Drones are used as a regular part of US counterterrorism strategy to kill, rather than capture, suspects accused of taking part in terrorist activities within Pakistan. The US policy in Afghanistan and Iraq has not been questioned because the US was at war with these states and still has a military presence there but drone strikes in Pakistan have raised questions. Since Pakistan is in a state of flux primarily over security issues, governance crisis and a deteriorating law and order situation, the leadership lacks the capacity or willingness to deal with terrorists who are a threat both to the US and Pakistani interests, their people and soldiers.
Reliance on technology is an attractive idea to target terrorists and to win the war without proclaiming a new war in Pakistan following Afghanistan and Iraq. The drone strikes in Pakistan are widely challenged by both the public and politicians alike. Such strikes, despite having some great breakthroughs, are creating hatred against the US in the eyes of the layman. For the last several years there has been no legal justification offered by the US for the drone attacks. The effectiveness and success of drone attacks is considered to be the answer to all objections.
Drone attacks are immensely disliked in Pakistan. Sentiments are anchored on legal grounds like encroachment of sovereignty among the enlightened literati. So far as the common people, the hoi polloi are concerned, there is angst that drone strikes will engender an increase in suicide attacks by the Taliban targeting civilians in Pakistan. On moral and political grounds, the killing of innocent children, women and the elderly by drones is generating anti-US feelings. The US has been saying that deaths of innocents are collateral damage, unavoidable in the interests of curbing terrorism.
The drone strikes and suicide attacks have some sort of resemblance with respect to achievement of their targets, for instance the claims of effectiveness cannot be sustained when compared to collateral damage and the killing of innocent civilians including women, children and elderly people in the civilian population. This is the same logic suicide terrorists use to justify the loss of any number of civilians if their targets happen to be present among them.
The drone programme was perhaps initiated with the tacit approval of Pakistan’s security establishment. The previous government has been in consonance with the establishment on the condition that the programme eliminate the top guns of the TTP as well. The present government seems to be at odds with the security establishment in this regard. This seems to have negatively impacted civil-military relations, e.g. the Taliban time and again targeted numerous security officials, resulting in heavy national loss. The military wants stern retaliatory actions against such attacks but the present government, right from the day it came into power, has been trotting out feeble excuses of public pressure to desist from any action, which would be a violation of the sovereignty of the nation. Hence, the government is toothless to curb the activities of terrorists and is holding out an olive branch to them to come for peace negotiations, which are underway.
In spite of targeting ruthless militants, the government and its factionaries think about how to destroy the drone! The majority cadres of politicians even became furious in rhetoric simply to woo voters while addressing the public in the past. Such anti-US slogans tremendously rouse the emotions of the public resulting in great gains for such leaders in the polls. When the same politicians move from public to government corridors, they resort to equivocation as the government remains the key stakeholder in letting the US carry out drone attacks but put up a show as if they are against such done strikes. This tacit understanding with the US and putting up a different stance before the public smacks of double standards, running with the hare and hunting with the hounds so to say.
As the drone strikes have become comparatively more focused with less collateral damage, they have blown away the militant network more than anything else and hence there has been an appreciative attitude of the local people towards drone strikes than in relation to the direct military operations by the military. At least in one report by the Aryana Institute for Regional Research and Advocacy it is stated that these attacks enjoy public support in FATA and local Pashtuns welcome these attacks. It is further stated in the report that the majority of local residents considered the air strikes to be accurate.
So far, most of the top rung of the Taliban leadership has been eliminated by drone strikes. Farhat Taj, an Oslo-based contributor of this website says according to the people of Waziristan, “The only civilians who have been killed so far in the drone attacks are women or children of the militants in whose houses/compounds they hold meetings. But that, too, used to happen in the past.” In the same article she accepts that, “The Pakistani government and media take the figure appearing in the American media as an admission by the American government. The US media, too, do not have access to the area. Moreover, the area is simply not accessible for any kind of independent journalistic or scholarly work on drone attacks. The Taliban simply kill anyone trying to do so.”
In a recent UN monitor report on drone strikes, Ben Emmerson told reporters in Geneva, “The total number of recorded strikes in 2013 was down to 27 from a peak of 128 in 2010.” But perhaps, most significantly, for the first time in nine years there were no reports of civilian casualties during 2013 in the FATA area of Pakistan. “I could not infer the affairs and connection of responsibilities and liabilities by individuals primarily in the contour of politicians, bureaucrats and law enforcement agencies in Pakistan. How greedy they seem in grabbing the ‘chair’ putting aside the decisive responsibilities of their job. Where craving for power overarches responsibility there always emerges turmoil, killing and bloodshed. Everyone is engaged to get status, money and fame. If a single person dies in my presence on such positions I would forthwith quit the chair. Remorseless Pakistani monsters.”
In summation, we have to ask the serious questions: are drone strikes a bane or a boon to the terrorism-stricken people of Pakistan? Is it a necessary evil? What will be the scenario after the presence of NATO and US troops in Afghanistan is diluted? What would be the outcome of the TTP-Pakistan peace parleys? Will the ceasefire be extended? We have to keep our fingers crossed and await the developments as they take place hoping that peace will return to our land so that the government can concentrate on improving the lot of the people instead of wasting resources on fighting terrorism.
The writer is a freelance columnist and can be reached at [email protected]