The Drone Strikes Again
Take a moment and imagine this: for every terrorist killed by a U.S. drone strike, 50 Pakistani civilians fall victims to these ruthless attacks. According to an article written by David Kilcullen and Andrew McDonald from the NY Times, “press reports suggest that over the last three years drone strikes have killed about 14 terrorist leaders. But, according to Pakistani sources, they have also killed some 700 civilians. This is 50 civilians for every militant killed, a hit rate of 2 percent — hardly “precision”” (Killcullen, McDonald 9). Regardless if the number of casualties of innocent people caused by drone strikes has increased or decreased, the policy itself should be eliminated if there is even the slightest chance that innocent lives will be at stake. Kant was not a consequentialist theorist; in other words, he believed that despite the outcome of an action being good or bad, what was important was the premeditated idea behind the action, was it right or wrong, unrelated to the consequences. Therefore, if actions are not based on consequences, Kant’s theory would support the argument that using drone tactics to eliminate terrorists is morally unacceptable, for the following reasons: the U.S. military is using drone tactics against terrorist without their consent, and innocent lives are being taken at the push of a button.
As humans, our moral duty is to treat people in such a way that shows them respect, as though they are autonomous beings with intrinsic value. All people have autonomy, and it is up to the individual to use their reason to act based on good will; “Kant believed that there was a supreme principle of morality, and he referred to it as The Categorical Imperative. The Categorical Imperatives determines what our moral duties are” (Anscombe). Humans have the moral duty to act simply for the right reasons. However, in the