research paper on psychological warfare

Psychological Dimensions of Drone Warfare

• Published: 14 September 2017
• Volume 38 , pages 1285–1296, ( 2019 )

Cite this article

• Alaa Hijazi 1 ,
• Christopher J. Ferguson 2 ,
• F. Richard Ferraro 5 ,
• Harold Hall 3 ,
• Mark Hovee 4 &
• Sherrie Wilcox 6  

4471 Accesses

14 Citations

1 Altmetric

Explore all metrics

The use of weaponized drones or “unmanned aerial vehicles” (UAVs) has become increasingly widespread and controversial over the past few decades. The current paper reviews the state of the research regarding the potential psychosocial impact of weaponized drones on operators and target populations and communities. It is concluded that research regarding the impact of drones in the psychological literature remains limited and most discussion of drones’ impact has taken place in the public policy and legal/ethical spheres, often by entities invested in condoning or condemning the use of drones. The limited available data addresses potential new challenges to the well-being of drone operators, factors influencing decision making regarding the use of drones, and the impact on target communities. The current paper neither condones nor condemns the use of drones, but is advanced as a state of the research and a call for additional objective and empirical analysis on this relatively new form of warfare.

This is a preview of subscription content, log in via an institution to check access.

Access this article

Price includes VAT (Russian Federation)

Instant access to the full article PDF.

Rent this article via DeepDyve

Institutional subscriptions

Similar content being viewed by others

Self-Driving Vehicles—an Ethical Overview

Community-oriented policing to reduce crime, disorder and fear and increase satisfaction and legitimacy among citizens: a systematic review.

Understanding the Relationship between Urban Public Space and Social Cohesion: A Systematic Review

Adams, R., & Barrie, C. (2013). The bureaucratization of war: Moral challenges exemplified by the covert lethal drone. Ethics & Global Politics, 6 (4), 245–260.

Article   Google Scholar  

Amnesty International. (2013). Will I be next? US drone strikes in Pakistan. Retrieved from https://www.amnestyusa.org/reports/will-i-be-next-us-drone-strikes-in-pakistan/ .

Associated Press (2008). Remote–control warriors suffer war stress. NBC News. Retrieved from http://www.nbcnews.com/id/26078087/#.U2e_tPmSySo .

Bandura, A., Barbanelli, C., Caprara, G. V., & Pastorelli, C. (1996). Mechanisms of moral disengagement in the exercise of moral agency. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 71 , 364–374.

Basoglu, M. (2012). Drone strikes or mass torture? – A learning theory analysis. Retrieved from http://metinbasoglu.wordpress.com/2012/11/25/drone-warfare-or-mass-torture-a-learning-theory-analysis/ .

Basoglu, M., Livanou, M., & Crnobaric, C. (2007). Torture vs. other cruel and, inhuman, and degrading treatment; Is the distinction real or apparent? Archives of General Psychiatry, 64 , 277–285. https://doi.org/10.1001/archpsyc.64.3.277 .

Article   PubMed   Google Scholar  

Blass, T. (1999). The Milgram paradigm after 35 years: Some things we now know about obedience to authority. Journal of Applied Social Psychology, 29 (5), 955–978.

Byman, D.L. (2013). Why Drones Work: The Case for Washington's Weapon of Choice. Retrieved from http://www.brookings.edu/research/articles/2013/06/17-drones-obama-weapon-choice-us-counterterrorism-byman .

CBSnews.com (2013). http://CBSnews.com . Accessed 12 September 2017.

Callam, A. (2010). Drone wars: Armed unmanned aerial vehicles. International Affairs Review, 18. Retrieved from http://www.iar-gwu.org/node/144 .

Canetti-Nisim, D., Halperin, E., Sharvit, K., & Hobfoll, S. E. (2009). A new stress-based model of political extremism: Personal exposure to terrorism, psychological distress, and exclusionist political attitudes. Journal of Conflict Resolution, 53 , 363–389.

Center for Civilians in Conflict (2010). Civilian harm and conflict in Northwestern Pakistan. Retrieved from http://civiliansinconflict.org/uploads/files/publications/civilian_harm_in_nw_pakistan_oct_2010.pdf .

Center for Civilians in Conflict and Human Rights Clinic at Columbia Law School (2012). The civilian impact of drones: Unexamined costs, unanswered questions. Retrieved from http://civiliansinconflict.org/uploads/files/publications/The_Civilian_Impact_of_Drones_w_cover.pdf .

Chapelle, W., & McDonald, K. (2011). Occupational health stress screening for remotely piloted aircraft & intelligence (distributed common ground system) operators [PowerPoint slides]. Retrieved from http://www.airforcemag.com/.../Reports/2012/.../RPA_pilot_screening.pptx .

Chapelle, W., Goodman, T., Reardon, L., & Thompson, W. (2014a). An analysis of post-traumatic stress symptoms in United States Air Force drone operators. Journal of Anxiety Disorders, 28 , 480–487. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.janxdis.2014.05.003 .

Chapelle, W., McDonald, K., Prince, L., Goodman, T., Ray-Sannerud, B., & Thompson, W. (2014b). Assessment of occupational burnout in United States Air Force predator/reaper “drone” operators. Military Psychology, 26 , 376–385. https://doi.org/10.1037/mil0000046 .

Chappelle, W., McDonald, K., & MacMillan, K. (2011a). Important and critical psychological attributes of USAF MQ-1 predator and MQ-9 reaper pilots according to subject matter experts. Wright-Patterson AFB, Ohio: Airforce Research Laboratory.

Chappelle, W., Salinas, A., & McDonald K. (2011b). Psychological health screening of remotely piloted aircraft (rpa) operators and supporting units. Department of Neuropsychiatry, USAF School of Aerospace Medicine: Wright-Patterson Air Force Base, OH.Common Dreams. (Sep 28 2012). Drones are the top cause of Anti-Americanism. Retrieved from http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2012/09/28/hina-rabbani-khar-drones_n_1922637.html .

Chappelle, W., McDonald, K., Thompson, B., & Swearengen, J. (2012). Prevalence of high emotional distress, symptoms of post-traumatic stress disorder in U. S. Air Force active duty remotely piloted aircraft operators (2010 USAFSAM survey results) (technical report AFRL-SA-WP-TR-2013-0002). OH: U. S. Air Force School of Aerospace Medicine: Wright-Patterson AFB.

Common Dreams (2012). https://www.commondreams.org/news/2012/09/28/pakistan-foreign-ministerdrones-are-top-cause-anti-americanism . Accessed 12 September 2017.

Cronin, A. K. (2013). Why drones fail: When tactics drive strategy, Foreign affairs. Retrieved from http://www.foreignaffairs.com/articles/139454/audrey-kurth-cronin/why-drones-fail .

Cummings, M. L., How, J. P., Whitten, A., & Toupet, O. (2012). The impact of human–automation collaboration in decentralized multiple unmanned vehicle control. Proceedings of the IEEE, 100 (3), 660–671.

Deltek (2012). http://iq.govwin.com/corp/downloads/Deltek-Unmanned-Aerial-Systems.pdf . Accessed 12 September 2017.

Deri, A. R. (2012). "Costless" war: American and Pakistani reactions to the U.S. Drone war. Intersect, 5 , 1–16.

Google Scholar  

Drescher, K. D., Foy, D. W., Kelly, C., Leshner, A., Schutz, K., & Litz, B. (2011). An exploration of the viability and usefulness of the construct of moral injury in war veterans. Traumatology, 17 , 8–13. https://doi.org/10.1177/1534765610395615 .

Drew, C. (2010). Study cites drone crew in attack on Afghans. The New York Times. Retrieved from http://www.nytimes.com/2010/09/11/world/asia/11drone.html?drone-strikes .

Ferguson, C. J. (2015). Do angry birds make for angry children? A meta-analysis of video game influences on children’s and adolescents’ aggression, mental health, prosocial behavior and academic performance. Perspectives on Psychological Science, 10 , 646–666.

Fitzsimmons, S., & Sangha, K. (2010). Killing in high definition. Technology, 12 , 289–292.

Flora, D. B. (1985). Battlefield stress: Causes, Cures and Countermeasures: DTIC Document. http://www.dtic.mil/dtic/tr/fulltext/u2/a162098.pdf . Accessed 12 September 2017.

Gellman, B. & Miller, G (2013). “U.S. spy network’s successes, failures and objectives detailed in “black budget” summary” http://www.washingtonpost.com/world/national-security/black-budget-summary-details-us-spy-networks-successes-failures-and-objectives/2013 .

Getmansky, A., & Zeitzoff, T. (2014). Terrorism and voting: The effect of rocket threat on voting in Israeli elections. American Political Science Review, 108 , 588–604.

Government Accountability Office. (2014). Actions needed to strengthen management of unmanned aerial system pilots. Retrieved from: http://www.gao.gov/products/GAO-14-316 .

Gregory, D. (2011). From a view to a kill: Drones and late modern war. Theory, Culture & Society, 28 , 188–215. https://doi.org/10.1177/0263276411423027 .

Hall, H. V., & Ebert, R. (2002). Violence prediction: Guidelines for the forensic practitioner, Second Edition . Springfield: Charles C. Thomas.

Hall, H. V., & Pritchard, D. A. (2002). Workplace violence risk analysis: Effective prediction and intervention strategies . Kamuela: Pacific Institute for the Study of Conflict and Aggression.

Hall, H. V., & Whitaker, L. C. (Eds.). (1999). Collective violence: Effective strategies for assessing and intervening in fatal group and institutional aggression . Boca Raton: CRC Press.

Hancock, P. A., & Krueger, G. P. (2010). Hours of boredom, moments of terror: Temporal desynchrony in military and security force operations: DTIC document. http://ctnsp.dodlive.mil/files/2013/07/DTP-078.pdf Accessed 12 September 2017.

Herman, J. L. (1997). Trauma and recovery: The aftermath of violence- from domestic abuse to political terror . New York: Basic Books.

Human Rights and Conflict Resolution Clinic (2012). Living under drones: Death, injury, and trauma to civilians from US drone practices in Pakistan. New York: at Stanford Law School and Global Justice Clinic at NYU.

Human Rights Watch (2013). Between drones and Al-Qaeda: The civilian cost of US targeted killings in Yemen. Retrieved from http://www.hrw.org/sites/default/files/reports/yemen1013_ForUpload_1.pdf .

Kakar, P. (2004). Tribal law of Pashtunwali and women’s legislative authority. Retrieved from Harvard Law School's website : http://www.law.harvard.edu/programs/ilsp/research/kakar.pdf .

Keirsey, D. (1998). Please understand me: Temperment, character, intelligence . Del Mar: Prometheus Nemses Book Company.

Keirsey, D. (2002). A modern guide to the four Temperments . Del Mar: Archer Publications.

Litz, B. T., Stein, N., Delaney, E., Lebowitz, L., Nash, W. P., Silva, C., & Maguen, S. (2009). Moral injury and moral repair in war veterans: A preliminary model and intervention strategy. Clinical Psychology Review, 29 , 695–706. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.cpr.2009.07.003 .

Long War Journal (2017). Pakistan Strikes. Retrieved from: http://www.longwarjournal.org/pakistan-strikes/ .

Lyall, J. (2013). Dynamic coercion in civil war: Evidence from air operations in Afghanistan. Working Paper.

Lyall, J., Blair, G., & Imai, K. (2013). Explaining support for combatants during wartime: A survey experiment in Afghanistan. American Political Science Review, 107 , 679–705.

MacNair, R. M. (2002). Perpetration-induced traumatic stress: The psychological consequences of killing . Westport: Praeger.

Maguen, S., Metzler, T. J., Litz, B. T., Seal, K. H., Knight, S. J., & Marmar, C. R. (2009). The impact of killing in war on mental health symptoms and related functioning. Journal of Traumatic Stress, 22 , 435–443. https://doi.org/10.1002/jts.20451 .

Maguen, S., Lucenko, B. A., Reger, M. A., Gahm, G. A., Litz, B. T., Seal, K. H., et al. (2010). The impact of reported direct and indirect killing on mental health symptoms in Iraq war veterans. Journal of Traumatic Stress, 23 , 86–90. https://doi.org/10.1002/jts.20434 .

Maguen, S., Luxton, D. D., Skopp, N. A., Gahm, G. A., Reger, M. A., Metzler, T. J., & Marmar, C. R. (2011). Killing in combat, mental health symptoms, and suicidal ideation in Iraq war veterans. Journal of Anxiety Disorders, 25 , 563–567. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.janxdis.2011.01.003 .

Marine Corps Warfighting Publication 3–33.5 (2007). Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 2007, paragraph 7.44.

McCloskey, M. (2009). The war room: Daily transitions between battle, home takes toll on drone operators. Stars and stripes. Retrieved from http://www.stripes.com/news/the-war-room-daily-transition-between-battle-home-takes-a-toll-on-drone-operators-1.95949 .

Milgram, S. (1974). Obedience to authority; an experimental view . New York: Harper & Collins.

Miller, G. (2012). Drone wars: Are remotely piloted aircraft changing the nature of war? Science, 336 , 842–843.

Moraski, J. (2002). Leadership: The personality factor. Marine corps combat development command, Naval War College, Quantico, Virginia.

Myers, Isabel Briggs, Mary H. McCaulley, Naomi Quenk, and Allan Hammer (1998) MBTI Handbook: A Guide to the development and use of the Myers-Briggs Type Indicator Consulting Psychologists Press, 3rd edition. https://www.amazon.com/MBTI-Manual-Development-Myers-Briggs-Indicator/dp/0891061304 Accessed 12 September 2017.

Mynatt, C., & Sherman, S. J. (1975). Responsibility attribution in groups and individuals: A direct test of the diffusion of responsibility hypothesis. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 32 , 1111–1118. https://doi.org/10.1037/0022-3514.32.6.1111 .

New American Foundation. (2017). International Security Data Site. Retrieved from: http://securitydata.newamerica.net/ .

Ortega, H. (2012). Challenges n monitoring and maintaining the health of pilots engaged in telewarfare. Medical Surveillance Monthly Report, 20 (3), 2.

Otto, J. L., & Webber, B. J. (2013). Mental health diagnoses and counseling among pilots of remotely piloted aircraft in the United States Air Force. Medical Surveillance Monthly Report, 20 (3), 3–8 Retrieved from http://www.afhsc.mil/ .

PubMed   Google Scholar  

Ouma, J., Chappel, W., & Salinas, A. (2011). Facets of occupational burnout among U.S. air Force active duty and National Guard/reserve MQ-1 predator and MQ-9 reaper operators. Retrieved from: https://timemilitary.files.wordpress.com/2013/04/pages-from-pages-from-msmr_mar_2013_external_causes_of_tbi.pdf .

Pennebaker, J. W. (1999). The effects of traumatic disclosure on physical and mental health: The values of writing and talking about upsetting events. International Journal of Emergency Mental Health, 1 (1), 9–18.

Pew Research Center (2012). Pakistani public opinion ever more critical of U.S. Pew Research Center Publications. Retrieved from http://www.pewglobal.org/2012/06/27/pakistani-public-opinion-ever-more-critical-of-u-s/ .

Pryer, D. A. (2013). The rise of the machines: Why increasingly “perfect” weapons helps perpetuate our wars and endanger our nation. Military Review, 14–24. http://usacac.army.mil/CAC2/MilitaryReview/Archives/English/MilitaryReview_20130430_art005.pdf . Accessed 12 September 2017.

Reprieve (2013a). Drones: No safe place for children. Retrieved from http://www.reprieve.org.uk/media/downloads/2013_04_04_PUB_drones_no_safe_place_for_children.pdf .

Reprieve (2013b). Drones in Yemen causing a ‘psychological emergency’, psychologist tells MPs. Retrieved from http://www.reprieve.org.uk/press/2013_03_05_ drones_in_yemen_psychological_emergency/.

Royakkers, L.M.M. and Q. van Est (2010) The cubicle warrior: The marionette of digitalized warfare. Ethics and Information Technology 12 , 289–296.

Schogol, J. (2012). Demand grows for UAV pilots, sensor operators. Air force times. Retrieved from http://www.airforcetimes.com/article/20120421/NEWS/204210318/Dema%20nd-grows-UAV-pilots .

Speaker's Briefing. (2013). Speaker's Briefing: Psychological terror? Lessons from Pakistan and YemenWashington, DC: Author.

Stein, N. R., Mills, M. A., Arditte, K., Mendoza, C., Borah, A. M., Resick, P. A., the STRONG STAR Consortium, et al. (2012). A scheme for categorizing traumatic military events. Behavior Modification, 36 , 787–807. https://doi.org/10.1177/0145445512446945 .

van der Kolk, B. A., Roth, S., Pelcovitz, D., Sunday, S., & Spinazzola, J. (2005). Disorders of extreme stress: The empirical foundation of a complex adaptation to trauma. Journal of Traumatic Stress, 18 , 389–399. https://doi.org/10.1002/jts.20047 .

Vargas, A. F., Hanson, T., Kraus, D., Drescher, K., & Foy, D. (2013). Moral injury themes in combat veterans’ narrative responses from the National Vietnam Veterans’ readjustment study. Traumatology, 19 , 243–250. https://doi.org/10.1177/1534765613476099 .

Wall, T., & Monahan, T. (2011). Surveillance and violence from afar: The politics of drones and liminal security-scapes. Theoretical Criminology, 15 (3), 239–254. https://doi.org/10.1177/1362480610396650 .

Wallach, M. A., Kogan, N., & Bem, D. J. (1964). Diffusion of responsibility and level of risk taking in groups. The Journal of Abnormal and Social Psychology, 68 , 263–274. https://doi.org/10.1037/h0042190 .

Webber, D., Schimel, J., Martens, A., Hayes, J., & Faucher, E. (2013). Using a bug-killing paradigm to understand how social validation and invalidation affect the distress of killing. Personality and Social Psychology Bulletin, 39 , 470–481. https://doi.org/10.1177/0146167213477891 .

Wilcox, S. L., & Rank, M. G. (2013). Transitioning through the deployment cycle. In B. A. Moore, J. E. Barnett, B. A. Moore, J. E. Barnett (Eds.) , Military psychologists' desk reference (pp. 306-311). New York, NY, US: Oxford University Press. https://doi.org/10.1093/med:psych/9780199928262.003.0063

Wilcox, S. L., Oh, H., Redmond, S. A., Chicas, J., Hassan, A. M., Lee, P.-J., & Ell, K. (2015). A scope of the problem: Post-deployment reintegration challenges in a national guard unit. WORK: A Journal of Prevention, Assessment, and Rehabilitation, 50 (1), 73–83. https://doi.org/10.3233/WOR-141935 .

Williams, B. G. (2013). Predator: The CIA's drone war on al Qaeda . Washington DC: Potomac Books.

Book   Google Scholar  

Wilson, G.I. (2011). The psychology of killer drones. Retreived from: http://fabiusmaximus.com/2011/09/28/29263/ .

Wood, D. (2013). Obama drone war ‘kill chain’ imposes heavy burden on at home. Huffington post. Retrieved from http://www.huffingtonpost.com/david-wood/obama-drone-war_b_3149660.html .

Woods (2012). Drone strikes in Yemen: The civilian massacre the U.S. neither confirms or denies. Bureau of Investigative Journalism. Retrieved from http://www.thebureauinvestigates.com/2012/03/29/the-civilian-massacre-the-us-will-neither-confirm-nor-deny/ .

Yousufzai, H. M., & Gohar, A. (2005). Towards understanding Pukhtoon Jirga. Retrieved from Justice Peace International: http://peace.fresno.edu/docs/Pukhtoon_Jirga.pdf .

Zimbardo, P. G., Sword, R. M., & Sword, R. K. M. (2012). The time cure: Overcoming PTSD with the new psychology of time perspective therapy . San Francisco: Jossey Bass.

Download references

Author information

Authors and affiliations.

American University of Beirut, Beirut, Lebanon

Alaa Hijazi

Department of Psychology, Stetson University, 421 N. Woodland Blvd, DeLand, FL, 32729, USA

Christopher J. Ferguson

Pacific Institute Study Conflict & Aggression, Kamuela, HI, USA

Harold Hall

George Fox University, Newberg, Oregon, USA

University of North Dakota, Grand Forks, North Dakota, USA

F. Richard Ferraro

Uniformed Services University of the Health Sciences, Bethesda, MD, USA

Sherrie Wilcox

You can also search for this author in PubMed   Google Scholar

Corresponding author

Correspondence to Christopher J. Ferguson .

Ethics declarations

Conflict of interest.

None to declare.

Ethical Approval

All procedures performed in studies involving human participants were in accordance with the ethical standards of the institutional and/or national research committee and with the 1964 Helsinki declaration and its later amendments or comparable ethical standards.

Additional information

Division 48 Presidential Task Force, 2013–2014: Research Agenda for the Psychology of Weaponized Unmanned Aerial Vehicles (Drones)

Rights and permissions

Reprints and permissions

About this article

Hijazi, A., Ferguson, C.J., Richard Ferraro, F. et al. Psychological Dimensions of Drone Warfare. Curr Psychol 38 , 1285–1296 (2019). https://doi.org/10.1007/s12144-017-9684-7

Download citation

Published : 14 September 2017

Issue Date : October 2019

DOI : https://doi.org/10.1007/s12144-017-9684-7

Share this article

Anyone you share the following link with will be able to read this content:

Sorry, a shareable link is not currently available for this article.

Provided by the Springer Nature SharedIt content-sharing initiative

• Unarmed aerial vehicles
• Target communities
• Find a journal
• Publish with us
• Track your research

Academia.edu no longer supports Internet Explorer.

To browse Academia.edu and the wider internet faster and more securely, please take a few seconds to  upgrade your browser .

Enter the email address you signed up with and we'll email you a reset link.

• We're Hiring!
• Help Center

Psychological Warfare, Japanese

Related Papers

THE RISE AND FALL OF THE JAPANESE EMPIRE PART III

Jean Sénat Fleury

Japan's road to war began many decades before the attack at Pearl Harbor. At the end of 1800, the Japanese decided to expand Japan's territory in Asia. According to the Japanese officials, this decision would help the country to get resources that it would need, particularly oil. Japan's desire to build a modern industrial civilization drove it through politics of extension. Near the turn of the twentieth century, the Japanese embarked on a period of aggressive expansion to change the trajectory of their nation isolated from the rest of the world for much of its history. Nationalist Japanese leaders believed that Western powers such as United States, Britain, France, and Russia had enacted tariffs that prevented Japan from accessing natural resources that it needed to develop its industrial capacity. At the end of July 1894, Japanese troops attacked Chinese forces that out posted the peninsula of Korea. Four days later, on August 1, 1894, Japan declared war on China.

1914-1918-Online. International Encyclopedia of the First World War

Rustin Gates

This article discusses Japan’s war aims during the First World War, as well as the different policy approaches Japanese leaders employed to achieve those aims. It explores Japan’s entrance into the war on the side of its ally Britain, its military actions against German possessions in the Asia-Pacific, and the fulfillment of its war aims, which included securing and expanding imperial interests in China and taking its place as a world power.

Elliott Ford

Oxford Illustrated History of World War II, Richard Overy, editor

Japanese Foreign policy in the early XX century

Fidan Ibadova

Since the early twentieth century, Japan has made significant progress in terms of foreign policy. Speaking of Japan's foreign policy, we can mention three main alliances. 1902 Anglo-Japanese Union, 1940 Germany-Italy-Japan Union and finally 1951 USJapan Pacific Security Union. When analyzed as strategic cooperation agreements that determine the main direction of Japan's foreign policy in this century, we see the existence of a common Japanese great strategic thinking. Japan's foreign policy in the twentieth century The rapid growth of Japanese capitalism was accompanied by aggressive wars. The geographical proximity of giant but weak China and the distance of major rivals gave Japanese capitalism a certain advantage. It was especially easy and convenient for the Japanese imperialists to plunder the Chinese people. As a result of the Sino-Japanese War of 1894-1895, Japan defeated and plundered China. However, the Japanese imperialists began to prepare for influence in the Far East. Japan tried to seize China's northeastern provinces (Manchuria) Korean and Japanese imperialists also dreamed of capturing Russian lands - the Sakhalin Islands and even the entire Russian Far East. In 1902, Japan entered into an alliance with Britain to prepare for war with Russia. Japanese spies and scouts flooded Russia's Far East. Merchants, hairdressers, etc. demonstrated the location, actions and combat readiness of military units under his leadership. Japan is well prepared for war, and it has received British and American support. Landless and lowland peasants worked on other people's lands. At that time, Japan was one of the world's leading producers of copper ore and metal. The Portuguese were the first Europeans to come to Japan. Later, the arrival of English and Dutch people in this country intensified. Japan's trade relations with European countries were gradually developing. In the middle of the century, Shogun issued a decree declaring Japan a "closed country." After the end of the First World War, Britain, the Netherlands and the United States began to oppress Japan. They demanded that the country's borders be opened to foreign trade, threatening to put Japan in China's shoes. Thus, Japan was forced to abandon the policy of "closure".

THE RISE AND FALL OF THE JAPANESE EMPIRE (PART VIII)

Soon after Japan withdrew from the League of Nations, its armed aggression began to spread across the subcontinent. Its army began the invasion of Jehol and continued to neighboring Manchuria.6 The Japanese forces occupied Hopei and created a demilitarized zone in the North of this region. They then took control of many regions near the Great Wall of China while maintaining their main garrisons around Tianjin.7 The Japanese began to concretize their policy goals: military expansion on the continent, naval control of the western Pacific, Southeast Asian sea lanes, and equalization of relations with the Great Powers.

Pamięć i Sprawiedliwość

Michał A Piegzik

The Greater East Asia Co-Prosperity Sphere ( 大東亜共栄圏– Daitōa Kyōeiken) was a pan-Asian concept of the political and economic order in East Asia, implemented by the government of the Empire of Japan. This ideology is closely connected with the expansionist policy of Japan in 1931–1945 and an attempt to subjugate other Asian nations, including those that were under the colonial rule of the Western powers. Despite many comparisons to the parallel development of the Nazi concept of the Lebensraum, Daitōa Kyōeiken was a doctrine of completely different ideological assumptions and methods of accomplishment. Both ideas were to be abandoned in 1945 when the Axis powers were finally defeated in the greatest conflict of the 20th century.

Gabriel van Oppen Ardanaz

This paper analyzes Japanese Strategic Culture as a story of different phase. Focusing mostly on the post- Second World War pacifism, this paper argues Japan might be in the midst of major changes to its Strategic Culture in light of emerging threats to its National Security.

THE RISE AND FALL OF THE JAPANESE EMPIRE (PART IX)

By the summer of 1941, the Japanese took advantage of the overthrow of the French government by the Nazis and its replacement by the puppet Vichy regime. They expanded their empire with the conquest of Vietnam, Cambodia, and Laos. The occupation of French Indochina not only put the Japanese army just across the water from Luzon, but also threatened to cut all supply to Chiang Kai-shek’s Kuomintang government based in Chongqing. For the next months, step-by-step, Japan’s conquest of territories in the Pacific continued. The next major decision was the attack of the American Pacific Fleet at Pearl Harbor.

THE RISE AND FALL OF THE JAPANESE EMPIRE (PART X)

In the six months following Pearl Harbor nothing seemed to stop Japan’s advance in the Pacific. As tensions rose between Tokyo and Washington, Japanese troops invaded several islands, looking to take control of their natural resources. On December 8, 1941, they attacked Guam in the Mariana Islands. Japanese troops then attacked the Philippines. The Japanese launched the invasion by sea from Formosa, over 200 miles (320 km) north of the Philippines, and on December 8, 1941, landed on Luzon.

RELATED TOPICS

•   We're Hiring!
•   Help Center
• Find new research papers in:
• Health Sciences
• Earth Sciences
• Cognitive Science
• Mathematics
• Computer Science
• Academia ©2024

Taking the toll of Drake and Kendrick Lamar's vicious, gripping psychological warfare

In the waning moments of Drake 's "The Heart Part 6," the isolated Toronto plutocrat, deflated and humbled, waves the white flag. With the latest song (at the time this was written) in a string of diss tracks on which he has butted heads with Kendrick Lamar , dating back to March, when Lamar appeared on Future and Metro Boomin 's "Like That," he seems to all but tip over his king on the chessboard, but not before complaining about the rules of engagement: "Just let me know when we're gettin' to the facts / Everything in my s*** is facts / I'm waitin' on you to return the favor," he says, addressing Kendrick directly.

There are no favors in beef, and one of Drake's great miscalculations in this situation was thinking that he and Kendrick were playing the same game. In pursuit of the scandalous scoop, both artists seemed to lose sight of the opponent, thinking primarily about the impressions. When Pusha T changed the state of play for Drake — and the rest of us — forever with "The Story of Adidon," which turned the classic battler form into a Maury episode, he opened the door for "truth-telling" as an effective mode in an arena made for tricksters and spin artists. This has led to a rap climate that mirrors our political one — disinformation campaigns and murky intelligence coloring perception wars waged online, as isolated audiences filtered into the same arena to spectate. But they weren't just bearing witness, they were taking part.

For years now, the archetypes that Drake and Kendrick Lamar embody have been fixed in public opinion. On To Pimp a Butterfly 's "Hood Politics," Kendrick, our era's chosen rap sage, presented himself as a galvanizing force: "Less you askin' me about power, yeah, I got a lot of it / I'm the only n**** next to Snoop that can push the button," he rapped, as if in command of a cultural nuclear arsenal. On For All the Dogs ' "Stories About My Brother," Drake, the perpetually paranoid rap king, seemed to look out over his castle walls and see an impending siege: "N***** so down bad, they makin' alliances up / Cliquin' up with haters that was thinkin' of signin' to us," he rapped, implying a mutiny was afoot, orchestrated by a cabal of envious, impotent debtors.

Both of those perceived realities came to a striking head over the weekend, as a bubbling feud between the two biggest rappers of a generation reached its tipping point. In a new turn for this kind of exercise, the final exchanges between them played out at breakneck speed, with songs disseminated as YouTube links or posted straight to social media. It's a beef that expected a certain inside-baseball knowledge, and even then your mileage may vary depending on how familiar you are with names like Chubbs, Cash, Duval Timothy or Dave Free, and what Delilah means to you. But that tangle of background players could not disrupt the mass appeal of such a furiously entertaining sequence of attacks from the headliners.

When Kendrick released the frenzied rant raps of "euphoria" last Tuesday, it could have been another relatively isolated shot across a frosty battlefield, but then he took a page from the Drake playbook, not waiting for a response before following with the accusatory, clock-watching Instagram exclusive "6:16 in LA" on Friday morning, starting a chain of five songs released in a 72-hour span. That night, Drake dropped the epic heel turn "Family Matters," only to have all momentum undercut by the Kendrick response, the morose intervention "meet the grahams," which was out less than an hour later. With the upper hand, Kendrick doubled up again by dropping the floating, coast-rallying knockout punch "Not Like Us" Saturday afternoon; Drake's unofficial concession arrived Sunday night. Across these songs, Kendrick overwhelmed his opponent with a blitzing game plan, and the story he told was more compelling than Drake's.

Charting the beef and assessing its blast radius tells us a lot about how rap drama in 2024 feeds off narrative distortion. As a neutral observer long critical of Drake, I found something about this whole thing exhausting. From the beginning, the terms of it pointed in a specific direction: the built-in projections of the two stars overlapping in perfect harmony to cast a particular judgment against him. (I wrote weeks ago that playing this game could only diminish him.)

There is some tension between what Drake is owed and what he deserves. He has been too omnipresent, too excessive, too unprincipled, and his machinelike consumption at the commercial apex of hip-hop's food chain has bred a lingering desire to see him shamed and discredited. Kendrick, as a more private figure with a scrappy disposition and a perceived moral authority, is the perfect candidate for such a ceremonial execution. It was fair for Drake, having learned the importance of oppo research from his battle with Pusha, to believe that, in playing the game on those terms, he would be graded on the same scale, and the truth of that puts me in an uncomfortable alignment with the self-proclaimed 6 God, who should be taken down a peg (or two) after stepping on everyone else on his way to the top.

The bad blood between these two traces back more than a decade, to Kendrick's frag grenade verse on Big Sean 's "Control," which prompted a yearslong cold war between the artists as they became heavyweights in different spheres. Drake was drawn into open conflict with Kendrick now, not simply by the "Like That" verse, which was more of a scattershot than a snipe, but by a throng of former Drake collaborators rallying around producer Metro Boomin in its wake to share his disdain: The Weeknd , Rick Ross and A$AP Rocky have all taken their whacks as if lining up beneath a piñata. In view of this onslaught, Drake used his initial response, "Push Ups," to reframe the attacks as peons revolting against their master, and he framed his purported lead over Kendrick as a numbers game, his usual tactic. Cocksure and swaggering, he depicted Kendrick's former TDE label boss Top as a slave driver to whom the rapper was still paying dues. Drake suggested that all of the acclaim Kendrick has received was merely to spite him, and he ended with a comparative analysis of the two stars as mainstays and earners.

By this stage, J. Cole , the other (lesser) target of Kendrick's "Like That" verse, had bowed out of any potential conflict and left his two peers to hash it out themselves. The move affirmed what some of us already suspected: That beef is only for a particular kind of unrelenting rapper, and that Drake and Kendrick, as the two left in the ring, solidified their dyadic bond at rap's poles. The beef became about awareness early on — Cole realized his limits, and Drake saw an opportunity. With "Push Ups," he put Kendrick in the middle of a conspiracy to unseat him as the sole rap front-runner, situating his rival within the rest of the pack ("You ain't in no big three, SZA got you wiped down / Travis got you wiped down / Savage got you wiped down") and implying that he was only emboldened by the strength in numbers.

Believing he had the high ground, Drake circled back with "Taylor Made Freestyle," a bizarre bit of roleplay in which he donned voice filters for Kendrick's OGs, Tupac and Snoop Dogg , trying to goad him into a response, suggesting the Compton MC wanted out of a squabble he started. A cease-and-desist from the Tupac estate got the song taken down from social platforms, which felt like a mercy for all of us — not only was it cringe-worthy and stilted, it felt particularly poorly timed .

It took nearly two weeks for Kendrick to finally respond with the venomous "euphoria" last week, but he immediately shifted the stakes from pissing contest to grudge match. Kendrick identified a demarcation line between them as artists ("electrifying vs. pacifying," explaining away the numbers disparity) before presenting himself as the inheritor of all of Drake's ongoing beefs, including those of Pusha and Pharrell Williams , drawing from that well of negativity to boost his own spite. "This ain't been about critics, not about gimmicks, not about who the greatest / It's always been about love and hate, now let me say: I'm the biggest hater," he taunts before rattling off everything Drizzy does to irritate him: the way he talks and dresses, the sneak dissing, the use of ghostwriters, his depoliticized and convenient relationship with his Blackness. The song's rambling quality is fueled by the intensity of its animus, which turned what once felt like unnecessary playacting into unavoidable score-settling.

View this post on Instagram A post shared by Kendrick Lamar(@kendricklamar)

Kendrick's designation of Drake as a "master manipulator" in "euphoria" was a psychological ploy to paint Drake as the deceiver facing a straight shooter, which set the table for "6:16 in LA." In the wake of Drake's AI identity swap, the song took advantage of what felt like an unscrupulous embrace of manipulation technology, saying Drake is running a rap PSYOP online to defame him, one that couldn't even work because Kendrick is in the streets, beyond the reach of the internet, and because those in Drake's employ are plotting his demise.

You can hear warnings on both Kendrick songs not to "take it there" — "there" being the crossed boundary of "fabricated family stories" — because he would take it further. Drake did not heed them: The multi-part muckraking "Family Matters" is a layered, if grim, attempt to penetrate a seemingly impenetrable reputation by pulling the thread at its center. Locked in and blustering, he tries to undermine Kendrick's high-minded image by stripping him of his activist bonafides (something Kendrick all but abandoned on his last album, Mr. Morale & the Big Steppers ), and, true to Kendrick's prediction, attacking on the homefront, punctuated by accusations that Kendrick abused his partner. It's an impressive attempt, demonstrating Drake at the peak of his technical and narrative powers — versatile, vindictive and machiavellian.

But before the weight of those allegations could really take hold, "meet the grahams" had dropped a bigger bomb: With listless energy seemingly built to undercut the gleefully malicious tone of "Family Matters," its verses directly address Drake's parents, his son, a faceless daughter that Kendrick suggests Drake has been neglecting and, finally, Drake himself. The tactic within the song itself isn't far from Pusha's, but its effectiveness is in its counteroffensive, the speed and sharpness of the rebuttal, its prescience and its outward omniscience. The maneuver itself was masterful.

And yet it took Kendrick only a few hours to one-up himself with "Not Like Us." The song seemed to hammer home the highlights from previous disses — Drake's weird relationships with underage girls, the sus-ness and dysfunction of his OVO crew, his extensive history as swag "colonizer" in Atlanta — as Kendrick reps Compton and America, pitting Drake as a cultural interloper, all while using his own strategy of generating a diss your adversary will be forced to hear out in the club. By this point, you could hear victory in Kendrick's voice, embodying all the showboating of a bat flip after a walk-off home run. It's impossible to bounce back from being called a groomer and a carpetbagger over a slapping Mustard beat that sounds as if it's conjuring the spirits of West Coast legends. As a response, "The Heart Part 6" couldn't sound more foiled and defensive.

By the rapid volley that defined this beef over the weekend, nothing was too illicit for mudslinging. It didn't really matter what was true, only what could draw the biggest reaction. That has always been the nature of beef, but the sadism is now amplified by our endless gaggle of livestreaming armchair clout stalkers and bloodthirsty digital storm chasers. (There were many moments where real-time discourse seemed to be shaping the beef, Akademiks debuted the CDQ version of "Push Ups" when it leaked, and commentators like DJ Vlad seemed to be hovering around the periphery.) The pageant is more consequential than the rapping now. Eventually, the one-upmanship was predominantly theatrical and, sadly, the women on both sides — Whitney Alford, Sandra Graham, Rihanna , Millie Bobby Brown and all the unnamed others treated as asides — became collateral damage in a dirt-digging operation with no purpose beyond keeping score. Whether or not lines were crossed (if you want to say so I wouldn't hold it against you), the slander isn't really about accountability at all; it is merely about the attention grabbed by greater and greater provocation. Even if everything they said was true, neither man would see the other held responsible for his actions, as evidenced by the ways they've dealt with the abusers they already know .

If there is any fact that has been truly revealed by all this, it is that Drake fatigue is real and palpable, not just among rappers but listeners as well, and most don't care what the repercussions of seeing him fall are. When Kendrick rapped that he represented what the culture was feeling on "euphoria," the response seemed to bear that out in earnest. I would make a case for "Family Matters" as the best song and diss to come out of this whole thing (with there being a strong argument for "Not Like Us," too), but Drake is operating from a disadvantage and his problems are twofold: He is the more known commodity with glaring flaws that have been talking points on the record for years, and many are simply ready to see him lose no matter what he does.

That shouldn't be read as a defense of Drake. There are no rules in beef, and the blowback here is the result of years of chickens coming home to roost for one of rap's most unsavory characters, his many calculated heel turns establishing the cottage industry of solitude he formed at the top. As much as anything, this is a lesson in reaping what is sowed. But it is interesting that, as everyone collectively decided the basis for this beef would be "facts," one rapper faced a higher burden of proof than the other.

Beneath the more sensational claims made by both artists were open secrets that still need addressing on both sides. Drake called into question Kendrick's moral superiority and his radical positioning. Consult his comments on Mike Brown, or his support of R. Kelly , or his own albums absolving Michael Jackson or signal-boosting Kodak Black. Kendrick called into question Drake's predatory behavior and a creative opportunism ceaselessly in service of self-interest. It is the latter that not only brought this barrage to Drake's doorstep in the first place but also induced a noxious atmosphere where everything he says feels like self-serving agitprop, and that is why he is now slouching back to his corner defeated.

With this beef more or less settled for the audience, it does seem like the appropriate time to reevaluate the general rules of engagement. I, for one, do not want the form to devolve into a game of feed-dumping, rewarding whoever can turn around songs the quickest or best harness the power of an algorithmic skew toward the sensational. The public decides who wins these, and if the public is scrolling, we're doomed. I'd like to see less "fact-finding," and let's do away with the AI stunts.

But if you can forget about the ramifications for a second, it's hard not to walk away from the experience somewhat invigorated simply because it feels like we've finally introduced some suspense back into the rap race. Clashes of this magnitude are rare. What began as histrionics became something more; for a time it even felt revelatory, and now perhaps hip-hop can experience entropy again. No matter what else is true or untrue, the circumstances set in motion were real. How else do we get Kendrick to take a break from invocation to just get busy? How else do we get a long-overdue Drake humbling? Only the spectacle of a spat this suggestive and high-profile could so dramatically upend the state of affairs — for better and worse. Perhaps some rules must be broken, some chaos instigated, to avoid the game feeling rigged forever.

Copyright 2024 NPR

• Share full article

Advertisement

Supported by

Kendrick Lamar vs. Drake Beef Goes Nuclear: What to Know

The two rappers had circled one another for more than a decade, but their attacks turned relentless and very personal in a slew of tracks released over the weekend.

By Joe Coscarelli

The long-building and increasingly testy rap beef between Kendrick Lamar and Drake exploded into full-bore acrimony and unverifiable accusations over the weekend. Both artists rapid-fire released multiple songs littered with attacks regarding race, appropriation, sexual and physical abuse, body image, misogyny, hypocrisy, generational trauma and more.

Most relentless was Lamar, a Pulitzer Prize winner from Compton, Calif., who tends toward the isolated and considered but has now released four verbose and conceptual diss tracks — totaling more than 20 minutes of new music — targeting Drake in the last week, including three since Friday.

Each racked up millions of streams and the three that were made available commercially — “Euphoria,” “Meet the Grahams” and “Not Like Us” — are expected to land near the top of next week’s Billboard singles chart, while seeming to, at least momentarily, shift the public perception of Drake, long a maestro of the online public arena and meme ecosystem .

In between, on Friday night, Drake released his own broadside against Lamar — plus a smattering of other recent challengers — in a teasing Instagram interlude plus a three-part track and elaborate music video titled “Family Matters,” in which he referred to his rival as a fake activist and attempted to expose friction and alleged abuse in Lamar’s romantic relationship.

But that song was followed within half an hour by Lamar’s “Meet the Grahams,” an ominous extended address to the parents and young son of Drake, born Aubrey Graham, in which Lamar refers to his rival rapper as a liar and “pervert” who “should die” in order to make the world safer for women.

Lamar also seemed to assert that Drake had more than a decade ago fathered a secret daughter — echoing the big reveal of his son from Drake’s last headline rap beef — a claim Drake quickly denied on Instagram before hitting back in another song on Sunday. (Neither man has addressed the full array of rapped allegations directly.)

On Tuesday, a security guard was shot and seriously injured outside of Drake’s Toronto home, which appeared on the cover art for Lamar’s “Not Like Us.” Authorities said they could not yet speak to a motive in the shooting, but the investigation was ongoing. Representatives for Drake and Lamar did not immediately comment.

How did two of the most famous artists in the world decide to take the gloves off and bring real-life venom into an extended sparring match for rap supremacy? It was weeks, months and years in the making, with a sudden, breakneck escalation into hip-hop infamy. Here’s a breakdown.

Since late March, the much-anticipated head-to-head seemed inevitable. Following years of “will they or won’t they?” lyrical feints, Lamar hit directly on record first this year during a surprise appearance on the song “Like That” by the Atlanta rapper Future and the producer Metro Boomin, both formerly frequent Drake collaborators.

With audible disgust, Lamar invoked the track “First Person Shooter” from last year’s Drake album, “For All the Dogs,” in which a guest verse from J. Cole referred to himself, Drake and Lamar as “the big three” of modern MCs.

Lamar took exception to the grouping, declaring that there was no big three, “just big me.” He also called himself the Prince to Drake’s Michael Jackson — a deeper, more complex artist versus a troubled, pop-oriented hitmaker.

“Like That” spent three weeks at No. 1 on the Billboard Hot 100, as Future and Metro Boomin released two chart-topping albums — “We Don’t Trust You” and “We Still Don’t Trust You” — that were anchored by a parade of Drake’s past associates, each of whom seemed to share a simmering distaste toward the rapper, who later called the ambush a “20 v. 1” fight.

In early April, J. Cole fought back momentarily , releasing the song “7 Minute Drill,” in which he called Lamar overrated, before backtracking, apologizing and having the song removed from streaming services. But Drake soon picked up the baton, releasing a wide-ranging diss track called “Push Ups” less than a week later that addressed the field, with a special focus on Lamar’s height, shoe size and supposedly disadvantageous business dealings.

Less than a week later, Drake mocked Lamar’s lack of a response on “Taylor Made Freestyle,” a track released only on social media. It featured Drake taunting Lamar for being scared to release music at the same time as Taylor Swift and using A.I. voice filters to mimic Tupac and Snoop Dogg imploring Lamar to battle for the good of the West Coast.

“Since ‘Like That,’ your tone changed a little, you not as enthused,” Drake rapped in an abbreviated third verse, as himself. “How are you not in the booth? It feel like you kinda removed.” (“Taylor Made Freestyle” was later removed from the internet at the request of the Tupac Estate.)

But it was a seemingly tossed-off line from the earlier “Push Ups” that included the name of Lamar’s longtime romantic partner — “I be with some bodyguards like Whitney” — that Lamar would later allude to as a red line crossed, making all subject matter fair game in the songs to come. (It was this same alleged faux pas that may have triggered an intensification of Drake’s beef with Pusha T in 2018.)

How We Got Here

Even with Drake-dissing cameos from Future, Ye (formerly Kanye West), Rick Ross, the Weeknd and ASAP Rocky, the main event was always going to be between Drake, 37, and Lamar, 36, who have spent more than a decade subtly antagonizing one another in songs while maintaining an icy frenemy rapport in public.

In 2011, when Drake introduced Lamar to mainstream audiences with a dedicated showcase on his second album, “Take Care,” and an opening slot on the subsequent arena tour, the tone was one of side-eying competition. “He said that he was the same age as myself/and it didn’t help ’cause it made me even more rude and impatient,” Lamar rapped on “Buried Alive Interlude” of his earliest encounter with a more-famous Drake. (On his Instagram on Friday, Drake released a parody of the track, citing Lamar’s jealousy since then.)

The pair went on to appear together on “Poetic Justice,” a single from Lamar’s debut album, “Good Kid, M.A.A.D City,” in 2012, as well as “___ Problems” by ASAP Rocky the same year.

But their collaborations ceased as Drake became his generation’s premier hitmaker across styles in hip-hop and beyond, while Lamar burrowed deeper into his own psyche on knotty concept albums that brought wide critical acclaim alongside less constant commercial success.

When asked, the two rappers tended to profess admiration for one another’s skill, but seemed to trade subtle digs in verses over the years, always with plausible deniability and in the spirit of competition, leading to something of a hip-hop cold war.

The Week It Went Nuclear

Lamar’s first targeted response, “Euphoria,” was more than six minutes long and released last Tuesday morning. In three sections that raised the temperature as they built, he warned Drake about proceeding and insisted, somewhat facetiously, that things were still friendly. “Know you a master manipulator and habitual liar too,” Lamar rapped. “But don’t tell no lie about me and I won’t tell truths ’bout you.”

He accused the biracial Drake, who was born and raised in Toronto, of imitating Black American heritage and insulting him subliminally. “I hate the way that you walk, the way that you talk, I hate the way that you dress,” Lamar said. “I hate the way that you sneak diss, if I catch flight, it’s gon’ be direct.” And he called Drake’s standing as a father into question: “Teachin’ him morals, integrity, discipline/listen, man, you don’t know nothin’ ’bout that.”

Days later, Lamar doubled down with an Instagram-only track called “6:16 in LA,” borrowing both Drake’s “Back to Back” diss tactic from his 2015 beef with Meek Mill and a song title structure lifted from what is known as Drake’s time-stamp series of raps. Opting for psychological warfare on a beat produced in part by Jack Antonoff, Swift’s chief collaborator, Lamar hinted that he had a mole in Drake’s operation and was aware of his opponent’s opposition research.

“Fake bully, I hate bullies, you must be a terrible person,” he rapped. “Everyone inside your team is whispering that you deserve it.”

That night, Drake’s “Family Matters” started with its own justification for getting personal — “You mentioned my seed, now deal with his dad/I gotta go bad, I gotta go bad” — before taking on Lamar’s fatherhood and standing as a man in excruciating detail. “They hired a crisis management team to clean up the fact that you beat on your queen,” Drake rapped. “The picture you painted ain’t what it seem/you’re dead.”

Yet in a chess move that seemed to anticipate Drake’s familial line of attack, Lamar’s “Meet the Grahams” was released almost immediately. “This supposed to be a good exhibition within the game,” Lamar said, noting that Drake had erred “the moment you called out my family’s name.” Instead of a rap battle, Lamar concluded after another six minutes of psychological dissection, “this a long life battle with yourself.”

He wasn’t done yet. Dispensing with subtlety, Lamar followed up again less than 24 hours later with “Not Like Us,” a bouncy club record in a Los Angeles style that delighted in more traditional rap beef territory, like juvenile insults, proudly unsubstantiated claims of sexual preferences and threats of violence.

Lamar, however, didn’t leave it at that, throwing one more shot at Drake’s authenticity as a rapper, calling him a greedy and artificial user as a collaborator — “not a colleague,” but a “colonizer.”

On Sunday evening, Drake responded yet again. On “The Heart Part 6,” a title taken from Lamar’s career-spanning series, Drake denied the accusation that he preyed on young women, indicated that he had planted the bad information about his fake daughter and seemed to sigh away the fight as “some good exercise.”

“It’s good to get out, get the pen working,” Drake said in an exhausted outro. “You would be a worthy competitor if I was really a predator.” He added, “You know, at least your fans are getting some raps out of you. I’m happy I could motivate you.”

Joe Coscarelli is a culture reporter with a focus on popular music, and the author of “Rap Capital: An Atlanta Story.” More about Joe Coscarelli

Explore the World of Hip-Hop

The long-building and increasingly testy rap beef between Kendrick Lamar and Drake  has exploded into full-bore acrimony .

As their influence and success continue to grow, artists including Sexyy Red and Cardi B are destigmatizing motherhood for hip-hop performers .

ValTown, an account on X and other social media platforms, spotlights gangs and drug kingpins of the 1980s and 1990s , illustrating how they have driven the aesthetics and the narratives of hip-hop.

Three new books cataloging objects central to rap’s physical history  demonstrate the importance of celebrating these relics before they vanish.

Hip-hop got its start in a Bronx apartment building 50 years ago. Here’s how the concept of home has been at the center of the genre ever since .

Over five decades, hip-hop has grown from a new art form to a culture-defining superpower . In their own words, 50 influential voices chronicle its evolution .