The Daily Beast reports that “the U.S. Air Force’s fleet of drones is being strained to the ‘breaking point,’ according to senior military officials and an internal service memo acquired by The Daily Beast. And it’s happening right when the unmanned aircraft are most needed to fight ISIS.”  

“The Air Force has enough MQ-1 Predator and MQ-9 Reaper drones. It just doesn’t have the manpower to operate those machines. The Air Force’s situation is so dire that Air Combat Command (ACC), which trains and equips the service’s combat forces, is balking at filling the Pentagon’s ever increasing demands for more drone flights.”  

The piece continues: “In other words, the Air Force is saying that its drone force has been stretched to its limits. ‘It’s at the breaking point, and has been for a long time,’ a senior service official told The Daily Beast. ‘What’s different now is that the band-aid fixes are no longer working.’”