The Man Behind the Drone War

Editor's Note: My apologies for the extremely light posting of late.  I've been hit by the perfect storm of a major crisis in my day job, and the apparent death of my home computer.  Hopefully at least one of the two will be resolved in the near future to allow for the resumption of more regular postings.

In the meantime, over the weekend The Washington Post published an interesting account of "Roger," the head of the CIA's Counterterrorism Center (CTC) and architect of the Drone War.  Among the more interesting pieces of information (which are naturally limited given the sensitivity of the subject) is that while posted abroad, "Roger" fell in love with a Muslim woman and converted to Islam in order to marry her. 

Ah, the crazy things we do for love . . . although it apparently hasn't inhibited him from blowing al-Qa'ida operatives and other militants to smithereens at an impressive rate.

Drone Casualties Less Than Believed?

An interesting report by the Associated Press claiming that the number of civilians killed by U.S. drone strikes in Pakistan is much lower than claimed by Pakistani opponents of the campaign, as well as other media reporting, a subject I've discussed previously.
Although the AP's methodology is still somewhat inexact, they come up with the same figure for total casualties as reported by Pakistani intelligence.  Yet the AP reporters find that, excluding one attack that allegedly killed 38 civilians on March 17, 2011, Pakistani villagers interviewed say 90 percent of the victims of all other people killed were militants.  Conversely, the London-based "Bureau of Investigative Journalism" has claimed the percentage of militants killed is roughly 70 to 80 percent. 

Debating the Drone Wars

Two pieces appeared last weekend raising questions about the U.S. global targeted killings campaign against al-Qa'ida and its affiliates.

In the Los Angeles Times, Doyle McManus asks "Who Reviews the U.S. Kill List?", citing the lack of transparency regarding how the CIA selects targets for drone strikes.  Although I'm reasonably confident that virtually all such strikes are justified, it is not unreasonable to suggest there be greater pre-attack Congressional oversight when the government seeks to target an American citizen. 

On Sunday, the London Sunday Times published "Bureau of Investigative Journalism" (BIJ)'s claim that between 282-535 civilians have been killed by drone strikes during the Obama administration, including more than 60 children.  The BIJ also claims that at least ten times rescuers have been targeted in follow-on strikes, and that U.S. drones have struck funerals as well.

While potentially troubling, this report should be taken with a grain of salt.  Drone strikes occur in regions of Pakistan generally unaccessible to Western journalists, so these reports inevitably rely on unverifiable local sources who may have an incentive to boost the civilian casualty figures.  Even if journalists did have access to the Federally Administered Tribal Areas, the extremists targeted by these strikes do not wear uniforms, making it extremely difficult to differentiate between tribal fighters and civilians in the wake of an attack.  Moreover, senior leaders of these terror networks frequently surround themselves with civilians specifically in the hopes of deterring a U.S. strike.  In such a case, the laws of war place moral culpability for civilian casualties on the the targeted leader using them as shields rather than on the attacker.

To be sure, there undoubtedly have been collateral deaths as a result of our targeted killing campaign in the FATA.  Even if we accept the New America Foundation's lower estimate of 145-313 civilian deaths over the same time period as the BIJ report, it reasonable to say that roughly 300 civilians have been killed over this time.  Yet when one looks at the history of warfare or considers the number of civilians likely to be killed in a terrorist strike emanating from the FATA (i.e. the Tehrik-i-Taliban's attempted car bombing of Times Square in May 2010), 100 civilians killed per year -- although tragic for those families -- is not a particularly remarkable figure.

That being said, if rescuers or funerals are being intentionally targeted, this is problematic both from a legal and strategic perspective, as it risks exacerbating a backlash by Pakistanis not aligned with the terror networks whose cooperation is necessary for targeting certain groups.  But again, given that the reports are dependent upon "local researchers," there is absolutely no way to verify these claims.

Meanwhile, in Pakistan (January 2012 edition)

An interesting report from Reuters claiming how a network of Pakistani "spotters" are assisting in U.S. drone strikes in Waziristan.  Two major caveats to this story:

1. First, the headline is misleading, as stating "How Pakistan Helps the U.S. Drone Campaign" implies this cooperation is officially sanctioned by the ISI or other senior elements of the Pakistani army.  Although the story alludes to Pakistani and U.S. intelligence officers meeting to determine whom to target, this does not imply similar Pakistani control over the spotters who locate these targets.  In other words, it is entirely possible that these may be operatives recruited by our intelligence agencies for observation/targeting purposes wholly outside the Pakistani military's chain of command, as was the case with the local agents who assisted in intelligence collection leading up to SEAL Team Six's Abbottabad raid (and whom were subsequently arrested by the ISI).  They could be officially sanctioned, but I don't think the case made by the reporter's sole Pakistani source support the certainty of the headline.
2. Second, in the bottom half of the story, the reporter notes: "It was impossible to verify the [Pakistani] source's claims and American experts, who decline to discuss the drone program, say the Pakistanis' cooperation has been less helpful in the past."  In other words, the entire report should be taken with a grain of salt.

Yet even if the reporting here may be dubious, clearly our targeting efforts are reliant on some indigenous support, as it is highly improbable to think that U.S. personnel could travel in Pakistan's tribal areas with the freedom of movement necessary to execute this campaign.

In the meantime, last Thursday it was announced that Aslam Awan, a "senior operations organizer" for al-Qa'ida was killed in a drone strike on January 10.  This was a separate operation from the January 12 strike that was intially alleged to have killed Hakimullah Mehsud, a claim that Pakistani officials have stepped away from since the early reports.

My apologies if my lag in posting created any confusion on this point.

On Drones and Arms Races

International law professor and blogger Kenneth Anderson -- possibly the most articulate commentator on the legality of drones and targeted killings -- offers some interesting assessments on two articles on drones and targeted killings from his perch over at The Volokh Conspiracy.

I'm rushing through my to-do list (including pre-posting a slew of historical posts) so that I can hit the road for the holidays, so will defer full commentary until a later date.

However, Anderson attempts to answer a question raised by Adam Entous and Julian Barnes' piece in the Wall Street Journal as to whether the United State is triggering an arms race in drones.  Although Anderson's analysis is interesting, he is overthinking this.  As someone whose (sadly, never-to-be-published) doctoral dissertation was on arms races, the spread of drone technology is similar to the spread of dreadnoughts prior to World War I.  After the war, some historians claimed it was a mistake for Great Britain to introduce this technology, as it inspired other competitors (especially Germany) to follow suit, and therefore mooted Britain's overwhelming lead in conventional wooden ships. 

In fact, John Abizaid made this argument in response to a question I asked regarding . . . well, okay, I forgot what I asked that prompted his response . . . at a national security seminar at Harvard in 2000 or 2001 when he was a three-star and the J-5 for the Joint Chiefs.

But in reality, Japan and the United States' navies were already experimenting with all big-guns designs by the time Great Britain christened the HMS Dreadnought in 1906.  Had the British navy not introduced this class of ship when they did, others would have.  Similarly, even had the U.S. military and intelligence agencies never developed its extensive drone capabilities, the basic technology of unmanned flight is fairly diffuse, and would have been put toward military applications by a potential competitor eventually regardless of U.S. actions.