Monthly Archives: March 2014

The State of Drone Policy

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The War on Terror rolls on today in 2014 after 13 years of warfare. Through these 13 years, the technology of war has advanced as the United States’ government has pushed a large budget towards the defense industry which has taken the money to improve its capabilities in defending the United States against terrorist networks such as Al-Qaeda and its affiliates (Al-Shabab, Abu Sayaaf, Somali and Filipino branches of Al Qaeda respectively). One of these military technological developments is the development of various multipurpose flying drones. These drones can take photographs of targets, laser target objectives for laser-guided munitions from other aircraft, and even with later developments to the technology, the drone itself could carry and deliver lethal munitions with precise accuracy to the target.

An Air Force MQ-1 Predator Unmanned Aerial Vehicle (UAV or A.K.A. a drone) The Predator drone shown here has been armed with Hellfire air to surface missiles.

The Air Force has grown incredibly reliant on drones to complete missions, and the reason why the debate on drones has been started is the government has begun to use drones over countries that are not in conflict with the United States, but are known to hold terrorist strongholds. Examples include, Somalia, Libya, Algeria, Yemen, Pakistan, North Korea and Iran. The drones over these countries spy and even sometimes destroy high value targets that are in the sovereign territory of these nations even though the United States is not at war with these countries. The debate about this drone policy is the use of these drones can be seen as an act of war, and is what many would consider as technically illegal in the eyes of international law as the United States many times does not ask for the country’s permission in using these lethal spy drones over the country’s sovereign airspace to photograph the area or to engage a high value target that may be in the area.

Another facet of the debate over the legality of drones is there are many cases of drones initiating a missile strike and the destruction causes excessive collateral damage, because targets often live among villages or other areas of high terrorist activity. These innocent casualties are the face that the countries that we infiltrate with our drones use as news fodder to promote hatred against the United States’ policies and as a face to their objection to the ignoring of their sovereign airspace by the United States and its military. Pakistan in particular is extremely agitated by the activity of American drones over its western tribal lands. As much as the Pakistani government desires to degrade the Taliban base of operations in this western frontier of sorts for Pakistan, the Pakistani government would still desire to take care of the threat itself, not with any American aid, especially when this aid is given without asking.

The debate also is a hot area also for some Americans, because the government has ruled that in the interest of national security, the government has the legal right to eliminate an American who is deemed as a threat (terrorism related or not). This angered many (rightfully so in my opinion) and invoked thoughts to many of a 1984 Orwellian “Big Brother is watching” scenario of where the government could eliminate any American as a target whenever the government would decide to eliminate them.

Although these are the arguments against the American policy of drone use, many, including some citizens of the countries that are being infiltrated by these drones, are approving of the CIA and Air Force’s use of drones. For example, in the tribal lands of Pakistan that I have mentioned earlier in this post, several surveys have shown that many approve of the drone strikes and would prefer more drones in the skies above them. They find the laser guided missile strikes much more effective than the artillery barrages of the Pakistani military’s effort to drive out the terrorist forces from the area. Opposite of mainstream Pakistani opinion, many of those who live in the tribal lands believe that the drone strikes do not kill many civilians in unfortunate collateral damage.

The Federally Administered Tribal Area (FATA) is the largest base of operations for the Taliban and Al Qaeda forces that plague Afghanistan as well as other places around the world.

The pros and cons of drone warfare and drone surveillance are both valid in their own ways, and it would be difficult to come to a conclusion on which side is more right. I believe that the use of drones is vindicated, but it is up to the public to be mindful and wary of the government abusing its “toys” to eliminate targets which don’t even benefit the War on Terror anymore, but are just used as the President’s flying, robotic, stealth assassins. As with many things in this great country, it is up to the people to be wary of the government’s doings, and to police them with the voice of the people.

D Day: The Largest Amphibious Invasion in History

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During the break, I decided that I would now focus my Passion blog posts on historical events from World War II, because I found it too hard to find historical events that happened to coincide with the day and that had an abundant amount of info online to support writing on it. Thus, for my continuation from my first passion blog post which was on the Battle of the Bulge, I decided to discuss D Day, the largest amphibious invasion in history. I will also discuss the airborne operation that was also behind D Day’s successful landings.

“Into the Jaws of Death” by photographer Robert F. Sargent. Arguably the most famous photo from the D Day landings.

After being postponed several times, the D Day landings finally took place on 6 June 1944. The landings were the largest in history and it was the invasion that broke through Hitler’s Fortress Europa. The invasion began with airborne and glider troops landing behind the beaches and sabotaging any efforts that might have been used to hamper the landings. The airborne troops were landed to cut off any reinforcement efforts that the Germans made to counterattack the beach landings. About 15,000 paratroops and glider troops were landed behind enemy lines to hamper the German defense effort.

A C-47, the standard workhorse which was used to deploy airborne troops into battle

 

 

 

 

 

 

As much resistance as the airborne units put up, the Germans were still able to bring some reinforcements up to the beaches. Before any of the landings occurred, the Allies launched the largest naval bombardment campaign that has been seen in history. Destroyers and other naval ships of war pounded the beach defenses with their guns. However, as the infantry that land would soon find out, some beach defenses were more sabotaged by the naval fire than others. The Allies also launched a massive bombing campaign against the beach defenses, using mainly fighter bombers to attack the targets.

Once the naval and air bombardment ceased on the beaches, the infantry finally made their landings. There were 5 beaches: Omaha, Utah, Gold, Juno, and Sword. The Allies split up and covered each of the different beaches. The United States forces were responsible for Omaha and Utah, the United Kingdom’s forces were responsible for Sword and Gold, and finally Canadian forces were responsible for the landings at Juno. The landings at Utah had the lightest casualties, meanwhile Omaha had the heaviest casualties. Out of the British-Canadian forces, Juno, the Canadian landings took the second heaviest casualties out any beach.

Although the Allies would lose 10,000 casualties (dead and wounded) in the single historic day which was and is D Day, the Allies would prove victorious for the day in their valor and force of will in capturing each of the beachheads. These landings would prove the beginning of the end for Hitler’s Nazi Third Reich. From these landings, the Allies would continue to push forward throughout France, into the Low Countries, and eventually even into Germany where the Allied forces would force the unconditional surrender of Germany