BREAKING: Unleash the Drones
In unofficial coordination with Skynet, the U.S. has released flight capable terminators to seek out the source of the recent attack on the U.S. embassy in Benghazi, Libya.
“A senior U.S. official tells CNN that U.S. unmanned surveillance drones are expected to begin flying over Benghazai and other locations in eastern Libya to look for jihadi encampments and targets that may be tied to the attack on U.S. State Department personnel.
The proposal for use of drones is expected to be approved shortly by the Pentagon and the White House, CNN’s Pentagon Correspondent Barbara Starr reported. The official said the plan is for U.S. surveillance drones to gather the intelligence and then hand it off to the Libyans to strike the targets.”
CNN also reports that the attack is now believed to have been planned and that protest over online clips from a film mocking Islam were only cover for the terrorist plot.
(Hat/Tip Dashiell Bennett at the Atlantic Wire)
Question: Would folks be more or less bothered by this plan if it used manned planes? Soldiers in tanks? Soldiers on foot?
Generally speaking, I wonder if part of the opposition to the drone program is the fact that it uses creepy robots.Report
I second your question. I’d just say that it is irrelvent what type of flying craft we use. If what we are doing is good then whether it is a two seater, one seater, drone, guy in a tux with a jet pack doesn’t matter. If what we are doing is stupid then, again, the modality doesn’t matter in general.Report
Except that a guy in a tux with a jet pack would be AWESOME.Report
I certainly am not bothered by virtue of it being a computer, but rather the indirect impact that the ease and risk minimization such technologies make possibel will have complicating effects.
For instance, if and when the assumed terrorist is found (you can see CNN for his name and bio), will the existence of the drone make it more or less likely that the U.S. will accept “collateral damange” in its attempts to exact justice and further national security?Report
I agree with this. When we minimize risk, it makes taking certain actions far easier. This is ideal in a great number of areas, but ought to at least give us some pause in warfare.
That being said, I get the sense that a number of folks object to drone warfare (and it shoukd be noted that surveillance and strikes are different) because of the “creepy robot” thing, and not the “makes it easier to kill others through minimized risk” thing.Report
It’s not even “creepy robots”. It’s more along the lines of a remote-control plane with a webcam bolted to the front.Report
I should have put “creepy robots” in square quotes. For many folks, an RC plane alone is a bit much… Attach a webcam (“What’s a webcam!?!?!?) and you’ve entered “creepy robot”-ville for some folks.Report
The last bit actually is plausible, whatever the way you’re framing it here.
The likelihood of a spontaneous protest mob managing to lob a rocket at an armored diplomat’s car is…well, not that great.Report
Rumour has it this assault on the consulate was ginned up by a loose confederation of jihaadi groups called Ansar al-Sharia. This seems to conform to the pattern established long ago in Pakistan and Chechnya: These guys always crop up, like so many mushrooms on horse turds, when a regime loses the ability to control its own writ. Anarchic carbuncles on a nation’s ass, if you will.
The stupidest approach is to think this was a solid group with a big objective. These are little more than jumped up thugs with a veneer of religiosity. The only solution here is to declare something akin to martial law and put out civilian foot patrols, a-la the Sons of Iraq, to pacify and subdue Benghazi. Get the mainline imams to back these patrols. There will be pushback from the thugs, but they’re probably not a big force in town anyway. If history’s any guide to these things, they’re probably holed up in one specific neighbourhood they’ve managed to subdue, exactly as we’d think of gang turf here in the USA.
Benghazi’s a long way from Tripoli. Think of the distance between Fallujah and Baghdad, that war we know better. Same forces in play. Libya’s had no end of trouble getting all the militias to disarm the farther it gets from Tripoli.Report