http://edition.cnn.com/2009/POLITICS/05/18/cia.pakistan.airstrikes/index.html
Do you think that the US airstikes in Pakistan are effective from military, diplomatical, political points of view?
Maybe the experts and decision makers in the CIA and the Pentagon don't understand these arguments? Unlikely. But for them international image of the USA is not an issue at all. Apparently the CIA hasn't other means at own disposal and the strikes are a confession that the CIA hasn't a net of local agents in respective areas of Pakistan.
U.S. airstrikes aimed at al Qaeda leaders in Pakistan have been "very effective," with few civilian deaths as a result, CIA Director Leon Panetta said Monday in a rare public acknowledgment of the raids.
Asked about criticism of the missile attacks by counterinsurgency experts, Panetta said he did not want to discuss specifics, "but I can assure you that in terms of that particular area, it is very precise and is very limited in terms of collateral damage."
"Very frankly, it's the only game in town in terms of confronting or trying to disrupt the al Qaeda leadership," Panetta told the Pacific Council on International Policy in Los Angeles.
Pakistan has complained repeatedly about what it says are airstrikes on its territory by U.S.-operated drones.
Asked about criticism of the missile attacks by counterinsurgency experts, Panetta said he did not want to discuss specifics, "but I can assure you that in terms of that particular area, it is very precise and is very limited in terms of collateral damage."
"Very frankly, it's the only game in town in terms of confronting or trying to disrupt the al Qaeda leadership," Panetta told the Pacific Council on International Policy in Los Angeles.
Pakistan has complained repeatedly about what it says are airstrikes on its territory by U.S.-operated drones.
Two leading former advisers on counterinsurgency warfare, David Kilcullen and Andrew Exum, wrote in The New York Times over the weekend that the strikes have killed about 14 terrorist leaders in the past three years -- but Pakistani sources say the civilian death toll could be as high as 700.
...
While U.S. officials dispute that ratio, Kilcullen and Exum wrote, "Every one of these dead noncombatants represents an alienated family, a new desire for revenge and more recruits for a militant movement that has grown exponentially even as drone strikes have increased."
"The persistence of these attacks on Pakistani territory offends people's deepest sensibilities, alienates them from their government and contributes to Pakistan's instability," Kilcullen and Exum said. They compared the tactics to British bombardment of the same region in the 1920s and French airstrikes on Algeria in the 1950s, arguing that the strikes were likely to remind Pakistanis of colonial rule.
...
While U.S. officials dispute that ratio, Kilcullen and Exum wrote, "Every one of these dead noncombatants represents an alienated family, a new desire for revenge and more recruits for a militant movement that has grown exponentially even as drone strikes have increased."
"The persistence of these attacks on Pakistani territory offends people's deepest sensibilities, alienates them from their government and contributes to Pakistan's instability," Kilcullen and Exum said. They compared the tactics to British bombardment of the same region in the 1920s and French airstrikes on Algeria in the 1950s, arguing that the strikes were likely to remind Pakistanis of colonial rule.