Hellfire from Paradise Ranch: On the Front Lines of Drone Warfare

Front Cover
Univ of California Press, Mar 3, 2020 - Social Science - 296 pages

In this intimate and innovative work, terror expert Joseba Zulaika examines drone warfare as manhunting carried out via satellite. Using Creech Air Force Base near Las Vegas as his center of study, he interviews drone operators as well as resisters to the war economy of the region to expose the layers of fantasy on which counterterrorism and its self-sustaining logic are grounded. 

Hellfire from Paradise Ranch exposes the terror and warfare of drone killings that dominate our modern military. It unveils the trauma drone operators experience, in part due to their visual intimacy with their victims, and explores the resistance to drone killings in the same apocalyptic Nevada desert where nuclear testing, pacifist militancy, and Shoshone tradition overlap.

Stunning and absorbing, Zulaika offers a richly detailed account of how we continue to manufacture, deconstruct, and perpetuate terror.

 

Selected pages

Contents

Slaughterhouse359 17
1
Fantasy and the Art of Drone Assassination
51
Drone Wars Returning from the Future
85
The Killer as Voyeur
111
A Harsh and Dreadful Love
151
Obamas Troy Kill Me a Son
189
Acknowledgments
225
Bibliography
263
Index
281
Copyright

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Hellfire from Paradise Ranch: On the Front Lines of Drone Warfare
Joseba Zulaika
Limited preview - 2020

Common terms and phrases

Aaronson Abdulrahman Achilles Afghanistan Air Force al-Awlaki al-Qaeda Anwar Area 51 arrested asked assassination atomic Awlaki Bacevich Barack Barack Obama became believe Berrigan bomb Cabana Catholic Worker Cian Westmoreland civilians Cockburn Code Pink combat counterterrorism counterterrorist Creech Air culture death Dorothy Day drone attacks drone operators drone pilots drone program drone strikes drone warfare Ellsberg Emphasis in original enemy fantasy father Frank Guantánamo Hiroshima Homer human hunter hunting Iliad Iraq Kelly killer knew Las Vegas lives Madley Martin Mazzetti military murder Muslim narrative Nasser national security Nevada desert Nevada Test Site nuclear NYU School officials Pakistan Pauc plot political Predator president protesting Quoted in Shane robots Scahill School and NYU secret SENSOR Slahi soldier Stanford Law School Taliban targeted killing terrorism terrorists tion told torture trauma Vegas victims Vietnam War on Terror weapons wrote Yemen York Žižek Zulaika

About the author (2020)

Joseba Zulaika received his licentiate in philosophy from the University of Deusto, Spain, in 1975, his M.A. in social anthropology from Memorial University of Newfoundland, Canada, in 1977 and his Ph.D. in cultural anthropology from Princeton in 1982. He has taught at the University of the Basque Country, at the University of California, Santa Barbara, and at the University of Nevada, Reno, since 1990, where he is currently affiliated as a researcher with the Basque Studies program.

Bibliographic information

TitleHellfire from Paradise Ranch: On the Front Lines of Drone Warfare
AuthorJoseba Zulaika
PublisherUniv of California Press, 2020
ISBN0520329740, 9780520329744
Length296 pages
Subjects ›  › 

Political Science / Terrorism
Social Science / Anthropology / Cultural & Social
Social Science / Violence in Society
  
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