Baldwin: Obama administration’s use of drones is undemocratic

In the aftermath of 9/11, the United States has augmented its defense apparatus on every front and has employed a variety of new tactics and instruments, all in the name of creating a more secure homeland and quelling terrorist activity abroad. While this rationale has precipitated two wars and a range of other strategic defense moves, nothing has flown quite so far under the radar of the public eye as the use of unmanned aerial vehicles, otherwise known as drones.

Drones are sent out at high altitudes into hostile and foreign airspace on reconnaissance and strike missions. Air Force personnel in the United States who serve as “remote pilots” maneuver the aircraft from a land position. Using a variety of high-power and precise cameras, the drones are able to obtain thousands of images and hours of video footage, capturing everything from the mundane activities of tribal people in rural parts of the Hindu Kush mountains to live street views of a market in Karachi, Pakistan.

While this serves to track and pinpoint people of interest to the U.S. intelligence and defense community, the ramifications of this type of equipment are disturbing. These drones are equipped with combat weapons that are, compared to manned aircraft and more antiquated aircraft, precise and highly lethal.

The U.S. carries out most of these reconnaissance and strike missions with little or no warning to the sovereign government of the country in which they are operating, and there is no recorded agreement between the United States and countries affected by the ongoing drone combat tactics. There are no publicly available guidelines for choosing targets, and the hierarchy for approving a strike is obscured and kept classified by the intelligence and defense community.

The Obama administration claims to possess the unreserved right to order strikes on human targets, both foreign and U.S. citizens, per the 2001 congressional authorization granting the president power to use military force against al-Qaida. Since the drone program’s inception, 400 strikes have been carried out and 3,000 people killed, mostly in rural Pakistan.

Upon initial review, the use of drones to secure the American homeland and protect U.S. interests abroad seems necessary to advance America’s broader long-term objectives, which mostly culminate in the continued U.S. possession of global hegemony. The use of this blatantly undemocratic and immoral warfare tactic may protect U.S. interests in the short term but will have negative long-term ramifications for the United States’ reputation abroad and for the pursuit of America’s broader international objectives.

Col. Scott Brenton, an Air Force officer who remotely pilots a drone, said in an article in The New York Times, “I see mothers with children. I see fathers with children. I see fathers with mothers. I see kids playing soccer,” and that when he is ordered to strike a militant target, he attempts to wait for the family and other civilians to be separated from the target, but that this is not always possible, and that oftentimes civilians, including innocent women and children, are killed.

Also, former chief counterterrorism adviser and current CIA director candidate John Brennan said in an article in The New York Times, “we understand that there will be innocent children who will die because of this kind of warfare, but we must employ all available means to secure American lives and interests.” The logic is that these tactics do cause harm and are not subject to the typical rules of engagement, but that in order to protect U.S. lives and interests, exceptions must be made.

When we begin to make exceptions for aerial killings in foreign countries without the regular form of checks and balances reserved for other forms of engagement, we sacrifice democratic standards and respect for human life for our own arrogant purposes. While Brennan and the Obama administration claim that these attacks are critical to protect the United States, they fail to recognize the resentment and hatred toward the United States that happens as a result. Retired Gen. Stanley McChrystal said in an interview with The New York Times that drone attacks are “hated on a visceral level” and that the strikes contribute to a “perception of American arrogance.”

While the rationale behind drone use might be to protect America and hold onto American global hegemony, it could very well be compromising national security and putting U.S. citizens further at risk for attacks by terrorist cells.

This is not just an issue on the level of individual militants and public resentment in these nations, but continued and intensifying U.S. drone strikes could lead to institutional changes in Pakistan and Yemen — the countries where U.S. drones are most active — which could cause much more substantial threats to the United States. After violations of nations’ airspaces without permission and striking at their civilians without consent take place, the leadership within these nations could grow resentful and unwilling to cooperate with the United States in future endeavors that could be critical to the United States’ foreign-policy and defense strategies.

What is needed is more transparency, accountability and oversight of the administration’s use of drones. Drone use, while a safer and more sophisticated alternative to manned aircraft, should be subjected to the standard set of rules of engagement. I certainly do not advocate that the U.S. abandon its mission to target and remove militants and other persons threatening American democracy, but that drone missions should be carried out in respect to the sovereignty of all nations and according to established international conventions of war.

Write Eric at eab73@pitt.edu or tweet at him at @EricBaldwin_.