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Casualties of war.

notthe kind engaging anyone. going to have to clear house to house, room to room. messy business. what other way is there except sticking your fingers in your ears and hoping it goes away?

I stand corrected "only" at severe. For some reason I thought we'd been at critical for most of the year

Actually, its looking very much like we're about as accurate with strikes on civilians as terrorists tend to be. Leaked documents suggest as many as 90% of US Drone strikes kills are innocent civilians.

[Link] (for example).

So much so, that three drone pilots and a support tech, risk court martial over speaking out against orders.

I'd be surprised if the UK is any better. Human intelligence on the ground is scarce and unreliable and bombs and missiles are as indiscriminate as suicide bombers.

Same thing with the first Iraq war, show off all those super precision down the chimney guidance missiles, and never mention they represent 10% of the heavy ordinance used. Its about manufacture of consent by the public. Propaganda.

Just like the 'necessity of striking targets in Syria'. Its posturing, when in reality such strikes will make utterly no difference what-so-ever.

"One Nation Under God, has turned into One Nation Under the Influence of One Drug"
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When they show footage of these drone strikes they seem pretty accurate and cause minimal collateral damage.

Going back to Bomber Harris days you would have pathfinders lighting up a target with incendiary bombs to guide in the main blanket bombing of a target (which could be as vague as Dresden).

It seems we have been able to pinpoint specific targets like one building in a compound and be reasonably certain we could hit it without damaging the other buildings.

These sorts of headlines are misleading and full of spin to try and prick the conscience of those supporting reprisals for the cowardly sickening attacks on innocent people that care little for their victims and certainly do not even consider "collateral damage" in their planning.

Well if they don't hit the intended target - they're still hitting something, arguably an unconfirmed and undetermined target with a high explosive indiscriminate weapon. That cannot really be classed as a 'success'. Personally I'd imagine that 90% is an over exaggeration, but the importance behind the story is that it penetrates the myth of a strategy, that may well have created more 'enemy combatants' and terrorists, than it has killed - which we have been pretending and lying to the public about it being 'highly successful'.

The problem the US and UK face is that if you kill people who aren't guilty, you just end up creating hatred and a desire for revenge, which in turn leads to people picking up weapons to strike against those who they blame for the death of friends, family, children and loved ones. And the only group in the area that can give them an outlet for that anger is IS.

Which if your capacity to actually reclaim the territory held by the enemy, is fundermentally flawed. We have no realisable objectives to determine victory, other than killing them where we can and hoping to not create more in the process, than we can kill. They have very real objectives.

The problem is, sending ground forces into the battle is a very questionable outcome. The stomach of the west for a ground war in Syria is very weak.

"One Nation Under God, has turned into One Nation Under the Influence of One Drug"
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