Use of Armed Drones: Legal and practical considerations

The international media, on an almost weekly basis, mention targeted killings of so-called terrorists in Yemen, Somalia, or Pakistan by drones deployed by distant States, such as the United States and Israel. States reach for armed drones because of their free-ranging capacity to eliminate human targets anywhere in the world. The world has become an open battlefield without borders, and so-called ‘armed drones’ kill enemy individuals without there being a declaration of war. There seems to be no turning back for the logic of the use of drones. Therefore, the actual challenge is not to delegitimize the use of drones (since it now is a declared policy). Rather, the challenge is to regulate this practice. This Analysis focusses on the most important rules of public international law applying to drone attacks.

Crédit photo: drone de type Predator de l’US Air Force
(Source : Robert Huffstutter/Licence Creative Comons)