Description
This presentation investigates conceptions of remoteness which underpin arguments for the novel category of remote warfare, arguing that remote warfare suffers from a lack of conceptual clarity on the nature of the remoteness which sets such warfare apart from other forms of contemporary warfare. To demonstrate that such remoteness is neither new nor exclusive to so-called remote warfare, I explore three forms of militarised remoteness through the use of armed drones in the Global War on Terror, arguably the paradigmatic form of remote warfare. The first of these is the remoteness of security operations, namely the conception that the integrity of a state is to be secured away from a state's territory; the second lies in the remoteness of decision making, where decisions are made thousands of miles away from the battlespace. The third lies in the remoteness entailed by aerial warfare and sensing. I argue all three characteristics are integral to the practice of drone-led warfare, and yet none can be considered indicative of the novelty of drone warfare or of remote warfare writ large. I conclude, therefore, that the categorization of armed drones as manifestations of a new form of remote warfare is conceptually misguided and vacuous.
