# Oops, Another Wedding Party Gets "Droned" **URL:** \ **Category:** The BBQ Pit\ **Created:** [December 13, 2013, 2:47am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/oops-another-wedding-party-gets-droned/676219 "2013-12-13T02:47:01Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 3
**Author:** ![bup](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/6bbea6/32.png) [@bup](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/bup)\ **Post date:** [December 14, 2013, 3:56pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/oops-another-wedding-party-gets-droned/676219/41 "2013-12-14T15:56:38Z")
\*\*sailor \*\*was only calling **John Mace** ’s spelling of \*Nobel \*terrorism. Perfect content for the Pit. And I’ll tell you what real terrorism is: Obamacare! ---
**Author:** ![BrainGlutton](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/82dd89/32.png) [@BrainGlutton](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BrainGlutton)\ **Post date:** [December 14, 2013, 4:50pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/oops-another-wedding-party-gets-droned/676219/42 "2013-12-14T16:50:12Z")
> [@Rachellelogram](#): > > I’ve been against drone attacks since they started. There’s nothing that we can do about it besides bitch about it on the internet. It fucking sucks. And in not one election-cycle since 2008 has any party or candidate seriously run **against** it, AFAICR. (Greens, maybe, but they never win anyway.) ---
**Author:** ![Inigo\_Montoya](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/inigo_montoya/32/124_2.png) [@Inigo\_Montoya](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Inigo_Montoya)\ **Post date:** [December 14, 2013, 5:31pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/oops-another-wedding-party-gets-droned/676219/43 "2013-12-14T17:31:49Z")
> [@bup](#): > > And I’ll tell you what real terrorism is: Obamacare! You know who else hated Obamacare? ---
**Author:** ![Darth\_Panda](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/ee7513/32.png) [@Darth\_Panda](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Darth_Panda)\ **Post date:** [December 14, 2013, 5:52pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/oops-another-wedding-party-gets-droned/676219/44 "2013-12-14T17:52:43Z")
> [@The Great Sun Jester](#): > > You know who else hated Obamacare? Language professors? ---
**Author:** ![Smapti](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/smapti/32/17938_2.png) [@Smapti](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Smapti)\ **Post date:** [December 14, 2013, 6:03pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/oops-another-wedding-party-gets-droned/676219/45 "2013-12-14T18:03:48Z")
> [@RitterSport](#): > > Not better for the family, but one of my issues with drone attacks is that it is so low risk for the US. It takes away any manpower risk, allowing us to do a lot more bombing than we would if we were putting our own people at risk. > > So, if we had to put our own people at risk, along with all the costs and risks associate with getting our people in place, it’s possible they wouldn’t have been bombed at all. We would save those missions for really high value targets. With drones, you can bomb low value or no value targets with impunity. 55,000 dead Americans in Vietnam is evidence to the contrary. If we didn’t have drones, it wouldn’t mean that our adventures in the Mideast and Central Asia wouldn’t be happening - it just means that they’d be a lot bloodier and there’d be a lot more young men and women coming home in flag-draped coffins. I’m not particularly concerned about whether our means of making war are _fair_ to the other guy or not. If we can leverage our force without putting our soldiers and sailors and Marines and airmen in harm’s way, I’m all for it. ---
**Author:** ![BrainGlutton](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/82dd89/32.png) [@BrainGlutton](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BrainGlutton)\ **Post date:** [December 14, 2013, 6:24pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/oops-another-wedding-party-gets-droned/676219/46 "2013-12-14T18:24:45Z")
> [@Smapti](#): > > 55,000 dead Americans in Vietnam is evidence to the contrary. If we didn’t have drones, it wouldn’t mean that our adventures in the Mideast and Central Asia wouldn’t be happening - it just means that they’d be a lot bloodier and there’d be a lot more young men and women coming home in flag-draped coffins. > > I’m not particularly concerned about whether our means of making war are _fair_ to the other guy or not. If we can leverage our force without putting our soldiers and sailors and Marines and airmen in harm’s way, I’m all for it. Look, this is essentially a political war. Success depends ultimately on getting the civilians on our side. Hearts and minds, y’know? ---
**Author:** ![The\_Second\_Stone](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/bbe5ce/32.png) [@The\_Second\_Stone](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/The_Second_Stone)\ **Post date:** [December 14, 2013, 6:43pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/oops-another-wedding-party-gets-droned/676219/47 "2013-12-14T18:43:24Z")
> [@John\_Mace](#): > > … There is a difference between the deliberate targeting of civilians and the accidental killing of civilians during a military or police action. Yeah, yeah, yeah, I know it makes little difference to the dead or the dead’s loved ones, but I do think that intent matters when discussing what is and what is not an act of terrorism. > > … A difference in nomenclature and a difference in taking the time to make sure who we are killing and a difference in making our country safer or in greater danger in the long run. However, if there are never any legal charges for making these mistakes, whether it is murder or manslaughter really doesn’t matter. ---
**Author:** ![Fuji](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/a9a28c/32.png) [@Fuji](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Fuji)\ **Post date:** [December 14, 2013, 6:56pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/oops-another-wedding-party-gets-droned/676219/48 "2013-12-14T18:56:35Z")
> [@Smapti](#): > > 55,000 dead Americans in Vietnam is evidence to the contrary. If we didn’t have drones, it wouldn’t mean that our adventures in the Mideast and Central Asia wouldn’t be happening - it just means that they’d be a lot bloodier and there’d be a lot more young men and women coming home in flag-draped coffins. I don’t think so. Time was, pre-9/11, when the deaths of only [18 servicemen](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Battle_of_Mogadishu_%281993%29) were sufficient to compel the US to withdraw entirely from Somalia. This current Islamic terrorist paranoia that justified much higher body counts in Iraq and Afghanistan will eventually recede from the electorate’s consciousness. > [@](#): > > I’m not particularly concerned about whether our means of making war are _fair_ to the other guy or not. If we can leverage our force without putting our soldiers and sailors and Marines and airmen in harm’s way, I’m all for it. How about being concerned about whether your means of making war are _fair_ to those unfortunate people in the other guy’s vicinity? To not do so makes you kind of a foolish asshole who may eventually reap what he has sowed. ---
**Author:** ![John\_Mace](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/john_mace/32/185_2.png) [@John\_Mace](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/John_Mace)\ **Post date:** [December 14, 2013, 7:11pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/oops-another-wedding-party-gets-droned/676219/49 "2013-12-14T19:11:21Z")
> [@The\_Second\_Stone](#): > > A difference in nomenclature and a difference in taking the time to make sure who we are killing and a difference in making our country safer or in greater danger in the long run. However, if there are never any legal charges for making these mistakes, whether it is murder or manslaughter really doesn’t matter. I certainly agree that to the folks on the ground, this sure looks like terrorism. I don’t blame them for perceiving it that way. And to the extent that perception is reality, that’s all that matters. To them, anyway. We Americans seem to be so used to us just going in and doing whatever we want that we don’t understand we are essentially the only country in the world that does that. We think our good intentions are all that matters. I’d call it arrogance, but that doesn’t seem to quite capture the wrongness of it all. ---
**Author:** ![Slithy\_Tove](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/slithy_tove/32/18248_2.png) [@Slithy\_Tove](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Slithy_Tove)\ **Post date:** [December 14, 2013, 7:24pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/oops-another-wedding-party-gets-droned/676219/50 "2013-12-14T19:24:50Z")
after Culoden Moor the English went through the Highlands, raising every male’s kilt with their bayonets. If they saw pubic hair they’d thrust. I guess we should at least praise them for making the effort to do their atrocities retail. ---
**Author:** ![Dissonance](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/85f322/32.png) [@Dissonance](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Dissonance)\ **Post date:** [December 14, 2013, 8:25pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/oops-another-wedding-party-gets-droned/676219/51 "2013-12-14T20:25:12Z")
> [@Fuji](#): > > I don’t think so. Time was, pre-9/11, when the deaths of only [18 servicemen](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Battle_of_Mogadishu_%281993%29) were sufficient to compel the US to withdraw entirely from Somalia. This current Islamic terrorist paranoia that justified much higher body counts in Iraq and Afghanistan will eventually recede from the electorate’s consciousness. The US wasn’t at war in Somalia, it was there as part of a UN nation building operation, and the deaths of ‘only’ 18 servicemen in the hunt for warlords made the US public wonder what the hell we were doing over there in the first place. The US didn’t leave Somalia until 5 months later when UNSCOM II withdrew. One of the first reactions to the Battle of Mogadishu was the deployment of the Ready Battalion of the 24th Infantry Division, 1–64 Armor, from Fort Stewart, Georgia, to Mogadishu to provide heavy armored support for U.S. forces, and the stepping down of Les Aspin as Secretary of Defense who shouldered the blame for failing to deploy armor to Somalia despite requests from commanders on the ground on the basis that deploying tanks would look too provocative to the US public. It wasn’t so much the deaths of ‘only’ 18 servicemen that led to the US withdrawal, it was the questioning of why _any_ US servicemen were dying in a country that the US had no vested interest in conducting an extremely ill-defined mission in a country that seemed to not want to be nation-built but preferred to remain run by warlords in a state of anarchy. ---
**Author:** ![Darth\_Panda](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/ee7513/32.png) [@Darth\_Panda](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Darth_Panda)\ **Post date:** [December 15, 2013, 2:43pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/oops-another-wedding-party-gets-droned/676219/52 "2013-12-15T14:43:29Z")
> [@Slithy\_Tove](#): > > after Culoden Moor the English went through the Highlands, raising every male’s kilt with their bayonets. If they saw pubic hair they’d thrust. I guess we should at least praise them for making the effort to do their atrocities retail. And for promoting good grooming. ---
**Author:** ![BrainGlutton](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/82dd89/32.png) [@BrainGlutton](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BrainGlutton)\ **Post date:** [December 15, 2013, 3:59pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/oops-another-wedding-party-gets-droned/676219/53 "2013-12-15T15:59:07Z")
> [@Slithy\_Tove](#): > > after Culoden Moor the English went through the Highlands, raising every male’s kilt with their bayonets. If they saw pubic hair they’d thrust. Is “bayonet” a euphemism here? ---
**Author:** ![FXMastermind](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/fxmastermind/32/7289_2.png) [@FXMastermind](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/FXMastermind)\ **Post date:** [December 22, 2013, 1:50pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/oops-another-wedding-party-gets-droned/676219/54 "2013-12-22T13:50:24Z")
> [@John\_Mace](#): > > When are we going to fucking learn? if history is any teacher, never. > [@John\_Mace](#): > > I don’t want my country bombing wedding parties in other countries. Nobody sane does. > [@John\_Mace](#): > > Is this supposed to make us safe? No, it’s supposed to strike terror into the hearts and minds of the evil people. > [@John\_Mace](#): > > Are we not creating more terrorists by this stupid shit than are actually out there now? Of course. In fact, it might even be creating an entire world of people that might be willing to die in order to return the favor. ---
**Author:** ![NotfooledbyW](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/n/f475e1/32.png) [@NotfooledbyW](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/NotfooledbyW)\ **Post date:** [December 28, 2013, 1:18am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/oops-another-wedding-party-gets-droned/676219/55 "2013-12-28T01:18:54Z")
> [@AdmiralQ](#): > > What I’d like to see is any supporters that Obama has left to start hammering him on this issue and demand he stop these type of strikes. The left was wailing and gnashing their teeth when Bush was doing the same things, but is incredibly silent on this issue since “their” guy is the one allowing innocent people to be killed. > > Where are the anti-war protesters that we were seeing when Bush was in power? They seem to be nowhere to be found. The hypocrisy is astounding. I support Obama in signing off on drone strikes against suspected Taliban or al Qaeda leaders specifically in the lawless region of Pakistan like the Swat Valley and other parts of Africa where there is no government in control. I also support Bush when he did it. So I don’t know the issue there. However I did not support one particular type of drone or manned air strike that was used in Iraq. That is those strikes where drone surveillance caught an IED being planted and then the planters were tracked to a dwelling and the dwelling was targeted and hit. It seemed to me at the time that once the location of the IED was fixed we could have detonated it if the suspected planter could not be killed or captured. Hitting a dwelling they entered after planting IED’s seemed to me to be targeting without regard to civilians. ---
**Author:** ![marshmallow](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/df705f/32.png) [@marshmallow](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/marshmallow)\ **Post date:** [December 28, 2013, 1:43am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/oops-another-wedding-party-gets-droned/676219/56 "2013-12-28T01:43:18Z")
> [@AdmiralQ](#): > > What I’d like to see is people like this guy [here](http://www.zombietime.com/sf_rally_april_10_2004/characters/120-2044_IMG.JPG) protest Obama’s war policy the same way he protested Bush’s. True 'dat. Although seven years of protests did exactly jack and shit, so it’s mostly academic. ---
**Author:** ![The\_Universe\_Lashes\_Out](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/8797f3/32.png) [@The\_Universe\_Lashes\_Out](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/The_Universe_Lashes_Out)\ **Post date:** [December 28, 2013, 2:22am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/oops-another-wedding-party-gets-droned/676219/57 "2013-12-28T02:22:19Z")
> [@John\_Mace](#): > > When are we going to fucking learn? I think we have “learned” to some extent. Our taste for war as a nation has been declining throughout our history. Even in recent times, the war in Iraq was markedly less violent than the war in Vietnam. And Obama’s drone strikes are thousands of times less violent than Bush’s anti-terrorism policy. Yeah, it is still evil, and yeah, it is still self-defeating, but it’s much better than invading and occupying a country for no reason. Maybe in another ten or twenty years, the general public will be more aware of how evil these drone strikes are, and there will be zero tolerance for this type of violence. But in general, things are trending in the right direction. ---
**Author:** ![NotfooledbyW](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/n/f475e1/32.png) [@NotfooledbyW](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/NotfooledbyW)\ **Post date:** [December 28, 2013, 3:48am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/oops-another-wedding-party-gets-droned/676219/58 "2013-12-28T03:48:33Z")
> [@AdmiralQ](#): > > What I’d like to see is people like this guy [here](http://www.zombietime.com/sf_rally_april_10_2004/characters/120-2044_IMG.JPG) protest Obama’s war policy the same way he protested Bush’s. Do you not recognize the vast distinction between Obama finishing what Bush started in the needless unjustified war in Iraq; plus the distinction of Obama finishing the justified war in Afghsnustan that Bush started but could not finish because of Iraq? There was not a dimes worth of protest against Bush’s military action in Afghanistan. But there was billions worth of protest against Bush’s decision to invade Iraq. Most Anericans who protested invading Iraq did not protest Afghanistan. So your search for sanitized uniform protest is quite an errant quest on your part. You are not squaring your request with any kind of reality. ---
**Author:** ![AtomicDog](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/ac91a4/32.png) [@AtomicDog](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/AtomicDog)\ **Post date:** [December 28, 2013, 6:34pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/oops-another-wedding-party-gets-droned/676219/59 "2013-12-28T18:34:01Z")
> [@NotfooledbyW](#): > > I support Obama in signing off on drone strikes against suspected Taliban or al Qaeda leaders specifically in the lawless region of Pakistan like the Swat Valley and other parts of Africa where there is no government in control. I also support Bush when he did it. So I don’t know the issue there. However I did not support one particular type of drone or manned air strike that was used in Iraq. That is those strikes where drone surveillance caught an IED being planted and then the planters were tracked to a dwelling and the dwelling was targeted and hit. It seemed to me at the time that once the location of the IED was fixed we could have detonated it if the suspected planter could not be killed or captured. Hitting a dwelling they entered after planting IED’s seemed to me to be targeting without regard to civilians. He who plants and runs away, Lives to plant another day. And you may not catch him next time. But your daughter’s Humvee may harvest his crop the hard way. ---
**Author:** ![Slithy\_Tove](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/slithy_tove/32/18248_2.png) [@Slithy\_Tove](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Slithy_Tove)\ **Post date:** [January 2, 2014, 4:23pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/oops-another-wedding-party-gets-droned/676219/60 "2014-01-02T16:23:19Z")
What is the next step after they adopt countermeasures: the al Qaeda intended target quickly puts on a chicken mask, and while the drone is wondering what to do, he writes “Obama” at the end of the dial and re-sets it? [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/oops-another-wedding-party-gets-droned/676219.md?page=2) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/oops-another-wedding-party-gets-droned/676219.md?page=4)