Drones are no panacea

In the post-9/11 era, the rise of armed military drones offered former president Barack Obama the opportunity to fulfil a promise he had made to the American people, one which helped him get elected. By the time Mr Obama came to power in January 2009, the US had lost at least 625 soldiers in Afghanistan and 4,221 personnel in Iraq. The electorate was tired of the mounting body count and the lack of certainty of a victory. As such, Mr Obama’s promise was simple. He pledged to remove America’s best and brightest from harm’s way in the “bad war” in Iraq and to prove that the US could win the “good fight” in Afghanistan. It was there, during this sombre period in American history, that drones were harnessed, allowing the US military and the CIA to combat national security threats around the world while reducing the cost to life. Drones, of course, were nothing new in 2009. Since the first days of George W Bush’s “war on terror” in 2001, they had been used to hunt and kill Taliban militants and Al Qaeda terrorists.

In total, Mr Bush utilised this killer technology in more than 50 strikes, allowing the US military and the CIA to reach further and strike deeper into enemy-held territory. Yet, as it turned out, the peak of American drone use was still to come.

It would be under Mr Obama that the strike rate would exponentially increase. Now known as “the drone president”, Mr Obama deployed the lethal capacity of the drone more than 500 times between 2009 and 2017, a tenfold increase in drone use from his predecessor. These strikes were controversial, with human rights groups concerned about the ease at which the US was using force and the stark number of reported civilian casualties. Nevertheless, the use of drones continued and even increased. In so doing, Mr Obama set an example to the world: that force could be deployed with so-called “pinpoint precision” on one’s enemies, yet there need not be substantial risk to the perpetrator. The demand for drones from both allied and antagonistic nations soon began to grow off the back of this promise of cost-free precision wars. While the US – the world’s most overt and obvious actor to use drones – was selective about where it supplied its latest armed drone technologies, newer drone nations capitalised on the growing drone market. China created its own lucrative industry, supplying armed drones to states ranging from Iraq and Pakistan to Nigeria and, most recently, Serbia. Other states such as Turkey, Israel and Iran also joined the exclusive club of drone manufacturers and exporters. By 2017, about 24 different nation states were said to have obtained armed drone capabilities and it was within this context that the use of the drone began to evolve.

The writer is an assistant professor in war studies with the Danish Institute for Advanced Study and the Centre for War Studies at the University of

Southern Denmark

 

Drones are no panacea

In the post-9/11 era, the rise of armed military drones offered former president Barack Obama the opportunity to fulfil a promise he had made to the American people, one which helped him get elected. By the time Mr Obama came to power in January 2009, the US had lost at least 625 soldiers in Afghanistan and 4,221 personnel in Iraq. The electorate was tired of the mounting body count and the lack of certainty of a victory. As such, Mr Obamas promise was simple. He pledged to remove Americas best and brightest from harms way in the bad war in Iraq and to prove that the US could win the good fight in Afghanistan. It was there, during this sombre period in American history, that drones were harnessed, allowing the US military and the CIA to combat national security threats around the world while reducing the cost to life. Drones, of course, were nothing new in 2009. Since the first days of George W Bushs war on terror in 2001, they had been used to hunt and kill Taliban militants and Al Qaeda terrorists. In total, Mr Bush utilised this killer technology in more than 50 strikes, allowing the US military and the CIA to reach further and strike deeper into enemy-held territory. Yet, as it turned out, the peak of American drone use was still to come. It would be under Mr Obama that the strike rate would exponentially increase. Now known as the drone president, Mr Obama deployed the lethal capacity of the drone more than 500 times between 2009 and 2017, a tenfold increase in drone use from his predecessor. These strikes were controversial, with human rights groups concerned about the ease at which the US was using force and the stark number of reported civilian casualties. Nevertheless, the use of drones continued and even increased. In so doing, Mr Obama set an example to the world: that force could be deployed with so-called pinpoint precision on ones enemies, yet there need not be substantial risk to the perpetrator. The demand for drones from both allied and antagonistic nations soon began to grow off the back of this promise of cost-free precision wars. While the US the worlds most overt and obvious actor to use drones was selective about where it supplied its latest armed drone technologies, newer drone nations capitalised on the growing drone market. China created its own lucrative industry, supplying armed drones to states ranging from Iraq and Pakistan to Nigeria and, most recently, Serbia. Other states such as Turkey, Israel and Iran also joined the exclusive club of drone manufacturers and exporters. By 2017, about 24 different nation states were said to have obtained armed drone capabilities and it was within this context that the use of the drone began to evolve. The writer is an assistant professor in war studies with the Danish Institute for Advanced Study and the Centre for War Studies at the University of Southern Denmark