"A Game of Drones" by Ximena Ortiz

"America’s recent foreign policy has been enabled by a central idea: the United States does things differently. It wages wars differently. It suspends habeas corpus sparingly and with great restraint. It encroaches on liberties more gingerly. And it puts military men and women at risk with a respectful selectivity. To advance this mythology, the federal government has, time and again, insisted that it acts with painstaking precision when it resorts to military intervention or security-state measures at home. This, officials have consistently suggested, is the American distinction."  Ximena Ortiz

http://www.theamericanconservative.com/blog/a-game-of-drones/#.T59SULmDMI8.mailto

Comments

[jonst]

The game changer here, or, one of them, anyway, will be the moment some enterprising nation decides that this is a good way to dispatch its foes, that are located on US Territory. I believe it is simply a matter of time. What are we going to say?

[Farmer Don]

Universities are starting drone courses.
http://www.salon.com/2012/05/01/drones_on_campus/

[Walrus]

The game changer here would be the easy availability of an open source MANPADS as ubiquitous and effective as the RPG - something we have managed to prevent for a long time.

[Basilisk]

In the meantime, with the tools available and the veritable lack of a standard of measurement, we are likely to continue in this "out of sight, out of mind" war until, as it says in this reference, "the sun goes supernova.

http://www.wired.com/dangerroom/2012/05/defeating-al-qaida/

[brenner]

The main concern, to my mind, should be the mindset. The 'antiseptic' drone attacks are but one of various counter-productive manifestations. That mindset is incompatible with the shifting realities of international life that inescapably will reduce American prerogatives, constrain American unilateralism, and narrow the margin of error Psychologically and intellectually, we are utterly unprepared for that world. The "American is back" mentality is at once absurd and dangerous.

[Jackie]

I kind of have to agree with "jonst". I wonder what country would send drones into the US to kill their enemies?

[Jose L Campos]

I have been amazed by Hegel's sharp suggestion that the invention of gunpowder made war somewhat abstract. Now with drones the abstraction has become absolute.

[DCA]

The American claim to wage war more precisely goes back a ways: compare what RAF Bomber Command and the USAAF Eighth
Air Force were claiming about their bombing strategies over Germany. (They were not, in reality, that different, Norden bombsights notwithstanding).

[turcopolier]

Jackie

What country? One that wants to be exterminated. pl

[optimax]

I think the only drones flying in US airspace will be the ones flown by our own gomint.

[Medicine Man]

I was going to say something along those lines. I'm not normally given to conspiracy but I think the chance of drones being used in the future to survey/control the US populace is greater than 0%.

[Fred]

I think this is part of the problem (quoting the linked article):

"A three-month investigation including eyewitness reports indicates that at least 50 civilians were killed in follow-up strikes when they had gone to the aid of others."

Where is the context to why there were additional bombs/rockets etc fired? In addition isn't the intelligence necessary to actually target someone the more important item in all of this?

[optimax]

Medicine Man,

If the technology exists to control the plebs, the aristocrats can't help themselves but to use it. It has always been that way. The only way I can think of for me to counter their intrusion into my privacy is to start sunbathing nude in my backyard. They'll be sorry.

[optimax]

Obama has expanded drone warfare by targeting not only"known terrorists" but also those perceived by their actions to be terrorists.Wapo:

"The expanded authority will allow the CIA and JSOC to fire on targets based solely on their intelligence “signatures” — patterns of behavior that are detected through signals intercepts, human sources and aerial surveillance, and that indicate the presence of an important operative or a plot against U.S. interests.

Until now, the administration had allowed strikes only against known terrorist leaders who appear on secret CIA and JSOC target lists and whose location can be confirmed."

http://www.washingtonpost.com/world/national-security/white-house-approves-broader-yemen-drone-campaign/2012/04/25/gIQA82U6hT_story.html

[YT]

The elderly Sinologist, Abe Yukio (阿部幸夫) once expressed his fears of drone technology in the introductory essay to his book
"The Æsthetics of Victory: Empowerment of the Corporate Ranks thru the study of the Shiji & the Sangokushi"
(史記～三国志に学ぶ「勝つ」技術! 人を活かし組織を動かす勝ち残りの戦略)
back in '05.

He cited the play, R.U.R. (Rossum's Universal Robots), written by Karel Čapek 'bout robots & how they led to the extinction of Man.

Bad enough that optimax & Medicine Man augur that the prognosticated future of drone technology will be one of utilization on citizens of U.S.of A within their own soil.

But what happens if said technology becomes self-sufficient & start thinking on their own, much like the golems depicted in the play by the Czech playwright?

The End of Man caused by tech singularity?

Not exactly a future that augers well.

Far-fetched? A matter of opinion.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Karel_%C4%8Capek

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/R.U.R._%28Rossum%27s_Universal_Robots%29

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Technological_singularity

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Records_of_the_Grand_Historian

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Records_of_the_Three_Kingdoms

P.S.: All translation mistakes are entirely my own, & yours truly will be most thankful if someone would point out any & all existing deviation.