Precision Strike Warfare And International Intervention: Strategic, Ethico-legal And Decisional Implications (routledge Global Security Studies)

This book explores whether the new capabilities made possible by precision-strike technologies are reshaping approaches to international intervention. Since the end of the Cold War, US technological superiority has led to a more proactive and, some would argue, high risk approach to international military intervention. New technologies including the capacity to mount precision military strikes from high-level bombing campaigns and, more recently, the selective targeting of individuals from unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs) have facilitated air campaigns, supported by Special Forces, without the commitment of large numbers of troops on the ground. Such campaigns include, for example, NATO’s high-level aerial bombardment of Milosevic’s forces in Kosovo in 1999 and of Gaddafi’s in Libya in 2011, and the US operation involving Special Forces against Osama Bin Laden. The development of UAVs and electronic data intercept technologies has further expanded the potential scope of interventions, for example against Islamic militants in the tribal areas of Pakistan. This volume examines three key and interrelated dimensions of these new precision-strike capabilities: (1) the strategic and foreign policy drivers and consequences; (2) the legal and moral implications of the new capabilities; and (3), the implications for decision-making at the strategic, operational and tactical levels. This book will be of much interest to students of war and technology, air power, international intervention, security studies and IR. Part I: Strategic and Foreign Policy Drivers and Consequences. - Introduction, Precision Strike Warfare and International Intervention: Strategic, Ethico-Legal and Decisional Implications, Mike Aaronson and Tom Dyson 3. - 1. Dealing with Risk: Precision Strikes and Interventionism in the Obama Administration, Andre Barrinha and Luis da Vinha 14. - 2. European Precision Strike Capabilities: A Neoclassical Realist Perspective, Tom Dyson 33. - 3. The Global Diffusion of Unmanned Aerial Vehicles or "drones", Ulrike Esther Franke 52. - 4. The Political Appropriation of Casualties in Threat Construction: The Case of US Drone Strikes in Pakistan, Wali Aslam 73. - Part II: Legal and Moral Implications . - 5. Covert Drone Strikes and the Fiction of Zero Civilian Casualties, Chris Woods 95. - 6. Drones: Degrading Moral Thresholds for the Use of Force and the Calculations of Proportionality, Conway Waddington 114. - 7. Terrorising Terrorists: The Jus ad bellum of Drone Operations in Pakistan, Tobias Ruettershof 133. - 8. UAV for R2P? Exploring the Legitimacy and Effectiveness of Drones, Ina Wiesner 152. - Part III: Strategic and Foreign Policy Drivers and Consequences . - 9. Psychological Perspectives on Military Decisions to Deploy Precision Strike Capabilities, Adrian Banks and Mandeep Dhami 173. - 10. Unmanned Weapons Systems and Just Wars: The Psychological Dimensions, Nicola Power, Laurence Alison and Jason Ralph 188. - 11. Keeping the Human "in the loop": A Qualified Defence of Autonomous Weapons Systems, Alex Leveringhaus and Tjerk de Greef 206. - Conclusion: Precision Strikes - the Way Forward, Wali Aslam and Regina Rauxloh 234 Edited By Mike Aaronson, Wali Aslam, Tom Dyson And Regina Rauxloh. Includes Bibliographical References And Index.