Oops, our bad (By Tom Engelhardt )

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DISPATCHES FROM AMERICA
Oops, our bad
By Tom Engelhardt

Let's start with a few simple propositions.

First, the farther away you are from the ground, the clearer things are likely to look, the more god-like you are likely to feel, the less human those you attack are likely to be to you. How much more so, of course, if you, the "pilot," are actually sitting at a console at an air base near Las Vegas, identifying a "suspect" thousands of miles away via video monitor, "following" that suspect into a house, and then letting loose a Hellfire missile from a Predator drone cruising somewhere over Iraq, Afghanistan, Somalia or the tribal areas of Pakistan.

Second, however "precise" your weaponry, however "surgical" your strike, however impressive the grainy snuff-film images you can put on television, war from the air is, and will remain, a most imprecise and destructive form of battle.

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And yet, don't expect this counterproductive way of war to end any time soon. After all, the air force already has underway its "2018 bomber", due for delivery the same year that, according to the chief American trainer of Iraqi forces, Lieutenant General James Dubic, the Iraqi army will theoretically be able to guard the country's frontiers effectively. And don't forget the 2018 bomber's successor, "a true 'next generation' long-range strike weapon" that "may be a traditional bomber or an exotic 'system of systems,' with features such as hypersonic speed". Maybe by then, the Iraqis will actually be successfully defending their borders.

http://www.atimes.com/atimes/Middle_East/JD15Ak01.html