Earlier quoted context omitted.
I will continue to refuse to believe American military personnel choose to strike otherwise-collateral civilian targets. You're talking about moral humans, here. Our soldiers/airmen/marines/sailors are not soulless automatons, nor are officers that develop strategy and provide direction. Nor would I consider their pay to be either incentive or motivation.
You must have been very busy ignoring a lot of evidence then. Not that that's unusual.
If a Drone Strike Hit an American Wedding We'd Ground Our Fleet
231–240 of 361 posts
Re: If a Drone Strike Hit an American Wedding We'd Ground Our Fleet
#232It continues to baffle me why the fact they're drones matter in the slightest. They're not autonomous, they're flown by pilots who just happen to not be sitting in the aircraft they're flying. Manned aircraft have killed huge groups of innocent civilians more than once, but apparently that's fine because the pilot was sitting in the aircraft.
Regular aircraft are "expensive." They're literally expensive, in dollar terms, but even ignoring that they're logistically and operationally resource-intensive to operate. You only have so much airpower at your disposal, you're limited by flight deck space and pilot availability, you want to keep some in reserve, and aircraft are a bitch to maintain. Like, a week in service per day of flight time.
Basically, you default to not using them. You don't bust them out unless you have good reason to. You don't just cruise around looking for people who look suspicious, because that would be a tremendous waste of resources that could be better-spent elsewhere. Like transporting supplies for the troops on the ground. You only bust out the planes when you have solid, definitive, verified evidence that there is something that should get blown up.
Drones flip that around. You can't quite go cruisin' around just looking for stuff, but it's worth the time & effort to check out quite a few of your semi-sketchy tips. Now you're doing a lot more operations, on less-reliable intel, and the risk of cock-ups rises significantly. But because the drones are remote, none of that risk is borne by any member of the military performing the operations; all the extra risk falls on the local civilian population. I don't think many people partaking in these operations are intentionally heartless, but this is a classic case of moral hazard, and on the margin more aggressive, risk-taking behavior is incentivized.
Additionally, putting a drone in the sky is faster than putting a regular plane in the sky. This means that planes tend to be used only against 'static' targets, which gives you an opportunity to scout & verify. Drones allow you to hit 'time-sensitive' targets, which means you are now making time-sensitive decisions. A wedding party got hit because some dude had literally minutes (or less) to decide if a collection of vehicles was a wedding or an armed convoy. I take it as axiomatic that the added time-pressure increases the number of wrong decisions.
Re: If a Drone Strike Hit an American Wedding We'd Ground Our Fleet
#233Earlier quoted context omitted.
> you've got a much itchier trigger finger now I doubt that. It would seem that a pilot sitting in a cockpit would be a lot more trigger-happy. Both pilots can make two types of mistake: don't recognize an enemy for what he is, or do the same thing with a civilian. If plane pilot mistakes an enemy for something else and said enemy succeeds in his efforts, the pilot will lose his place and may be his life. The drone p…
Clarification: I don't mean that the pilot has an itchy trigger finger, I mean the system or decision maker. I see how the two might be confused based on my original comment. The commander/politician/leader is answerable and responsible for his soldiers, as such if the risk to the soldier's life is taken out of equation an attack suddenly begins to make more sense as it carrier lower risk & lower costs, therefore req…
Re: If a Drone Strike Hit an American Wedding We'd Ground Our Fleet
#234The way America is conducting the war on terror is both self-defeating and morally repugnant.
It's very easy to not agree with the way the US government handles these sort of things, but you have to give them the benefit of the doubt that they are not doing this for shits and giggles. It might seem nationalistic to some but it reminds me of a quote from "A Few Good Men" - Son, we live in a world that has walls, and those walls have to be guarded by men with guns. Who's gonna do it? You? You, Lt. Weinburg? I h…
I am very confident that I do not have to do that. How are you going to make me?
Re: If a Drone Strike Hit an American Wedding We'd Ground Our Fleet
#235Earlier quoted context omitted.
Blowing up a wedding is not extraordinary? 'Not taking sides' doesn't cut it - you're either doing your bit to end drone strikes like these, or you are morally bankrupt. There is no fence sitting when civilians are being blown up.
Civilians are blown up in every war, drones did not create this problem, and eliminating UAVs will not end it. If you want people to be "doing your bit to end drone strikes", you should consider that the probable counter-factual is not an end to non-combatant (civilian) deaths; civilian mortality may increase, decrease, or stay the same, depending on what tactics are chosen to replace drones.
Re: If a Drone Strike Hit an American Wedding We'd Ground Our Fleet
#236Earlier quoted context omitted.
Civilians are blown up in every war, drones did not create this problem, and eliminating UAVs will not end it. If you want people to be "doing your bit to end drone strikes", you should consider that the probable counter-factual is not an end to non-combatant (civilian) deaths; civilian mortality may increase, decrease, or stay the same, depending on what tactics are chosen to replace drones.
Weddings are not war zones.
Re: If a Drone Strike Hit an American Wedding We'd Ground Our Fleet
#237Earlier quoted context omitted.
Blowing up a wedding is not extraordinary? 'Not taking sides' doesn't cut it - you're either doing your bit to end drone strikes like these, or you are morally bankrupt. There is no fence sitting when civilians are being blown up.
Civilians are blown up in every war, drones did not create this problem, and eliminating UAVs will not end it. If you want people to be "doing your bit to end drone strikes", you should consider that the probable counter-factual is not an end to non-combatant (civilian) deaths; civilian mortality may increase, decrease, or stay the same, depending on what tactics are chosen to replace drones.
Re: If a Drone Strike Hit an American Wedding We'd Ground Our Fleet
#238Earlier quoted context omitted.
Civilians are blown up in every war, drones did not create this problem, and eliminating UAVs will not end it. If you want people to be "doing your bit to end drone strikes", you should consider that the probable counter-factual is not an end to non-combatant (civilian) deaths; civilian mortality may increase, decrease, or stay the same, depending on what tactics are chosen to replace drones.
Weddings are not war zones.
But they can take place in them, and, more to the point, the problem that needs to be addressed in the legalities of modern war is that modern wars, increasingly, don't have "zones" at all.
Re: If a Drone Strike Hit an American Wedding We'd Ground Our Fleet
#239Earlier quoted context omitted.
It matters because it changes the fundamental nature of combat. If a pilot is in the plane you're risking an American life, not to mention a very expensive piece of equipment with numerous safety features etc. Now take away the risk to American life and lower the cost of the attack significantly, and viola, you've got a much itchier trigger finger now. If you've played MW3, which would you rather do, use the drone to…
> It matters because it changes the fundamental nature of combat. Said about literally EVERY SINGLE change in warfare over the centuries. I am talking all the way back to armor and catapults to gunpowder based munitions, the blitzkrieg, rockets, planes, bombs, and of course nuclear weapons. The thing is -- it is absolutely true, but it is always true, and therefore meaningless. Lets look at the Gulf War for example -…
Re: If a Drone Strike Hit an American Wedding We'd Ground Our Fleet
#240Earlier quoted context omitted.
Civilians are blown up in every war, drones did not create this problem, and eliminating UAVs will not end it. If you want people to be "doing your bit to end drone strikes", you should consider that the probable counter-factual is not an end to non-combatant (civilian) deaths; civilian mortality may increase, decrease, or stay the same, depending on what tactics are chosen to replace drones.
Sorry - by drone strikes I was actually incorrectly implying the broader picture. I mean end attacks on civilians in countries you are not even at war with. There really is no moral justification for blowing these people up. Even if they were terrorists, there is no way they could have done as much damage as the slaughter of a whole wedding. The 'cure' is far worse than the illness.