Drones Good for Killing Innocent Civilians

[I AM NOT THAT GUY 5,715]

UN: Drones killed more Afghan civilians in 2012

KABUL, Afghanistan — The number of U.S. drone strikes in Afghanistan jumped 72 percent in 2012, killing at least 16 civilians in a sharp increase from the previous year, the U.N. said Tuesday in a sign of the changing mission as international forces prepare to withdraw combat forces in less than two years.

The U.N. said most of the civilian casualties from drone strikes appear to be the result of weapons aimed directly at insurgents but some may have been targeting errors.

It called for a review of tactical and operational policy on targeting to ensure compliance with international humanitarian law "with the expansion of the use of unmanned combat aerial vehicles" in Afghanistan.

Drones are highly effective but have strained relations between the U.S. and Pakistan as well as other nations where the strikes are carried out because civilians are sometimes killed alongside targeted terrorists.

Most nations have given Washington at least tacit agreement to carry out the attacks, although the issue has not been prominent in Afghanistan as most drone strikes are targeted against militants on the border with Pakistan.

Peter Singer of the Washington-based Brookings Institution think tank noted that the drones program in Afghanistan is run by the Pentagon, and therefore is more transparent than the CIA drone counterterrorism program in Pakistan.

The number blamed on U.S. and allied forces, meanwhile, decreased by 46 percent, with 316 killed and 271 wounded in 2012. Most of those were killed in U.S. and NATO airstrikes, although that number, too, dropped by nearly half last year to 126, including 51 children.

The death of civilians during military operations, particularly in airstrikes, has been among a major source of acrimony between Karzai's government and foreign forces.

The U.S.-led military coalition said last June that it would only use airstrikes as a self-defense weapon of last resort for troops and would avoid hitting structures that could house civilians.

The report came a day after President Hamid Karzai banned government forces from requesting foreign air support during operations in residential areas.

Anger is high over an airstrike last week in northeastern Kunar province that killed five children, four women and one man along with four insurgents. Karzai said it was requested by the national intelligence service.

The top U.N. envoy in Afghanistan, Jan Kubis, welcomed the decline in casualties but warned militants who target civilians that they will face justice.

"This is a war crime and people will be held responsible," he told reporters in Kabul.

http://xfinity.comcast.net/articles/news-general/20130216/AS.Afghanistan/

War crime when the enemy targets civilians, but not when the US does it. I see.

Edited February 19, 2013 by The Patriot

[Karee 4,189]

War crime when the enemy targets civilians, but not when the US does it. I see.

You think the U.S. is intentionally targeting civilians?

[I AM NOT THAT GUY 5,715]

You think the U.S. is intentionally targeting civilians?

Of course. Unlawful combatants are civilians by definition.

[decocker 7,198]

You think the U.S. is intentionally targeting civilians?

what about all the future evil doers we're creating by leaving angry survivors - grieving families, over and over and over again?

[Caryh 5,206]

what about all the future evil doers we're creating by leaving angry survivors - grieving families, over and over and over again?

Maybe we should just go back to carpet bombing like back in good old WWII? That didn't leave that many behind to be pissed off.

[Karee 4,189]

what about all the future evil doers we're creating by leaving angry survivors - grieving families, over and over and over again?

What about them?

Look at past wars

Hiroshima, Dresden, North Vietnam , Iraq, etc. etc. Where are those angry survivors and what did they do? Nothing.

Look at what the Germans did do the Jews. Although IMO Israel is being passive aggressive with their treatment of the Palestinians, but that's another subject.

Personally I think the U.S. is showing great restraint by only using drones. They're lucky we don't turn the place in to in uninhabitble desert for the next 1000 years.

It's called war. It's not fair. Innocent people die.

[decocker 7,198]

oh i'm sorry, you guys both must be under the impression that i believe we should be in afghanistan in the first place. i don't.

[Caryh 5,206]

oh i'm sorry, you guys both must be under the impression that i believe we should be in afghanistan in the first place. i don't.

Well thats a totally different topic then. I believe we should have finished the job there instead of jumping into Iraq while it was half done and ignoring it for years.

[decocker 7,198]

I believe we should have finished the job there instead of jumping into Iraq while it was half done and ignoring it for years.

certainly, unless of course the 'job' isn't something that can necessarily be 'finished' anyway.

[Caryh 5,206]

certainly, unless of course the 'job' isn't something that can necessarily be 'finished' anyway.

Its hard to say today if the job could have been finished, I'll certainly give you that. But the very same Islamic extremist group that has created the problems there, has now also turned on its neighbor who helped create it in order to gain influence and control in Afghanistan.

[Obama 2012 1,714]

oh i'm sorry, you guys both must be under the impression that i believe we should be in afghanistan in the first place. i don't.

Things we agree on.