Distributed for University of Wales Press
The Ethics of Remote Warfare
A look at war ethics in the age of drones and artificial intelligence.
Can there be purely defensive or moral wars? In response to this question and others like it, this book offers unique insights into twenty-first-century warfare through the lenses of realism, militarism, and just war theory. This book challenges its readers to consider war from different perspectives and to reevaluate their views on the morality of war.
Ethical approaches to war require that we don’t value only the lives of ‘our’ people, as realism asserts; that we don’t enforce our sense of justice with weapons, as militarism demands; that force is used only in self-defense, based on the principles of just war theory. The author explores the issue of civilian harm in war, questioning whether the use of so-called precision weapons—celebrated for minimizing risks to soldiers and civilians—and the rapidly developing technology of lethal autonomous weapons are increasing rather than decreasing civilian harm. In engaging with these questions, The Ethics of Remote Warfare highlights the need for new accountability mechanisms that reflect a sense of legal and moral justice.
Can there be purely defensive or moral wars? In response to this question and others like it, this book offers unique insights into twenty-first-century warfare through the lenses of realism, militarism, and just war theory. This book challenges its readers to consider war from different perspectives and to reevaluate their views on the morality of war.
Ethical approaches to war require that we don’t value only the lives of ‘our’ people, as realism asserts; that we don’t enforce our sense of justice with weapons, as militarism demands; that force is used only in self-defense, based on the principles of just war theory. The author explores the issue of civilian harm in war, questioning whether the use of so-called precision weapons—celebrated for minimizing risks to soldiers and civilians—and the rapidly developing technology of lethal autonomous weapons are increasing rather than decreasing civilian harm. In engaging with these questions, The Ethics of Remote Warfare highlights the need for new accountability mechanisms that reflect a sense of legal and moral justice.
224 pages | 1 halftone | 12.52 x 8.5 | © 2024
Philosophy: Ethics
Political Science: Diplomacy, Foreign Policy, and International Relations
Sociology: Individual, State and Society
Table of Contents
Rules-based Orders’ by Dr Barry J. Ryan
List of Tables
Foreword by Sorin Baiasu
Introduction: Twenty-first century wars and technology. The changing parameters of conflict within a context of changing global power relations.
1 Three Approaches to Ethics
2 Killing from Afar: The Terror of the Air
3 From the Bomber to the Drone
4 Remote Killing in the War on Terror
5 Remote Killing and the War in Ukraine
Conclusion: Remote Warfare and the (New) Ethics of War
Notes
Select bibliography
Index
List of Tables
Foreword by Sorin Baiasu
Introduction: Twenty-first century wars and technology. The changing parameters of conflict within a context of changing global power relations.
1 Three Approaches to Ethics
2 Killing from Afar: The Terror of the Air
3 From the Bomber to the Drone
4 Remote Killing in the War on Terror
5 Remote Killing and the War in Ukraine
Conclusion: Remote Warfare and the (New) Ethics of War
Notes
Select bibliography
Index