeli Tadiran Mastiff, which first flew in 1973, is seen as the first mode
rn battlefield UAV, due to its data-link system, endurance-loitering, and live v
ideo streaming.[16]
In 1973 the U.S. military officially confirmed that they had been using UAVs in
Southeast Asia (Vietnam).[17] Over 5,000 U.S. airmen had been killed and over 1,
000 more were missing or captured. The USAF 100th Strategic Reconnaissance Wing
had flown approximately 3,435 UAV missions during the war[18] at a cost of about
554 UAVs lost to all causes. In the words of USAF General George S. Brown, Comm
ander, Air Force Systems Command, in 1972, "The only reason we need (UAVs) is th
at we don't want to needlessly expend the man in the cockpit."[19] Later that sa
me year, General John C. Meyer, Commander in Chief, Strategic Air Command, state
d, "we let the drone do the high-risk flying ... the loss rate is high, but we a
re willing to risk more of them ... they save lives!"[19]
During the 1973 Yom Kippur War, Soviet-supplied surface-to-air missile batteries
in Egypt and Syria caused heavy damage to Israeli fighter jets. As a result, Is
rael developed the first UAV with real-time surveillance.[20][21][22] The images
and radar decoying provided by these UAVs helped Israel to completely neutraliz
e the Syrian air defenses at the start of the 1982 Lebanon War, resulting in no
pilots downed.[23] The first time UAVs were used as proof-of-concept of super-ag
ility post-stall controlled flight in combat flight simulations was with tailles
s, stealth technology-based, three-dimensional thrust vectoring flight control,
jet steering UAVs in Israel in 1987.[24]
With the maturing and miniaturization of applicable technologies as seen in the
1980s and 1990s, interest in UAVs grew within the higher echelons of the U.S. mi
litary. In the 1990s, the U.S. Department of Defense gave a contract to AAI Corp
oration along with Israeli company Mazlat. The U.S. Navy bought the AAI Pioneer
UAV that was jointly developed by AAI and Mazlat. Many of these Pioneer and newl
y developed U.S. UAVs were used in the 1991 Gulf War. UAVs were seen to offer th

e possibility of cheaper, more capable fighting machines that could be used with
out risk to aircrews. Initial generations were primarily surveillance aircraft,
but some were armed, such as the General Atomics MQ-1 Predator, which used AGM-1
14 Hellfire air-to-ground missiles.
As of 2012, the United States Air Force employed 7,494 UAVs - almost 1 in 3 USAF
aircraft.[25][26] As of 2012, the United States Air Force employed 7,494 UAVs almost 1 in 3 USAF aircraft.[25][26] The CIA has also operated UAVs.[27]
In 2013 it was reported that UAVs were used by at least 50 countries, several of
which made their own: for example, Iran, Israel and China.[28]
Regulation[edit]