美國沉迷無人機反恐釀惡果_風聞

作者：蘭順正

首發自：CGTN

近日，美國外交政策分析家邁克爾·霍頓在美國《國家利益》雙月刊網站上刊登了題為《為什麼美國（和特朗普）沉迷於無人機戰爭》的文章。作者認為，特朗普政府沉迷於用無人機進行反恐戰爭，因此卻導致了“越反越恐”的惡果。很明顯，該篇文章將再次引發對於美國無人機肆意殺戮問題的探討。

自“９·１１”以來，各類無人作戰平台日益成為美軍反恐戰爭的主角。作為信息化作戰手段最新、最典型的代表，美軍無人機作戰具備對己的“零傷亡”及對敵的“定點清除”打擊等特徵，因此使用無人機作為一種有效反恐手段對“人命大於天”的美軍而言早已是屢試不爽。最近十餘年，武裝無人機已經成為美國全球反恐作戰的重要組成部分，遍佈阿富汗、巴基斯坦、也門、索馬里、利比亞和敍利亞等恐怖襲擊高發國家。尤其在針對恐怖組織頭目的“斬首行動”中日益發揮着主導作用。

但是美軍在反恐戰爭中過於依賴無人機也引發了一系列的麻煩和爭議。

首先是道德上的困境。由於無人作戰特殊的作戰方式，無人機戰爭對於在遠離目標千萬裏之遙的空調房中操作無人機的軍人和承包商來説沒有任何人身危險。同時操作人員每天按時上下班，參與戰爭對其個人私生活影響很小。長此以往，作戰人員從人性角度感知理解戰爭的能力可能會逐漸麻木、喪失，久而久之就會存在以遊戲心態來執行殺戮，從而給予戰爭的道義基礎根本性的衝擊。

其次是在責任區分上。在常規的戰爭模式下，戰爭機器由權責分明的軍事部門和政府機構來推動，因此對於戰犯的指認與辨識在操作層面並非難事。然而，對於因無人作戰引發的戰爭罪行，其責任的追究可能涉及操控者、軍火商、程序員、採購官、戰地指揮官、相關維護人員乃至無人機本身，涵蓋其研製、生產、裝備與應用的整個過程，其追責難度較常規戰爭進一步提升。另外決策者和政客不必為描述受傷或死亡的美國軍人的可怕報道擔心。公眾也不會就美國軍人犧牲的意義提出棘手問題。

以上因素導致了這些年來除了恐怖分子以外，死在美國無人機翼刀下的平民人數也居高不下。美軍在巴基斯坦、也門、利比亞和索馬里使用無人機等手段打擊恐怖分子，造成了大量的無辜平民傷亡。據統計，自2004 年美國開始在巴基斯坦使用無人機反恐至2013年10月，死亡人數在2525～3613人之間，其中平民死亡為407～926 人，佔總死亡人數的16%～25%。在也門，美軍無人機日常活動地區的民眾也承受着重大心理壓力。2013年12月12日，也門境內一個大型的迎親車隊被誤當作一羣恐怖分子，而遭到美國無人機發動的“特徵攻擊”，結果造成 11～15 位無辜平民死亡。2010年 2 月，美軍一架“捕食者”無人機在阿富汗執行反恐行動時，因“不準確和不專業的情報”，錯誤地攻擊了3輛滿載平民的客車，導致23人死亡。這一系列的平民傷亡被視為是對無人機的濫用，堪稱國家恐怖主義行為。

而此次的文章指出，自特朗普上任以來，估計在索馬里已經發動了155次空中和無人機打擊。這個數量是奧巴馬最後一個任期中發動的同類打擊數量的5倍。在也門和阿富汗，空中與無人機打擊有着類似的增加，只是美國不再公佈有關襲擊的數據。作者在文中表示，美國對無人機的依賴，就像“反恐戰爭”本身一樣是一種缺乏戰略的戰術，只會製造更多的恐怖分子和好戰分子。現在在也門、索馬里以及美國正進行反恐作戰的其他國家，叛亂分子和恐怖分子數量遠比反恐開始前多得多。尤其是無人機的使用已經助推好戰的“薩拉菲”組織在各個穆斯林國家招兵買馬。據戰略與國際問題研究中心估計，從2001年到2018年，支持“薩拉菲”組織的好戰分子數量增加了近400%，這可能還是一種低估。

綜上不難看出，美軍漠視他國平民生命，肆意使用無人機的作法，在未來會導致自己的“反恐戰爭”以及世界安全局勢更加複雜。

（以下為英文原文）

America’s obsession with drones has paid offLan ShunZheng

Michael Horton, an American foreign policy analyst, recently published an article on the National Interest website titled “Why America (and Donald Trump) are addicted to drone wars.” The author argues that the Trump administration’s obsession with drones in the war on terror has led to more and more terror. Clearly, this article will reignite a discussion of the issue of indiscriminate killing by American drones.

Since the September 11 attacks, unmanned combat platforms of various types have increasingly become the protagonist of the U.S. military’s war on terror. As the latest and most typical representative of information operation means, the U.S. military unmanned aerial vehicle (UAV) operation has the characteristics of “zero casualties” and “targeted killing” against the enemy.

In the last decade or so, armed drones have become an important part of the U.S.’s global counter-terrorism campaign, spreading across countries with high incidence of terrorist attacks such as Afghanistan, Pakistan, Yemen, Somalia, Libya and Syria. In particular, it has increasingly played a leading role in the “beheading” of terrorist leaders.

But the U.S. military’s reliance on drones in the war on terror has also created a host of problems and controversies.

The first is the moral dilemma. Because of the special nature of unmanned combat, drone warfare poses no personal danger to military personnel or contractors operating drones in air-conditioned rooms thousands of miles away from their targets. At the same time, the operators go to work on time every day, and the war has little impact on their personal lives. In the long run, the warfighter’s ability to perceive and understand war from a human perspective may gradually become numb and lost, and over time there will be a video game mentality to carry out the killing, thus having a fundamental impact on the moral foundation of war.

An American flag is placed among names of victims at the September 11 Memorial in New York, December 6, 2019. /AP

The second is in the division of responsibility. In the conventional mode of war, the war machine is driven by the military and government agencies with clear powers and responsibilities, so the identification of war criminals is not difficult at the operational level. However, for war crimes caused by unmanned combat, the accountability may involve operators, arms dealers, programmers, procurement officers, field commanders, relevant maintenance personnel and even the UAV itself, covering the whole process of its development, production, equipment and application, which is more difficult to be held responsible than conventional war.

These factors have contributed to the high number of civilian deaths from American drones in recent years in addition to terrorists.

According to statistics, since 2004 when the United States began to use UAV in Pakistan up until October 2013, the death toll was between 2,525 and 3,613, among which the civilian death toll was 407 to 926, accounting for 16 to 25 percent of the total death toll.

In Yemen, people in areas where U.S. drones operate are also under significant psychological pressure. On December 12, 2013, a large welcoming convoy in Yemen was mistaken for a group of terrorists, and was attacked by a U.S. drone, resulting in the death of 11 to 15 innocent civilians. In February 2010, a predator drone mistakenly attacked three buses full of civilians during a counterterrorism operation in Afghanistan based on false intelligence, killing 23 people. The series of civilian casualties is seen as a misuse of drones and an act of state terrorism.

The article notes that an estimated 155 air and drone strikes have been launched in Somalia since Trump took office. That is five times the number of such strikes launched in Obama’s last term. There has been a similar increase in air and drone strikes in Yemen and Afghanistan. The authors argue that America’s reliance on drones, like the “War on Terror” itself, is “a tactic devoid of strategy that only creates more terrorists and militants.”

There are now far more insurgents and terrorists in Yemen, Somalia and other countries where the United States is fighting the war on terror than there were before it began. In particular, the use of drones has helped militant salafi groups recruit in Muslim countries. The Center for Strategic and International Studies estimates that the number of militants supporting salafi groups increased by nearly 400 percent between 2001 and 2018, which may still be an underestimate.

In conclusion, it is not hard to see that the U.S. military’s disregard for civilian lives in other countries and indiscriminate use of drones will lead to its own “War on Terror” and a more complex world security situation in the future.