DRONE FLASH CARDS
Sidewalk Education.
i.
Many of us are familiar with protest, but sidewalk education
calls for a different approach, one in which you actively
undertake to engage people in conversation, listen carefully
to their observations and questions, and try to discern
underlying concerns, often their fears. It is an approach
that sometimes requires patience and respect for the fact
that we all have had to start learning from a place of
absolute ignorance.
Approaching People.
iii.
Never get angry or sarcastic regardless of how much you
may be goaded. Responding evenly to a belligerent
person can calm him/her down, and this can win respect
from those watching the interaction. Asking an antagonistic
person thoughtful questions about the basis of their
assertions and concerns can turn the conversation around.
The following cards provide background for key points. It is
hard, obviously, to hit all the points in a brief conversation,
but over time you will find which points are having an
impact, and you will develop a style and rhythm for
speaking with people and covering a lot in a short time.
ii.
In sidewalk education on drones you will have either an
MQ-9 Reaper drone replica and/or signs, photographs or
other graphic material. It is important if you don’t have a
replica to have a large photo of a drone, preferably of a
Reaper, as it is the workhorse of US drone war.
For anyone who stops and looks, it is critical to go over to
them immediately and ask them something like: “Are you
familiar with drones?” It is essential to be open and
friendly, to initially withhold your opinions and to continue to
pursue the conversation with questions to see what the
person knows and what they think about drones.
1. THIS IS A REPLICA OF AN MQ-9 REAPER DRONE –
THE WORKHORSE OF DRONE KILLING
The real Reaper is five times bigger than the replica.
Length – 36 feet / wingspan 66 feet.
Carries 4 Hellfire missiles / two 500-pound bombs (More
details Cards 5 – 5B.)
Speed – 230 MPH
Range – 1,000 nautical miles with full weapons load.
Stays aloft - 14-28 hours, depending on weapons load.
Note: Research is under way on drones, such as solarpowered, that can stay aloft for weeks, months and
even years.
2. REAPER COST.
Reapers operate in groups of four. The cost of a four-plane
combat air patrol (CAP) unit, including ground equipment,
is at least $120 million, according to Time magazine, which
says it is two to six times more expensive to buy than the F16 and A-10, manned aircraft. Total Reaper program cost $12.5 billion. The total cost of the Reaper’s weapons load
is about $330,000.
Operating costs of a Reaper unit about six times that of the
above manned aircraft. Each CAP requires 171 people to
operate it, including 10 “pilots”,10 sensor operators and 66
intelligence analysts.
3. HOW IS THE REAPER CONTROLLED?
The Reaper, like other drones, is an aircraft without a pilot
that is controlled by satellite communications. For example
drone operators just outside Syracuse, NY are flying
Reapers over Afghanistan.
The drone gets its “orders” by satellite through an antenna
in the bump on the top of its nose. The operator’s
command takes 1.2 seconds to reach the drone by
satellite. The commands control the flight and fire the
drone’s weapons.
4. HOW DOES THE REAPER’S SEE ITS TARGETS?
The Reaper “sees” through an electronically enhanced
video camera hanging under its nose and with infra-red and
heat sensing devices.
The camera is said to be able to read a license plate at 2
miles, but its “vision” is limited by rain, dust and
obstructions such overhangs of rock.
Some Reapers can carry the Argus camera that can scan
at one time, an area the size of a medium sized city,
constantly following all the people in that area, recording all
that is going on.
5. WHAT IS THE EFFECT OF THE REAPER’S
WEAPONS?
The Reaper’s Hellfire missiles (black on the replica) and
500-pound bombs are designed for use against light
armored vehicles, trucks and buildings, not individuals.
These weapons are not “precise”, as the government
claims.
When a Hellfire missile hits an individual, people within a
65-foot radius can be killed and maimed and often are.
The blast area of a drone’s 500-pound bomb is 200 feet.
6. NUMBERS KILLED BY US DRONES?
5A. EFFECT OF THE HELLFIRE MISSILE.
QUOTE:
“After the drone strike (in Yemen), villagers were left to
identify two dead relatives from identity cards, scraps of
clothing and the license plate of Mr. Jamal’s Toyota; the
seven bodies were shredded beyond recognition, as
cellphone photos taken at the scene attest. ‘We found
eyes, but there were no faces left,’” said Abdullah Faqih, a
student who knew both of the dead cousins.”
-
The Bureau of Investigative Journalism estimates about
4,000 killed by drones in Pakistan, Yemen and Somalia
combined, about 3,600 of these killed by CIA drones in
Pakistan. (See also Card 6A)
Of the total killed in all three countries about 1,100 are said
to be civilians and of this number about 215 are reported to
be children. But we don’t know for sure because our
government is not reporting on all it is doing and because
people are being pulverized by missile blasts. (Cards 5A
and 5B)
New York Times, February 6, 2013.
5B. EFFECT OF THE HELLFIRE MISSILE
6A. NUMBERS KILLED BY US DRONES?
QUOTE:
We have no reliable figures on drone killings in
Afghanistan, and the US says this information is classified.
We do know that US drone strikes in Afghanistan have
increased to 506 in 2012, compared to about 300 in 2011,
according to Air Force Magazine. A researcher with ties to
the US military told The Guardian in 2013 that drone strikes
in Afghanistan are 10 times more deadly to Afghan civilians
than strikes from manned aircraft. Brandon Bryant, a drone
sensor operator for drones in Afghanistan and Iraq said his
superiors told him he had participated in 1,626. most of
these were likely in Afghanistan. Put Afghan drone deaths
at 1,000 minimum.
“Ahmed Jan, who lost his foot in a drone strike, discussed
the challenges rescuers face in identifying bodies:
‘People were trying to find body parts. We find the body
parts of some people, but sometimes we do not find
anything.”
Living Under Drones – Stanford
University and New York University report – 2012.
7. DRONES KILL INNOCENT PEOPLE.
8. DRONES TERRORIZE WHOLE POPULATIONS.
We must remember that the designation of civilian versus
militant in describing those killed by drones is legally in
correct, in that no one killed by drones has been tried of
convicted, as required by international law and US law.
Four Americans have been killed by drones, most famously
Anwar Al Awaki.
“Drones hover twenty-four hours a day over communities in
northwest Pakistan, striking homes, vehicles, and public
spaces without warning. Their presence terrorizes men,
women and children, giving rise to anxiety and
psychological trauma…
People, particularly men, young and old, have been killed
in “signature” strikes because they seemed to be doing
something suspicious through the imperfect drone’s “eye”.
“Some community members shy away from gathering in
groups, including important tribal dispute-resolution bodies,
out of fear that they may attract the attention of drone
operators. Some parents choose to keep their children
home, and children injured or traumatized by strikes have
dropped out of school. (Continued on Card 8A.)
7A. DRONES KILL INNOCENT PEOPLE.
8A. DRONE TERROR.
“Signature” behavior – “The definition is a male between
20 and 40”. – former US ambassador to Pakistan Cameron
Munter, as reported in The Daily Beast and Huffington
Post. In 2011, 42 killed in a “signature” strike in Pakistan
because they were participating in a meeting of tribal
elders.
“Waziris told our researchers that the strikes have
undermined cultural and religious practices related to
burial, and made families afraid to attend funerals. In
addition, families who lost loved ones or their homes in
drone strikes now struggle to support themselves.”
A “personality” strike is defined as killing a particular
individual thought to be a “terrorist”.
Targeting “intelligence” is often questionable. For example
may be based on grudges between local groups.
- Living Under Drones 2012
Like Nazi “buzz bombs” in WW II, the sound of a drone is a
weapon of terror.
9. DRONE SURVEILLANCE CREATES A
VIRTUAL PRISON.
9B. DRONE SURVEILLANCE CREATES A
VIRTUAL PRISON.
The Reaper can follow a few people for 14 to 20 hours of
surveillance before killing them. As noted on Card 4 there
is now a drone camera called Argus that can monitor
everyone on the street in a medium sized city, and drones
are being developed that can stay in the air for weeks and
months at a time. Researchers at Leigh University in PA
have been looking into a drone that can stay in the upper
air indefinitely, soaring like a bird on the jet stream, using
solar power to control its wings. Special radar is being
developed for drone use in urban areas.
“Video surveillance is problematic regardless of whether it
occurs in private or in public. Even in public places,
surveillance can lead to self-censorship and
inhibition…Drone surveillance is a sweeping form of
investigatory power. It extends beyond search, for it
records everything a person says and does.”
9A. DRONE SURVEILLANCE CREATES A
VIRTUAL PRISON.
9C. DRONE SURVEILLANCE CREATES A
VIRTUAL PRISON.
Drones, like the Global Hawk, can also monitor cell phone
and text messaging. Drone video images can be joined
with information gathered from electronic surveillance of all
kinds to build files on “people of interest”.
“Michel Foucault wrote that modern control over society
may be accomplished by watching its members, and
maintaining routine information about them. Foucault
emphasized that Jeremy Bentham’s eighteenth –century
panopticon, a continuous surveillance model for prisoners
who could not tell if they were being watched, exemplified
an institution capable of producing what he called ‘docile
bodies’”. – Spying on Democracy 2013 City Lights Books
Drone surveillance imaging combined with electronic
surveillance are not only violating privacy around the world
but increasing public wariness of speaking freely and
assembling for protest, as if they were locked in prison
without walls.
Daniel J. Solove, “Nothing To Hide”, Yale
University Press 2011.
The US public is now beginning to experience anxiety of
being watched without knowing who may be singled out for
government attention and punishment.
10. ARE US DRONE STRIKES LEGAL?
10 B. ARE US DRONE STRIKES LEGAL?
US drone strikes violate international laws that require
people who are punished by a government to be put on trial
and that protect the sovereignty of nations and their
citizens from attack.
“…in the quest to make the entire world a free-fire (and
law-free) zone, drone warfare requires that due process be
destroyed everywhere, including within the borders of the
United States. The Obama-shaped preventive detention bill
signed into law this past New Years Eve (2011) is the
logical extension of the international lawlessness called
forth by drone warfare, and by the larger aims of full
spectrum American dominance.”
“Targeted or political assassinations – sometimes known as extrajudicial executions – run afoul of the Geneva Conventions, which
include willful killing as a grave breach. Grave breaches of Geneva are
punishable as war crimes under the U.S. War Crimes Act.”
Marjorie Cohn, former president of the National
Lawyers Guild, and Jeanne Mirer, president of the International
Association of Democratic Lawyers.
10A. ARE US DRONE STRIKES LEGAL?
The strikes violate rights to safety of person, privacy,
freedom of assembly, and freedom from threats of attack.
The rights are outlined in the Universal Declaration of
Human Rights, which was signed by the United States in
1948.
US drone strikes amount to a rejection of international rules
of conduct and protections for human rights and open the
way to similar violations by other nations. This is the
concern raised with respect to chemical weapons.
Glen Ford, Black Agenda Report
April 11, 2012
11. QUOTES ABOUT THE MORALITY OF DRONE
STRIKES.
“Revelations that top (US) officials are targeting people to be
assassinated abroad, including American citizens, are only the most
recent, disturbing proof of how far our nation’s violations of human
rights has extended…As a result, our country can longer speak with
moral authority on these critical issues.” - Former President Jimmy
Carter - Op-Ed – New York Times, June 24, 2012
“Do the United States and its people really want to tell those of us who
live in the rest of the world that over lives are not the same value as
yours?” - Archbishop Desmond Tutu, Letter to the New York Times,
February 12, 2013
12. DO DRONES SAVE LIVES?
KEEP BOOTS OFF THE GROUND?
12B. DO DRONES SAVE LIVES?
Drone strikes are creating conditions threatening to the US.
"What scares me about drone strikes is how they are
perceived around the world… "The resentment created by
American use of unmanned strikes ... is much greater than
the average American appreciates. They are hated on a
visceral level, even by people who've never seen one or
seen the effects of one.
- Former Army General Stanley McCrystal interviewed in
the Alantic on-line Jan. 12, 2013
Another quote related to blowback.
“…every one of these (drone) dead noncombatants
represents an alienated family, a new desire for revenge,
and more recruits for a militant movement that has grown
exponentially even as drone strikes have increased.”
David Kilcullen, advisor to General David Petraeus 20062008 and Andrew Exum, Center for the New American
Century. Op-Ed, New York Times May 16, 2009
12A. DO DRONES SAVE LIVES?
“We’re seeing that blowback…If you’re trying to kill your
way to a solution, no matter how precise you are, you’re
going to upset people even if they’re not targeted.”
- Gen. James E. Cartwright, former chairman of Joint
Chiefs of Staff, quoted in the New York Times, March 21,
2013.
This raises the specter of attacks on US forces around the
world, such as the attack on the Marine barracks in Beirut
in 1983, killing 241 US military personnel.
13. DO DRONES STOP TERRORISTS?
“A recent RAND research effort sheds light on this
issue by investigating how terrorist groups have
ended in the past. By analyzing a comprehensive
roster of terrorist groups that existed worldwide
between 1968 and 2006, the authors found that
most groups ended because of operations carried
out by local police or intelligence agencies or
because they negotiated a settlement with their
governments.
(Go to Card 13A)
14. DRONES MAKE WAR EASIER.
13A. DO DRONES STOP TERRORISTS?
“Military force was rarely the primary reason a
terrorist group ended, and few groups within this
time frame achieved victory.
“These findings suggest that the U.S. approach to
countering al Qa'ida has focused far too much on
the use of military force. Instead, policing and
intelligence should be the backbone of U.S. efforts.”
President Obama attempted to sell the US public on
attacking Syria with the promise of “no boots on the
ground”. What he was really saying is that this attack using
bombs and missiles would bring no real suffering to any
American. He promised the killing of Syrians without
consequences for Americans.
Fortunately, the US public realized the attack had many
possibilities for unforeseen consequences that could bring
suffering by Americans.
(Go to Card 14A.)
- How Terrorist Groups End - 2008 Rand Corporation
report. ( See chart on Card 13B.)
13B. DO DRONES STOP TERRORISTS?
How 268 Terrorist Groups Worldwide Ended 1968-2006.
Rand Corporation.
14A. DRONES MAKE WAR EASIER.
Drones warfare has been sold to the US public with the “no
boots on the ground” argument, war without consequences.
The comments of Generals McCrystal and Cartwright on
Cards 12 and 12A are warning the US public not to buy the
idea of war with consequences. Indeed there is no such
thing.
For example, the New York Times reported on Sept. 9,
2013 that the US has been using drones to follow people in
Libya believed to be connected to the Benghazi attack.
(Go to Card 14B for Times quote.)
14B. DRONES MAKE WAR EASIER.
The Times reports that there is worry about the
consequences of a drone strike in Libya:
15A. ARE DRONES REALLY BEING USED TO FIGHT
TERRORISTS? OR IS IT RESOURCES?
“But a number of Libyan political figures have expressed
wariness that any unilateral military action by the United
States, like a drone strike, would fuel popular anger and
add a destructive new element to the uncertain security
situation in Benghazi, especially with the Obama
administration considering military strikes against Syria.”
The economic importance of the Middle East with its energy supplies
hardly needs emphasis. Whatever the outcome of the conflicts in Iraq
and Afghanistan, U.S. forces will find themselves again employed in
the region on numerous missions ranging from regular warfare,
counterinsurgency, stability operations, relief and reconstruction, to
engagement operations. The region and its energy supplies are too
important for the U.S, China, and other energy importers to allow
radical groups to gain dominance or control over any significant portion
of the region.
– Joint Operating Environment 2010
U.S. Joint Forces Command
15. ARE DRONES REALLY BEING USED TO FIGHT
TERRORISTS? OR IS IT RESOURCES?
15B. ARE DRONES REALLY BEING USED TO FIGHT
TERRORISTS? OR IS IT RESOURCES?
Currently, the US government is bent on using its military
(at more than $1 trillion a year) to gain and hold access to
oil and other resources worldwide. The drone has a unique
role in this drive for control because, unlike any other
weapon, it can monitor the lives of individuals and groups
for days on end and kill by remote control at a moment's
notice, without any accountability. The weaponized drone
and drone surveillance are cutting edge weapons of control.
US drones are attacking now in Afghanistan, Pakistan,
Yemen, Somalia, Uganda and the Philippines, All these
areas are important in terms of resources sought by US
corporations and/or their shipping routes.
The existence of working relationships between Petraeus
and corporations seeking military security to extract wealth
from Afghanistan is also hinted at in a "Meet the Press"
interview distributed on YouTube in which the general
talked about "trillions, with an 's' on the end, trillions of
dollars worth of minerals" in Afghanistan that can be
exploited only if there is military security in place.
- General Petraeus Seduced Us, Too. Truthout Nov. 21,
2012
16. WE CAN EXPECT MORE DRONE WAR.
17A. DRONES AND PTSD.
New Reaper drone control centers are popping up in Des
Moines, Horsham, PA, Niagra Falls, NY, Battle Creek, MI,
Fort Benning, GA, adding to the existing 24 control centers
in the US for Reaper and/or Predator drones, the major
drone war aircraft. The US Air Force now operates 61
drone combat air patrols (three drones each), 24 hours a
day, primarily in Afghanistan, Yemen and the North African
coast. It will increase this to 65 daily patrols by mid-2014,
according to a Brookings Institution report released in
August, 2013.
17. DRONES AND PTSD.
A 2013 Air Force study found that mental health issues for
drone “pilots” were no greater than pilots of manned
aircraft. However, within the overall findings there was
evidence of slightly higher levels of anxiety and depression
among drone “pilots” and sensor operators.
An editorial accompanying the study says drone operators
“face unique stressors related to the impact of fighting a
war at the office and going home to a family at
night…(drone) pilots are faced with rotating shifts and long
hours contribute to stress, sleep issues and other negative
consequences.”
According to a Brookings Institution report the Air Force
now has more than 1,300 drone “pilots”, and it wants to
increase this to 1,650 by Fiscal Year 2017, but it is having
trouble keeping pace with drone operations plans. “Mental
health and post-traumatic stress disorders aside,” the
report says, there are career factors, like promotion rates,
that can attract more drone operators.
- Manning the Next Unmanned Air Force – Brookings 2013
18. AUTONOMOUS DRONES ARE BEING DEVELOPED
THAT CAN KILL AUTOMATICALLY.
The US is developing drones that can identify a human
target through facial imaging and attack without human
command. In addition, researchers are developing drones
that can communicate with each other and “swarm” a
target, attacking relentlessly until the target is destroyed.
“Human Rights Watch issued an unequivocal report last November
calling for an absolute ban on the development, production and use of
autonomous weapons systems. The report concluded that "such
revolutionary weapons would not be consistent with
international humanitarian law and would increase the risk of death or
injury to civilians during armed conflict." USNews July 25, 2013
18B. AUTONOMOUS DRONES.
19. WHY ARE DRONES A UNIQUE WEAPON?
The US News article continues: “A report by the Special
Rapporteur to the United Nations issued in April, came to a similar
conclusion stating, "[autonomous weapons] may seriously undermine
the ability of the international legal system to preserve a minimum
world order."
“As it currently stands, international humanitarian law prohibits weapon
systems that cannot follow the two cardinal rules of distinction and
proportionality.
“Developing useful systems that pass principle of distinction muster is
particularly problematic for the U.S. which, for years, has been
engaged in asymmetrical, urban counterinsurgencies, where enemies...
(See Card 18C)
18C. AUTONOMOUS DRONES.
“…are often indistinguishable from civilians. Soldiers engage enemies
only after observing subtle, contextual factors or taking direct fire. In
an environment where most individuals are not combatants (think:
Baghdad or Kabul), autonomous weapons' inability to assess individual
intention – i.e. a butcher chopping meat in a busy market or a child
playing with a toy gun – make their presence on the battlefield an
international legal liability.”
Tragically, the failure to accurately discern people’s
intentions is also one of the horrible aspects of current
drone attacks, guided by humans viewing computer
screens.
Drones are unique because of their ability to follow and
watch individuals and groups continuously for hours on end
and then to kill on command. No other weapon has this
capability.
Drones, therefore, are a unique weapon of subjugation and
control.
20. WHY A BAN ON WEAPONIZED AND
SURVEILLANCE DRONES?
1. Weaponized and surveillance drones are unique in their
capability to violate rights of privacy, freedom of speech,
freedom of assembly, freedom from threat of attack and
national sovereignty of whole populations, all guaranteed
by international law and of individual rights identified in the
Universal Declaration of Human Rights.
2. Weaponized drones are used universally as tools of
assassination, violating international guarantees of due
process.
20A. WHY A DRONE BAN?
3. Weaponized and surveillance drones create extensive
zones of perpetual danger for civilian populations, just as
land mines do, in which one never knows when one may
be attacked or what conduct will bring attack. The result is
indiscriminant terror and trauma just as the injury resulting
from chemical weapons.
22. WHAT RULES GOVERN DRONE OPERATIONS IN
THE US?
5. Weaponized drones and drone surveillance is spreading
globally.
There are currently no federal laws that address the
potential and real violations of privacy from drones.
Because of this communities, like Charlottesville, Va, and a
number of states, have taken steps to protect privacy and
limit police use of drones. Such measures often require
warrants to be issued allowing drone surveillance, but
warrants offer no protection to the many people a suspect
may encounter. In spite of the lack of laws protecting
privacy, the federal government promote police use of
drones.
21. ARE DRONES OPERATING NOW IN THE UNITED
STATES?
22. WHAT KINDS OF WEAPONS CAN POLICE
DRONES CARRY?
Congress has directed the Federal Aviation Administration
to take steps to introduce drones of all sizes and purposes
through US airspace by September 15, 2015.
Weapons that have been designed for police drones
include: 12-guage shotguns, tear gas and rubber bullet
projectors and tasers.
4. Drone attacks are highly imprecise in identify friend or
foe and lead inevitably to civilian casualties
Right now drones are being used by the FBI, Homeland
Security and some local police departments and the Border
Patrol. The FBI has not given specifics on the drones it is
using. Local police drones are limited to weighing 25
pounds, flying no higher than 400 feet and being in line of
sight. The Border Patrol is using unarmed Reaper drones,
which appear to be violating privacy rights. The military is
also flying drones in restricted areas.
23. DRONE AND ELECTRONIC SURVEILLANCE.
SUMMARY OF KEY POINTS
Technology is being developed that will enable drone
imagery to be incorporated into the US system of global
electronic surveillance as well as such national and local
systems. The imagery is key in providing information on
the nature of relationships as well as the relationships
themselves. However, imagery can also be misleading and
the same concerns arise about how information is
interpreted as with electronic surveillance.
1. A drone is a pilotless aircraft controlled remotely by
satellite communication. For example, drones flying
right now in Afghanistan are controlled from Hancock
Air Base near Syracuse, NY.
Federal law and government has totally failed in protecting
rights of privacy, free speech and assembly in the face of
drone and electronic surveillance, as has international law.
24. WHAT IF I HAVE NOTHING TO HIDE?
“’My life’s an open book,’ people say. ‘I’ve got nothing to
hide’ But now the government has a massive dossier on
everyone’s activities, interests, reading habits, finances and
health…What if the government mistakenly determines that
based on your pattern of activities, you’re likely to be
engaged in a criminal act…What if the government thinks
your financial transactions look odd-even if you’ve done
nothing wrong-and freezes your accounts?”
From Nothing to Hide by Daniel Solove, who argues that
there must be much more strict control of government
surveillance of all kinds.
2. Drone attacks have killed at least 5,000 people, but
the exact numbers are not known because of US
government secrecy and because some people are
simply pulverized by Hellfire missiles or 500 pound
bombs. Those being killed are not getting the right to
go to court.
3. Drones can do surveillance of individuals and
groups for hours on end, and then kill them. The FBI is
now using drones in the US, along with some police
departments, Homeland Security and the Border Patrol.
Drone use by police is being promoted by Homeland
Security and will grow dramatically in the next few
years unless people organize to prevent it.
4. There are no federal laws prohibiting drone
surveillance or weapons-carrying drones. Some cities
and states are seeking to ban drone surveillance and
drones that carry weapons. Drones can carry 12-guage
shotguns, tear gas, rubber bullet guns and other
weapons.
5. Drone images will increasingly be become part of
files on individuals to go along with the electronic
surveillance that is being done of our email, text
messaging and internet use.
6. We must have privacy for its own sake and to enable
free speech and to protect our right to peacefully
assemble to redress grievances.
9. We are in the midst of a struggle among
countries and corporations for the control of
natural resources and the control of labor.
Weaponized drones and surveillance drones
are engaged in that struggle as instruments of
subjugation and control. The basic purpose is
not to fight “terrorism,” it is to keep and gain
resources. (One might argue that the struggle for resource
control is based on a consumption model of economics rather
than a conservation model, leading to squandering of nonrenewable resources and global warming. Further the US
needs to redirect its military budget to the creation of a
conservation economy. Drones forestall the time when that
can happen be creating the illusion of cost-free military
dominance.)
7. Drones are a key part of a global structure of
surveillance and control being created by the United
States. This system of surveillance and control is
being organized to serve a variety of interests of multinational corporations which will include suppressing
labor movements and movements for great local
control of, and fair prices for, key resources, such as
oil and minerals.
8. Drones do not “save lives”. The kill and terrorize
and they can and do create conditions that lead to
more killing, widely dispersed, against which there is
often no practical defense.
10. The widening use of weaponized and
surveillance drones threatens to reduce the
private and public discourse and non-violent
rebellion necessary to change the goals of
global economies and the distribution of
wealth within nations.
ADDENDUM: Drones range in size from insect to airliner. The primary
users of weaponized and surveillance drones are the United States and
Israel. Drones are used by at least 11 countries,including China and
Russia. data for China not available.
Graph source: The Guardian Datablog.