Global war on terror is better understood as manhunting than combat

Evidence

Contrary to Carl von Clausewitz’s classical definition, the fundamental structure of this type of warfare is no longer that of a duel, of two fighters facing each other. The paradigm is quite different: a hunter advancing on a prey that flees or hides from him. The rules of the game are not the same. “In the competition between two enemy combatants,” wrote Crawford, “the goal is to win the battle by defeating the adversary: both combatants must confront to win. However, a manhunt scenario differs in that each player’s strategy is different. The fugitive always wants to avoid capture; the pursuer must confront to win, whereas the fugitive must evade to win.” The hostile relationship now boils down, as in a game of hide-and-seek, to “a competition between the hiders and the seekers.” — Grégoire Chamayou, A Theory of the Drone, 171 (#expands, via linked claim)

Using new means, the drone procures for its operators an even greater sense of invulnerability. Today as yesterday, the radical imbalance in exposure to death leads to a redefinition of relations of hostility and of the very sense of what is called “waging war.” Warfare, by distancing itself totally from the model of hand-to-hand combat, becomes something quite different, a “state of violence” of a different kind. It degenerates into slaughter or hunting. One no longer fights the enemy; one eliminates him, as one shoots rabbits. — Grégoire Chamayou, A Theory of the Drone, 332 (#corroborates, via linked claim)

Categorization

• XREF: connects to: Accepted zero-risk killing would collapse just war theory; Claimed precision paradoxically expands global killing rather than limiting it; Manhunting replaces Clausewitz’s duel with a hunter-prey asymmetry — Grégoire Chamayou, A Theory of the Drone, 171 (+4 more)

Related

• Manhunting replaces Clausewitz’s duel with a hunter-prey asymmetry (similarity 0.92)
• Hunting, unlike combat, defines violence by the prey’s location (similarity 0.90)
• Extreme asymmetry in vulnerability transforms war into hunting or slaughter (similarity 0.90)
• Radical protection from death transforms war into one-sided slaughter or hunting (similarity 0.89)
• The hunter-state model redefines armed violence around pursuing prey rather than fixed territory. (similarity 0.89)
• Militarized manhunting combines warfare and policing into a new state violence (similarity 0.87)
• Accepted zero-risk killing would collapse just war theory (similarity 0.83)
• Terror’s content is hunting objective enemies once real ones are exterminated (similarity 0.83)
• Zero-risk warfare implies radical inequality in the value of lives (similarity 0.81)
• Remote weapons make war unilateral with deaths confined to the enemy side (similarity 0.81)
• Drone warfare replaces combat’s duel with a hunter-prey hide-and-seek structure (similarity 0.80)
• Drone-weaponized remote control radicalizes war into one-sided killing from safe zones (similarity 0.80)
• A legal hybrid of war and policing grants a global license to kill (similarity 0.80)
• Armed drones make killing a priori one-directional, converting combat into slaughter. (similarity 0.79)

Broader Connections

• Manhunting replaces Clausewitz’s duel with a hunter-prey asymmetry #expands (0.80) — Grégoire Chamayou, A Theory of the Drone, 171
• Radical protection from death transforms war into one-sided slaughter or hunting #corroborates (0.65)
• Extreme asymmetry in vulnerability transforms war into hunting or slaughter #corroborates (0.65) — Grégoire Chamayou, A Theory of the Drone, 332