Don't worry about the future of drones; they are here to stay, like cruise missiles and aerial bombing. And the technology will spread fast.
If we had not come up with the concept some other technologically literate country or fighting force would have come up with the idea. Indeed, they are not that much different than guided missiles. However, the guided missile self-destructs when it finds its target. A drone is reusable. In other respects the weapon systems are comparable.
We are basically discussing attack on ground targets from the air. Bombing from the air began in earnest in World War I and yes, civilian casualties occurred. In World War II bombing from the air became a significant factor. In one B-29 fire bomb raid on Tokyo more than 100,000 people were killed, most of them civilians. The V1 and V2 missiles employed by Germany killed civilians more than military personnel.
It is mere sentimentalism to wring our hands over the pilotless nature of the weapon. The remote pilot is relatively invulnerable. But the same is true of a cruise missile. In our involvement in the wars in Kosovo and Libya we incurred zero combat casualties by using superior technologies.
There has been no formal declaration of war on al-Qaida approved by Congress. We last issued a declaration of war in WWII. Instead, Congress has authorized military action by other methods.
The remaining issue then is how and when we employ this latest technology. At the moment we are at war not with a nation, but with a world-wide network of terrorists. When we discover the location of leaders of these terrorists we sometimes take them out with drone strikes, even if they are located in a country with whom we are at peace. If the terrorists are in a civilian neighborhood there likely will be civilian casualties as well.
It is not important whether the terrorists are Americans or of other nationalities. Americans have fought other Americans in many conflicts, starting with our Revolution and continuing with the Whiskey Rebellion and, of course, the American Civil War. No one read the enemy their rights in these conflicts.
The issue then is not the weapon nor nationality of the target, nor the possibility of civilian casualties. We always have civilian casualties in war. And the weapon is here to stay. It is the violation of national sovereignty of the nation hosting the terrorists that is of concern.
Nations like Yemen and Pakistan know full well who is launching these drone attacks. But they just make a few pro forma protests of these acts of war. They really don't want these terrorists either. But their populations really resent these attacks.
To facilitate this tacit allowance of our attacks on their soil we have kept the program unacknowledged and used the CIA as the organization to launch the attacks, not our regular military.
Committees of the Congress have been informed early on. The raid and execution of Osama bin Laden was also a violation of Pakistan's national sovereignty. Few Americans objected to that.
Whether the Congress or some special court should approve each drone mission in advance is a doubtful proposal. Individual combat decisions should be left to the military. But drone attacks on nominally neutral countries may require some general authorization. Transfer of the drone capability from the CIA to the Defense Department is useful and will occur soon.
We still have some issues to deal with. But the weapon is not the problem. Conditions for its use need to be worked out. The drone is no more or less immoral than its immediate parent, the cruise missile, or its remote ancestor, the well-thrown rock.
