Citation

Chubarov I, Appolonova Y. Logos (Russian Federation) 2022; 32(3): 63-106.

Copyright

(Copyright © 2022)

DOI

10.22394/0869-5377-2022-3-63-105

PMID

unavailable

Abstract

The article challenges traditional notions of war and war ethics from the standpoints of a terrorist attack victim and of a drone strike victim, of the decentralized opposition of "old" and "new" wars, "major" wars and "small" ones, combatants vs. non-combatants, soldiers vs guerilla fighters, friends vs enemies, victors vs defeated. Accordingly, the authors consider the political status and social role of ethnographic, anthropological and ethical research within the context of "new wars," which include guerilla warfare and resort to terrorist tactics. Building on current research in sociology, anthropology, ethics and political studies (Hugh Gusterson, Mary Kaldor, Jeff McMahan, Lucy Sachman, Emran Feroz, Grégoire Chamayou, Kirill Martynov, Victor Vakhshtayn et al.), the authors regard whether drone technologies and other automated weapons conform to the Russia's military ethics. They also speculate upon prospects of some technologies being socially adapted in different world cultures. The article brings up to date critique of violence by Walter Benjamin and problematizes the concept of the political by Carl Schmitt through the lens of the presentday military ethnography (see Nikolai Ssorin-Chaikov's Hybrid Peace: Ethnographies of War in this issue of Logos). Analyzing historical transformations and inversions of guerillas, suicide pilots, UAV operators and suicide bombers deconstructs the notion of "hybrid war" as well as "hybrid peace." Finally, the authors introduce a project of a less rigoristic and not purely prohibitive ethical program ("drone ethics") which might serve as a basis for automated systems' algorithms to make decisions during military crises and states of emergency. The article continues to address the range of problems brought up in the Logos issue on war (Vol. 29 #3 2019). © 2022, Gaidar Institute Press. All rights reserved.

Language: ru

Keywords

Asymmetric warfare; Drone ethics; Ethnography of violence; Guerilla; Hybrid peace; Karl Schmitt; Suicide pilot; Walter Benjamin