There is no contesting that there is major debate surrounding warfare of any kind, whether in terms of man-to-man combat warfare on battle grounds, modern warfare with the use of more advanced technology such as UAVs and drones or the more contemporary cyber warfare. Debates concerning the legality, morality and cost-benefit analysis of these kinds of warfare has filled the rhetoric of policy analysts, scholarly academics and national leaders on international frontiers. With the Middle-East and North Africa (MENA) regions currently highlighted as hotspots for the ‘war on terror’, it is pertinent to analyze and understand the implications of the various kinds of force being used against the terrorist groups and the innocent civil populations
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The use of such strikes to eliminate targets that pose credible current and future threats to the lives of the American people warrants such a violent response. Nevertheless, a major criticism – one which Hayden highlights in his article – which is laid against the use of the drone program is the uncertainty of the targets and the inability of the strike to be 100% precise. Hayden reveals that “…other attacks were intended to disrupt known Qaeda locations and activities even when the identities of the people present were not known.” (Hayden, 2016). Hayden sheds more light to this by identifying two scenarios in which civilian casualties were recorded due this imprecision; however, I argue that this is largely underestimated. According to a report by Andrew Blake for the Washington Times, “drone strikes conducted by the United States during a 5-month-long campaign in Afghanistan caused deaths of unintended targets nearly nine out of ten times” (Blake, 2015) In addition to that, Ofek argues that, “when innocents are inadvertently killed, drone strikes can foment public anger and increase the popularity of militants.” He adds, “Everyone of these dead noncombatants represents an alienated family, a new desire for revenge, and more recruits for a militant movement that has grown exponentially even as drone strikes has increased” (Ofek, 2010) This adds another layer of criticism against the drone strike program and the validity of Hayden’s arguments. From this perspective, on top of the lack of precision of the technology which could either result in missing the intended target, killing innocent civilians, or both, it can also cause grievance within the bereaved families of civilians killed by the strikes, which could then add to the threat of terrorist attacks which the drones aimed to deter in the first
The use of such strikes to eliminate targets that pose credible current and future threats to the lives of the American people warrants such a violent response. Nevertheless, a major criticism – one which Hayden highlights in his article – which is laid against the use of the drone program is the uncertainty of the targets and the inability of the strike to be 100% precise. Hayden reveals that “…other attacks were intended to disrupt known Qaeda locations and activities even when the identities of the people present were not known.” (Hayden, 2016). Hayden sheds more light to this by identifying two scenarios in which civilian casualties were recorded due this imprecision; however, I argue that this is largely underestimated. According to a report by Andrew Blake for the Washington Times, “drone strikes conducted by the United States during a 5-month-long campaign in Afghanistan caused deaths of unintended targets nearly nine out of ten times” (Blake, 2015) In addition to that, Ofek argues that, “when innocents are inadvertently killed, drone strikes can foment public anger and increase the popularity of militants.” He adds, “Everyone of these dead noncombatants represents an alienated family, a new desire for revenge, and more recruits for a militant movement that has grown exponentially even as drone strikes has increased” (Ofek, 2010) This adds another layer of criticism against the drone strike program and the validity of Hayden’s arguments. From this perspective, on top of the lack of precision of the technology which could either result in missing the intended target, killing innocent civilians, or both, it can also cause grievance within the bereaved families of civilians killed by the strikes, which could then add to the threat of terrorist attacks which the drones aimed to deter in the first