Thread: U.S. drone strikes blur the lines of war, UN warns

Originally Posted by bust331

Hypothetical situation.....what would be worse:

A.) U.S. Drone sends pinpoint accurate hellfire into a known terrorist hideout possibly killing a couple civillians. Terrorists retaliate and shoot down the drone.

B.) U.S. plane drops a 2000 lb JDAM onto the building, killing not only the terrorists, but dozens of civillians. Terrorists retaliate and shoot down the plane, killing the pilot.


seems pretty obvious to me.

Why cant the plane drop a hellfire in a and the drone do the hellfire in b. Precision ordnance is just that precision it does not matter what platform it came from. With today computer systems in the planes even a dumb bomb is damn near a precision instrument. Crist they even have to have a variable program in the f18 to land on the carrier because the computer will hit the same spot every time on the catch rope which wears it out.

Originally Posted by Gumby

Here is the thing. The so called "rules of war" do not apply to this conflict. Our enemy does not even wear uniforms because they are not part of a regular army that is officially endorsed by any state. To fight an unconventional enemy requires an unconventional approach. The drones are great. They terrorize the terrorists. And that makes me smile just a little.
And if this was a conventional war, anyone we would be fighting conventionally would have their own drones and we would develop technologies to detect and intercept their drones just as they would try and do to ours.

Exactly. Thats what people are forgeting about this war. These are illegal combatants the normal rules do not apply.

The operators of this technology do not treat it like a video game. Whomever said the operators have "Playstation Mentalities" are just skewing their perception because the operator is not at risk physically. The service men in the navy who operate some of the largest weaponry in the world do so from a computer console. This is no different.

That article was completely unbias.

Originally Posted by GReYVee

The operators of this technology do not treat it like a video game. Whomever said the operators have "Playstation Mentalities" are just skewing their perception because the operator is not at risk physically. The service men in the navy who operate some of the largest weaponry in the world do so from a computer console. This is no different.

It kind of like saying that if the president ever gave the word to launch a nuclear weapon he did so without thinking people are actually going to die.

Originally Posted by Red_Lizard2

Basically agree with Rock (surprising) that if they aren't being used on known civilian targets it isn't really a problem.

You make me feel all warm and fuzzy inside....