Assassins and Drones

Modern day terrorists mostly seek to cause mass civilian casualties so, at first glance, those old time Assassins don't seem to fit the definition because they had carefully selected targets which they picked off one at a time. The Anarchists were like that too. I think what qualifies both of them as terrorists is that they targeted well known political leaders, usually in a public place in broad daylight. The message they seemed to be sending was that if they want to get you, they will get you, and you never know who might be the next target. They weren't trying to terrorize the whole population, just the leadership of their enemies, or potential enemies.

The more I think about it, I disagree with National Geographic's designation of the Boston Tea Partiers as terrorists. Nothing that I have ever read about them suggests that they were trying to terrorize anybody. They were protesting the tea tax by destroying the tea, which made them protesters, activists, and maybe vandals, but not terrorists.

I agree with what you said before about terrorists pissing people off more than they are terrorizing them, at least in the U.S. You'd think that they would have figured out by now that, every time they launch an attack, there will be retaliation. I honestly don't know what those guys are hoping to accomplish anymore. Maybe they're just slow learners.

I think the main attraction of drones is that they don't risk American lives. Also, I think they have an agreement with Pakistan to not send U.S. troops into their territory, and drones aren't troops. They do indeed care if somebody shoots one of them down, though. For one thing, those things aren't cheap and, for another thing, they don't want them falling into the wrong hands. I remember awhile back when some country, I think it was Syria, shot down one of our drones, recovered it pretty much intact, and were bragging about it. Obama must have been concerned about this because he asked them to please give it back. They must have had a good laugh over that one!

Drones aren't just for bombing anymore either, they're really good for surveillance, which is the polite term for spying. They have developed some small ones that resemble kids' toys, but they have high tech cameras in them. They say that they just want them to spy on criminals, but nobody believes that. Pretty soon those things will be buzzing around all over the place bothering decent people, if they aren't already. I have not seen any around here, just on television, so maybe they don't work so well in the cold and snow, or maybe there is nothing going on around here that they are interested in, at least not yet.