Wayne Northey: The use of drones–as with any aerial bombing–invariably murders civilians, often in vast numbers. Two classic studies of aerial warfare by Tami Davis Biddle are: (2019) Air Power and Warfare: A Century of Theory and History, and (2004) Rhetoric and Reality in Air Warfare: The Evolution of British and American Ideas about Strategic Bombing, 1914-1945.
With reference to drone warfare, the author in the first-mentioned book cites Professor Rosa Brooks:
Professor Rosa Brooks explained, “to go after an ever-lengthening list of bad actors, many of whom appear to have only tenuous links to al Qaeda and the 9/11 attacks, and many of whom arguably pose no imminent threat to the United States.”1 This warning came in Brooks’ testimony before the Senate Armed Services Committee in the spring of 2013.
Ms. Biddle writes further:
The work is carried out quietly and off the front pages of newspapers. This means that it has little immediate political cost. Thus, the strikes can have the appeal of a silver bullet — a low-cost, almost magical way to dispatch enemies. However, dangers lurk in this seductive appeal. One first-order question is simply about due process of law. The target of an RPA strike has no opportunity to face the charges against them or argue a case before a court. Who ought to have the authority to be judge, jury, and executioner (all three) in these cases? Using RPAs for the targeted killing of enemies concentrates vast power in a few hands — and this sets up a situation that can be quite readily abused if it is not overseen and monitored for compliance with domestic and international law. There is also a concern about mission creep. How high on the enemy leadership chain need one be to qualify for an RPA strike? What evidence must that person reveal of intent to do harm? How imminent and clear must that threat be?
Many critics of RPAs during the Obama years saw their use as evidence of American high-handedness and arrogance — evidence that Americans do not feel themselves to be bound by any rules or constraints in their international behavior. They perceived an American President using RPAs rather like a self-proclaimed Zeus, hurling thunderbolts from the sky. (Institute, Strategic Studies; War College Press, U.S. Army. Air Power and Warfare: A Century of Theory and History (pp. 58-59). Kindle Edition; emphasis added.)
The reality is, “Good Guys” snipers trained in Canada, the U.S., and other Western nations, hurl their smaller, equally deadly, thunderbolts across vast distances through the use of a scope, thereby raising the identical question: Who ought to have the authority to be judge, jury, and executioner (all three) in these cases? Combine these murderous atrocities with treacherous (or just plain faulty) intelligence, and no telling how many rival warlords, warlord enemies, and hated persons at the local level are murdered through Western “intelligence” gathering. Whole wedding parties, etc., have been slaughtered through this callous calculus.
Who is to know who and how many fell victim to wanton slaughter in Afghanistan, Syria, etc., –by the “Good Guys”?
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