Laurie Calhoun's Blog, page 15
February 17, 2016
Obedience to Authority: The Relevance of the Milgram Experiments in the Drone Age
I recently watched Experimenter (2015), a film directed by Michael Almereyda, which relays the story of social psychologist Stanley Milgram and his quest to understand how human beings could be brought to do things which they would never have thought to do, left to their own devices. Being Jewish, Milgram was keen to comprehend what […]
February 11, 2016
Zooming in on the Drone Warfare Ground Game: Drone (2014), directed by Tonje Hessen Schei
Many people believe that lethal drones are good because they have been used to “take the battle to the enemy” while sparing the lives of US soldiers. CIA directors have long touted targeted killing using UCAVs (unmanned combat aerial vehicles) as an essential tool in the Global War on Terror. What more needs to […]
February 7, 2016
Drones and Death in the 8th Republican Presidential Debate, February 6, 2016
Lethal drones have come to symbolize “smart power” to Democrats. In the first Democratic presidential debate, former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton went so far as to characterize the “no boots on the ground” 2011 intervention in Libya as “smart power at its best”. Judging by their campaign trail rhetoric, Republican candidates tend to believe […]
January 30, 2016
Is “Humanitarian Intervention” a Good Idea? Tom Woods Show Episode 569
In this 37 minute interview, Tom Woods and Laurie Calhoun discuss a relatively new phenomenon in the history of warfare, what has been christened “humanitarian intervention” by its advocates. With the advent of lethal drones, the political costs of waging war abroad have diminished because soldiers’ lives need not be sacrificed in wielding military force. At the same time, the […]
January 28, 2016
A 300-word essay on ISIS
I have received a number of visitors to this blog as result of Google searches for the phrase “A 300-word essay on ISIS”. Happy to oblige: ISIS, or the Islamic State in Iraq and Syria, is a group of radical fundamentalist anti-Western Islamists who believe that Muslims must follow strict Sharia law and forsake cultural perversions […]
January 27, 2016
War and Delusion: A Critical Examination to be issued in paperback edition soon!
I am very excited to report that my penultimate book, War and Delusion: A Critical Examination (2013), will be issued in a paperback edition with a new foreword in the fall of 2016. For more information about this work, please click on the book image: 
January 21, 2016
Inside the Drone Warfare “Theater”: Drones (2013), directed by Rick Rosenthal
I was intrigued by the movie Drones (2013) immediately upon seeing the trailer a couple of years ago—before they had found a distributor. This past week, I learned that the film was indeed distributed and is now available on Netflix, so I watched it. Twice. I decided to watch the movie twice because I […]
January 17, 2016
Extrajudicial Killing Machine: a conversation about lethal drones
On the last day of 2015, interviewer and commercial drone advocate Patrick Egan (@TheDroneDealer) and USAF veteran and drone expert Gene Robinson (the founder of RP Search Services) sat down with Laurie Calhoun for a fruitful conversation about lethal drones. The interview was part of the Small Unmanned Aerial Systems (sUAS) News weekly podcast program hosted and produced by Mr. Egan. Among […]
January 11, 2016
“Bug Splat” to Become “Bug Zap” as Drones are Equipped with Lasers
A recent report on the State of the Lethal Drone, based on an interview with US Air Force Chief Scientist Dr. Greg Zacharias, reveals that drones will be equipped with lasers in the near future, superseding the currently favored implements of remote-control killing, Hellfire missiles. Only two missiles are currently harnessed to each Predator drone […]
January 7, 2016
“Nous Sommes Tous George W. Bush”: The Government of France follows Obama down the Bush-Cheney Rabbit Hole
Does anyone else remember back when members of the US congress proclaimed that fried potato sticks should henceforth be referred to as “Freedom fries”? Some self-styled patriots, who apparently believed that the impending 2003 war on Iraq would have something to do with defending our liberty, went even so far as to pour bottles of French wine into the gutter! I […]
