Splash.
Good kill.
These are the words spoken after almost every confirmed drone strike in Andrew Niccol’s 2014 war drama, Good Kill. The film follows Major Thomas Egan, an Air Force officer who flies UAVs (unmanned aerial vehicles) in the Middle East from a base near Las Vegas, Nevada. After six tours of combat, Egan struggles with the nature of drone warfare despite the fact that he is one of the most capable and precise pilots when it comes to flying these UAVs. The lines for Egan begin to blur when his unit becomes under the control of the CIA and he begins to doubt the ethics of his role in this war.
A major problem that Egan has in the film is coming to terms with the disjointedness his feels between his duty to his country and what he believes to be the right thing. His problems begin arising after he is put into situations where civilian casualties die, in some cases a demand to preform a second attack on first responders and in others the result is the deaths of children. In his Groundwork for the Metaphysics of Morals, Immanuel Kant argues that “the concept of duty includes the concept of good will” and “what makes acts out of duty morally worthy is not their actual or intended results, but the underlying principle on which they are based” (260, 261). A line from the film that really sticks out in this fine line between duty and good will is when Jack Johns states, “Don’t ask me if this is a just war. It’s just war.” For Johns, duty is the most important aspect. He must do whatever he is called upon in this need to defend his nation. For Egan, he begins to see the injustice in the killing of innocents.
UAVs also pose other ambiguous aspects of morality for Egan. Throughout the film Egan wishes to return to combat. Although he preforms his duty and does it well, he is visibly shaken at times because of these attacks. The use of UAVs bring a component to warfare that is new in the era of advancing technology. Egan and his team is based approximately 15,000 km away from the bombs they are detonating. Are acts of war made more morally wrong when the attacker has no chance of being hurt in the process?
Enjoyed reading your post Meghan. It made think of how crazy modern warfare has become. Pretty remarkable how we have the ability to engage in warfare hundred of thousands miles away.
ReplyDeleteTo answer your question : Are acts of war made more morally wrong when the attacker has no chance of being hurt in the process?
No I don't think so, and I also don't believe Kant would think so either. As you posted Kant says, "what makes acts out of duty morally worthy is not their actual or intended results, but the underlying principle on which they are based”.
I agree with that. So let's say, I learn how to fly and navigate UAVs after watching some videos on youtube. The US military learns about this, and they ask me to accomplish a specific mission. They have learned that ISIS terrorists are going to kill everyone on this earth, except for me. I have no risk of being injured. The US military also says that I am the only one that can stop it. I accept the task, and I eliminate these ISIS terrorists from the comfort of my own couch.
What is morally wrong about me fulfilling my duty and saving the world from the comfort of my own couch? I don't think there is anything wrong with that, despite me not being at risk to be harmed.
I think that's an interesting question to ask. I could see how some might think it is unfair to sit back out of harms way while performing the task of an air strike.
ReplyDeleteFor me, and like I mentioned in my blog, I do not believe there are moral actions in war. Going by what Kant says, the actions have to be good themselves, not just have a good intended outcome. Would you say that killing people by a drone attack for example is a good action? I would not. Killing is not a universal law therefore cannot be moral in any case. You could say it's a necessary evil but definitely not morally correct.