The Concept Of Collateral Attacks : Indirecly Targeting Civilians

The word ‘terrorism’ can be traced back to the French Revolution and the reign of terror committed against the population of France in the 1790s. During this time, thousands of people were killed and the general population was severely oppressed. Also, some of the first instances of terrorist tactics, such as assassination and intimidation, were witnessed in the killing of prominent officials and other opponents of the Revolution. In general, terrorists aim to incite fear in the population through pre-meditated violent acts and gain publicity as a medium in achieving their goals. Such acts include taking hostages, bombings and assassinations, all of which create fear and compliance in a victim or audience. Terrorism can be distinguished from other types of political violence through its disregard for and intentional harming of innocent civilians. Also, terrorists usually adopt a state of mind where one side is always good and any opposition is bad and deserves to be punished. As a result, terrorists will always have some supporters who share the same radical thoughts as them and thus terrorism, as a whole, will always be accepted as a legitimate use of violence. This is the reasoning behind the famous phrase by Gerald Seymour, “One man’s terrorist is another man’s freedom fighter”(QUOTE

America must hold an ethical standard when using counterterrorism tactics such as drones in order to maintain support from Americans and nations with active jihadist organizations. This task can be difficult because various groups around the world have different opinions of how terrorism should be approached. For example, individuals who have Kantian ethics ideologies are against the assassination of terrorist because they believe that the killing another rational person is morality incorrect (Algar-Faria, 2015). In contrast, utilitarian ethic condones violence acts if the outcome outweighs the evilness if the violence does not occur. These two ethical positions are often used when discussing the ethicality of counterterrorism

In some countries people, do not have the freedom to choose their own path. Many people live in places with so much conflict and destruction that they are force to follow the orders of a political lieder and force to make decision that are not in accordance to what they believe, but they do it because they are loyalty to their country, family and friends Pauline M. Kaurin provide a scenario of a soldiers killing civilian people that they confused with a suicide bomber, then she asked, “When is killing murder and when is it a legitimate act of war? Whom can one legitimately kill in war?” (Kaurin in page 41). She argues that during combat distinction from the enemy and civilian should be relevant to preserve the essence of true morality. In the contrast to Achilles the essence of true morality is irrelevant when he claims that no Trojan should keep their life, he swore death to all Trojan. (book XXI). During a time, war, is important to accept the fact of the situation in the eyes a devastation believing that one fate must be accepted in other to continue living or accepting the consequence and the faith of their own

For our purposes, we will use the Title 22 of the US Code, Section 2656f(d), to define terrorism. It defines terrorism as “premeditated, politically motivated violence perpetrated against noncombatant targets by subnational groups or clandestine agents” (Central Intelligence Agency, 2013). Examples of terrorism persist on a near daily basis around the world. Unstable countries, such as Afghanistan and Syria, deal with terrorist attacks on a constant basis. The common thread of these attacks is deliberate targeting of civilian populations in order to achieve political objectives. The best known and largest example are

As seen from the eyes of an American soldier, Chris Kyle, a sniper in the Iraq War, “The streets were covered with splinters and various debris… Metal shields blocked most of the storefronts…” (Source A). Just like in most wars, many towns and cities targeted in the Iraq war were destroyed as an effort to break the will of the people or the economy in that area, in hopes of a US led , coalition victory. These destructive raids on cities not only crumple infrastructure, they kill innocent civilians who had nothing to do with the war. The innocent killing of civilians has increased since WWI, the first of the modern wars where civilians were majorly targeted. Since WWI, the ratio of civilian to soldier deaths has risen dramatically. The ratio during WWI was 1 civilian per 9 soldiers, since then, the ratio has flipped to an alarming 9 civilians

In my point of view, terrorism actions generally contribute nothing to their political ends. I acknowledge that perhaps some terrorists care about proportionality. However, how can acts such as detonating a suicide bomb in a busy subway station or attacking a school help achieve their political goals? Actually, the vast majority of terrorist groups merely intentionally decimate the lives of innocents. What those acts of terrorism bring about are thousands of civilian deaths and injuries, and the most exquisite torment to their families. For example, in September 11 attacks, terrorists successfully bombed the World Trade Center. Such terrorism act indeed disturbs the American political and economic system in a short run. Nevertheless, the loss of the World Trade Center definitely does not make an impact on the American economy. On the contrary, the terrorism action causes a large amount of casualties. Lots of children therefore lose their parents and family members of those victims have to suffer from intense sorrow of loss of a loved one constantly. It is categorically immoral to violate human dignity and deliberately inflict suffering on others, for pointless political ends.

Assassinations and targeted killings have been topics vastly debated around the world throughout history. As a matter of fact, this matter can be discussed through the eyes of Michael Walzer from a just war theory perspective. This viewpoint can be used in order to explain just assassinations of political and military leaders as well as other individuals. For example, a person can be the victim of targeted killings if their death would result in less future violence or warfare. However, the individual must pose an imminent threat, capture is not feasible, and the operation is executed in observance of the applicable laws of war. Yet the burden of proof and responsibility resides with those in highest power since it is their duty to maintain order among everyone below them. As a result, only those in power can decide who is assassinated and for what reason. All arguments against this belief can be annihilated by the fact that targeted killing will lower the chances of further combatant and civilian casualties. Ultimately, just assassination or targeted killing are blameless if the outcome will create less vehemence.

An argument often used that isn’t completely wrong, but can easily be justified is the idea that we create more terrorists than we kill. This while holding some truth is easily disputed with the logic of “so what if we don’t kill them do we just let them attack and kill us” or “why don’t we just send troops in and risk their lives”, well using this logic we would be ignoring the better option we have that is more effective in killing terrorists and the fact that with this we do less collateral damage[Source

On September 11, 2001 a normal Tuesday morning an American Airline Boeing 767 plane loaded with 20,000 gallons of jet fuel crashed into the north tower of the World Trade center in New York City. The impact left a massive burning hole near the 80th floor of the 110-story skyscraper, instantly killing hundreds of people and trapping hundreds more in in higher floors. As the evacuation of the tower and its twin got underway, television broadcasted live images of what initially appeared to be a freak accident. Then, 18 minutes later after the first plane hit, a second Boeing 767- United Airlines flight 175- appeared out of the sky, turned sharply toward the world trade center and sliced into the south tower near 60th floor. The collision caused a massive explosion that showered burning debris over surrounding buildings and the streets below. It was evident that America was now under attack; at this point we knew that the U.S had been a target of terrorist. What is a terrorist, some may say that terrorism is the evil acts of a group or individual geared towards another group that has a political motive but also cause fear among a group of people. That is true but would it be a called terrorism, if you

Target killing and signature strikes specifically remain quite problematic. The exercising of signature strikes has lent a hand in killing many innocent civilians. People associate or in proximity of suspected militants will unsuspectingly suffer the consequences. Numerous victims to signature strikes persist with a lack of governmental acknowledgment reflecting remorse or regret to value the lives of those they took impulsively. The main problem within the context of signature strikes concerns targeted “suspected” militants whose identity are completely unknown. These suspects haven’t been proven guilty, so in a way the government may seem a little trigger happy as they kill based on inclinations rather than certainty and refuse to consider other possibilities to assume the suspects are innocent. Signature strikes, once again, are strikes that target and kill on the basis of patterns of behavior mimicking that of a terrorist. A deeper look into this and we could question on who has created these criteria of patterns of behaviors where such behaviors of militant, terrorist were derived

By valuing noncombatants fully, yet mechanistically dehumanizing combatants, the noncombatants life as far more valuable than the combat itself. It is only through animalistic dehumanization, that the line begins to blur between what does and what does not constitute a legitimate target. When civilians are killed, the general sentiment of “their lives are worth less than those we are fighting for” they have been animalistically

Empirical studies of targeted killings and civilian casualties in counterinsurgency and counterterrorism show that drone strikes may obtain either of the following two outcomes:

Once all avenues of cross-examination on the contents and quality of an opinion have been exhausted, it may still be desirable to launch a collateral attack on the witness. To ask very few questions, even where there is little to cross-examine on, may be perceived by the trier-offact as acquiescence to the testimony of the expert. Collateral attacks can include inquiring about:

Unfortunately terrorism is morally wrong; therefore it can never be justified. From a utilitarian standpoint, terrorism does not contribute to achieving maximum happiness. If no one committed terrorist acts than there is a greater chance for society to achieve maximum happiness. A society without terrorism would have an easier time having more people

A central theme in the book is examining the effect that the ruthless and unsympathetic drone strikes have in creating enemies of those tribal societies that under other circumstances would be neutral in the war against literalist terrorist organizations. Ahmed explains how these strikes not only lead to the massive amounts of innocent people, but that they also lead to trauma and resentment among the survivors who stage acts of retaliation which leads to more violence on behalf of the US military  - creating a brutal pattern of violence and oppression. For example, in one section, Ahmed describes an interview with Osama bin Laden in which he is quoted as saying, “If killing those who kill our sons is terrorism, let history witness that we are terrorists,” and in which bin Laden asserts that innocent Muslim civilians are being killed by the enemies of Islam; therefore the killing of their innocent civilians is justified, which he claims is “valid both religiously and logically.”  This framework works in tandem with the concepts that we have been examining in class