USA To Launch Even More Drone Attacks

USA To Launch Even More Drone Attacks

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The American Ministry of Defense has announced several days ago that it has decided to increase the number of daily attacks by unmanned aerial vehicles (UAV). Today between 60 and 65 attacks are launched daily, but the ministry’s spokesperson has revealed that they, headed by Ash Carter, have decided to increase the number in nearly 50% to 90 attacks every day up to the year 2019. The decision was made after commanders fighting in the field have demanded to attack more frequently than what is presently approved.

The plan to increase the number of attacks will include increased use of two main vehicles: MQ-1 Predator and MQ-9 Reaper, which are already, according to U.S. air force officials, on the brink of its performance ability. UAVs are currently used for gathering intelligence, whereas in the future it seems that they could perform more missions to cope with threats originating in Russia and China.

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Along with the demands from fighters in the field to increase the daily number of UAV attacks, human rights organizations, such as Amnesty International and Human Rights Watch, have published reports showing that there was no decrease in the number of uninvolved civilian casualties in the battlefield. One obvious example for this is Pakistan, where 416 to 951 people were accidently killed by drone attacks, among them 168 to 200 children.

Aside from the unintentional killing of civilians, there is also a need to consider the affect that increasing the number of attacks have on the soldiers operating these vehicles. Although the operator is not in the battlefield physically and isn’t jeopardized, this many attacks could have a significant influence on the soldier’s mind. In oder to increase attacks, soldiers will be forced to do longer shifts and attack more, which might affect their mental state. So if the U.S. wants to increase the attacks, it must also increase mental support to its UAV operators, and consider the negative impact on innocent people under these attacks.

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