[binreadin]

Someone close to me is in the military, highly placed. He was very resistant to my concern about using drones to the extent we do, but to his credit he mad some inquiries, and changed his tune completely. We went from killing people based on somewhat solid intel to killing those who are “behaving suspiciously,” like shepherd boys in the mountains, early morning drivers, garbage collectors, etc. I'm for drone use in direct support of military operations, based on credible intel, but I think we've gone way over the top. The hatred of Americans that is generated as a result does grave harm to our national security and to those foreign governments who have supported our cause.

[NonValueAdded]

So we're back to the door gunner mentality from Full Metal Jacket:

Git some! Git some! Git some, yeah, yeah, yeah! Anyone who runs, is a VC. Anyone who stands still, is a well-disciplined VC!

[kabar]

We went from killing people based on somewhat solid intel to killing those who are “behaving suspiciously,” like shepherd boys in the mountains, early morning drivers, garbage collectors, etc. I'm for drone use in direct support of military operations, based on credible intel, but I think we've gone way over the top. The hatred of Americans that is generated as a result does grave harm to our national security and to those foreign governments who have supported our cause.

You seem to think we can wage war with a scalpel and we should do so even at the risk of injury to our own personnel.

Over the top? Would you have supported the fire bombings of Dresden, Hamburg, Tokyo, etc. or dropping the atomic bomb twice on Japanese cities? Every war has collateral damage and when you are fighting a guerrilla war with the populace proving aid and assistance to the enemy, you go after "suspicious" people. By doing so, you protect your own people and deter others from helping the enemy.

I am more concerned that more of our people will be lost by ROE that limit the application of force. We are putting our own people at risk for fear of causing collateral damage. I suspect that we didn't use drones or fighter jets against those surrounding our mission in Benghazi because of the fear of collateral damage and hurting our bilateral relations with Libya.