The seemingly eternal problem of “collateral damage” to unintended civilian targets is examined from multiple perspectives in a book edited by Cornell’s Matthew Evangelista, “The American Way of Bombing” (Cornell University Press, 2014).

Subtitled “Changing Ethical and Legal Norms, from Flying Fortresses to Drones,” the book is co-edited by Henry Shue, a former Cornell philosophy professor, who also contributes a chapter on the 1991 bombing of Iraq.

Eleven other authors – including military historians and practitioners of aerial bombardment, legal experts (civilian and military), political scientists and anthropologists – explore the evolution of bombing “norms.”

 Evangelista, the President White Professor of History and Political Science, writes in the book’s introduction: “The authors focus mainly on the United States – the world’s preeminent military power and one of the most frequently engaged in air warfare – because we expect that its behavior has influenced normative change in this domain and will continue to do so. The United States sets the standard for bombing practices and remains the focus of efforts to change those practices.”

With the proliferation of remotely piloted aerial vehicles (drones), Evangelista writes, “air power has taken on new forms. Several of our authors address the challenges that drones, as well as more thoroughly automated killing machines, pose to the existing legal regime.”