Thursday’s
readings on Terrorism completely altered my previous perspective of what
constitutes a terrorist action. David Rodin’s “Terrorism without Intention”
opened my eyes to the various types of terrorist actions. Prior to
reading this article, I had never before considered that there are different
ways to define terrorism. Rodin discusses the double effect principle, in which
neutral or good means to achieve a good end result in evil consequences, such as the death of innocent noncombatants. His
comparison of the double effect principle to recklessness and negligence as
Mens rea in U.S. law was particularly eye opening. Before reading this article
I had never considered U.S. military actions to be anything like terrorist
attacks from enemy countries. I am now contemplating the idea of the 9/11 terrorist attacks being just as destructive
and harmful to innocent lives as the U.S. drone attacks in Pakistan. I can understand why other countries openly hate the United States. Innocent lives of
noncombatants are being taken for no reason other than to promote the selfish
desires of the President and other individuals in power.
Amanda Mullins’
article continues the discussion on terrorism and the use of drones by the
United States. According to her article, “from June 2004 to mid-September 2012,
US drone strikes killed 2,562-3,325 people in Pakistan alone.” What strikes me
the most about this statistic is the fact that many of the individuals killed
were innocent men, women and children with families living in poor villages.
These individuals are merely trying to live their lives in peace. Instead, the
actions of an individual working far away in the United States to set off a
drone strike can completely destroy their homes and uproot families. How is it fair for the United States to kill children in Pakistan through the use of drones as a means of
protecting their own children? After reading this article, I can understand why President Obama could be considered a terrorist by other countries just as
Osama bin Laden was by the United States. It will be interesting to see if citizens
in the United States stand up to the Obama Administration as they become
informed of the growing use of drone warfare against other countries.
My gut say that many of Obama's political enemies support the drone campaign, meaning that the US public would back him up on this. Doesn't change the morality of the act though.
ReplyDeleteIt is unfortunate that drone strikes have often ended in a high incidence of noncombatant civilian casualties. This is an ugly aspect of war, and obviously has a detrimental impact on the global community's perspective on US foreign policy decisions. That being said, I think it is absolutely excessive to compare US drone strikes to the terrorist attack on 9/11. While there is no arguing that the number of casualties in Pakistan is outrageously high, consider that a terrorist tactic is to surround themselves with civilian targets (human shielding) often near schools or hospitals, very common in Gaza. The mission of strikes should always be surgical removal of targets from a given area, but when terrorists act in densely-populated areas there is an exponentially higher risk of civilian casualties in war. This is another reason we don't hear about there being as many civilian casualties in Israel as there are in Gaza (that and advanced anti-air missile capabilities).
ReplyDeleteI agree with Eli when he said that it is impossible to compare the acts of the United States to the events on 9/11. Sure, it all depends on who is doing the comparing, but the overall methods (only TARGETING combatants) make a clear distinction. I think the easy difference is that terrorists generally want to do as much damage as possible, while the drone strikes attempt to simply remove the enemy.
ReplyDeleteI agree with Brittany that I NEVER considered the United States a terrorist, but after reading David Rodin's article I am now unsure. As an American patriot, I believed that the United States could do no wrong. This article helped me realize that terrorism is extremely hard to define and up for interpretation. Although we may view our actions as helpful or preventive, the opposing country may view our actions as reckless and forceful. We have to remember that people's culture and religion also plays a major role in how a country defines terrorism.
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