The RUSI Journal Killer Drones

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Killer DronesDavid WhethamPublished online: 27 Jun 2013.

To cite this article: David Whetham (2013) Killer Drones, The RUSI Journal, 158:3, 22-32, DOI: 10.1080/03071847.2013.807582

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© RUSI JOURNAL JUNE/JULY 2013 VOL. 158 NO. 3 pp. 22–32 DOI: 10.1080/03071847.2013.807582

THE RUSI JOURNAL

Drones are now ubiquitous inthe battle space. The US Armyalone has more than 7,500

unmanned aerial systems – up fromseventy-six in 2002 – at a total cost of$5.23 billion.1 Although the numbersfrom the UK perspective are not quiteas extraordinary, the British militarystill deploys a range of unmanned aerialsurveillance platforms ranging from theBlack Hornet mini-helicopter providingenhanced situational awareness fortroops on the ground through to theReaper (a medium-altitude, long-endurance remotely piloted air system)at the other end of the spectrum.2

First deployed by the RAF inAfghanistan in October 2007, thecapabilities provided by Reapers interms of surveillance, reconnaissanceand, since May 2008, firepower (acombination of laser-guided bombs andHellfire air-to-ground missiles) havebeen used since then in conjunctionwith other platforms and capabilities.The Reapers are launched from airfieldsin Afghanistan by crews deployed intheatre, but ‘flown’ using secure satellitecommunications by pilots sitting inCreech Air Force Base in the US, and nowalso from RAF Waddington in the UK.3As former Assistant Chief of the Air StaffBaz North has explained, ‘Our experienceof operating RPAS has confirmed that

they have unique capabilities thatcomplement those of traditional combatand ISR [intelligence, surveillance andreconnaissance] platforms; maximumeffect is achieved by employing themin a mixed grouping’.4 It is no surprise,therefore, that the RAF’s current modestcontingent of five Reapers is set to doublein the near future.5 This technology iscertainly not restricted to just the USand its allies. Indeed, what is very clearis that drone numbers around the worldare increasing, and it is difficult not toconclude that they will continue to be anintegral part of future military operations.

The debate as to whether thisincreasing reliance on drones is apositive or a negative developmentis extremely polarised. As with mostcomplex situations, however, there isa great deal of confusion as to whatexactly is being argued about, making itdifficult to reach a considered view. Forexample, while some appear to be verycritical of the very existence of drones, itis possible that what they actually objectto is the use of drones by the US to carryout ‘targeted killings’ on the territory ofother states.6 This is, in fact, not a drone-specific concern, as such actions could becarried out through less remote means,such as helicopter gunships or evenspecial forces on the ground. As such,the ethical issues surrounding the use of

targeted killing deserve to be discussedmore broadly and at greater length thancan be accommodated here.7 Othersobject to the concept of ‘killer machines’,a perceived unfairness in the imbalanceof risk inherent to the use of drones,or what they see as the indiscriminatenature of drones due to the excessivecivilian casualties associated with them.This article will discuss such issues inorder to offer a balanced appraisal ofsome of the more profound ethicalimplications of recent developments indrone technology.

The commonly used term ‘drone’can, of course, cover a huge arrayof unmanned aerial technologies,ranging from micro air vehicles (MAVs)measured in inches through to the hugeGlobal Hawk surveillance aircraft witha wingspan of over 130 feet (almost 40metres). Drones come in many guisesand can be used for a huge array of tasks,and are considered particularly attractivefor carrying out what are known as dull,dirty or dangerous jobs. For example,different platforms can be used aroundthe clock to monitor conservation andanti-poaching campaigns, detect forestfires using sophisticated heat-detectionequipment, or conduct search-and-rescuemissions in treacherous conditions usingadvanced all-weather optical sensors andinfrared capabilities. These alternative

kILLER DRONESTHE mORAL UPS AND DOWNS

DAvID WHETHAm

The use of drones has increased exponentially in recent years, causing a mounting waveof concern amongst the media and public about the implications of using unmannedsystems – often misunderstood in their nature – above all in terms of accountability,legitimacy and ‘fairness’. David Whetham explores the many facets of this question,delving into the often-overlooked nuances of the use of remote-controlled systems andits practical as well as moral implications.

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uses notwithstanding, this articlefocuses specifically on the ethical issuessurrounding the use of military drones tokill people during armed conflicts.

‘Autonomous’ KillingResponding to public perceptions –and, indeed, fears – that drones arecold, calculating, emotionless machinesdispatched to eliminate any and allidentified threats, the UK Ministry ofDefence (MoD) has chosen to re-brandits Unmanned Aerial Vehicles (UAVs)with the much less threatening termRemotely Piloted Air System (RPAS).The latter is far more accurate given itsemphasis on the person in control ofthe system, rectifying the notion thatthe platform operates entirely withouthuman input. While drone technology issophisticated enough to permit a widerange of automated functions, from take-off and landing through to loitering overa particular geographical area for manyhours at a time, there is still a personsupervising its activity. As such, the

aircraft does not make ‘life and death’decisions autonomously. According toNoel Sharkey, a professor of artificialintelligence and robotics, despite themany and various developments in thisfield in the past twenty years, no systemyet exists that can discriminate betweena combatant and a non-combatant in acombat zone.8 As such, the UK positionremains very clear: ‘A fully autonomoussystem would have to be capable ofmaking the qualitative assessmentscurrently required by the Law of ArmedConflict, until this is possible, the humanmust remain within the decision-makingprocess.’9

Clearly, autonomous killing is not,as yet, an issue in practice. However, itis worth noting Sharkey’s concern thatresearch into the ability of artificial-intelligence systems to select targets,for example, is being enthusiasticallypursued in many parts of the world,even if the systems themselves are notcurrently being equipped with weaponry.It is not inconceivable, therefore, that if,

or more likely when, the military situationor political landscape changes at somepoint in the future, politicians seducedby promises of casualty-free conflictsare very likely to give the order to armsuch systems.10 In this vein, HumanRights Watch called for a pre-emptiveban on all fully autonomous weapons inNovember 2012 and the organisers of theCampaign to Stop Killer Robots – a globaleffort launched in April 2013 – arguethat advances in robotic technologymean it is only a matter of time beforefully autonomous, ‘human-out-of-the-loop’ systems – capable of identifyingand firing on targets on their own – aredeveloped.11 This will indeed raise someprofound ethical challenges, not leastover the question of responsibility andaccountability should the systems proveinaccurate in their targeting.

Killing at a DistanceOf course, ‘stand-off’ weaponsthemselves are nothing new and there isa spectrum in terms of such capabilities:

Protesters burn an effigy of a US military drone during a rally outside the US Embassy in Manila, Philippines, April 2012. Courtesy of AP Photo/Bullit Marquez.

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a rock thrown a few yards might beat one end, while a Tomahawk cruisemissile might be at the other. A soldierwith a sniper rifle, able to watch atarget through a scope from a distanceof several kilometres before pulling thetrigger, is also clearly on the stand-offspectrum, as is a fast-jet pilot deliveringclose air support to those on the ground.From this perspective, therefore, thedrone’s degree of remoteness is muchgreater when considering that theoperator may sit many thousands of milesaway from where the drone is actuallyflying its mission. However, while thedegree of stand-off is obviously greater,this does not necessarily imply that thereis any moral difference between thesoldier looking down the rifle scope, thepilot using an aircraft’s sensor display totarget a laser-guided bomb and the droneoperator looking at targets on a screen.

One of the obvious physicaldifferences is that however safe thesniper is, or however high above thefront line the fast-jet pilot is, both arestill in, over or at least near the theatreof operations, sharing certain risks withthose on the ground, including thetargets. These are risks that the droneoperator is simply not concerned with.Yet the question remains as to why thisshould matter at all. If the effect of thecombatant’s action is going to be thesamewhether they are pulling the trigger,flying a plane or piloting a drone, it wouldappear perverse to insist on putting one’sown personnel in harm’s way, and toclaim it as somehow ethically preferable,when the same effect could be achievedwithout doing so. Bradley J Strawser, anassistant professor in the defence analysisdepartment at the US Naval PostgraduateSchool and a research associate withOxford University’s Institute for Ethics,Law and Armed Conflict, suggests theremight actually be a moral imperative atwork that compels the West to pursueand deploy this type of technologicaldevelopment to minimise unnecessaryrisk to personnel.12 Indeed, it is ‘wrongto command someone to take onunnecessary potentially lethal risks in aneffort to carry out a just action for somegood’.13 As a programme manager atHoneywell puts it: ‘every time a T-Hawkgoes down it means a human didn’t.’14

Surely, this should be a good thing, basedon a clear common-sense, if not ethical,requirement to reduce risks to one’s ownpersonnel where it is possible to do so.

This appears to be a strong argumentin favour of using more drones ratherthan fewer. However, there are also otherconcerns related to this distance betweenthe pilot and the target – primarily thatof moral disconnection. Some militarytraining is designed to allow individualsto achieve emotional distance fromtheir enemies and thus enable them toovercome an innate reluctance to kill.15One of the tools traditionally employedin this regard is dehumanisation – thepromotion of a sense of ‘otherness’ inthe group that is deemed to be a threat.Those who fall into such a group can thenbe perceived as ‘non-entities, expendableor undeserving’, making the act of killingthem easier to carry out.16 Given PrinceHarry’s recent comparison of his work asa co-pilot gunner in an Apache gunshipto a video game,17 it is easy to see howsome people would wonder about themoral effect of killing when the targetsare just pixels on a screen and there isno need to look anyone ‘in the eye’– aclear, perhaps even extreme, example ofdehumanisation.

It also raises the question as to howmuch easier this would be if the person‘pulling the trigger’ were 8,000 km awayto begin with. The English philosopher A CGrayling notes that an RAF bomber crewin the Second World War could unleashits bombs from 20,000 feet and knowinglykill hundreds or even thousands ofwomen and children. If, however, onegave the same bomber crew a knife andtold them to slit the throats of the familyin the room next door, they would not beable to do it.18 Indeed, physical separationappears to ease the suspension of moralconcerns, even to the extent of makingterrible things possible. Interviewswith contemporary military pilots withcombat experience show that they tendto agree that ‘not only are decisionsto kill [from the air] rarely perceivedas emotionally charged, the death offriendly, yet physically distant combatantsis emotionally dulled’.19

It would appear, then, that such alack of physical contact associated withremote killing contributes greatly to the

alienation of each side from the other.Whether this ‘remoteness’ is achievedthrough the planting of a roadsideimprovised explosive device (IED) – forwhich people bid money via the Internetto win the right to detonate the bomband watch the results live on a website –or a drone operator ‘wasting’ tiny avatarson a computer screen, it is thus difficultto ensure the essential mutual respectthat combatant equality – the bedrockof the law of armed conflict – requires. Ifa faceless enemy can be so debased, it iseasy to see how lines can become blurredand civilians can come to be seen as justanother target.

However, physical distance doesnot always guarantee a correspondingemotional separation. An AmericanSecond World War veteran recalledthe moment at which he opened hisaircraft’s bomb-bay doors on his firstmission over Europe: ‘He felt terribleresistance, nausea, sickness, headaches,despair. He couldn’t do it, but his crewchief screamed at him, “Now! Now!” If hedidn’t, the mission would be a failure andit would be his fault. He finally pushedthe button. Then he vomited.’20Of course,this refers to an act that was part of atotal war in which large-scale, devastatingattacks on civilian populations werecommonplace, rather than the typeof highly accurate, precision-targetingpolicies of wars of choice in thecontemporary age, in which the ‘pilot’can even be on a different continent.Nevertheless, the moral comfort thatdistance can provide might not extendas far as many would think. Just becausethe target is viewed through a screenrather than a rifle or bombsight does notmean that taking life has no effect onthe person pulling the trigger. Perhapssurprisingly, just as fast-jet pilots cansuffer from post-traumatic stress disorder(PTSD), there are also cases among dronepilots who have never personally evenbeen in (or over) the theatre of militaryoperations.21

Onewonders if operating a drone foroffensive missions in the contemporaryoperating environment might actuallybe closer to the experience of militarysnipers.22 Snipers, too, are separatedby distance, but can also be intimatelyaware of their target, much like the drone

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operator who might be tracking a targetfor hours using real-time video feedsbefore the decision is taken to strike. Asniper deployed in Iraq recalls:23

Theoretically, sniping was supposed tobe a matter of clinical, dispassionatekilling. ‘Even when we were in Iraq,killing Iraqis, it was target one, targettwo. Target one’s on the left; targettwo’s on the right. OK, scan target one.Target one’s down. Scan target two. Fire.Target two’s down. That’s it. They’re justtargets; you try to convince yourself ofthat.’ [However,] imagining a man purelyas a target was not easy when you hadto aim specifically at him and fire andthen watch him fall over, screaming andarching his back in agony.

Drone footage can be just as graphic.This raises questions about whetherthe geographic dislocation is actuallyproviding moral dislocation at all, or atleast any dislocation greater than thatexperienced by a sniper.24 An RAF RPASoperator noted that: 25

[A] day, two days, maybe a month canbe spent watching and then when ithappens, we don’t leave once we’vedropped the weapons, we stick aroundfor battle damage assessment andbecause of the way of the Muslim faith– they like to bury their dead beforethe sun goes down – generally you willsee the funeral procession, the womenand children arrive, it can be veryemotional and that’s one of the thingsthey’re looking for to make sure thatthat doesn’t turn into a problem in ten,fifteen years.

Such considerations feed into a widerdebate regarding the long-termemotional effects of combat on droneoperators – and in particular whetherthe geographical and emotional distanceentailed will prove a positive or negativefactor. Dave Grossman, in his powerfulbook On Killing: The Psychological Costof Learning to Kill in War and Society,notes that those who do not dehumanisetheir opponents are most likely to beable to deal with the aftermath of warand go on to lead happy and productivelives.26 If it is true that the innate (or

at least the socially programmed)inhibitions against killing do not need tobe overcome in the same way for droneoperators as they do, for example, forinfantry who need to be prepared toclose with and then kill the enemy, thenthe psychological repercussions of warmight be significantly reduced. It will beinteresting to see if incidences of PTSDamong drone operators in the longerterm turn out to be significantly different– both quantitatively and qualitatively– to those among combatants who arephysically present in (or over) the battlespace.

Putting aside this questionof emotional and psychologicalconsequences associated with remotecombat, it remains the case that theabsence from the physical situationhas some obvious implications for theeffectiveness of the drone operator. Thefact that the operator is not directly atrisk when on a ‘mission’ provides him orher with some advantages over a personphysically in harm’s way. Another droneoperator refers to this as the abilityto ‘step back and have a bit more ofa Hamlet moment as it were … youcan hopefully double-check whatyou’re doing is correct’.27 Thisdetachment provides time and space fordecision-making that is, quite literally,a world away from the experiences ofsoldiers on the ground or even of pilotsin hostile airspace. The ability to remaincool, calm and detached arguablyallows better decisions to be taken in theheat of battle.

There are undoubtedly issues ofsituational awareness linked to thephysical limitations of the informationfeeds, such as the need to ensuresufficient bandwidth for receivingall of the required sensor data, andpotential time delays (of about one totwo seconds) caused by the distancethe signals need to travel, but these areall technical issues that are constantlybeing minimised or ameliorated. Thisauthor has been told by current RPASpilots who have also flown combatmissions in fast jets that, in practice,problems surrounding situationalawareness generally have more to dowith the quality and chosen field of viewof the sensors being employed rather

than whether those sensors are on amanned jet or a drone. Just as mannedaircraft can increase their situationalawareness by calling on visual back-upfrom other aircraft or other assets intheatre, a drone operator can also referto images provided by other drones andISR assets to build up a more detailedand accurate picture of the situation. Ofcourse, this must be balanced against thepossible negative effects of drone pilotsswitching between different platformsor coming ‘on shift’ halfway through anoperation, and therefore not having thecontinuity of focus required to build upan understanding of the ‘story’ playingout on the ground. However, such issuesshould be avoidable and one mightexpect that as technology continues toimprove, the quality of the decisionsbeing made should also thereforeincrease.

There may be other advantages tobeing physically remote: a correspondingemotional distance between the operatorand events on the ground may wellhave a positive influence on thebehaviour of the former towards thetarget. As Strawser notes, ‘Once fearfor their own safety is not a pressingconcern, one would assume the operatorwould be more capable, not less, ofbehaving justly.’28 By contrast, a 2006report by the US military’s Mental HealthAdvisory Team (MHAT) avers a strongcorrelation between anger among armedforces personnel and the mistreatmentof non-combatants. It also suggests thatsoldiers and marines who were membersof units that had suffered casualtieswere more likely to treat civilians innegative ways.29 Furthermore, PaoloTripodi argues that the ability to remainslightly detached from one’s immediatesituation is one of the attributes ofa good commander.30 As such, theenforced detachment of the droneoperator might well be a positivething.

The distance between the droneand the operator also raises the questionof whether the operator needs to be acombatant at all or whether civilianscould undertake such roles. In doing so,however, they would relinquish theirimmunity from attack, meaning thatthey may be directly targeted and, if

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captured, they may not be recognisedas combatants or receive the protectionafforded by prisoner-of-war status.31If the civilian operator is not based inthe country in which the actual militaryoperation is taking place, this might seemto be a small or acceptable risk to take.However, as Wing Commander AllisonMardell notes in her contribution toan RAF Directorate of Defence Studiesreport on UAVs, ‘allowing civilians tooperate drones during armed conflictmay have significant implications forthem if their activity amounts to adirect part in hostilities’.32 As such,attention should be paid to the legalquestions surrounding the employmentof civilian drone operators; indeed,it must be remembered that civiliansemploying lethal force that is not indirect self-defence may be charged withmurder.

Continuing in this vein, however,the removal of physical risk raises thequestion of whether drone operatorsare really at war at all – and whethereven those in uniform are actuallyfellow combatants. In turn, this highlightssome interesting dilemmas over thenature of direct and indirect participationin conflict that the geographic separationfrom the battlefield might appear tocloud a little. If a man knowingly helpshis brother to plant an IED by drivinghim and the device in his car, he mightbe a civilian, but he is facilitatingthe planting of the device and cantherefore be considered to be directlyparticipating in hostilities at that time.As such, he may be legitimately targetedwhile carrying out this role. Consider,then, a husband on the morning schoolrun who drops his wife at work at anair base in Nevada where she will bepiloting a drone employed in offensiveoperations. The question must then beraised whether he, too, becomes a directparticipant in hostilities while acting aschauffeur.

This has implications for the wayin which the contemporary operatingenvironment is conceptualised andthe changing moral landscape thisgenerates. Some of these challengeswere acknowledged by the same RPASoperator cited above who noted thathis hour-long commute was important

for adjusting from home life to combatmentality:33

[I]t gives you time to adjust – you dohave to be in the right frame of mindto do this. You are carrying munitionsand weapons that can end lives so it’snot the kind of thing where you canenter the box worried about the nextmortgage payment or worried abouthow the kids are going to get to schooltomorrow.

Clearly, expecting people to go into workas if it were simply a day in the office,be directly involved in events that killpeople, and then go home again at theend of the shift to play games with thechildren may be introducing a cognitivedissonance that is difficult to maintainwithout significant, and perhaps long-lasting, effects. Such issues will requirein-depth consideration as dronesbecome increasingly prevalent in defencedoctrine.

AccountabilityBy highlighting the potentially hugedistances between what is happeningon the ground and the person operatingit, the question of accountability comesinto sharp relief. The person targeted bya drone will probably remain completelyunaware of the weapon system – and,in turn, of its operator – until his or herworld, quite literally, comes crashingdown. Similarly, the marine unit on theground has no idea which individualis controlling the drone in the skiesabove when it calls in fire support. Akey consideration, therefore, is whathappens if something goes wrong, andhow individual responsibility can bedetermined.

While it is, of course, always aquestion of how the technology isemployed in practice, formally, thereare strict guidelines in place regardingdecisions to deploy munitions, as in thecurrent military theatre of Afghanistan,for example. Unless acting in self-defence(in which case no further authority isrequired), any use of lethal force by ISAFmembers has to be duly authorised bya correctly empowered engagementauthority. In practice, this is normallythe commander on the ground who,

having gone through and satisfied boththe target-eligibility procedures andcollateral-damage assessments, passesinstructions through a qualified jointterminal attack controller (JTAC) to theoperator of the platform required todeliver the munition, be that an artillerybattery or a drone.34 Such command-and-control procedures lead some to arguethat ‘the ground commander owns thebomb’: they make the decision and soshould also ultimately be accountablefor the effects of that decision. Thiswould appear to remove responsibilityfrom the drone pilot. However, there isalso the clear requirement that everyoneinvolved in prosecuting a target, fromplanning through to pulling the trigger,has the obligation to comply with theLaw of Armed Conflict and to rejectany order that is deemed unlawful. Aweapon-release authorisation does notturn anyone into a moral automaton andthe drone operator can still decide not toprosecute a target. As such, responsibilityis spread across everyone involved.35Culpability, in turn, is closely linked to thehonesty – rather than just the accuracy– of the situational assessment madeby the person carrying out the action orgiving the order. Therefore, anyone in aposition to influence a targeting decisionwho fails to pass on pertinent informationbears the moral responsibility for anyresultant mistake – be they on the groundwith ‘eyes on’, someone at the back ofthe Operations Room with a view of adifferent camera feed, or the drone pilothim- or herself. While this attributionof responsibility and culpability is notunique to the use of drones, it doesemphasise the importance of trust inmilitary operations between the differentparties involved in decision-making.

Another consideration with regardsto accountability is that the very natureof this new technology actually offers amuch higher degree of oversight than invirtually any other area of military activity.Many of this author’s conversations withmilitary personnel recently returnedfrom operations in Afghanistan highlightthe complete lack of effective scrutinyin theatre; no journalists are foolhardyenough to be embedded on long-rangepatrols so there is no media presence andsuch teams can be out of contact with

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their own bases for extended periods. Itis easy to see how what happens out onthe open plains of Afghanistan might wellremain known only by those involved asa result.36 However, the drone operator’sexperience could not be further removedfrom this: every movement of thejoystick, every frame of camera footageand therefore every decision – or,indeed, hesitation or omission – madeby the operator is recorded and can bepored over at great length followingany incident.37 There is nowhere tohide from a bad decision if the militarywishes to use such information to holdthe drone operator to account (andrecent experience suggests that if theydo not, there is at least a chance that theinformationmay well end up in the publicdomain throughWikileaks or some otherforum, enforcing accountability anyway).

Such scrutiny would appear toplace profound restraint on any ‘trigger-happy’ behaviour; however, it goesfurther than this. The 2006 MHAT reportmentioned above recounted that 45per cent of US soldiers and 60 per centof marines surveyed stated that theywould not report a fellow unit memberfor killing an innocent non-combatant.These figures rose to 57 and 70 per centrespectively for those claiming theywould not report a fellow unit memberfor unnecessarily destroying privateproperty.38 (It should be noted, however,that this research was undertaken invery particular circumstances in Iraq andthat a great deal of work has since beendone to correct such attitudes.) Adequateoversight – allied with an attendant fearof being caught – is one of the waysthat such attitudes and behaviours canbe adapted.39 While the prospect ofusing drones to spy on both friendlyand hostile forces is not necessarilypalatable, the fact that the whereaboutsof such assets is generally unknown,combined with their ability to observeevents on the ground in intimate detail,means that there is at least a chance ofmisdemeanours being captured on film– or even being watched live. Knowingor even thinking that there is a smallchance of someone watching remotelymight help improve both behaviour andaccountability among those other thanthe drone operator as well.40

Precision (and its Paradox)It is a necessary, if obvious, caveat thatjust because technology is capable ofbeing used in a particular way, it doesnot mean that it actually will be. In thissense, drones are exactly the same as anyother military technological developmentthroughout history: each is potentiallyopen to abuse or can be put to use inpursuit of illegitimate ends. However,in terms of precision, many of theadvantages of current drone technology,when used appropriately, appear obvious.Rather than saturating a target withmultiple sorties and ordinance in orderto have confidence in its destruction, thesame military outcome can be achievedwith fewer and smaller weaponsdue to their improved accuracy. Theresultant reduction in foreseeable butunintended and unwanted civilian deathand destruction – collateral damage – istherefore significant.41 As such, given theremoval of risk to drone pilots, discussedabove, it is clear that ‘Such weapons cantherefore help to preserve life from bothperspectives (and are more financiallyefficient into the bargain).’42

Of course, sometimes things dogo wrong. For example, discriminationdecisions and proportionalityassessments for actions taken with anyweapon system might not be conductedwith the diligence required, whileany decision is only as good as theinformation or assumptions that informit. Indeed, history shows that mistakes inwar do happen: consider the destructionof the Chinese Embassy in Belgrade in1999 or the bombing of a wedding partyin Wech Baghtu, Afghanistan, in 2008 –both of which were entirely accidental.43One report reviewing the use of drones inPakistan’s remote tribal areas concludedthat ‘32 per cent of those killed in droneattacks since 2004 were civilians’.44 Whilethe numbers are debated (for example,the Brookings Institution puts the numberof civilians killed at between one in sevenand one in ten45), any civilian deathscaused by such accidents are obviouslyhighly regrettable and the fact that anyoccur at all leads some to the idea thatthey were intentional. They argue that ifthe weapons are as accurate as is widelyasserted then, surely, whatever thoseweapons hit must be the intended target.

This highlights the paradox of precision:that is, the more accurate the weaponsemployed, the more attention upon anymisses or mistakes.46 The importance ofmanaging expectations surrounding theWest’s ability to carry out attacks withunfailing pinpoint accuracy is essential,as is ensuring that policy-makersunderstand that the potential accuracy ofthe technology does not mean that therewill not be civilian casualties. Warfarehas never been clinical in this sense andis unlikely to suddenly become so giventhe persistence of the ‘fog of war’ and‘friction’ – encompassing those factorsthat cannot be controlled and thattherefore have the potential to derailplans. The situation is exacerbated whenan opponent deliberately seeks to ‘drawthe foul’, as it is known in basketball, bypositioning themselves in such a way thatany military response will either violate,or be perceived as violating, the rules inbello by creating substantial numbersof civilian casualties.47 The decision toabort an attack with Storm Shadowcruise missiles during Operation UnifiedProtector in Libya in 2011 rather than riskkilling civilians allegedly being used as‘human shields’ illustrates this dilemmaonly too well.48 Of course, as with somany other issues, this is not a problemunique to drones, but rather an issue forall military activity in the contemporaryoperating environment.

Asymmetric Implications andPerceptions of LegitimacyThe potential mismatch between thetechnological capabilities of opponentsmay also create a particular ethicalchallenge. The asymmetric-threatconcept normally focuses attention onthose hostile agents who seek to turnthe tables on the sophisticated militarymachines they oppose by playing bydifferent rules because they cannothope to match them technologically.Their tactics might include hit-and-run-style guerrilla attacks that prevent thepreponderance of military power beingbrought to bear through to the use ofIEDs against dismounted troops or theirvehicles. It is important to recognise,however, that the deployment ofdrones reverses this asymmetry: indeed,any military activity carried out by a

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technologically sophisticated protagonistagainst a less sophisticated one isinherently asymmetrical.

This is, in fact, merely therecognition that one normally seeksto exploit an opponent’s weaknessrather than attacking their strength.Admittedly, however, conducting a warfrom thousands of metres in the airwithout the pilot even being in the samehemisphere as the weaponmight be seento be taking asymmetry to the extreme.Peter Singer of the Brookings Institutionnotes Arthur C Clarke’s observation that‘[a]ny sufficiently advanced technology isindistinguishable from magic’.49

The work of the German politicalscientist Herfried Münkler might beinvoked in response to the questionwhether it is even ethical to use such‘magic’ against those who cannot employit themselves. He suggests that: ‘Thepilot of a fighter-bomber or the crewof a man-of-war from which Tomahawkrockets are launched are beyond thereach of the enemy’s weapons. Warhas lost all features of the classical duelsituation here and has approached, toput it cynically, certain forms of pestcontrol.’50 This conceptualisation ofmodern warfare – evocatively capturedhere and even more pertinent to drones– becomes of real concern when it isconsidered in relation to the principlesof jus in bello. As Singer notes, war canbecome ‘like playing God from afar, justwith unmanned weapons substitutedfor thunderbolts’.51 Disturbing thoughthese images might be, the questionis, however, fundamentally misguidedif it is motivated by a concern to createa level playing field: indeed, ‘theprinciple of proportionality is not aboutbeing fair, it is about not using moreforce than is necessary to achieve therequired ends.’52 As such, it would bemorally perverse to refrain from usingany weapon unavailable to the opponent– thereby eschewing precision munitionsand causing additional and unnecessarydeath and destruction, or puttingarmed forces personnel in harm’s wayunnecessarily – out of some misguidednotion of fair play.

Nonetheless, domestic andinternational public perceptions ofmorality will continue to shape the way

that drones contribute to present andfuture military operations:53

Although the decisions of democraticallyelected governments can claim a naturallegitimacy, they prefer to be workingwith public opinion and are apt tobecome nervous if they have failedto persuade international opinion.The legitimacy of a military operationis a subjective attribute, relating toquestions of legality and morality as wellas security. Because it is subjective thisis an area where the inability to developpersuasive narratives about the whysand wherefores of controversial policywill make itself felt. An operation’slegitimacy will be hard to obtain andsustain if it is not in accord with theprevailing political culture, and in theWest, that means with liberal values.

The discussion above has drawn outsome of the ways in which drones can beused in accordance with such values. It isinteresting that for all of the argumentsmade against the use of drones bythe US along and across the Pakistaniborder with Afghanistan, there was verylittle angst over the use of drones inconjunction with other tools to provideprotection for the civilian populationin Libya in 2011. The general publicmay have been unaware of or simplyuninterested in the presence of dronesthere, but perhaps the lack of concernhadmore to do with a general sense that,at least when the civilian population wasin direct need of protection from its owngovernment, this was a worthy causeand whatever appropriate tools wereavailable should be employed. The factthat no Western personnel lost theirlives during Operation Unified Protectorwas an added bonus. However, the nexttime that a pilot participating in a just waris lost in action while carrying out a taskthat could have been undertaken just aseffectively by a remotely piloted dronemay well prompt a more fundamentalshift in public perceptions of what isacceptable or legitimate.

The Threshold to the Use ofMilitary ForcePrecision-strike from stand-off weaponsystems such as drones offer policy-

makers an option for direct action thatwould simply not be possible usingmore conventional tools in the militarytoolbox. Experience suggests thatpublic support for military action willfall away as the number of casualties– both in terms of national militarypersonnel and civilians – mounts.If such numbers can be minimisedthrough the use of precision weapons,delivered safely from afar, the argumentfollows that public resolve cantherefore be maintained – an essentialconsideration when democracies wantto use military force, particularly wherenational interests are not obviously atstake. In 1999, the dark observationwas made that NATO was willing tobomb to stop a massacre, but onlyas long as pilots were not put at riskby flying below 15,000 feet: ‘the lifeof one NATO soldier is worth 20,000Kosovars’.54 This classic argument forthe utility of, and preference for, airpower has been taken to the nextlevel by removing the risk of harm tothe pilot as well, adding resonance toMichael Ignatieff’s prescient question:‘are we on the eve of a new age of“drive-by” wars, in which Americanpower can strike anywhere, in nearcertainty that neither its civilians norits soldiers will ever be put at risk?’55 Itmust also be considered whether suchcapabilities increase the likelihood ofwar, potentially transforming it from anoption of ‘last resort’ into a first or atleast an early response to certain typesof crisis instead.

Of course, in some instancesthis lowering of the costs of actionmay well be considered a good thing:perhaps, for example, the West couldbe willing to prevent a future genocidesuch as in Rwanda in 1994 using suchtechnology.56 Generally, however, theworry may be that any developmentthat makes the decision to go to wareasier must be profoundly worrying,even if it is difficult to see how thisobjection can be tested empirically.If the argument that drones makethe decision to use force easier thanit would otherwise be appears to be‘intuitively plausible’, Strawser countersthat it still ultimately fails as a validobjection to their use because there is

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still a moral imperative to use dronesor other stand-off weapons when theyare available and equally effective,presumably even if this means thatthey may be used more frequently.57 Itis indeed ‘wrong to command someoneto take on unnecessary potentiallylethal risks in an effort to carry out ajust action for some good’.58 However,a policy preference for the limitation– or, indeed, the elimination – of riskin combat might ultimately result ina strategic failure, suggesting thattaking some risk might be necessary toachieve one’s political aims. Perhaps,for example, those on the ‘losing side’might not accept defeat if they feelas though they have never even mettheir opponent in battle. In this vein,it is possible to draw a lesson fromthe experience of early months ofthe most recent conflict in Iraq: theSunni Triangle, ‘the future hotbedof rebellion[,] wasn’t occupied untilweeks after Baghdad fell in 2003, andlocal would-be insurgents instead gotthe signal that they had never beendefeated.’59

Similarly, new generationsof stand-off weapons seem todemonstrate ‘an ability to kill but littleor no willingness to die for the West’scauses’.60 Technological advantagesmight actually signal to opponentsa fundamental lack of resolve to seean issue through to the end. MichaelIgnatieff argues that the ‘willingnessto take mortal risk is what makesmilitary deterrence believable’.61The use of drones over Beirut, forexample, had the result of spurringmass identity politics ‘as an antidoteto the technology discrepancy’, andgave the impression that ‘they [Israelisand American] don’t want to fight uslike real men, but are afraid to fight.So we just have to kill a few of theirsoldiers to defeat them.’62 Furthermore,it should be noted that it was not thebombing from a safe distance of 15,000feet that led to success in Kosovo, butthe eventual threat of substantialnumbers of boots on the groundcombined with real political pressurefrom the international community– a demonstration of both crediblemeans and genuine resolve. If the use

of drones does indeed make it easierto ‘resort’ to war because of theapparent low cost of action, the resultmay actually be a crisis that cannot befinished without paying heavier costs.

Unintended Consequences?Of course, this ‘risk-free’ approach towarfare might also have implicationsfor one’s own civilian population,which might be seen as a ‘legitimate’target as a result. If it is impossible tostrike a state’s military assets due toits predominant reliance on dronesor other military tools that leave itsarmed forces all but invulnerable,those wishing to inflict damage onthe state may well broaden their listto encompass civilian targets, shouldthe stakes be high enough. This callsinto question whether the breaking ofinternational law becomes justifiablein the event of a ‘supreme emergency’,in which an effective response inalignment with the principles of jus inbello is simply impossible.

The term ‘supreme emergency’was coined by Winston Churchill todepict the terrible situation in whichBritain found itself in early in 1941,faced with imminent invasion and withonly RAF Bomber Command availableas an effective offensive weapon. Therewas little doubt regarding the terriblecost of defeat to Germany and theexistential crisis was seen to justifyusing those bombers against the onlytarget that could be struck given thelimits of technology at the time, whichincluded not only military facilitiesbut also the civilian inhabitantsof German cities.63 This supremeemergency passed as other theatresof war opened up, new allies joinedthe struggle, technology improved,allowing more accurate targeting, and,most importantly, the threat of theimminent invasion of Britain abated. Asthe emergency passed, the continuedbombing of German civilians becameincreasingly difficult to justify onmoral grounds.64 The justification oftargeting civilians in this way is clearlydifficult, but it is easy to see how sucharguments might be convincing to thosewho feel powerless to respond to theoverwhelming technological superiority

of a ‘faceless’ enemy whom it appearsotherwise impossible to counter.

ConclusionIn many ways, drones can be seen asthe continued evolution of mannedairpower in the twenty-first centuryand, as such, the type of ethical issuesassociated with them are often similarto those debated regarding theirmanned counterparts, differing only indegree rather than posing radically newquestions. As with any other militarytechnology, it is open to abuse andmisuse, but it can also be employedresponsibly within established legaland ethical frameworks. Drones arecurrently deployed in combinationwith, rather than as a straightforwardreplacement for, many other types ofmilitary asset in theatre. It would bechurlish not to acknowledge that, whenused appropriately, drone technologyoffers a whole range of militaryadvantages and that many of theseare to be genuinely welcomed from anethical perspective.

However, there are a number ofchallenges that potentially come to ahead if drones are transformed frombeing one of many tools into the tool ofmilitary and political choice. The abilityto conduct stand-off operations in a waythat minimises risks to non-combatantsand eliminates them entirely for nationalmilitary personnel might well lower thepolitical threshold to employing militaryforce, making the occurrence of warmore frequent. If this means a greaterwillingness to intervene and use forceto protect those that cannot protectthemselves then it may well be a goodthing, but it might also make it easierto become involved in situations thatprudence would otherwise rule out.At the same time, it might also makethose conflicts more difficult to resolvedue to a lack of will – either perceivedor real – to put one’s own people inharm’s way when required. Meanwhile,involvement in other people’s affairswhile relying overwhelmingly on militarytools that reduce or eliminate risk toone’s own combatants, ironically, mightalso increase the risk to one’s own civilianpopulation. Some may see robots as an‘answer to the suicide bomber’,65 but they

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should also consider that some suicidebombers may themselves be motivatedby a sense of helplessness in the face ofthat remote approach to war in the firstplace. Therefore, even if in some contextsthey can indeed offer some real practicaland ethical advantages over othermilitary tools, drones may not always bethe right means to match the politicalends.

David Whetham is a Senior Lecturer inthe Defence Studies Department ofKing’s College London. His publicationsinclude Ethics, Law and MilitaryOperations (Palgrave, 2010) and JustWars and Moral Victories: Surprise,Deception and the NormativeFramework of European War in theLater Middle Ages (Brill, 2009).

The article presented here is an updatedand substantially revised version of DavidWhetham, ‘Remote Killing and Drive-ByWars’, in DavidW Lovell and IgorPrimoratz (eds), Protecting Civilians DuringArmed Conflict: Theoretical and PracticalIssues During Violent Conflict (Farnham:Ashgate, 2012). Any opinions expressedhere should not be taken to represent anyofficial institution or position.

Notes

1 Geoff Fein and Grace Jean, ‘BudgetStalemate: US Military Seeks ImprovedUAS Capabilities Despite FinancialSqueeze’, IHS Jane’s InternationalDefence Review, April 2013.

2 Nick Hopkins, ‘British Military has 500Drones’, Guardian, 6 May 2013.

3 BBC News, ‘Armed Drones Operatedfrom RAF Base in UK, Says MoD’,27 April 2013.

4 Assistant Chief of the Air Staff, ‘RAF’sReaper logs 10,000 Hours overAfghanistan’, 19 May 2010. <www.gov.uk/government/news/rafs-reaper-logs-10-000-hours-over-afghanistan>,accessed 9 May 2013.

5 Royal Air Force, ‘Reaper’, <http://www.raf.mod.uk/equipment/reaper.cfm>,accessed 9 May 2013.

6 CNN, ‘Anti-Drone Protests Take Off inBritain’, 28 April 2013.

7 For an exploration of some of the moralissues specifically relating to this, seeDavid Whetham, ‘Drones and TargetedKilling: Angels or Assassins?’, in BradleyJay Strawser (ed.), Killing by RemoteControl: The Ethics of an UnmannedMilitary (Oxford: Oxford University Press,2013). See also Michael L Gross,MoralDilemmas of Modern War: Torture,Assassination, and Blackmail in an Ageof Asymmetric Conflict (Cambridge:Cambridge University Press, 2010),particularly Chapter 5.

8 Noel Sharkey, ‘The Life Scientific’,BBC Radio 4, 29 January 2013. For amore optimistic view regarding futuredevelopments, see Ronald C Arkin, ‘TheCase for Ethical Autonomy in UnmannedSystems’, Journal of Military Ethics (Vol.9, No. 4, 2010), pp. 332–41.

9 Allison Mardell, ‘Unmanned AerialVehicles: The Legal Perspective’, in OwenBarnes (ed.), Air Power: UAVs: The WiderContext (Northolt: Ministry of Defence,2009), p. 82.

10 Sharkey, ‘The Life Scientific’. Fordiscussions on some of the ethicalimplications of fully autonomousweapon systems, see ‘SpecialIssue: Ethics and Emerging MilitaryTechnologies’, Journal of Military Ethics(Vol. 9, No. 4, 2010).

11 See Human Rights Watch andInternational Human Rights Clinic, LosingHumanity: The Case against Killer Robots(New York, NY: Human Rights Watch,2012), <www.hrw.org/sites/default/files/reports/arms1112ForUpload_0_0.pdf>, accessed 9 May 2013. See alsoStuart Hughes, ‘Campaigners Call forInternational Ban on “Killer Robots”’,BBC News, 23 April 2013.

12 Bradley Jay Strawser, ‘Moral Predators:The Duty to Employ Uninhabited AerialVehicles’, Journal of Military Ethics (Vol.9, No. 4, 2010), pp. 342–68.

13 Ibid., p. 344.

14 Andy Simms, ‘A Magnificent Man andHis Flying Machines’, Soldier Magazine(October 2010), p. 37.

15 See Dave Grossman, On Killing: ThePsychological Cost of Learning to Killin War and Society (Boston, MA: LittleBrown, 1995).

16 Susan Opotow, ‘Moral Exclusion andInjustice: An Introduction’, Journal ofSocial Issues (Vol. 46. No. 1, Spring1990); see also Edward Tick,War andthe Soul: Healing Our Nation’s Veteransfrom Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder(Wheaton, IL: Quest Books, 2005), p. 82.

17 Jon Boone, ‘Taliban Retaliate after PrinceHarry Compares Fighting to a VideoGame’, Guardian, 22 January 2013.

18 For a fascinating and balanced discussionof these issues, see A C Grayling, Amongthe Dead Cities: Is the Targeting ofCivilians in War Ever Justified? (London:Bloomsbury, 2007).

19 Nick Tucker-Lowe, ‘Does the Advent ofUninhabited Systems FundamentallyAffect the Ethical Landscape ofContemporary Conflict?’, DefenceResearch Paper (unpublished DefenceStudies MA dissertation, King’s College,London), July 2010, p. 11.

20 Tick,War and the Soul, p. 91.

21 For example, see Jane Mayer, ‘The Risksof a Remote-Controlled War’, NationalPublic Radio, 21 October 2009. Thisis also discussed in P W Singer,Wiredfor War: The Robotics Revolution andConflict in the 21st Century (New York,NY: Penguin, 2009).

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22 Dave Cummins, an RAF Reaper operatorbased at Creech Air Force Base inNevada, made precisely this observationon BBC Radio 4, ‘World at One’, 4January 2013.

23 Jeff Sparrow, Killing: Misadventures inViolence (Carlton, Victoria: MelbourneUniversity Press, 2009).

24 This emphasises the idea introducedabove that, in many ways, remote killingis in reality a spectrum rather than sharpdifferentiation. There is a connectionbetween the Lancaster bomber crews inthe Second World War and the Englishand Welsh archers at Agincourt in 1415,for example.

25 Cummins, on BBC Radio 4, ‘World atOne’.

26 Grossman, On Killing.

27 Individual referred to only as Fire ControlOfficer, BBC Radio 4, ‘World at One’.

28 Strawser, ‘Moral Predators’, p. 353.

29 Mental Health Advisory Team (MHAT)IV, ‘Operation Iraqi Freedom 05-07: FinalReport’, 17 November 2006, pp. 38–39,<http://www.armymedicine.army.mil/reports/mhat/mhat_iv/MHAT_IV_Report_17NOV06.pdf>, accessed 9 May2013.

30 Paolo Tripodi, ‘Understanding Atrocities:What Commanders Can Do to PreventThem’, in David Whetham (ed.),Ethics, Law and Military Operations(Basingstoke: Palgrave, 2010),pp. 185–86.

31 Mardell, ‘Unmanned Aerial Vehicles’,p. 79.

32 Ibid.

33 Cummins, on BBC Radio 4, ‘World atOne’.

34 This is also known as the Forward AirController in the UK but the US termJTAC (Joint Tactical Air Controller or JointTerminal Attack Controller) has becomecommonly used for the suitably qualifiedground-based person who carries outthis role.

35 This debate is currently taking placeat the highest levels of ISAF militaryleadership. The UK tends to support thelatter view of spreading responsibilityacross all involved.

36 For a disturbing account of what canhappen when effective oversight islacking, see Mark Boal, ‘The Kill Team’,Rolling Stone, 27 March 2011, <http://www.rollingstone.com/kill-team>,accessed 12 May 2013.

37 In this sense, the drone pilot’sexperience is very much like that of thefast-jet pilot’s.

38 MHAT IV, ‘Operation Iraqi Freedom 05-07’, p. 37.

39 See Tripodi, ‘Understanding Atrocities’,pp. 173–88, and Peter Wall, ‘The Ethicaland Legal Challenges of OperationalCommand’, in Whetham (ed.), Ethics,Law and Military Operations, pp. 221–29.

40 While a non-military issue, one can seesuch thinking at play in the March 2013suggestion by the League Against CruelSports that they may begin using dronesto monitor (and presumably deter) anypotentially illegal hunting activities in theUK. See BBC News, ‘Drones May be Usedto Target “Illegal Hunting”’, 16 March2013.

41 Singer notes that during the SecondWorld War, it took an average of 108planes to successfully prosecute eachtarget. In Afghanistan sixty years later,each aircraft could be expected tosuccessfully engage more than fourdifferent targets per sortie. See Singer,Wired for War, p. 100. While accurate,the Hellfire missile – one of theweapons used by the Reaper – may notbe the most discriminate of weaponssimply due to the size of its warhead(originally designed for targeting tanksand bunkers). Just as with any decisionto deploy force in a combat zone, thismeans that appropriate precautionshave to be taken before the use of theseweapons can be authorised, but it isalso the case that smaller and smallerwarheads will likely be utilised in thefuture as certainty regarding accuracyimproves.

42 David Whetham, ‘Ethics, Law andConflict’, in Whetham (ed.), Ethics, Lawand Military Operations, p. 20.

43 BBC News, ‘Embassy Strike “a Mistake”’,8 May 1999; Reuters, ‘Karzai Says AirStrike Kills 40 in Afghanistan’,5 November 2008.

44 Dean Nelson, ‘One in Three Killed by USDrones in Pakistan is a Civilian, ReportClaims’, Daily Telegraph, 4 March 2010.

45 Douglas Murray, ‘Drones Save Lives’,Wall Street Journal, 7 March 2013.

46 See Whetham, ‘Ethics, Law and Conflict’,p. 21.

47 See Michael Skerker, ‘Just War Criteriaand the New Face of War: HumanShields, Manufactured Martyrs, andLittle Boys with Stones’, Journal ofMilitary Ethics (Vol. 3, No. 1, 2004),p. 28. That lessons are being learnt mightbe indicated by the apparent reductionin civilian deaths associated withdrones. For example, see Ken Dilanian,‘CIA Drones May Be Avoiding PakistanCivilians’, Los Angeles Times, 22 February2011.

48 Ian Dury, ‘Mission Aborted on Orders ofSAS: RAF Attack is Halted after TroopsSpot Human Shields’,MailOnline, 12May 2011, <http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-1368626/Libya-RAF-abort-attack-SAS-spot-Gaddafi-using-human-shields.html>, accessed 12 May 2013.

49 P W Singer, ‘The Ethics of KillerApplications: Why is it So Hard to TalkAbout Morality when it Comes to NewMilitary Technology?’, Journal of MilitaryEthics (Vol. 9, No. 4, 2010), p. 310.

50 Herfried Münkler, Die neuen Kriege(Hamburg: Rowohlt, 2003), quoted andtranslated in Uwe Steinhoff, ‘Torture:The Case for Dirty Harry and againstAlan Dershowitz’, Journal of AppliedPhilosophy (Vol. 23, No. 3, August 2006),pp. 337–53.

51 Singer,Wired for War, p. 324.

52 See David Whetham, ‘The Just WarTradition: A Pragmatic Compromise’, inWhetham (ed.), Ethics, Law and MilitaryOperations, p. 21.

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53 Lawrence Freedman, The Transformationof Strategic Affairs (London: IISS AdelphiPaper Series, 2006), p. 80.

54 Singer,Wired for War, p. 324.

55 Michael Ignatieff, ‘To Fight but Not toDie’,World Today, February 2000, p. 21.

56 See Zach Beauchamp and JulianSavulescu, ‘Robot Guardians:Teleoperated Combat Vehicles inHumanitarian Military Intervention’,Strawser, Killing by Remote Control,pp. 106–25.

57 Strawser, ‘Moral Predators’, p. 358.

58 Ibid., p. 344.

59 Singer,Wired for War, p. 308.

60 Whetham, ‘Ethics, Law and Conflict’,p. 22.

61 Ignatieff, ‘To Fight but Not to Die’, p. 23.

62 Rami Khouri, an ‘Arab moderate’, quotedin Singer,Wired for War, pp. 308–09.

63 See Michael Walzer, Just and UnjustWars: A Moral Argument with HistoricalIllustrations (New York, NY: Basic Books,1977), pp. 251–68.

64 See Grayling, Among the Dead Cities.

65 US Navy researcher Bart Everett, quotedin Singer,Wired for War, p. 62.

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