If SAM<\/span> systems were designed\u2014or for those already in use, retrofitted\u2014to receive and identify civilian Mode C and ADS<\/span>-B signals, gunners would be able to distinguish between civilian and military\u00a0planes.<\/p>\n The screens in front of missile operators could clearly identify civilian aircraft and warn against firing at them, and missile launch mechanisms could require authentication codes before accepting a civilian blip as a target. Some of these advancements are available, just not widely in use yet. The Polish arms manufacturer Mesko, for example, is already working on a SAM<\/span> that requires an authentication\u00a0code.<\/p>\n Improving the ability of missile gunners to understand what the target is would not eliminate deliberate atrocity, but the innovation would go a long way in preventing\u00a0mistakes.<\/p>\n In 1988, a U.S.<\/span> Navy cruiser in the Persian Gulf called the Vincennes shot a long-range SAM<\/span> at Iran Air Flight 655, a scheduled passenger flight. U.S.<\/span> and Iranian warships had recently been firing at each other.\u00a0Investigators found<\/a>\u00a0that personnel in the ship\u2019s windowless combat information center (CIC<\/span>) had confused radar reflections from the jetliner, an Airbus, with signals from an Iranian military aircraft that was not approaching but was in the same general direction as the passenger\u00a0flight.<\/p>\n Displays in 1988 did not show the tactical officers the difference between blips representing civilian aircraft and those representing threats. This became the first accident involving a modern long-range SAM<\/span>. Two-hundred and ninety people\u00a0died.<\/p>\n Recently, I was on the USS<\/span> Wasp, a huge American warship. The CIC<\/span> looked like any other: a windowless, boxy room with a mess of screens, buttons, and joysticks in low ambient\u00a0light.<\/p>\n Electronics on the Wasp and other Navy vessels can now distinguish between civilian and military aerial targets. That is, the ships already have what an international convention might require of all long-range radar-guided\u00a0missiles.<\/p>\n \u201cThere was a lot of soul-searching after the Vincennes incident, a lot of determination this won\u2019t happen again,\u201d says Greg Baker, the captain of the Wasp. The Vincennes killed civilians by mistake; since then, the Navy\u2019s sensor systems have been significantly improved. For example, screens now make civilian aircraft appear visually different from possible hostiles, the innovation that all gunners should\u00a0have.<\/p>\n Other military divisions are also making these technological improvements. In February, the Pentagon began installing the Patriot SAM<\/span>, operated by the Army, in Iraq. William Sharp, a spokesperson for the Army, told me that the ability to display the Mode C \u201cI am a civilian\u201d transponder signal has been added to Patriot batteries. The missiles\u2019 fire-director software is programmed to \u201cinterrogate\u201d any target by sending pings that ask friendly military aircraft to respond with an identification code, while requesting civilian aircraft to respond on Mode C. If the latter happens, the Patriot system marks the radar reflection as civilian. Various protocols make it unlikely, though not impossible, that an attacker could trick the Patriot, or Navy SAMs, into thinking it was\u00a0civilian.<\/p>\n This new technology goes a long way in preventing mistakes, but cooperation at a higher level is needed. Governments should collaborate on an international initiative to require that radar-guided SAMs, and the similar class of anti-ship missiles, incorporate improved technology for sensing and recognizing civilian signals. Any convention should also include non-technological guidelines, such as notices to pilots who are in a war zone, that would help prevent\u00a0accidents.<\/p>\n One possible model for a pact is the1980 Convention on Certain Conventional Weapons, which regulates the use of land mines and blinding lasers, among other threats to noncombatants. The agreement is not ironclad. Donald Trump recently\u00a0said the United States would<\/a>\u00a0no longer abide by certain restrictions on land\u00a0mines.<\/p>\n Nevertheless, the convention is considered a success, as land mines have declined since most nations declared they would renounce such weapons.\u00a0Forty-one of the 50 nations<\/a>\u00a0that a generation ago manufactured land mines have stopped producing\u00a0them<\/p>\n More informal diplomacy concerning conventional weapons has also been successful and provides a way forward for international cooperation on SAM<\/span>\u00a0technology.<\/p>\n In 2002, terrorists near an airport in Mombasa, Kenya, tried to use shoulder-fired rockets called MANPADS<\/span> to shoot down a civilian airliner. These weapons are easy to hide and relatively inexpensive. \u201cThere was a clear sense the situation was out of control and that no nation would benefit, only terrorists,\u201d Matthew Schroeder, a senior researcher for Small Arms Survey, which tracks battlefield armaments, says of MANPADS<\/span>. So organizations came up with regional agreements \u201cunprecedented in specificity and scope.\u201d Schroeder believes that these pacts reduced the problem considerably. For instance, Russia no longer markets the easily hidden bazooka-style rocket, offering only a mounted version that cannot be removed from a\u00a0vehicle.<\/p>\n Because the MANPADS<\/span> agreements are regional compacts administered by little-known organizations such as the Amazon Cooperation Treaty Organization, the conventions on these small anti-aircraft rockets failed to draw attention. Yet a 2019 Rand Corporation study<\/a>\u00a0found that since about 2000, attempts to hit airliners with small heat-seeking weapons have declined\u00a0dramatically.<\/p>\n These agreements involving land mines and small rockets show that international conventions actually can produce positive results. Because long-range radar-guided missiles are made only by large professional militaries, the United States, Russia, and China would need to\u00a0cooperate.<\/p>\n \u201cThere would be a lot of pushback against an agreement that allowed inspectors to look at the details of American, Russian, or Chinese weapons-sensor technology,\u201d cautions Steven Pifer of Stanford, a former State Department arms-control specialist. But even if an agreement were strictly declaratory, reform momentum would be\u00a0created.<\/p>\n The details of the tragedy in Iran earlier this year show that the accident could have been avoided if technological and diplomatic agreements had been in place. A notice to airmen was not issued; this would have closed airspace around Tehran to civilian planes. Pilots of Ukraine International Airlines Flight 752 took off unaware that Iran expected an air battle. Screens watched by Iranian gunners did not show that the passenger flight was announcing altitude and speed on a civilian\u00a0frequency.<\/p>\n A campaign to make anti-aircraft and anti-ship missiles less dangerous would not seek to ban such weapons. Rather, it would accept that nations arm for war, and ask only that armaments become less likely to take life by mistake. Winston Churchill once commented on the problem of military weapons killing civilians: \u201cAre we beasts?\u201d Let\u2019s prove that we are\u00a0not.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/article>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n