DRONE WARFARE: KILLING BY REMOTE CONTROL

"Science," the Greek word for knowledge, when appended to the word "political," creates what seems like an oxymoron. For who could claim to know politics? More complicated than any game, most people who play it become addicts and die without understanding what they were addicted to. The rest of us suffer under their malpractice as our "leaders." A truer case of the blind leading the blind could not be found. Plumb the depths of confusion here.

Re: DRONE WARFARE: KILLING BY REMOTE CONTROL

Postby admin » Fri Jun 26, 2015 10:01 pm

8. The Activists Strike Back

"KIRK: Yes, Councilman, you have a real war on your hands. You can either wage it with real weapons, or you might consider an alternative. Put an end to it. Make peace.

ANAN: There can be no peace. Don't you see? We're a killer species. It's instinctive.

KIRK But the instinct can be fought. We're human beings with the blood of a million savage years on our hands, but we can stop it. We can admit that we're killers, but we're not going to kill today. That's all it takes. Knowing that we won't kill today."

-- Star Trek


You may not have heard of the "Creech 14," but they have a special place in the heart of the anti-drone movement. If you saw a photo of the group, you might think they had just walked out of Sunday mass; indeed, some of its members are priests and nuns. But whether clergy or not, all are spiritually rooted in a theology that calls on people of faith to stand up against injustice -- in deeds, not just words.

And so on April 9, 2009, the group of fourteen activists entered Creech Air Force base -- where teams of young soldiers remotely operate many of America's killer drones -- protesting what they considered war crimes taking place inside. As they crossed onto the base, the group invited staff nearby to share a Good Friday meal with them. They were then told to leave, and when they refused, they were arrested, charged with trespassing and held in jail until Easter Sunday.

While the action was noteworthy, the most remarkable part was not anything that took place that day, but the trial itself, which did not begin until over a year later, on September 14, 2010, at the Clark County Regional Court in Las Vegas, Nevada. There, the defendants turned what would have been a mundane case over a minor misdemeanor into a broad debate about the use of drones. They decided not to be represented by lawyers but to represent themselves. They also invited three expert witnesses to speak on their behalf: Ramsey Clark, who was US Attorney General under President Lyndon Johnson; Center for Constitutional Rights legal director Bill Quigley; and Ret. Army Colonel Ann Wright.

The defendants took turns questioning the witnesses, establishing the fact that drone strikes kill a large number of civilians; that people have the right, even the duty, to stop war crimes; and that according to the post-World War II Nuremberg principles, individuals are morally and legally bound to disobey orders that entail crimes against humanity. They cited the history of protesters who broke petty laws, from the nation's founders to the Suffragists to the civil rights activists who illegally sat in at lunch counters. "In the long run, we honor them for obeying a higher law, for helping to bring us toward justice," said Quigley. [266]

In a surprising turn of events, at the end of the trial Judge Jansen declared that the issues at stake were too important to make an immediate ruling and gave himself four months to analyze the case. On January 27, 2011, the judge handed down his twenty-page decision. He found the group guilty of the crime of trespassing, concluding that they had been unable to prove their conduct was compelled by true "necessity." But he gave the defendants credit for the time they had already spent in jail and declared them free to go. "Go in peace," were Jansen's final words.

While the defendants were hoping for a non-guilty verdict, they knew they had won a victory no matter the ultimate ruling. As defendant Brian Terrell said in his closing statement, "Some have noted that the trend toward using drones in warfare is a paradigm shift that can be compared to what happened when an atomic bomb was first used to destroy the city of Hiroshima in Japan. When Hiroshima was bombed, though, the whole world knew that everything had changed. Today everything is changing, but it goes almost without notice. I hesitate to claim credit for it, but there is certainly more discussion of this issue after we were arrested for trespassing at Creech Air Force Base on April 9, 2009, than there was before." [267]

The transcript of that trial was so riveting that it was later turned into a play that is being used by religious groups as an educational tool. And the Creech 14 inspired similar protests, including one clear across the country in upstate New York.

On April 22, 2011, over three hundred activists organized by the local Upstate Coalition to Ground the Drones and End the Wars descended upon the Air National Guard Base at Hancock Field in Syracuse, New York. They chose the location because the National Guard at the base had been remotely flying weaponized Reaper drones over Afghanistan since late 2009.

As they approached the entrance, thirty-eight of them -- two in wheelchairs -- draped themselves in white cloth splattered with fake blood and dropped to the ground, a dramatic "die-in" intended to represent civilians killed in drone attacks. Dozens of police rushed in to intervene. After protesters refused to get up, they were forcibly removed in handcuffs.

The "Hancock 38," as they came to be known, were charged with obstruction of traffic and disorderly conduct. When they went to court on November 3, 2011, they, too, got former US Attorney General Ramsey Clark to testify on their behalf. Clark insisted that drones inherently violate the laws of the United States and international law, and that the crimes the Hancock 38 had been charged with paled in comparison to the crimes the defendants were trying to stop.

Outside the courthouse, dozens of people staged a mock drone attack, complete with a three-dimensional drone model, someone "manning" the drone from behind a computer, civilian victims covered in fake blood and a man labeled "Al Qaeda Recruiter" who was using the deaths to gain more recruits.

The final verdict of the case was delivered December 1, 2011. Judge Gideon found the defendants guilty on two charges of disorderly conduct, with sentences ranging from fines and community service to the maximum penalty of fifteen days in jail. The judge admitted that he had spent "many a sleepless night" before making his decision and that he learned a great deal during the five-day non-jury trial. "Ultimately, the defendants have arguably accomplished that which they sought by their actions -- the drawing of acute attention to their message," he concluded.

The Creech 14 and the Hancock 38 are just two examples of the growing US protest movement against the use of drones. In Pakistan and Yemen, people are pouring out into the streets by the thousands to condemn drone attacks that have devastated their communities. But in the US and Europe, where the effects of the drones are hidden from public view, activists have been slowly shaping the foundation of an anti-drone movement. Still in its early stages, the movement lacks clear strategies with tangible goals. But as it evolves, it may well prove to be as successful as earlier campaigns to ban landmines and cluster bombs.

***

One of the few American peace activists who have traveled dozens of times to Iraq and Afghanistan is Kathy Kelly, co-coordinator of Voices for Creative Nonviolence. During a trip to Afghanistan, Kelly wrote this report:

I met with a large family living in a wretched refugee camp. They had fled their homes in the San Gin district of the Helmand Province after a drone attack killed a mother there and her five children. The woman's husband showed us photos of his children's bloodied corpses. His niece, Juma Gul, age nine, had survived the attack. She and I huddled next to each other inside a hut made of mud on a chilly December morning. Juma Gul's father stooped in front of us and gently unzipped her jacket, showing me that his daughter's arm had been amputated by shrapnel when the US missile hit their home in San Gin. Next to Juma Gul was her brother, whose leg had been mangled in the attack. He apparently has no access to adequate medical care and experiences constant pain. [268]


Back in the 1980s, when the US government was funding and arming right-wing death squads in Central America, one of the strategies the peace movement employed was to organize hundreds of delegations to the region. Through these direct experiences, thousands of people became educated on the injustices being funded with their tax dollars and became motivated to do something about it. Returning delegates formed the heart and soul of the peace movement. But those trips to Central America were quick, inexpensive and relatively safe. Trips to places like Afghanistan and Iraq are costly and dangerous.

Despite the dangers, Voices for Creative Nonviolence organizes delegations to Afghanistan because they know how important it is to create a core of committed activists with firsthand knowledge. Kelly's colleague Brian Terrell recalls how profoundly he was impacted when, on one of the Afghan trips, he met a nine-year-old girl who had lost her arm in a drone air attack. "That still haunts me," Terrell said. "Drones are predators armed with Hellfire missiles, and the concept that peace could come from these killing machines is ridiculous." [269]

Unlike Kelly, Nancy Mancias has never been to those places halfway across the world where the US is unleashing its killer drones, but this has not dampened her resolve. Mancias runs the Ground the Drones campaign for the peace group that I co-founded, CODEPINK. As a passionate anti-war advocate, Mancias has been actively trying to bring the troops home from their overseas misadventures. She has also been part of the movement against torture and a proponent of closing the prison in Guantanamo, as well as a fierce believer in accountability for war crimes. She alerts people around the country when war criminals like George Bush or Dick Cheney will be speaking, encouraging them to try to make a citizen's arrest or at the very least some ruckus -- the latter being something Mancias herself is famous for.

Like many in the anti-war movement, Mancias views her work against drones as a natural extension of her efforts to promote peace. "The troops may come home from Iraq and Afghanistan, but drone attacks for extra-judicial assassinations will likely continue throughout the Middle East, Central Asia and Northern Africa. That's why it's so critical to draw attention to drones and build a movement to stop them," she said. Mancias collaborates in creative actions and public forums with groups like Voices for Creative Nonviolence, Nevada Desert Experience, Syracuse Peace Council, Catholic Workers, Pace e Bene, and others across the United States.

Another well-known activist focusing on drones is Jim Haber, who became involved in the movement after he found himself living near Creech Air Force Base. In 2008, Haber moved to Las Vegas to take a job with Nevada Desert Experience, an antinuclear organization that has been part of the movement against nuclear weapons testing since the early 1980s. He realized that every time he traveled from Las Vegas to the Nevada Test Site, he passed by one of the key hubs for operating UAVs around the world. "I couldn't pass Creech Air Force Base and not do anything about what goes on there -- or rather, what is controlled from there," said Haber. "So I started articulating the connection between drones and antinuclear work, pointing out that nuclear weapons are the chronic underpinning of US military projection while drones and other emerging robotic weapons are the acute forces in use today."

Haber is also connected to the Catholic Worker movement, a group of communities around the United States dedicated to helping the poor and practicing nonviolent resistance against injustice. Many Catholic Workers feel that resisting drones is part of their spiritual commitment. That's true for Mary Anne Grady and two of her sisters. All three were a part of the Hancock 38 group that got arrested for protesting drones in upstate New York. "The Bible says that all life is sacred," said Grady. "We need to expose the use of drones and the expansion of militarism, which does not respect the sacredness of life."

It's not only seasoned activists and religious communities taking a stand against drones. Even veteran government officials have come forward. Retired CIA analyst Ray McGovern is one of the most outspoken critics of drones. He is a frequent commentator on TV, railing against drone warfare and the civilian casualties they cause. McGovern not only gives talks, writes articles and blogs, he joins protests and gets arrested for his convictions.

So does retired US Army Colonel Ann Wright. While her home is in beautiful Honolulu, Hawaii, Wright generally lives out of a suitcase, traveling the country speaking out about the need for peace, always making a point to educate her audiences about the dangers of drones. And like McGovern, she doesn't just speak out: she puts her body on the line, racking up so many arrests that her profile is on a FBI criminal database.

Activists in other countries, such as Britain and Sweden, have also become involved in the anti-drone movement, many prompted by their own countries' complicity in the use of UAVs in Afghanistan and elsewhere. Agneta Norberg, a Swedish activist with the group Women for Peace, started protesting drones when she discovered that Sweden had purchased UAVs from Israel and was training drone pilots in Sweden. Appalled, in October 2011 she helped organize the Swedish Peace Council's conference on drones and joins others to vigil in front of Parliament.

In England, groups such as Fellowship of Reconciliation, England and Women in Black regularly hold vigils. Helen John, a decades-long campaigner against nuclear weapons, now keeps vigil at the Royal Air Force base at Waddington, UK, where drone pilots are located. But she doesn't just keep vigil. The 73-year-old activist has camped outside the Waddington base for weeks at a time, and has cut holes in the fence and broken inside. Nonviolent confrontation and improvisation, she believes, can turn tiny protests into big, influential ones. "I don't believe in the use of any weaponry, but there is something quite noble about someone who is prepared to lay down their life [in combat]," John told a reporter. "But sitting in an air-conditioned room thousands of miles away ...killing by remote control. These weapons are a complete departure from civilised behaviour. That's why we need to stir up as many problems as possible for this place," she added, referring to the air force base. [270]

The Nevada Desert Experience, Voices for Creative Nonviolence, Nevada County Peace Center, CODEPINK and others in the US hold vigils at least once a month outside US air bases.

Activists target bases for two reasons: First, they have the chance to interact with military personnel as they hand out information to people in their cars entering and leaving the base. Sometimes they even get a chance to interact with the soldiers who operate the drones, reminding them of their commitment to the rule of law and their obligation not to follow illegal orders. Second, having a presence at a base also informs the local community. It's hard for folks living or commuting past the bases to miss the protesters' messages, which come in the form of anything from large, colorful banners to lifelike model drones. Activists also invite the press to join them, hoping to reach a broader audience.

Debra Sweet, the director of the anti-war group The World Can't Wait, suggests reaching out to a different audience: students at middle schools and high schools. Sweet visits students to talk to them about the wars and warn students that the government is on the prowl for video game geeks they can recruit to operate drones. She often brings along Iraq and Afghanistan war vets from the group We Are Not Your Soldiers to share personal testimonies.

Some activists have taken their message to public venues that glorify war, like the drone exhibit at the Smithsonian Air and Space Museum in Washington, DC. In January 2010, a group called Peace of the Action -- started by anti-war activist Cindy Sheehan, who lost her son in the war in Iraq -- entered the museum and dropped a banner next to the drone exhibit reading: DRONES KILL KIDS. A few months later, they not only unfurled a massive, multi-story banner that read DRONES: VIDEO GAME FOR US, BLOOD-BATH FOR THEM, but they also dropped hundreds of fliers explaining why they opposed drones, fliers that floated through the air into the hands of the unsuspecting tourists below.

Organizer Nick Mottern also takes his anti-drone message to public venues, but he brings along a special home-made prop: an eight-foot-long model drone with an eleven-foot wingspan that floats through the air perched atop a ten-foot-high sheet rock lifter rolling on oversized wheels. People passing by stop in their tracks and ask questions, providing a window of opportunity to discuss robotic warfare. "Throughout my entire anti-war activist career, dating back to the Gulf War, I have never seen a sign or prop cause so much curiosity and interest," said Mottern.

Now retired and living in Westchester, New York, Mottern was first inspired to make the drones when he discovered that one of the companies in his community, ITT Corporation, manufactures the bomb releases on Predator drones. Outraged, Mottern suggested staging a war profiteers march near the house of CEO Steven Loranger. Wanting to visually convey the trauma of drone terrorism to Loranger, Mottern built the model drone. The media loved it, publishing several pictures in the local paper.

Since then Mottern and his colleagues have made several models, displaying them to audiences around the country as they give talks on robotic warfare. In October 2011 they made a guest appearance at Occupy Wall Street in New York City's Financial District, and later in an anti-drone demonstration at a General Atomics building in Washington, DC. They are such a hit that activists as far away as Australia have contacted them asking how to make models for their own protests.

Mottern's next move is to install video cameras in the nose of the drones, setting a computer next to them so people can get a taste of what it's like to have drones watching their every move.

Activist Jean Aguerre is not trying to educate people about drone warfare; she's trying to keep drones out of her community. Aguerre grew up on a ranch in southeast Colorado near the Comanche National Grasslands -- land that had been reclaimed from the devastating Dust Bowl back in the 1930s. For thirty years, local residents have been fighting back against the military's expansion into this delicate bioregion, but the fight has intensified with the advent of drones because the Army has its eye set on seizing 6.9 million acres of shortgrass prairie for unmanned aerial development, low altitude flights and robotic weaponry testing.

The military acquisition would take up 94,000 square miles of mostly private property, displacing thousands of Coloradans. And the civilian airspace for a robotic flight zone would reach across state lines, across sovereign indigenous nations, across national parks. It would extend as far north as Aspen, Colorado and as far south as Albuquerque, New Mexico. [271]

Aguerre's group, the Not 1 More Acre campaign, has taken a firm stand against the proposal and in 2007 achieved an overwhelming bipartisan vote in Congress to ban funding for any activity related to expanding the site. They have motivated people across the nation to petition Congress, successfully renewing the ban each year since. To keep tabs on what the government is up to, campaigners often send in Freedom of Information Act requests that reveal the government's plans, contracts and activities advancing the military takeover of southern Colorado and northern New Mexico, including the last intact shortgrass prairie remaining in the American Great Plains.

Activists around the country have also begun targeting the places where the drones are made and the people who are receiving multi-million dollar contracts to produce them. [272]

One of the most popular targets for direct actions is dronemaker extraordinaire General Atomics. Numerous protests have taken place at their offices, but some activists have gone even further -- paying a visit to the home of their CEO, James Neal Blue.

On May 18, 2010, my colleagues at CODEPINK held a somber vigil outside the CEO's elegant residence in La Jolla, California. They arrived at 10 am to find several news vans and police cars waiting for them. Unfurling banners that read, "Drone Attacks = Terror," the protesters set up a small altar with roses and candles to commemorate the children killed in drone attacks.

The next day, they organized the first-ever protest outside the General Atomics corporate headquarters in San Diego. News of the vigil at James Blue's house the day before had spread quickly, and members of the community informed the activists that some of the General Atomics employees had decided to stay home to avoid the attention. But the company's leadership had also gone through the trouble and expense of renting a 7-foot-high chain-link fence to surround the headquarters' entire perimeter. They were certainly afraid of a handful of peaceful protesters!

When the peace activists began arriving at 7:30 am, they "beautified" the rent-a-fence by adding roses and banners with messages like "Stop Drone Attacks" and "General Atomics, Your Profits = Civilian Deaths."

Within an hour, some sixty protesters had gathered. They carried signs, peace flags and model drone planes to make sure their presence was understood by General Atomics employees and any passersby. "Our intent was simply to ask the employees to think about the company they work for and hold the management accountable for the killing machines they manufacture," Nancy Mancias explained.

The protesters laid down for a die-in, and chalked the outlines of their bodies to leave behind a representation of the civilians killed indiscriminately by drone attacks. Three protesters then sat down in the driveway, preventing any access to the property and creating a backup of cars along the road. The police attempted to negotiate with them. "What do we want? We want General Atomics to agree to stop making drones," the protesters insisted. Since the police couldn't deliver that, the group then asked to meet with CEO James Neal Blue, a meeting they had already requested weeks in advance. The police couldn't arrange that either. So the sit-in continued.

After over an hour of preventing access to the company's headquarters and more than four hours of disrupting business as usual, CODEPINK, San Diego Peace Resource Center, and the coalition of activists packed up.

"This is one morning when we made it difficult to get to work," Mancias commented, "but there are mornings in Pakistan and Afghanistan when people never make it to work at all, or arrive to find buildings and roads destroyed by US attacks."

A few months later, on October 7, 2011, hundreds of protesters marched to the General Atomics headquarters in Washington, DC, to mark a decade of fighting in Afghanistan. Representatives of many of the nation's antiwar groups were there, armed with banners, signs, songs, and chants. Nick Mottern brought three of his drone models, which hovered ominously above the protesters' heads.

After stopping for several minutes in front of the White House to send a message to President Obama that it was time to ground the drones, the group trekked on towards the General Atomics office to deliver a letter to the CEO. But as soon as the activists entered the lobby, the police and building security panicked. They shoved everyone outside -- even pushing elderly veterans to the ground -- and slammed the doors shut.

The group staged a teach-in on the steps, with speakers highlighting General Atomics' role in escalating drone warfare. The event got good media coverage, and the activists left inspired.

Sometimes activists have targeted "secondary companies," i.e., those that have relationships with firms involved in the drone-making business. These can be easier targets because they may have more of a public face than weapons companies, and because it might be easier for them to sever their partnerships. In early 2011, CODEPINK contacted the car company Nissan to protest the relationship between Nissan and AeroVironment. AeroVironment makes the charging system for Nissan's electric car, the Leaf, but it also makes a variety of small drones. Nissan portrays itself as part of the green movement, as exemplified by their electric car, but here they were partnering with a company involved in drone warfare. CODEPINK asked Nissan to cut its ties with AeroVironment, but got no response.

So a group of Los Angeles activists decided to crash the Nissan exhibit at the prestigious LA auto show. They jumped onto the Leaf's platform, chanting, unfurling banners and calling upon Nissan to stop supporting drone warfare. They were eventually escorted off the premises, but not before getting out their message and embarrassing the company.

***

One of the best ways to build an activist base is to focus on local connections to drone warfare. Fran Quigley, a professor, lawyer, and journalist, had been researching the disturbing trend of robotic warfare and decided to see if his home state of Indiana was involved.

After submitting several Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) applications, he was surprised at the number of connections he uncovered. In West Lafayette, a company called Lite Machines had a multimillion-dollar contract with the Navy to manufacture a mini-drone. Rolls Royce in Indianapolis was making the engines for the Global Hawk. In Indianapolis, battery maker EnerDel had a $4-million-dollar contract to make batteries for drones. The engineering faculty at Purdue was doing research on drones, as was the Naval Surface Warfare Center in south central Indiana. And in Terre Haute, the Air National Guard was helping to pinpoint targets for drone attacks in Afghanistan and Pakistan. "There's nothing special about Indiana in this field," said Quigley, "so I presume that if you did the research, you'd find significant drone activities going on in universities, small factories and research parks all across the country."

"Our state needs jobs, but I hate the fact that people of good conscience may be sucked into the military-industrial complex process of creating machines that contribute to the death of innocent civilians," said Lori Perdue, an Air Force veteran and Indiana member of CODEPINK. "If we could create green jobs instead of war jobs, I bet the guy working the line making jet turbines would rather be building a wind turbine."

Quigley and the local activists have been educating students and plan to organize demonstrations outside the drone warfare support sites.

A group in Iowa didn't even wait until the local factory started working on drones to protest. As soon as they got wind that a company called AirCover Integrated Solutions was going to partner with the University of Iowa to build small surveillance drones in Cedar Rapids, they began protesting. [273] Company President James Hill said the protesters were misdirected, that the drones would be used for good purposes like searching for people lost after earthquakes, finding wandering patients with dementia and looking for suspicious packages in stadiums. [274]

But protesters think the drones will really be used to spy on the public, including folks like themselves. "The prospect of having drones flying around, spying on people, is kind of horrific," said Nate Adeyemi, one of the local organizers. "It's such an infringement upon the human right to privacy." The group is also protesting the university for its involvement and the local officials who gave the company a loan.

Another target for activists has been the organization that lobbies on behalf of the industry, the Association for Unmanned Vehicle Systems International (AUVS!). The group created in 1978 "to promote and support the unmanned systems and robotics industry." The organization has ballooned to include 1,400 members -- all anxious to feed at the government trough. Activists have crashed their press conferences, conventions and fairs.

Given their close connections in Congress -- the companies give millions in campaign contributions and get, in return, billions of tax dollars -- AUVSI can even show off its wares right inside the Capitol. At an exhibit hosted by the Congressional Drone Caucus in September 2011, activists broke up the lovefest, unfurling white sheets covered in fake blood and falling to the floor, moaning and writhing in pain. "Stop the killer drones," they wailed, while another protester carrying a large cardboard drone made a loud buzzing noise as he zoomed around the room. Startled, the Congresspeople, staffers and corporate employees were forced to stop their conversations -- until the police arrived and escorted the group out of the building.

While protesters are busy naming and shaming companies, some of the nation's best legal and human rights groups have been taking the issue of drone warfare and extrajudicial assassinations to court. The Center for Constitutional Rights (CCR) and the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) sued Treasury Secretary Tim Geithner over the government's decision to put US citizen Anwar al-Awlaki on a hit list and freeze his US assets. They brought the case to a US federal court on behalf of Anwar al-Awlaki's father, hoping to prevent the targeted killing of his son. [275]

They lost the case on procedural grounds, but the judge was disturbed by the "serious questions" raised by the practice. "Can the executive order the assassination of a US citizen without first affording him any form of judicial process whatsoever, based on the mere assertion that he is a dangerous member of a terrorist organization?" the judge inquired. [276]

The UK-based human rights law group Reprieve is considering bringing litigation against some European governments that have been complicit in the drone attacks on their nationals, including the governments of the UK, Germany, Belgium, France, and Spain. The laws in Europe make it easier than in the United States to sue in the courts. "We're going to sue the government in Britain because the British have admitted that they provide intelligence for the drone attacks," said Reprieve director Clive Stafford Smith. "1think we have every chance to find violations of Geneva Conventions and humanitarian law. Whether we win in court or not, though, it's the kind of thing where the British government cannot prevail in the court of public opinion, as what they are doing is just wrong."

Reprieve assisted its Pakistani partner organization, Foundation for Fundamental Rights, to lodge a legal case in Pakistan against John Rizzo, the former acting CIA general counsel who gave the final okay for adding names to the CIA's hit list, and against the CIA station chief in Pakistan, Jonathan Banks, who fled the country after he was named in the case. The group is also investigating UK corporations involved in the production of drones for possible lawsuits.

Another US group, the Electronic Frontier Foundation (EFF) has filed lawsuits about drones, but their focus is the secrecy surrounding the domestic use of drones. EFF filed suit demanding that the Federal Aviation Association release data on certifications and authorizations the agency has issued for the operation of unmanned aircraft. Certification by the FAA is required to operate a drone over 400 feet. And though the FAA said there were 285 certifications covering eighty- five different users as of mid- September 2011, the details on those users were unclear.

Jennifer Lynch, the staff attorney for EFF, said that the use of drones domestically was raising significant privacy concerns. "Drones give the government and other unmanned aircraft operators a powerful new surveillance tool to gather extensive and intrusive data on Americans' movements and activities," she said. "As the government begins to make policy decisions about the use of these aircraft, the public needs to know more about how and why these drones are being used to surveil United States citizens." [277] Other groups are insisting that if the FAA does not protect people's privacy, then Congress should enact additional protections.

Human Rights Watch has taken on an even more difficult task: trying to get more transparency and accountability for the CIA's secret drone program. It has called on the Justice Department to release information such as legal memos on targeted killings, drone videotapes from specific attacks, and after-action reports. Where there is a finding of wrongdoing, the group says, individuals responsible for conducting or ordering unlawful attacks should be promptly investigated and disciplined or prosecuted.

Human Rights Watch also thinks the drone program should be taken out of the hands of the CIA. Since the US government is unwilling to demonstrate that the agency is abiding by international legal requirements for accountability and redress, the group feels the use of lethal drones should be exclusively within the command responsibility of the US military. [278]

This was echoed by professor Mary Ellen O'Connell in her testimony to Congress in April 20 10. "Restricting drones to the battlefield is the most important single rule governing their use," she said, adding that at the very time the United Sates was trying to win hearts and minds to respect the rule of law, "we are ourselves failing to respect a very basic rule: remote weapons belong on the battlefield." [279]

The American Civil Liberties Union wants the government to account for casualties. Through a Freedom of Information Act request, the ACLU received an official statement from the Department of Defense confirming it does not compile statistics about the total number of civilians killed or injured by drones. "Given widespread concerns about drone warfare and varying estimates of civilians killed, the Defense Department should compile data about the number of civilian casualties caused by drones and disseminate that information to the public," said Jonathan Manes, an attorney with the ACLU National Security Project. [280]

The Campaign for Innocent Victims in Conflict (CIVIC) agrees. It asserts that good military practice to minimize civilian harm dictates data collection before, during and after a combat operation, analysis of any harm that occurs and a review of lessons learned. But CIVIC goes farther, calling on the government to not only keep a record of civilians harmed by US drones, but also to compensate them. In 2010 CIVIC released a report called Civilian Harm and Conflict in Northwest Pakistan, showing that there is no comprehensive or systematic accounting of drone strike casualties nor any measure of amends, including compensation, for civilian victims. [281]

"There are US systems in place, imperfect as they are, to compensate an Afghan harmed by a US convoy or small arms fire. But not a Pakistani harmed by a drone. Why are their losses treated differently?" asked CIVIC Executive Director Sarah Holewinski. "This makes no sense, and worse, it disrespects civilians, leaving them to suffer with no recognition or help." [282]

Holewinski told me that her group has tried repeatedly to meet with the CIA, but has had no success. "There's a Catch 22, which is that the program is secret, it 'doesn't exist.' So how can they meet to talk about a program that doesn't exist?"

It is precisely where this "non-existent" CIA program operates, Pakistan, where the largest outpouring of anti-drone protests have occurred. These include tens of thousands rallying in Peshawar and Karachi, hundreds sitting down on the main highway between Pakistan and Afghanistan to physically block the NATO supply route, general strikes in North Waziristan and protests outside Parliament in Islamabad.

The immensely popular Pakistani opposition leader and former cricket champion Imran Khan has led the nation's largest rallies against drone strikes. He insists that there is no military solution and calls for dialogue with the Taliban. He also laments the lack of response from civil society in the West, particularly the United States, where, he says, people don't even know what their government is doing.

Khan is right. Drones strikes are wreaking havoc from Pakistan to Gaza with little outcry from the citizens living in the "democracies" that are dropping the missiles. But while protests in the West are still in their embryonic stage, a growing group of activists are at least starting to educate the public, ask questions of their governments and companies, and demand answers.
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Re: DRONE WARFARE: KILLING BY REMOTE CONTROL

Postby admin » Fri Jun 26, 2015 10:01 pm

9. Opposition to Drones Goes Global

In the United States, the activist movement against drone warfare grew up organically, in different parts of the country, without much national coordination. A loose umbrella coalition called United Against Drones, formed in August of 2010, connects groups through a listserv, a website and monthly conference calls to coordinate actions.

Another network called the Alliance to Resist Robotic Warfare & Society (ARROWS) was formed in July 2009 to expand awareness and resistance to what it calls the emerging robotic/biotech/nanotech control matrix.

In April 2010 the Alliance organized a civil society conference called Challenging Robotic Warfare and Social Control. Held in Columbia River Gorge, Oregon, near Boeing Corporation's military drone complex, it brought together over 125 people from veterans' groups, churches and peace organizations throughout the US Northwest. The conference ended with an urgent call for further activism and a protest at Boeing's ScanEagle drone headquarters. The Alliance has continued to organize speaking tours and to promote resolutions in churches rejecting robotic weaponry and other artificial life forms. But like United Against Drones, this is a loosely coordinated network.

Across the Atlantic, in England, a more developed coalition of organizations, academics and individuals emerged in 2010 called the Drone Campaign Network. Many UK groups had drones on their radar ever since the Royal Air Force started using them in 2007, but until the creation of the network, there wasn't one particular group that focused exclusively on drones.

The network is led by author and activist Chris Cole, formerly director of Fellowship of Reconciliation, Oxford. Cole helps groups connect to drone-related activities in their local area, particularly if there are manufacturers based in their communities, and organizes a yearly gathering to share information and coordinate activities. Through the blog Drone Wars UK, he keeps track of drone news, information sources, and upcoming actions.

One thing in the activists' favor is the UK public's general antipathy towards drones. After some snooping, Cole discovered on the Ministry of Defence's website that one of their top concerns was the increasingly negative public perception of drones. Suspiciously, the Ministry of Defence took down the page as soon as he publicized it on the Drone Wars UK website. "People aren't buying the whole 'they're keeping our boys safe' story," Cole said. "With the Iraq war debacle, people are skeptical about what the military says, especially claims that the drones are so accurate that they don't kill civilians. There is also much more skepticism about the use of drones for surveillance in the UK than the US."

The coalition includes peace groups such as War Resisters International and Campaign for Nuclear Disarmament; faith-based organizations such as Fellowship of Reconciliation, England and Pax Christi; and professionals such as Scientists for Global Responsibility. They have organized actions that range from a Stop the Arms Fair at the Houses of Parliament to demonstrations at General Atomics' new London office. Member group Child Victims of War sets up meetings with members of Parliament to complain about the number of children killed in drone attacks. Scientists for Global Responsibility disseminates information about drones on their website. [283]

The Fellowship of Reconciliation, England, which has done its own excellent reports on drone warfare, has been calling on the government to make public the number of casualties resulting from British drone attacks and calls for a more open, serious, and informed discussion about the UK's use of drones. [284] "Drones are the latest in a long line of new weapons used in the mistaken belief that they will provide a clean and tidy solution to a conflict. Time and again history has proved that this is a myth," their website states. [285]

The Campaign for Nuclear Disarmament Cymru (the Welsh name for Wales), or better known as CND Cymru, was inspired to speak out against drones when they discovered in 2004 that the Aberporth training area in Wales -- an area that is also a missile base -- was slated to become a "UAV Centre of Excellence," with promises to deliver one thousand jobs in an area ravaged by unemployment. Despite protests, the government went ahead with its plan. The jobs never materialized -- only about thirty jobs were created -- but Aberporth became one of two places in Europe where drones are flight tested. The other location is in northern Sweden.

The group continues to raise a ruckus -- holding vigils, trespassing on military property, putting pressure on their elected officials. On September 21, 2011, which is International Peace Day, they launched a Commemorative Garden to recognize all victims of the deployment of drones. "Quite apart from the problem that these machines and their imaging equipment were being tested over our homes, many people objected to the terrible fact that our community, and our country, was planning something appalling against people in other countries," said CND Cymru's national secretary Jill Gough. "We certainly don't want Wales to be part of that."

One issue that is more prevalent in European antidrone campaigns than American ones is the connection between Israel and the drone industry. Concerned about the occupation of Palestine and the use of drones in Gaza, UK activists were appalled to discover that their corporations were producing key components for Israeli drones, exporting them to Israel, and then buying them back in the form of completed vehicles. They are calling on their government to stop using the Israeli Hermes 450 drone made by Elbit, and to cut ties with Israeli drone manufacturers.

The Catholic peace group Pax Christi UK holds a regular vigil outside a factory called UAV Engines, also owned by Elbit. [286] Hastings Against War, a UK coalition of individuals formed in 2003 to oppose the war on Iraq, also protests against the lease and purchase of Israeli drones. [287] They are particularly vigilant around the UK Watchkeeper drone project, in which several hundred million dollars went to an Israeli company, thus indirectly supporting the occupation of Palestine.

Another approach to curbing drone warfare comes from a group formed in 2009 called the International Committee for Robot Arms Control (ICRAC). It represents a group of robotic specialists, philosophers and human rights activists from a number of countries -- including the US, UK, France, Germany, Austria, the Netherlands, and Australia.

Among the members are Noel Sharkey, a professor of artificial intelligence and robotics at the University of Sheffield; Peter Asaro, a professor of philosophy at the New School University in New York; Robert Sparrow of the Centre for Bioethics in Melbourne, Australia; and Mark Gubrud, a physicist at the University of North Carolina.

The organization started with the aim of stimulating debate about the ways that military robots have already altered the nature of warfare and subverted many of the existing rules of engagement. They were concerned that robotic technologies might tempt policymakers to think war can be less bloody, and that hostile states or terrorist organizations would be able to hack robotic systems and redirect them.

Bringing together experts from allover the world, the group held its first workshop in Berlin in the summer of 2010, organized by Wrgen Altmann, a physicist teaching at Dortmund, Germany. The meeting consisted of academics and policy experts, human rights lawyers, Red Cross representatives, peace activists, military advisers, and others opposed to the arms trade. They explored the threats to peace and international security posed by robotic weapons, including threats to civilians and the undermining of international law. In addition to worries that robots may be used as weapons in space or be armed with nuclear weapons, the experts expressed serious concerns about the inability of automated robotic systems to discriminate between combatants and civilians, and that these new technologies could make it difficult to determine the moral and legal responsibility for any atrocities committed in war.

They came up with the following goals: the prohibition of the development, deployment and use of armed autonomous unmanned systems, with the exception of automated anti-missile systems; limitations on the range of and weapons carried by "man-in-the-loop" unmanned systems; a ban on arming unmanned systems with nuclear weapons; the prohibition of the development, deployment and use of robot space weapons; and restrictions on the use of armed drones for targeted killings in sovereign territories not at war. [288]

For guidance, ICRAC is looking back at other successful campaigns to ban certain kinds of weapons, particularly the 1997 Mine Ban Treaty outlawing the use of land mines.

After failed attempts by government institutions to regulate the use of landmines, non-governmental organizations launched their own campaign to ban the weapons altogether. In 1992, the International Campaign to Ban Landmines was formed, bringing together hundreds of member organizations in countries all over the world. These included organizations in both mine-producing and mine-affected countries, and groups focusing on human rights, humanitarian assistance, children, peace, disability, veterans concerns, arms control, religious affairs, the environment, and women's issues. The members engaged in education campaigns, shared political strategies, and pushed their governments to come up with a solution.

In October 1996, fifty governments and twenty-four observers met in Ottawa to strategize, and over the course of several subsequent meetings, they drafted a treaty. The International Campaign to Ban Landmines, representing the grass roots global community, won a seat at the table -- participating in all the diplomatic meetings and negotiations, helping draft the treaty, and writing the preamble to the treaty that eventually passed. [289]

The Mine Ban Treaty, officially titled the Convention on the Prohibition of the Use, Stockpiling, Production and Transfer of Anti- Personnel Mines and on Their Destruction, was adopted in September 1997. Thanks to the constant pressure from the grassroots, it was implemented in less than two years, faster than any treaty of its kind in history. By 2011, eighty percent of the world's nations had banned the use of landmines. [290]

The landmine campaign credits its success to several factors. [291]

It had a clear message and goal. Signature states agreed to six major commitments, among them the destruction of their mine stockpiles within four years and their mine areas cleared within ten years.

It had a campaign structure that was non-bureaucratic and strategy that was flexible.

It put together an "unusually cohesive and strategic partnership" of non-governmental organizations, international organizations, United Nations agencies, and governments.

There was a favorable international context.

Also critical to the campaign's success was that the negotiations took place outside the UN system, and the treaty conference relied on voting, rather than consensus, which made it easier to move forward. Governments were also required to "opt in," meaning that governments attending the treaty negotiation conference had to agree on the text beforehand. Strong leadership at the negotiation conference led to a persuasive treaty that was safeguarded from the possibility of governments watering it down or slowing down the negotiations. [292] Another success of the campaign was that it so stigmatized landmines that even most states that refused to sign the treaty were shamed into not using them.

Key to the fight against landmines was Jody Williams, who won the Nobel Peace Prize in 1997 for her campaign work. With the recent proliferation of unmanned aerial vehicles, Williams has been writing and speaking out against drone warfare. She would love to see a ban on all lethal drones, but she fears it would be infinitely more difficult than banning landmines because their use is already so widespread, because it's easier for the military to make the argument that their benefits outweigh their drawbacks, and most of all, because drones have become such a big business.

"I have a visceral repugnance to the use of drones; I would love for all lethal drones to disappear," Williams said in an interview. "But with landmines, we didn't have a lot of industry blowback because in terms of weapons sales, landmines were chump change. Drones are different. They're a cash cow for the beltway bandits. There's going to be a massive arms race for these kind of weapons and I'm afraid the companies just won't tolerate a ban."

Even regulations on their use would be fiercely opposed by both the weapons industry and by government authorities, especially in the US." There would be absolutely no support in the US government for any international restrictions on the use of drones," insisted Jeff Hawkins from the State Department's Bureau of Democracy and Human Rights at a meeting on drones from the State Department's Bureau of Democracy and Human Rights at a meeting on drones. "Of that you can be certain." [293]

Williams thinks the best chance the international community has to curb the use of drones is to stop autonomous robotic weapons -- weapons that operate independently according to pre-programmed missions -- because they are not yet fully developed and because they bring up the most difficult ethical and legal questions.

"If we think it's bad now, imagine a fully autonomous vehicle going out and wiping out several villages," said Williams. "Who's accountable? The company who made them? The military who used them? The software developer? Perhaps they all should be taken to court but that probably isn't going to happen. So we need to stop them before they're used. And this is something I think an international coalition could accomplish."

Peter Asaro of ICRAC agrees. He is concerned about targeted killings, but feels that these are already illegal under international law, so what is needed is enforcement, not a new treaty. In terms of a treaty banning autonomous robotic weapons, Asaro understands that there are many complex questions about implementation and enforcement, but he believes that just having an international consensus that autonomous systems are immoral and illegal would be a major step. "An international ban would dissuade the major military technology developers by vastly shrinking the potential economic market for those systems, which would greatly slow their current pace of development," said Asaro. [294]

Many groups agree that fully autonomous attack and kill robotic weapons can and must be banned before they appear in the global weapons market and fuel an entirely new and terrifying weapons race. Such a campaign is something that has the potential to unite the activists, human rights organizations, academics, humanitarians, and the religious community.

For most activists, however, banning autonomous drones would be good but not nearly enough. "It would be a big mistake to just focus on autonomous drones," said organizer Nick Mottern. "Our goal should be to ban all weaponized drones. This new kind of warfare where the US and others feel they can attack any place, anytime, must be opposed, just as the overwhelming invasion of privacy with surveillance drones intimidating entire populations -- from Waziristan to Gaza -- must be stopped." [295]
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Re: DRONE WARFARE: KILLING BY REMOTE CONTROL

Postby admin » Fri Jun 26, 2015 10:01 pm

10. Conclusion

Over a steak dinner and a couple glasses of wine, former CIA-acting general counsel John Rizzo -- "a bearded, elegant 63-year-old who wears cuff links and pale yellow ties" -- discussed the CIA's drone attacks with Newsweek's Tara Mckelvey. [296] Referring to a suspected Pakistani militant being "blown to bits" as he got out of his car, Rizzo said he had reviewed the attack on video and concluded that it was "very businesslike." Rizzo said he liked to observe the killings via live footage at CIA headquarters in Virginia because he was concerned that they be done "in the cleanest possible way."

"Clean" is defined as minimal collateral damage, but it also has another meaning: Drone attacks are "clean" because they are not meant to detain, or maim, or disarm, or capture. They are meant to kill, to extinguish a life -- and potential public relations problems -- on the spot.

"Since the US political and legal situation has made aggressive interrogation a questionable activity anyway, there is less reason to seek to capture rather than kill," wrote American University's law professor Kenneth Anderson. "And if one intends to kill, the incentive is to do so from a standoff position because it removes potentially messy questions of surrender." [297]

Think about it: Why bother with a cumbersome and extended extradition process when a Hellfire missile can handle the job, without the risk of a messy trial and perhaps even an embarrassing acquittal? While a few human rights groups might complain following an extrajudicial assassination-by-drone, unlike a prisoner at Guantanamo Bay, the dead man isn't a lingering pock on America's image abroad. Armed with that knowledge, politicians have an incentive to resort to lethal force first, usually sentencing people to death on evidence so flimsy it would never stand up in a court of law -- or even a military tribunal.

The way US policymakers see it, drones are the ideal way to deal with violent extremists. Defense Secretary Leon Panetta called drone attacks the "only game in town in terms of confronting or trying to disrupt the Al Qaeda leadership." [298] Perhaps this is understandable when coming from the head of the military, but what has happened to the other branches of government? What happened to the old-fashioned idea of negotiations? Diplomacy? Peace talks? Reconciliation? Did they all suddenly disappear post 9/11?

I hear all the time that peace activists are naive, that it is impossible to talk to extremists -- people who have no regard for the lives of innocents, people capable of strapping on suicide vests and blowing up a bunch of innocent bystanders.

But in my experiences in conflict zones the world over, there are always people to talk to. From members of Hamas in Gaza to Baathists under Sad dam's Iraq to the Taliban in Afghanistan to government officials in Iran, it is a major blunder to label all our perceived enemies as extremists incapable of rational conversation. People join militant groups for many reasons -- religious, family, social pressure, revenge for some wrong they experienced, political ideology, poverty. With such diversity of motives, there are always some people who can be enticed to talk about peace. Our goal should be to seek them out, to strengthen the moderates. Unfortunately, our actions have often only served to embolden the extremists.

Consider Somalia.

After nearly two decades of fighting among rival warlords, a period of unrest that itself followed decades of brutal rule by a US-backed dictator, the people of Somalia began to experience some measure of peace when in 2006 a coalition of groups called the Islamic Courts Union (ICU) took power in Mogadishu. For the first time in years, Somalia's capital was safe enough to go out at night without a heavily armed security detail.

But there was a problem: that word "Islamic." Despite the ICU representing a moderate strain of Islam, the Bush Administration was convinced that the ICU was a dangerous terrorist organization that, if left in power, would give groups like Al Qaeda sanctuary. Since US troops were bogged down in Iraq and Afghanistan, the Bush Administration outsourced the job, backing Ethiopia with money for a proxy invasion and backing up the Ethiopian troops with aerial attacks, including drones.

They pushed the ICU out of power -- and pushed Somalia back into chaos. The moderate ICU splintered into a number of now-radicalized groups like Al Shabab, the emergence of which was then used to justify ever more US intervention in Somalia in the form of stepped-up air strikes.

Al Shabab has been most active in precisely those parts of Somalia where the US and its cohorts -- first Ethiopia and then Kenya -- have been most active. "Somalia is an example of the US military policy gone completely amok," said Emira Woods, director of Foreign Policy in Focus. "It helped destabilize Somalia and strengthen Al Shabab, which barely existed before the US heavy-handed response to the ICU."

In Iraq and Afghanistan, years of war with hightech drones did not lead to victories. Regarding drones strikes in Pakistan, counterinsurgency expert David Kilcullen and former Army officer Andrew McDonald Exum wrote in a 2009 opinion piece: "Every one of these dead noncombatants represents an alienated family, a new desire for revenge, and more recruits for a militant movement that has grown exponentially even as the drone strikes have increased. [299] They concluded that it would be in the best interest of the American and Pakistani people to declare a moratorium on drone strikes in Pakistan.

New York Times reporter David Rohde, emerging from seven months as a Taliban hostage in Afghanistan and Pakistan, wrote that his kidnappers' hatred for the United States was fueled in part by civilians being killed by drones. [300] "To my captors," he wrote, "they were proof that the United States was a hypocritical and duplicitous power that flouted international law."

Pashtun tribal culture considers face-to-face combat honorable. Firing a missile at faceless people from a bunker thousands of miles away? Not so much.

Suspending drone strikes won't stop Islamic radicals altogether, but continuing the unmanned killing only exacerbates the problem. That's because while violent extremists may be unpopular, for a frightened population they seem less of a threat than an omnipresent, hovering enemy that at any moment could choose to eliminate one's loved ones with a Hellfire missile. Extremists -- Al Qaeda, the Taliban, Al Shabab, whoever -- capitalize on that fear, casting themselves as the defenders of the people. Ultimately, it is those same local people who must defeat the extremists. Drone strikes make that task harder, not easier, by driving those victimized by anonymous terror-from- the-sky into the arms of terrorists.

Even if one concedes the morality of killing out-and-out terrorists without trials, that's not what is really at issue. Sure, drones do kill bad people who perhaps on some level deserve their fate, but they also kill a lot of innocents -- usually at the same time. So the question is not just whether it's morally right to execute killers, but whether it's right to do so even if that means killing innocent men, women and children -- and whether, in the end, doing so really makes us all any safer.

Air strikes have not only blown up perceived enemies and innocent people, but also peace talks. In November 2011, a US air strike meant to target the Taliban in Pakistan mistakenly killed Pakistani soldiers who were camped along the Afghan border, leaving two dozen dead. The strike came just before a long-planned major diplomatic gathering on Bonn, Germany, where over one hundred countries and international organizations were gathering to discuss how to end the war in Afghanistan. Pakistan was a key player in the discussions.

But in the wake of the air strike and public outrage, the Pakistani government refused to attend the gathering, destroying the long-awaited attempt at peace negotiations. An anonymous State Department official complained to the Washington Post that this was one more example of the disconnect between the military's short-term security objectives and the State Department's long-term diplomatic goals. [301] "In a lot of ways, diplomacy is this historical anachronism," the official lamented.

At the Aspen Security Forum marking ten years since 9/11, retired admiral and former Director of National Intelligence Dennis Blair, who was pushed out of the Obama Administration, questioned the drone attacks and the entire focus on terrorism from both a strategic and economic perspective. Blair estimated there were 4,000 Al Qaeda members around the globe. With most of the yearly intelligence budget of $80 billion devoted to catching them, that comes to $20 million per terrorist per year. "You think -- wow, $20 million. Is that proportionate?" he asked.

Blair said that in the decade since 9/11, less than twenty Americans had been killed on US soil by terrorists (fourteen of them in the Ft. Hood massacre when a Muslim soldier went beserk after the army refused to discharge him). He contrasted the terror body count with deaths from car accidents and street crime, which killed more than one million Americans in the same time frame. "What is it that justifies this amount of money on this narrow problem versus the other ways we have to protect American lives?" asked Blair. "I think that's the question we have to think ourselves through here at the tenth year anniversary."

Retired Lieutenant Colonel Willam Astore wondered the same thing. Looking back at the "shoe bomber" and the "underwear bomber," he asked, "Why did the criminally inept actions of those two losers garner so much attention in the media?" As the most powerful nation on earth, we should have "shared a collective belly laugh at the absurdity and incompetence of those 'attacks' and gone about our business." Instead, he said, they were used as yet another excuse to feed the "web of crony corporations, lobbyists, politicians and retired military types who pass through Washington's revolving door ...engorged by untold trillions devoted to a national security and intelligence complex that dominates Washington." [302]

Indeed, since 9/11, the Pentagon and CIA have been lavished with funding, especially for their drone programs. Even during the post-recession budget crisis, the funding for drone research and acquisition increased. When Secretary of Defense Leon Panetta talked about 2013 budget cuts, including cuts in troop numbers, weapons systems, and military benefits, he made it clear that "unmanned systems" would be given priority.

In contrast, the State Department has been reeling from budget cuts. One of the only areas of its budget that hasn't been slashed is funding for its operations for Iraq, where the State Department -- after the December 2011 pull-out of the US military -- is now responsible for such "diplomatic activities" as overseeing thousands of armed guards, training the Iraqi police, and operating a fleet of drones.

In Pakistan, the State Department is forced to collaborate on drone killings with the CIA. US Ambassador Cameron Munter was put in the most undiplomatic position of having to give a thumbs up or thumbs down on each of these strikes. "Can you imagine if the Pakistani ambassador to Washington DC Sherry Rehman was required to say yea or nay to killing people in Texas every other day?" asked Reprieve lawyer Clive Stafford Smith. "She would be assassinated if she wasn't prosecuted for the death penalty in Texas itself. What they are doing is making the State Department's job absolutely impossible."

In the past decade, the State Department has become a weaker and weaker institution, watching its anemic attempts at diplomacy go up in smoke. It's only gotten worse since Predators and Reapers became key players in US foreign policy. With drones as the new workhorse, diplomacy -- the forgotten art of talking to one another -- has been unceremoniously taken out to pasture.

"Forty years ago American universities used to teach the art of diplomacy, now they teach about national security and strategic studies -- all militarized ways of thinking about international issues," lamented former diplomat and retired US Army Colonel Ann Wright. "Consider the belligerent policies of the State Department during the tenures of the last secretaries of state: Madeline Albright, Colin Powell, Condoleezza Rice and Hillary Clinton. They were not diplomats representing nonviolent resolutions to international challenges, but instead were extensions of the Defense Department carrying out the military policy of the United States for the president they served."

Yet, when we look at the forty-year history of groups once designated as terrorist, a RAND study shows that the primary factor for their demise was not military defeat but negotiations. Of 268 terrorist groups, 43 percent ended through participation in the political process, 40 percent through effective policing, and a mere 7 percent through military force. [303]

In the US struggle against terrorism that has been so biased toward a military response, we not only have a dire need to create more diplomacy, we also have a dire need for more citizen involvement. In the United States, foreign policy has only on the rarest of occasions been subject to democratic input, and typically only when body bags containing American soldiers dominated the evening news. With drones, the president can choose to take the nation to war with no Americans putting their bodies on the line. In a more perfect world, this would not have an impact on decisions to use lethal force; the justness of a war, after all, does not hinge on whether one's own side of a conflict might suffer casualties.

On the globe we actually live in, though, nationalism and a bias toward the familiar tends to lead people to feel more for their compatriots than for the nameless, faceless "Other."

And with US wars today, the Other is not only nameless and faceless, but invisible. Have you ever seen a drone victim on the news? Have you seen pictures of body parts hanging from trees, houses turned to rubble, mothers wailing in grief? The mainstream media, after cheerleading for war and enthusiastically covering the initial shock-and-awe volley of missiles, quickly became bored with America's imperial exploits. And with the rise of drone warfare that poses no risk to Americans, they aren't about to spend time covering blown-up foreigners, especially when there's something important like a celebrity breakup to report.

Imagine if the tables were turned, though. Imagine if Cuba was operating drones in Southern Florida, surveilling Cuban-Americans and executing confessed terrorists like Luis Posada Carriles.

Pretty soon one might not need to imagine. Other countries are sure to follow the precedent set by the United States government, the one that says it's acceptable to bypass the formality of the law and simply assassinate another country's citizens -- or your own -- so long as some anonymous official whispers the word "terrorist" in a journalist's ear. Israel is already doing the same thing. China, Russia, Iran -- indeed, the rest of the world -- are watching.

Instead of the rigorous public debate one would expect from a democratic society faced with these complex ethical questions regarding remote-controlled killing, the media is silent, most religious leaders are silent, elected officials are silent. And the anti-war movement, so vocal and vibrant during the Bush years, lost its voice when Barack Obama became president.

That provided the space for President Obama to continue his predecessor's wars and rain ever more Hellfire missiles overseas with less public debate than if he were a sports executive proposing to trade a first round draft pick. Sure, there have been wars with much greater casualty counts. But no president has ever carried out so many secret, targeted killings.

It's quite astounding that the Obama Administration has killed thousands of suspected militants and civilians alike, including US citizens, in undeclared, illegal wars with nary a whisper of "impeachment" on Capitol Hill.

Even if they were so inclined, it's not clear lawmakers would be able to dig up much about the wars being remotely waged in their names. Between the CIA, private contactors and the Pentagon's ultra-secretive Joint Special Operations Command, the Obama Administration has been able to wage undeclared wars in ways that shield it from public scrutiny. The convergence of military and intelligence resources has created blind spots in Congressional oversight, as the CIA briefs intelligence committees and JSOC reports to armed services committees. Since the briefs are secret, the committees can't compare notes to gain a comprehensive understanding. And it's only the relevant committees -- and sometimes only the committee heads -- that get briefed, leaving most officials in the dark.

But don't assume the lawmakers are clamoring to learn more. When there's a Democrat in the White House, other Democrats in positions of authority -- even the ostensibly anti-war ones -- have shown no real inclination to investigate their own president's wars of choice, particularly when there's no real risk to the Americans piloting the drones. And Republicans, being the less subtle pro-war party in Washington, are generally in favor of bombing everywhere and would rather investigate community groups like ACORN than something as banal as an illegal, only winkingly-acknowledged war.

There is one voice talking about drones in Congress, though. It's the self-described "industry's voice on Capitol Hill" -- the Congressional Unmanned Systems Caucus. This group of fifty lawmakers, who as of 2012 represented about one in eight members of the House of Representatives and just under half of the defense appropriations subcommittee, helps make sure that even killer drones enjoy a voice in Washington.

It seems that, like corporations, robots are people too.

A membership map provided by the caucus shows that its bipartisan membership spans the range of acceptable opinion in the US capital, from Republican hawk to militarist Democrat. From California conservative Buck McKeon to New York liberal Maurice Hinchey, the members, spread all over the country, demonstrate the drone industry's broad geographic and political support.

The group's mission statement says the members recognize "the urgent need to rapidly develop and deploy more Unmanned Systems in support of ongoing civil, military, and law enforcement operations." These Congress people, many of whom are fiscal conservatives busy slashing social programs in the name of the taxpayer, also pledge to support "policies and budgets that promote a large, more robust national security unmanned system capability."

Contrary to some its more strident critics, the United States does indeed have a functioning representative democracy. It's just that those being represented aren't the same "we the people" that they teach in grade school.

***

Peter Singer, author of Wired For War, says that we're at the Wright Brothers Flier stage of unmanned aircraft and that debating drones is like debating the merits of computers in 1979: "They are here to stay, and the boom has barely begun." [304]

But we are constantly having vigorous debates about computers. In January 2012, for example, when Congress attempted to pass a law that would have shut down Internet sites accused of violating copyright laws, they were flooded with so many millions of calls and petitions that they had to table the legislation.

Yet there is no such vigorous debate and activism around a technology like drones that has such a profound impact on our reputation, the ethical foundations of our society, the lives of innocent people, and ultimately, our security as a nation.

With the US military now using thousands of drones and FM opening domestic skies to drones, the conversation is long overdue.

Not all uses of unmanned aircraft are bad. Drones were used after the earthquake in Japan to observe radiation levels at the Fukushima nuclear plant. They were used in Australia to inspect the state of wildlife after a massive flood. They have great potential to help firefighters by hovering over swaths of burning forests.

Environmental, human rights and even protest groups are starting to use drones. The Sea Shepherd Conservation Society is launching small drones over the vast expanse of ocean to spot illegal whaling. Human rights groups are advocating that drones be used to spy on regimes cracking down on their people, as in the case of Syria. [305] Protest groups in Poland have flown drones over the heads of police to monitor their conduct, a tactic that Occupy Wall Street in New York mimicked with $300 toy mini-drones sold in Brookstone.

But what is fueling the drone boom is neither scientific missions nor creative activists, but state-sponsored assassinations and semi-covert wars. And unfortunately it is those latter pursuits-not a cure for cancer, say, or replacement for fossil fuels-to which some of the best scientific minds in the world today are dedicating their time.

Drones now under development in research centers all over the country are designed to be more lethal, have greater autonomy, stay airborne for longer periods and have a more precise, broader vision of the battlefield. One technology under development is termed the "swarm." Like a swarm of angry bees, a bevy of unmanned aerial, ground, and sea vehicles would autonomously converge on enemy troops, aircraft and ships. Then they'd jointly decide their plan of attack, engage the enemy -- and beat the hell out of 'em, of course -- all without direct human intervention.

Drone surveillance will become more all-encompassing. The USAir Force description of current drone projects says new "unmanned aircraft systems (Vulture) and airships (ISIS) can remain aloft for years ...large airships containing football-field size radars give extreme resolution/ persistence." One can imagine whole swaths of nations or whole nations subjected to a kind of "dronesphere" in which all public activity is monitored without respect for national borders or personal privacy in a way far beyond what has ever been technologically possible.

Of course, these new systems are not just for use overseas. The surveillance capabilities of drones and their increasing use by domestic law enforcement agencies in the United States and elsewhere threaten to eviscerate what's left of our privacy rights. The sensors on drones are designed to monitor miles of terrain. No matter how targeted an investigation, you always risk the prying eye of the state observing your affairs. Who needs to live in a glass house when the government, armed with drones and million-dollar heat sensors, can already see whatever it wants?

Drones aren't a unique evil -- but that's just the point. Drones don't revolutionize surveillance; they are a progressive evolution in making spying, at home and abroad, more pervasive. Drones don't revolutionize warfare; they are, rather, a progressive evolution in making murder clean and easy. That's why the increased reliance on drones for killing and spying is not to be praised, but refuted. And challenged.

The burden is now squarely on we the people to reassert our rights and push back against the normalization of drones as a military and law enforcement tool. The use of drones needs to be limited, transparent and, at the least, acknowledged; it's no less a war if the plane firing the missile is remotely operated. Our ability to curb the use of UAVs -- rescuing hurricane victims. yes, carrying out extrajudicial killings, no-will not only determine the future of warfare and individual privacy. but shape how we live together as a global human community.
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Re: DRONE WARFARE: KILLING BY REMOTE CONTROL

Postby admin » Fri Jun 26, 2015 10:01 pm

Acknowledgments

First, let me thank Charles Davis for his wonderful writing and research help; Allison McCracken for being such a terrific assistant; Rafia Zakaria for her work on the victims in Pakistan; Nadira Sheralam for her careful editing; Kindra Wyatt for her painstaking documentation; and Nancy Mancias for her research and action guide.

I also want to give a shout out to my CODEPINK sisters on the national team, who make this work so rewarding: codirectors Jodie Evans and Rae Abileah, Joan Stallard, Sasha Gelzin, Farida Sheralam, JanetWeil, Nancy Kricorian. Melanie Butler, Kristin Ess Schurr. Gayle Brandeis, and Lisa Savage, and my Global Exchange colleagues, especially Kirsten Moller.

My opposition to drone warfare has deepened by witnessing the commitment of the unsung activists around the country who have been protesting at Air Forces bases and dronemaker offices for years. These include Kathy Kelly, Nick Mottern, Brian Terrell, Jim Haber, Ann Wright, Ray McGovern, Ed Kinane, Mary Anne Grady, Judy Bello, Vicki Ross, Debra Sweet, Father Louis Vitale, Father Jerry Zawada, the Catholic Workers, the Creech 14 and Hancock 38, World Can't Wait, and the War Resisters.

I am inspired by my CODEPINK sisters who speak out so passionately on behalf of drone victims they have never met. Many thanks to Toby Blome for her pioneering work, as well as Nancy Mancias, Martha Hubert, Leslie Angeline, Eleanor Levine, Liz Hourican, Cynthia Papermaster, Marie Bravo, Zanne Joi, Chris Nelson, Caroline Kittrell, Shirley and Pamela Osgood, Zohreh Whitaker, Beverly McGain, Susan Witka, Renay Davis, and Dianne Budd. I extend special gratitude to Candace Ross, the Goddess Temple priestess, for her extraordinary hosting of protesters at the Guest House near Creech Air Force Base. I also want to recognize Jean Aguerre for her steadfast and effective Not 1 More Acre Campaign.

I received valuable input from many colleagues, including Pratap Chaterjee, Clive Stafford Smith, Jody Williams, Peter Ansaro, Noel Sharkey, Mark Gubrud, Fran Quigley, Tom Barry and Polly Miller, as well as interns Rosie Platzer and Viannka Lopez. Special thanks to Tara Murray at Reprieve and Mizra Shahzad Akbar for his work with drone victims in Pakistan, Chris Cole of Drone Wars UK and the great UK activists whom I look forward to working with.

It was due to a chance meeting with OR Books publisher John Oakes that I had the opportunity to write this book, and I thank him and the wonderful crew at OR for their encouragement.

Finally, I owe a debt of gratitude to my partner Tighe Barry for always being so thoughtful and supportive, and to my children Arlen and Maya for motivating me to leave a better world for them.
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Re: DRONE WARFARE: KILLING BY REMOTE CONTROL

Postby admin » Fri Jun 26, 2015 10:02 pm

Further Resources

BOOKS/REPORTS


Philip Alston, "Report of the Special Rapporteur on extrajudicial, summary or arbitrary executions," United Nations General Assembly, Human Rights Council, Fourteenth Session, May 23, 2010.

Chris Cole, Convenient Killing: Armed Drones and the 'Playstation' Mentality. Oxford: The Fellowship of Reconciliation, 2010.

Matt J. Martin and Charles W. Sasser, Predator: The Remote-control Air War over Iraq and Afghanistan: A Pilot's Story. Minneapolis, MN: Zenith, 2010.

Mary Ellen O'Connell, "Lawful Use of Combat Drones -- Hearing: Rise of the Drones II: Examining the Legality of Unmanned Targeting," Subcommittee on National Security and Foreign Affairs, US Congress, Apr 28, 2010.

Chris Rogers, "CIVIC: Campaign for Innocent Victims in Conflict-REPORT: Pakistan 2010." CIVIC: Campaign for Innocent Victims in Conflict.

P.W. Singer, Wired for War: The Robotics Revolution and Conflict in the Twenty-first Century. New York: Penguin, 2009.

Congressional Budget Office, "Policy Options for Unmanned Aircraft Systems," Publication 4083, Washington DC, June 2011.

United Kingdom Ministry of Defence, "The UK Approach to Unmanned Aircraft Systems," Joint Doctrine, 2011.

"Does Unmanned Make Unacceptable? Exploring the Debate on using Drones and Robots in Warfare," IKV Pax Christi, May 2011.

ORGANIZATIONS

American Civil Liberties Union: www.aclu.org

Amnesty International: www.amnesty.org

Bureau of Investigative Journalism: www.thebureau investigates. com

Campaign for Innocent Victims in Conflict (CIVIC): www. civicworldwide.org

CODEPINK: www.codepink.org

Catholic Worker Movement: www.catholicworker.org

Center for Constitutional Rights: ccrjustice.org

Drone Campaign Network: www.dronecampaignnetwork. org.uk

Drone Wars UK: dronewarsuk.wordpress.com

Fellowship of Reconciliation, England: www.for.org.uk

Global Network Against Weapons and Nuclear Power in Space: www.space4peace.org

Human Rights Watch: www.hrw.org

International Committee for Robot Arms Control: www. icrac.co/uk

Nevada County Peace Center: www.ncpeace.org

Nuclear Resister: www.nuclearresister.org

Reprieve: www.reprieve.org.uk

The Nevada Desert Experience: www.nevadadesert experience.org

United Against the Drones: Unitedagainstthedrones. wordpress.com

Upstate NY Coalition to End the Drones: upstatedroneaction.org

Voices for Creative Nonviolence: vcnv.org

Women in Black: www.womeninblack.org

World Can't Wait: www.worldcantwait.net

Know Drones: www.knowdrones.org

WEBSITES

Antiwar.com

wired.com/dangerroom, especially Noah Shachtman and Spencer Ackerman

Association for Unmanned Vehicle Systems International (AUVSI), www.auvsi.org

Lobbying Spending Database, OpenSecrets.org

Smithsonian Air and Space Museum drone exhibit: www. nasm.si.edu/exhibitions/gal104/uav.cfm

Congressional Unmanned Systems Caucus: unmanned systemscaucus.mckeon.house.gov

Tom Dispatch, especially Nick Turse and Tom Engelhardt

FILMS/VIDEOS

Remote Control War, available on DVD and Netflix: www.amazon.com/Remote-Control-Narrated- ... Donald/dp/ B004RV70JW

"America's use for domestic drones" Al Jazeera English, Dec 7, 2011, www.youtube.com/watch?v=QTLtNgSRXyc

"The Real Casualties of the Drone War," RT TV; December 14,2011, www.youtube.com/wiltch?v=xOaw4ym616c

Robot Wars, Faultlines, Al Jazeera, www.youtube.com/ watch?v=TyJoJUs14bc

CODEPINK at the AUVSI press conference, www.youtube. com /watch ?v=wOcF6g2Y1cQ

Stop the Arms Fair 2011-UK Anti Drones Action: www. you tube.com/watch?v=n8NaCgA1270

With song: www.youtube.com/watch?v=DQFOXOMqcDc
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Re: DRONE WARFARE: KILLING BY REMOTE CONTROL

Postby admin » Fri Jun 26, 2015 10:02 pm

Endnotes

1. Carl Conetta, "Operation Enduring Freedom: Why a Higher Rate of Civilian Bombing Casualties," Project on Defense Alternatives, Commonwealth Institute of Cambridge, MA USA. N.p., n.d.

2. P.W. Singer, Wired for War: Robotics Revolution and Conflict in the 21st Century, Penguin Press, 2009, p. 61.

3. Christopher Rogers, "Civilians in Armed Conflict: Civilian Harm and Conflict in Northwest Pakistan," CIVIC, 2010, p. 20.

4. Scott Shane, "U.S. Said to Target Rescuers at Drone Strike Sites," The New York Times, February 5, 2012.

5. Khawar Rizvi, Personal Interview by author, Washington, D.C., May 3, 2010.

6. "Politics is Funny," A Tiny Revolution, May 2, 2010.

7. Rod Powers. "Military Word/Phrase Origins," United States Military Information.

8. Jeremiah Gertler, "U.S. Unmanned Aerial Systems," p.1, Congressional Research Service.

9. Peter Finn, "Rise of the Drone: From Calif. Garage to Multibillion-dollar Defense industry," The Washington Post, December 24, 2011.

10. Chris Cole, "Convenient Killing: Armed Drones and the 'Playstation' Mentality," The Fellowship of Reconciliation, England, 2010.

11. Elizabeth Bone, "Unmanned Aerial Vehicles: Background and Issues for Congress," Congressional Research Service, April 25, 2003.

12. Nic Robertson, "How Robot Drones Revolutionized the Face of Warfare," CNN, July 23, 2009.

13. Jeremiah Gertler, "U.S. Unmanned Aerial Systems," Summary, Congressional Research Service, January 3, 2012.

14. "Program Acquisition Costs by Weapon System," Office of the Under Secretary of Defense, February, 2011 p. 1-1.

15. "General Atomics MQ-9 Reaper," Wikipedia.

16. Jeremiah Gertler, "U.S. Unmanned Aerial Systems," Congressional Research Service, January 3, 2012, p. 22.

17. David S. Cloud, "Contractors' Role Grows in Drone Missions, Worrying Some in the Military," McClatchy News, December 29, 2011.

18. Elisabeth Bumiller and Thorn Shanker, "Microdrones, Some as Small as Bugs, Are Poised to Alter War," The New York Times, June 20, 2011.

19. ibid.

20. Cloud, loc. cit.

21. "Policy Options for Unmanned Aircraft Systems," Publication 4083, Congressional Budget Office, Washington DC, June 2011, p. 31.

22. ibid.

23. Christopher Drew, "Drones Are U.S. Weapons of Choice in Fighting Qaeda," The New York Times, March 16, 2009.

24. Associated Press, "U.S. Deploys Drones Against Somali Pirates," CBS News, October 24, 2009.

25. David Zucchino, "Military Drone Aircraft: Losses in Afghanistan, Iraq," Los Angeles Times, July 6, 2010.

26. "Oops! Keystroke Goof Sets Navy Drone to Self-Destruct," FOX News, July 19, 2011.

27. Joshua Stewart, "Fire Scout report outlines tech glitches," Navy Times, July 2011.

28. Noah Shachtman, "Insurgents Intercept Drone Video in King-Size Security Breach," Wired.com, December 17, 2009.

29. Noah Shachtman, "Exclusive: Computer Virus Hits U.S. Drone Fleet," Wired.com, October 7, 2011.

30. Nic Robertson, "How Robot Drones Revolutionized the Face of Warfare," CNN.com International, July 23, 2009.

31. Chris Woods and Christina Lamb, "Obama terror drones: CIA tactics in Pakistan include targeting rescuers and funerals," Bureau of Investigative Journalism, February 4, 2012.

32. Jane Mayer, "The risks of the C.I.A.'s Predator drones," The New Yorker, October 26, 2009.

33. "UK Faults Self and US for Plane Shootdown," Space War, May 14, 2004.

34. David Zucchino and David S. Cloud, "U.S. deaths in drone strike due to miscommunication, report says," The Los Angeles Times, October 14, 2011.

35. Medea Benjamin, "Did You Hear the Joke About the Predator Drone That Bombed?" CommonDreams, May 5, 2010.

36. Saeed Shah and Peter Beaumont, "US drone strikes in Pakistan claiming many civilian victims, says campaigner," The Guardian, July 17, 2011.

37. Elisabeth Bumiller and Thorn Shanker, "Microdrones, Some as Small as Bugs, Are Poised to Alter War," The New York Times, June 20, 2011.

38. "2010 Top 100 Contractors - General Atomics," Washington Technology, Eagle Eye Publisher.

39. W.J. Hennigan, "General Atomics: Drones Create a Buzz in Southern California Aerospace Industry," The Los Angeles Times, September 11, 2010.

40. Zach Rosenburg, "US Air Force orders General Atomics Avenger," Aviation and Aerospace News, Flightglobal.com, December 12, 2011.

41. Jen Dimascio, "New Drones net rosy skies for makers," Politico.com, November 23, 2009.

42. Steve Henn and Robert Brodsky, "'Top Gun' of travel," iWatch News, June 5, 2006.

43. Gopal Ratnam, "General Atomics Wins Approval to Sell First Predator Drones in Middle East," Bloomberg, July 20, 2010.

44. "Lobbying Spending Database - General Atomics," OpenSecrets, 2011.

45. Scott Shane, "Coming Soon - The Drone Arms Race," The New York Times, October 9, 2011.

46. "AeroVironment Receives $16 Million Order for Raven Unmanned Aircraft Systems Contractor Logistics Support," Business Wire, September 8, 2011.

47. "AeroVironment Receives $7.3 Million Order for Puma Unmanned Aircraft System Support Services," Business Wire, October 20, 2011.

48. David Wichner, "Distributed Common Ground System," Raytheon Company.

49. David Wichner, "Raytheon's new Griffin fit for drone," Arizona Daily Star, August 22, 2010.

50. David Wichner, "Raytheon developing drone-fired weapon," StarNet, April 25, 2011.

51. Spencer Ackerman, "Mini-Missile Promises to Shrink the Drone War," Wired.com, December 1, 201l.

52. Rikki Mitchell, "Drones that stay airborne forever," StarNet, February 27, 2011.

53. W.J. Hennigan, "Phantom Ray Test Flight: Boeing's Robotic Jet Phantom Ray Takes Maiden Test Flight," The Los Angeles Times, May 4, 2011.

54. Brian Wingfield, "Drone Wars," Forbes.com, June 1, 2009.

55. 1st Lt. Jason Sweeney, ''Armed and Dangerous: The Gray Eagle goes lethal," General Atomics, April 9, 2011.

56. "Factsheets: RQ-4 Global Hawk," Official Site of the US Air Force.

57. Christopher Drew, "Costly Drone Is Poised to Replace U-2 Spy Plane," The New York Times, Aug 3, 2011.

58. Steve Zaloga and David Rockwell, "UAV Market Set for 10 Years of Growth," EIJ - Earth Imaging Journal.

59. Christopher Drew, "Costly Drone Is Poised to Replace U-2 Spy Plane," The New York Times, August 3, 2011.

60. W.J. Hennigan, "U.S. may rely on aging U-2 spy planes longer than expected," The Los Angeles Times, January 28, 2012.

61. "Lobbying Spending Database - General Atomics, 2011," OpenSecrets.org.

62. "Lockheed Martin Announces Fourth Quarter 2010 Results," LockheedMartin.com.

63. "Lobbying Spending Database," OpenSecrets.org.

64. "Lockheed Martin," Wikipedia.

65. "HELLFIRE II Missile," LockheedMartin.com.

66. "US to deploy deadlier 'Hellfire Romeo' precision-strike missiles in war against terrorism," Yahoo! India News, October 16, 2011.

67. Amir Khan, "Lockheed Martin Tests Tiny Samarai UAV," Popular Mechanics, August 18, 2011.

68. Stephen Trimble, "REPORT: RQ-170 spied over Osama bin Laden's bed last night," The DEW Line, May, 2011.

69. Interview with Mark Gubrud, February 3, 2012.

70. "U.S. military drones that are so small they even look like insects," Daily Mail Reporter, July 12, 2011.

71. ''AFRL's new lab focused on micro air vehicles," AviationDayton, May 27, 2010.

72. "U.S. military drones that are so small they even look like insects," Daily Mail Reporter, July 12, 2011.

73. "Our Work," Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency.

74. Tina Casey, "DARPA Looks To The Crowd To Build Miniature Drones," TPM Idea Lab, October 2011.

75. Eric Hagerman, "Coming Soon: An Unblinking 'Gorgon Stare' For Air Force Drones," Popular Science, August 2009.

76. David Axe and Noah Shachtman, "Air Force's 'All-Seeing Eye' Flops Vision Test," Wired.com, January 2011.

77. Steve Zaloga and David Rockwell, "UAV Market Set for 10 Years of Growth," EIJ - Earth Imaging Journal, 2011.

78. Charles Levinson, "Israeli Robots Remake Battlefield," The Wall Street Journal, January 13, 2010.

79. "Israel and the rise of drone warfare," Neged Neshek , [Hebrew] n.d.

80. BBC World News, "Russia 'will buy Israeli drones'," BBC News, April 10, 2009.

81. Reuters, "Russia in talks to buy Israeli-made spy drones for $100m," Haaretz Israeli News, July 12, 2009.

82. "IAI delivers 12 UAVs to Russia in key deal," SpaceDaily.com, January 17, 2011.

83. AFP and Dawn.com, "Israel is leader in drone exports," CN Publications, July 2, 2010.

84. Rajat Pandit, "India lines up Israeli drones in race with Pak," The Times Of India, March 26, 2010.

85. "Say hello to Pakistan's first domestically produced armed drone: The Burraq UCAV," TechLahore, December 4, 2011.

86. Jeremy Page, "China's Drones Raise Eyebrows at Air Show," The Wall Street Journal, November 18, 2010.

87. Nathan Hodge, "U.S. Military Confirms It Shot Down Iranian Drone," Wired.com, March 16, 2009.

88. P.W. Singer, "Will Foreign Drones One Day Attack the U.S.?," The Daily Beast, February 25, 2010.

89. W.J. Hennigan, David S. Cloud, and Ken Dilanian, "Drone that crashed in Iran may give away U.S. secrets," The Los Angeles Times, December 6, 2011.

90. Brad Knickerbocker, "US considered missions to destroy RQ-170 Sentinel drone lost in Iran," The Christian Science Monitor, December 7, 2011.

91. Patrick McGroarty, "Two South African Defense Firms Take Aim at Niche Aircraft Market," The Wall Street Journal, September 27, 2011.

92. William Booth, "More Predator Drones Fly U.S.-Mexico Border," Washington Post, December 21, 2011.

93. "Iraqi Drones Not For WMD," CBS News, February 11, 2009.

94. Tom Vanden Brook, "Drones Reshaping Iraq's Battlefields," USA Today, July 6, 2006.

95. Associated Press, "Use of Unmanned Drones Soars in Iraq," MSNBC, January 1, 2008.

96. Christopher Drew, "Drones Are Playing a Growing Role in Afghanistan," The New York Times, February 19, 2010.

97. Gordon Lubold, "As Drones Multiply in Iraq and Afghanistan, So Do Their Uses," The Christian Science Monitor, March 2, 2010.

98. ibid.

99. Tom Vanden Brook, "Drone Attacks Hit High in Iraq," USA Today, April 29, 2008.

100. Eric Schmitt and Michale S. Schmidt, "Iraq is Angered by U.S. Drones Patrolling Its Skies," The New York Times, January 29, 2012.

101. Nick Turse, "America's Secret Empire of Drone Bases," The Nation, October 17, 2011.

102. Greg Miller, "Under Obama, an Emerging Global Apparatus for Drone Killing," The Washington Post, December 27, 2011.

103. Lolita C. Baldor, "Panetta Spills a Little on Secret CIA Drones," Yahoo! News, October 7, 2011.

104. Daniel Benjamin and Steven Simon, The Age of Sacred Terror. Random House, 2002.

105. Jane Mayer, "The Predator War," The New Yorker, October 26, 2009.

106. Marc Ambinder, "The Secret Team That Killed bin Laden," National Journal, May 3, 2011.

107. Gretchen Gavett, "What is the Secretive U.S. "Kill/Capture" Campaign?," PBS: Public Broadcasting Service.

108. Ibid.

109. James Risen and Mark Mazzetti, "C.I.A. Said to Use Outsiders to Put Bombs on Drones," The New York Times, August 20, 2009.

110. Karen DeYoung, "US increases Yemen drone strikes," The Washington Post, September 17, 2011.

111. "Air raid kills Yemeni mediator," Al Jazeera English, May 25, 2010.

112. Bill Roggio, "Yemeni airstrike kills deputy governor, Al Qaeda operative," The Long War Journal, May 25, 2010.

113. CBS/AP "Al Qaeda's Anwar al-Awlaki killed in Yemen," CBS News, September 30, 2011.

114. Peter Finn and Greg Miller, "Anwar al-Awlaki's family speaks out against his son's death in airstrike," The Washington Post, October 17, 2011.

115. "Wikileaks cable corroborates evidence of US airstrikes in Yemen," Amnesty International, December 1, 2010.

116. Spencer Ackerman, "CIA's Drone Join Shadow War Over Yemen," Wired.com, June 14, 2011.

117. Jim Lobe, "US: Expanding Network of Drone Bases To Hit Somalia, Yemen," IPS Inter Press Service, September 21, 2011.

118. Department of Defense, "News Transcript: Deputy Secretary Wolfowitz Interview with Sam Tannenhaus, Vanity Fair," The Official Home of the Department of Defense, May 9, 2003.

119. Nick Turse, "The Forty-Year Drone War," TomDispatch, January 24, 2010.

120 "Al Dhafra Air Base," GlobalSecurity.org, May 7, 2011.

121. Greg Miller and Craig Whitlock, "U.S. building secret drone bases in Africa, Arabian Peninsula, officials say," The Washington Post, September 20, 2011.

122. "Press Briefing by Press Secretary Jay Carney," The White House, October 28, 2011.

123. Jim Lobe, "US: Expanding Network of Drone Bases To Hit Somalia, Yemen," IPS Inter Press Service, September 21, 2011.

124. "Seychelles: Ocean Look Tops Agenda During Presidential Meeting," The Washington Post, n.d.

125 "U.S. Building Secret Drone Bases in Africa, Arabian Peninsula, Officials Say," The Washington Post, September 20, 2011.

126. "Uganda and Burundi to get US Drones to Fight Islamists." BBC News, June 28, 2011.

127 Spencer Ackerman, "Libya: The Real U.S. Drone War." Wired.com, October 20, 2011.

128. Greg Jaffe. "Fleet of U.S. Drones now Based in Turkey," The Washington Post, November 14, 2011.

129. "The Future of War: Keynote Address at the CSIS Global Security Forum 2011," United States Department of Defense, June 8, 2011.

130. Anshel Pfeffer. "WikiLeaks: IDF uses drones to assassinate Gaza militants," Haaretz Israeli News, February 9, 2011.

131. Scott Wilson. "In Gaza, Lives Shaped by Drones," The Washington Post, December 3, 2011.

132. Chris Cole, "Drone Wars Briefing," January 2012 p. 6.

133. Robert Wall, "Watch keeper Misses Key Schedule Milestone," Aviation Week, January 11, 2012.

134. Nick Hopkins. "Afghan civilians killed by RAF drone," The Guardian, July 5. 2011.

135. ibid.

136. "Iraq insurgents hack into video feeds from US drones," BBC News, December 17, 2009.

137. "Syrian Downing of Israeli drone Raises Specter of Syrian Scuds," DEBKAfile Exclusive, 2006.

138. "Iranian drone 'shot down in Iraq'," BBC News. March 16, 2009.

139. Dr. Mark T. Maybury, "Remotely Piloted Aircraft," US Air Force, September 27, 2011.

140. William Booth, "More Predator Drones Fly U.S.-Mexico Border," The Washington Post, December 21, 2011.

141. Charlie Savage, "U.S. Drug Enforcement Agency Expands War on Drugs," The New York Times, November 6, 2011.

142. "Membership" Congressional Unmanned Systems Caucus Committee.

143. Alan Levin, "Commercial Drones: A Dogfight at the FAA," Business Week, February 9, 2012.

144. Brian Bennett, "Police Employ Predator Drone Spy Planes on Home Front," The Los Angeles Times, December 10, 2011.

145. "Drone may be coming to Miami-Dade," WSVN 7NEWS Miami/Ft. Lauderdale, January 6, 2011.

146. Tim Elfrink, "MDPD is First Force to Get FAA Clearance to Fly Drones at Crime Scenes," The Miami New Times' Blogs, November 15, 2011.

147. "Miami police could become first to use drones in a U.S. city," TPMMuckraker, January 7, 2011.

148. Stephen Dean, "New Police Drone Near Houston Could Carry Weapons," Click 2 Houston IKPRC Local 2, November 10, 2011.

149. Jay Stanley and Catherine Crump, "Protecting Privacy From Aerial Surveillance," ACLU, December 2011, p 1.

150. Jay Stanley and Catherine Crump, "Protecting Privacy From Aerial Surveillance," ACLU, December 2011, p 11.

151. Glenn Greenwald, "NPR's Domestic Drone Commercial," Salon.com, December 6, 2011.

152. "As The Drone Flies ...," The Nader Page, Nader.org, September 26, 2011.

153. CBS/ AP, "Mass. Musician Accused of D.C. Terrorist Plot," CBS News, September 28, 2011.

154. Business Wire, ''AeroVironment, Inc. - U.S. Army Awards AeroVironment $4.9 Million Contract for Switchblade Agile Munition Systems and Services," AeroVironment, Inc., September 1, 2011.

155. David Zucchino, "Drone Pilot Fights Afghan War from Nevada Base," AZ Central, February 24, 2010.

156. Nick Turse, ''America's Secret Empire of Drone Bases," The Huffington Post, October 17, 2011.

157. Thorn Shanker and Matt Richtel, "Military Struggles to Harness a Flood of Data," The New York Times, January 17, 2011.

158. ibid.

159. Gareth Porter, "CIA's Push for Drone War Driven by Internal Needs," IPS Inter Press Service, September 5, 2011.

160. United Nations General Assembly - Human Rights Council, "Report of the Special Rapporteur on extrajudicial, summary or arbitrary executions, Phllip Alston," Fourteenth Session, May 23, 2010.

161. Christian Caryl, "Predators and Robots at War," The New York Review of Books, September 29, 2011.

162 P.W. Singer, Wired for War: The Robotics Revolution and Conflict in the Twenty-First Century. New York: Penguin Press, 2009, Ch. 3, p. 68.

163. P.W. Singer, Wired for War, New York, 2009, p. 332.

164. Greg Jaffe, "Combat Generation: Drone Operators Climb on Winds of Change in the Air Force," The Washington Post, February 27, 2010.

165. ibid.

166. Elisabeth Bumiller, "Air Force Drone Operators Show High Levels of Stress," The New York Times, December 19, 2011.

167. "Report on Operating Next-Generation Remotely Piloted Aircraft in Irregular Warfare," United States Airforce Scientific Advisory Board, April, 2011.

168. Elisabeth Bumiller, ''Air Force Drone Operators Show High Levels of Stress," The New York Times, December 19, 2011.

169. Associated Press, "Air Force Makes Push For Drone Operators," CBS News, October 23, 2008.

170. David S. Cloud, "Contractors' role grows in drone missions, worrying some in the military," McClatchy D.C., Dec 29, 2011.

171. Mark Thompson, "Flying Air Force Drones: Pilots No Longer Required," TIME. com, September 18, 2008.

172. Associated Press, "Remote-control Warriors Suffer War Stress," MSNBC, August 7, 2008.

173. Al Jazeera English, "America's use for domestic drones," YouTube, December 7, 2011.

174. Malt J. Martin and Charles W. Sasser, Predator: The Remote-control Air War Over Iraq and Afghanistan: A Pilot's Story. Minneapolis, MN: Zenith Press, 2010 ch. 20, p. 211.

175. "Interview with a Drone Pilot: 'It Is Not a Video Game'," SPIEGEL ONLINE - Nachrichten, March 12, 2010.

176. David S. Cloud, "Afghanistan Predator Drones: Despite High-Tech tools, a Fatal Error," The Los Angeles Times, April 10, 2011.

177. "Drone Pilot Kills Afghani Militants from Nevada Control Centre," YouTube, October 23, 2009.

178. Tom Bowman, "Predator Pilots Engage in Remote Control Combat," NPR, September 4, 2007.

179. Rachel Martin, "Report: High Levels Of 'Burnout' In U.S. Drone Pilots," NPH, December 19, 2011.

180. Elisabeth Bumiller, "Air Force Drone Operators Show High Levels of Stress," The New York Times, December 19, 2011.

181. Sally B. Donnelly, "Long-Distance Warriors," TIME.com, December 4, 2005.

182. Megan McCloskey, "Two Worlds of a Drone Pilot," Military.com, October 27, 2009.

183. "Interview with a Drone Pilot: 'It Is Not a Video Game'," Spiegel Online, Nachrichten, March 12, 2010.

184. Sally B. Donnelly, "Long-Distance Warriors," TIME.com, Dec 4, 2005.

185. Matt J. Martin and Charles W. Sasser, Predator: The Remote-Control Air War Over Iraq and Afghanistan: A Pilot's Story, Minneapolis, MN: Zenith Press, 2010 ch. 10, p. 112.

186. Thorn Shanker and Matt Richtel, "Military Struggles to Harness a Flood of Data," The New York Times, January 17, 2011.

187. Joe Pappalardo, "The Future For UAVs in the U.S. Air Force," Popular Mechanics, February 26, 2010.

188 P.W. Singer, Wired for War: Robotics Revolution and Conflict in the 21st Century, New York: Penguin, 2009, accessed via Google Books.

189. Peter Finn, "U.S. Moves Towards Robotic Warfare," The Fiscal Times, September 20, 2011.

190. Alex Rodriguez and David Zucchino, "U.S. Drone Attacks in Pakistan get Mixed Response," The Los Angeles Times, May 2, 2010.

191. "Drones Are Successful Tool in War on Terror," The Wall Street Journal, January 9, 2010.

192. Chris Woods, "Number of CIA Drone Strikes in Pakistan Hits 300," TBIJ, Oct 14, 2011.

193. Scott Shane, "C.I.A. Claim of No Civilian Deaths From Drones Is Disputed," The New York Times, August 11, 2011.

194. "The Year of the Drone," Counterterrorism Strategy Initiative, NewAmerica.net.

195. Chris Woods, "Number of CIA Drone Strikes in Pakistan Hits 300," TBIJ, October 14, 2011.

196. Saeed Shah and Peter Beaumont, "US Drone Strikes in Pakistan Claiming Many Civilian Victims, says Campaigner," The Guardian, July 17, 2011.

197. Pir Zubair Shah, Sabrina Tavernise and Mark Mazzetti, "Taliban Leader in Pakistan Is Reportedly Killed," The New York Times, August 8, 2009.

198. Jane Mayer, "The Risks of the C.I.A.'s Predator Drones," The New Yorker, October 26, 2009.

199. Carlotta Gall, "Pakistani Militant Chief Is Reported Dead," The New York Times, June 4, 2011.

200. Salman Masood and David E. Sanger, "Standoff on Pakistan Naval Base Ends," The New York Times, May 24, 2011.

201. Story provided by lawyer Shahzad Akbar, January 29, 2012.

202. Legal Notice served on behalf of Karim Khan to US Consulate in Islamabad by Mirza and Associates, provided by Karim Khan's legal counsel.

203. Declan Walsh, "Pakistani Journalist Sues CIA for Drone Strike That Killed Relatives," The Guardian, December 13, 2010.

204. ibid.

205. Ansar Abbasi, "Local CIA Chief May Face Case Against Drone Attacks," News International, December 1, 2010.

206. Pratap Chatterjee, "Bureau Reporter Meets 16-year-old Three Days Before US Drone Kills Him," TBIJ, Nov 4, 2011.

207. Ibid.

208. Clive Stafford Smith, "In Pakistan, Drones Kill Our Innocent Allies," The New York Times, November 4, 2011.

209. Nick Schifrin, "Tariq Khan Killed by CIA Drone," ABC News, December 30, 2011.

210. Interview with Pratap Chatterjee, January 16, 2012.

211. Adam Entous, Siobhan Gorman and Julian E. Barnes, "U.S. Tightens Drone Rules for Its Pakistan Attacks," The Wall Street Journal, November 4, 2011.

212. Alex Rodriguez, "Pakistan Death squads Go After Informants to U.S. Drone Program," The Los Angeles Times, December 28, 2011.

213. Ibid.

214. Jane Perlez, "Karachi Turns Deadly Amid Pakistan's Rivalries," The New York Times, November 19, 2010.

215. Greg Miller, "Al-Qaeda Targets Dwindle as Group Shrinks," The Washington Post, November 22, 2011.

216. Shatha Al-Harazi, "Yemenis Question the Killing of 16-year-old Al-Awlaki's Son," Yemen Times, October 19, 2011.

217. "Drones shape life in Gaza," The Washington Post, December 3, 2011.

218. "Precisely Wrong: Gaza Civilians Killed by Israeli Drone-Launched Missiles," Human Rights Watch, June 2009.

219. Yotam Feldman and Uri Blau, "Consent and Advise," Haaretz, January 29, 2009.

220. Tara Mckelevey, "Inside the Killing Machine," The Daily Beast, February 13, 2011.

221. Jane Mayer, "The Predator War," The New Yorker, February 26, 2009.

222. Harold Hongju Koh, "The Obama Administration and International Law," U.S. Department of State, March 25, 2010.

223. Hunter Miller, "British-American Diplomacy: The Caroline Case," Avalon Project - Yale Law School.

224. Oliver Burkeman and Julian Borger, "War critics astonished as US hawk admits invasion was illegal," The Guardian, November 20, 2003.

225. Declan Walsh, "US extends drone strikes to Somalia," The Guardian, June 30, 2011.

226. Greg Miller, "Under Obama, an Emerging Global Apparatus for Drone Killing," The Washington Post, December 27, 2011.

227. "The Laws of War," Human Rights Investigations, Last updated: Apr 30, 2011.

228. "Court Dismisses Targeted Killing Case On Procedural Grounds Without Addressing Merits," ACLU Press Release, December 7, 2010.

229. Daphne Eviatar, "Pressure Mounts on Obama Administration to Release Legal Justification for al-Awlaki Killing," The Huffington Post, October 6, 2011.

230. Noah Feldman, "Obama Team's Al-Awlaki Memo Furthered Bush Legacy," Bloomberg, October 17, 2011.

231. Megan Mitchell, "Osama Bin Laden Won't Be Brought in Alive," U.S. Congressman John Culberson: 7th District of Texas, March 16, 2010.

232. Josh Gerstein, "Osama bin Laden Won't be Brought in Alive," POLITICO.com, March 16, 2010.

233. Yochi J. Dreazen, Aamer Madhani and Marc Ambinder, "For Obama, Killing - Not Capturing - bin Laden Was Goal," NationalJournal.com, May 4, 2011.

234. Human Rights Council, "Report of the Special Rapporteur on extrajudicial, summary or arbitrary executions, Philip Alston," United Nations General Assembly - Fourteenth Session, May 23, 2010.

235. Mary Ellen O'Connell, "Lawful Use of Combat Drones - Hearing: Rise of the Drones II: Examining the Legality of Unmanned Targeting," Subcommittee on National Security and Foreign Affairs, Congress of the United States: House of Representatives, April 28, 2010.

236. "ACLU Letter to President Obama," American Civil Liberties Union, April 28, 2010.

237. Scott Shane, "Leaked Cables Offer Raw Look at U.S. Diplomacy," The New York Times, December 28, 2011.

238. Delcan Walsh, "WikiLeaks cables: US and Pakistan play down impact of 'mischief'," The Guardian, December 1, 2010.

239. "Pakistan Says U.S. Drones in its Air Space Will be Shot Down," MSNBC, December 10, 2011.

240. Gary Solis, "CIA Drone Attacks Produce America's Own Unlawful Combatants," The Washington Post, March 11, 2011.

241. James Risen and Mark Mazzetti, "NY Times Advertisement," NY Times Advertisement, August 21, 2009.

242. David S. Cloud, "Contractors' Role Grows in Drone Missions, Worrying Some in the Military," The New York Times, December 29, 2011.

243. Ibid.

244. "UN human rights expert challenges 'targeted killing' policies," Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights, October 20, 2011.

245. "Q & A: US Targeted Killings and International Law," Human Rights Watch, December 19, 2011.

246. Charles Davis, "U.S./CUBA: Justice Not So Blind in Politically Charged Cases," IPS Inter Press Service, January 29, 2008.

247. "Collateral damage," Wikipedia.

248. David Rohde, "The Drone War," Reuters Magazine, January 17, 2012.

249. Washington Post-ABC News Poll, The Washington Post, February 8, 2012.

250. P.W. Singer, "Wired for War," Wilson Quarterly, Winter 2009.

251. Teri Schultz, "Meet the Pilots who Fly America's Drones," GlobalPost, December 16, 2011.

252. "No-fly zone" Wikipedia.

253. Barack Obama, "Letter from the President on the War Powers Resolution," The White House, June 15, 2011.

254. "United States Activities in Libya," Foreign Policy Files, June 15, 2011.

255. C.J. Chivers and Eric Schmitt, "Scores of Unintended Casualties in NATO War in Libya," The New York Times, December 18, 2011.

256. Joshua Foust, "Unaccountable Killing Machines: The True Cost of U.S. Drones," The Atlantic, December 30, 2011.

257. United Kingdom Ministry of Defence, "The UK Approach to Unmanned Aircraft Systems," Joint Doctrine Note 2/11, Section 5-9.

258. Jane Mayer, "The Predator War," The New Yorker, October 26, 2009.

259. Deputy Foreign Minister Ahmed Yusef, interview by author, Gaza, June 2, 2009.

260. "Remote-Control Warfare," The Christian Century, May 2005.

261. Paul E.M. Zahl, Daniel M. Bell Jr. and Brian Stiltner, "Drones: Is It Wrong to Kill by Remote Control?" ChristianityToday.com, August 2011.

262. Ben Austen, "The Terminator Scenario: Are We Giving Our Military Machines Too Much Power?" Popular Science, December 2010.

263. Peter Finn, ''A Future for Drones: Automated Killing," The Washington Post, September 15, 2011.

264. Noel Sharkey, "Automated warfare: Lessons Learned From the Drones," Journal of Law, Information and Science, August 11, 2011.

265. Lt. Col. Dave Grossman, "Hope on the Battlefield," Greater Good, Summer 2007.

266. Rev. John Dear, ''A Peace Movement Victory in Court," Common Dreams, September 18, 2010.

267. Ibid.

268. Kathy Kelly, "The Predators: Where is Your Democracy?" Voices for Creative Nonviolence, May 9, 2011.

269. Rachel Stern, "Ithaca Group Walking to Syracuse to Protest US Drone Missiles," Voices for Creative Nonviolence, April 2011.

270. Andy Beckett, "Protest and Survive: The Greenham Veteran who Refuses to go Away," The Guardian, November 17, 2011.

271. "Pinon Canyon Expansion Parcel Map," Grassland Trust and Not 1 More Acre.

272. Chris Hellman, "Press Room," National Priorities Project, February 14, 2011.

273. "Integrated Solutions News," The Sacramento Bee.

274. "James Hill News," The Sacramento Bee.

275. CCR and the ACLU v. OFAC & Al-Aulaqi v. Obama, Center for Constitutional Rights.

276. Michael Ratner, "The Extrajudicial Drone Murder of US Citizen Anwar al-Awlaki," AlterNet, October 2, 2011.

277. "Who Is Flying Unmanned Aircraft in the U.S.?," Electronic Frontier Foundation, January 10, 2010.

278. "Q & A: US Targeted Killings and International Law," Human Rights Watch, December 19, 2011.

279. Mary Ellen O'Connell, "Lawful Use of Combat Drones," Hearing: Rise of the Drones II: Examining the Legality of Unmanned Targeting from Subcommittee on National Security and Foreign Affairs, Washington, D.C., April 28, 2010.

280. "Defense Department Does Not Compile Total Number Of Civilians Killed In Drone Attacks," American Civil Liberties Union, March 22, 2011.

281. Chris Rogers, "REPORT: Pakistan 2010," CIVIC: Campaign for Innocent Victims in Conflict, October 2010.

282. Maria Keenan, "PAKISTAN: Compensation Promised to Civilian Drone Victims," CIVIC: Campaign for Innocent Victims in Conflict, March 28, 2011.

283. David Hookes, "Armed Drones: How Remote-Controlled, High- Tech Weapons are Used Against the Poor," Scientists for Global Responsibility, Winter 2011.

284. Chris Cole, "Convenient Killing: Armed Drones and the 'Playstation' Mentality," The Fellowship of Reconciliation, England, 2010.

285. "Current campaign - Drone Wars," Fellowship of Reconciliation, England.

286. Paul McGowan, Interview by Alli McCracken, Online, December 7, 2011.

287. Jim Wright, Interview by Alli McCracken, Online, December 5, 2011.

288. "ICRAC," ICRAC - International Committee for Robot Arms Control.

289. "ICBL - International Campaign to Ban Landmines," ICBL.

290. "ICBL - International Campaign to Ban Landmines, ICBL.

291. Ibid.

292. Ibid.

293. Jeff Hawkins, Personal Interview by Author, Washington, D.C., November 15, 2011.

294. Peter Asaro, personal website.

295. Nick Mottern, Personal Interview by Author, Washington, D.C., January 4, 2012.

296. Tara Mckelvery, "Inside the Killing Machine," Newsweek, February 13, 2011.

297. Ibid.

298. Noah Shachtman, "CIA Chief: Drones 'Only Game in Town' for Stopping Al Qaeda," Wired, May 19, 2009.

299. David Kilcullen and Andrew McDonald Exum, "Op-Ed Contributors - Death From Above, Outrage Down Below," The New York Times. May 17, 2009.

300. David Rohde. "Held by the Taliban - A Times Reporter's Account. A Five-Part Series," The New York Times, October 18, 2009.

301. Karen DeYoung and Karin Brulliard. "U.S. Breach with Pakistan Shows Imbalance Between Diplomatic Security Goals," The Washington Post, December 4, 2011.

302. William Astore. "Fighting 1 Percent Wars." TomDispatch.com. December 8, 2011.

303. Seth Jones and Martin Libicki. How Terrorist Groups End: Lessons for Countering Al Qaida. Rand Publishing, 2008.

304. The New York Times, June 6, 2011.

305. Andrew Stobo Sniderman and Mark Harris. "Drones for Human Rights," The New York Times, January 30, 2012.
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