If you want an armed drone China is always in the market

Reaper and Rainbow armed drones look alike, operate from similar altitudes, can drop anti-armour missiles and precision-guided bombs and are in demand throughout the Middle East. But only Rainbow is for sale. Reaper, the advanced, heavily armed drone which has a record of kills over Iraq, Syria, Afghanistan, Yemen and Somalia, is American. Rainbow, already used by Saudi Arabia over Yemen, is Chinese. The sale of US armed drones is restricted by America’s membership of the missile technology control regime, set up in 1987 to prevent the spread of ballistic missiles and other weapons. China, while not a signatory, agreed originally to abide by its basic guidelines, but is today aggressively offering Rainbow and another version called Wing Loong II, to whoever wants them. As a result, armed drones are everywhere in the Middle East. For the Chinese, it has been a gift. With the US unable to sell armed drones to even the closest allies in the Middle East, China has swamped the market with its own unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs). China has also developed strategic relationships in countries which have previously relied on the US to provide the weapons they want to buy. “Washington told its allies in the region that they can have the unarmed surveillance versions but not armed, whereas the Chinese don’t seem to have a problem and offer countries whatever they want,” Douglas Barrie, senior fellow for military aerospace at the London-based International Institute for Strategic Studies, said. “At arms fairs, every Chinese defence manufacturer seems to have a UAV on offer,” he said. The MQ-9 Reaper, made by General Atomic Aeronautical Systems, and the CH-4B Rainbow, developed by the state-owned China Aerospace Science and Technology Corporation, look almost identical. However, the American drone is superior. It has more advanced sensors and on-board computers which are capable of pinpointing crucial data from the mass of images taken during a flight mission. Reaper also carries five times the bomb and missile payload than its Chinese rival. With armed drones having become the weapon of choice for many countries, partly as a result of the unique targeting capabilities demonstrated by Israeli and American models, China has stepped in where the US has feared to tread. The Chinese Rainbow is also half the price of the Reaper. In Yemen, there are more Saudi and UAE Chinese armed drones operating against Huthi rebels than there are Reapers targeting al-Qaeda terrorists in the country. Both Saudi Arabia and the UAE have their own American Predator drones operating over Yemen. But they are only the unarmed surveillance version and cannot be integrated with the Chinese Rainbow. It’s a mismatch which gives the US at least some sense of relief. The Pentagon allows interoperability of that kind only within the Nato alliance.