Surgical Sledgehammers 0
In the Guardian, Patrick Porter considers the likely effects of trying to be the MPs for the world. He writes from a UK perspective, but his thoughts are worth considering.
Part of the mythology that feeds the idea of being using, or “projecting,” as its proponents like to say, military around the world to control what persons in other countries do, is the myth of the “surgical strike.”
Mr. Porter argues that both the costs and the likely effects of these projects are frequently misstated:
And there are other dangers. What if, in appointing ourselves as world police, we are agents of chaos rather than order? Our activism will probably have perverse results, unintended consequences and blowback. It could create accidental guerrillas. It could drive neighbouring countries into new confrontations with us. Democracy promotion can promote communal violence or unwelcome new regimes. Evidence of these dangers litters the decade.
Confident activism carries an added danger of moral hazards. Adroit armed groups can exploit and escalate conflicts to draw us in, using their victimhood strategically to wag the dog.
The column is worth a read.
A drone is not a scalpel. It is a flying bomb, and all the false analogies in the world will not make it anything other than a flying bomb.
And war is not a game. Unlike in games, players in wars get only one life.
