Abstract

At the end of his book about the aerial war in Germany and Englandduring World War II, Dietmar Süss concludes that since then the kill-ing of civilians has always been tactically and strategically taken intoaccount in war (Süss, 2011, 581). According to the author, the readinessto attack enemy cities and to accept the fear, defenselessness, and thedeath of the local population has been part of the arsenal of ideas in-forming aerial warfare theory, and the fate of the population is usuallynot a matter of debate. In his book, he has unearthed all the available testimony from people on both sides of the air war and illuminated the rather underexposed perspective of those who have experienced the difficult conditions of aerial warfare.The following essay is a reflection on the air war, and its technical evolution into the drone war, in relation to traditions of storytelling,female handicraft, and Afghan carpet culture. I will compare different ways of critiquing the drone war, namely interventions through the humanities on the one hand and contemporary art on the other, as well as handknotted rugs.