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Stanford-NYU Report: Drone Attacks Illegal, Counterproductive
trbdavies writes "In 'Living Under Drones,' investigators from Stanford and NYU Law Schools report on interviews with 130 people in Pakistan about U.S.-led drone attacks there, including 69 survivors and family members of victims. The report affirms Bureau of Investigative Journalism numbers that count '474 to 884 civilian deaths since 2004, including 176 children' while 'only about 2% of drone casualties are top militant leaders.' It also argues that the attacks violate international law and are counterproductive, stating: 'Evidence suggests that US strikes have facilitated recruitment to violent non-state armed groups, and motivated further violent attacks One major study shows that 74% of Pakistanis now consider the U.S. an enemy.'"
Well, I guess it's time to hang up the drones, and dust of the ICBMs.
Without the baseline information the summary is clearly propaganda.
John McAfee 'It was like that time I hired that Bangkok prostitute; to do my taxes, while I fucked my accountant'
And it would help to stop being brown and start worshipping Jesus.
I love Jesus, except for his foreign policy.
And it would help to stop being brown and start worshipping Jesus.
Jesus was brown.
Bah!
If the US was interested in following the spirit (if not the letter) of the law, then you wouldn't have things like "Special Rendition". That the US use drone attacks in a country where it doesn't even have a "police action" going on is not surprising. This is just an example of the "Same ol' same ol' ..Ends justifies the means" that has been used for decades (if not since the beginning of the 20th century).
.. I know .. anti-american foreigner and all that. Been there, heard the criticism and got the free T-shirt. But if you won't listen when your friends say "Woooo dude .. that's way out of line there", then pretty soon you aren't going to have any friends left.
And yes
I am Slashdot. Are you Slashdot as well?
On the other hand the Pakistan Military allowed the US to use Pakistani airbases for the drone strikes until 8 months ago, requested increased use of drone attacks in 2008, still offer tacit support for the drone attacks, and have themselves said most of those killed in drone strikes were terrorists, despite the political inconvenience of admitting this (by contrast, Pakistan always denied their connection to terrorists working against India in Kashmir, even when the connection was obvious).
The souring of relations with Pakistan centers on the raid on bin Laden, and just the natural friction between the US and a nation with a record of selling nuclear secrets on the black market, supporting the Taliban, and supporting terrorist actions against India.
Slashdot: providing anti-social weirdos a soapbox, since 1997.
Maintaining the network would be impossible. The Taliban (or whoever) just kills the family of whoever is supposed to do the tech work to keep the network up.
paintball
"illegal", no. The aerial bombing (the bombers being unmanned is irrelevant) of Pakistan would be an act of war were it not being done with the permission of the Pakistani government (they are neither trying to shoot down the bombers nor filing official complaints with the UN). As it is being done with permission, it is legally a bilateral Pakistani and USA affair. It is, unfortunately, not a violation of USA law and evidently not a violation of Pakistani law either. Until the givernment of Pakistan tries to stop it by, at minimum, formally demanding that it stop it is not legally anyone else's business (which is not to say it is not wrong: it is).
Warning: this article may contain humor, sarcasm, parody, and perhaps even irony. Read at your own risk.
Dissatisfaction with the current incompetent administration != hatred of the USA
Is the Pakistani government an enemy of the US and often works against US interests?
Yes.
Is the Pakistani government an ally of the US that shares intelligence with the US and often allows US military to operate on Pakistani soil?
Yes.
Isn't that schizophrenic?
Yep.
Like the US, Pakistan has an elected government. Unlike the US, it has governmental organs that aren't fully under the control of civilian elected officials. The Pakistani military and intelligence services are independent national institutions (Egypt is this way as well) and within those institutions you have various fiefdoms and power centers. The Egyptian military is this way as well, almost forming a distinct society within the society with its own economic and social welfare programs.
Imagine you have a country governed by warlords. There might be some order of precedence or honor which theoretically unifies the country, but still some of the those warlords might be your "friends" and others your enemies. There's nothing mystifying about that. Now imagine those petty rulers aren't warlords who control territory, but bureaucrats that control various state functions. It's not that different.
Post may contain irony: discontinue use if experiencing mood swings, nausea or elevated blood pressure.
And this right here folks is why Americans shouldn't be allowed at the grown-ups' table.
Yes you can "play by the rules" and get the right result. In fact, in Ireland it was only once the British really stopped breaking the rules and adopted a more respectful pose that they made progress. Not playing by the rules just gives ammunition and recruits to your opponents - after all they're painting you as the aggressor here.
How many civilian casualties would have been OK for a drone strike on Timothy McVeigh? Should the Brits have bombed areas of Belfast? How about some extraordinary rendition for anyone who gave money to NORAID (a US based fund directly given to the IRA)?
Drone strikes like these don't reduce the number of enemies - they increase them. Every innocent civilian killed (and they are to be presumed innocent until proven guilty) is a klaxon call to take up arms. When fathers and brothers are killed, who do you think people turn to when they need a new guiding figure in their lives? Would you accept the deaths of your spouse and children because they were in the same region as a terrorist?
Acting like you're some kind of cowboy sheriff isn't going to fix things. This isn't the wild west - it's a country of hundreds of millions of people. Going in guns blazing just makes you the enemy to more and more people, and all the time the terrorists can hold up pictures of the dead innocents as proof that you are the indeed the great Satan that they claim.
You know there are two reasons why the police get hauled over the coals when they break the rules. The first is that people, even guilty ones, have rights. But the second reason is to protect the police themselves: Once they are seen to be corrupt their legitimacy shatters. When this happens they lose the support of the ordinary people, who will stop complying with them. This leads to a total breakdown of law and order, as has been seen countless times across (eg) African nations.
So play by the rules. Breaking them is immoral, it is repugnant, and even worse than all that: It doesn't work.
I guess I don't understand your point. Let's say you are completely correct; so what? Aren't we, as Americans, supposed to hold ourselves to higher standards of behavior, particularly in terms of tolerance of different races and belief systems? Saying that a militant theocracy acts in a certain horrific way doesn't mean we get to act that way, too;. it means that it's a good thing we're not a militant theocracy. Additionally, criticizing another nation for not adhering to our standards of behavior seems pointless to me, while criticizing ourselves for the same reason seems like a good idea.
What am I missing?
His point is that drawing equivalency between persecutions of Muslims in the US vs. Christians in Pakistan is ridiculous. Calling drone actions by the gov't as persecution of Muslims when civilians are hit is illogical as well, as Christians can just as easily be "collateral damage"
*gets asbestos suit on, affixes thermally resistant aluminum tape hat*
By that reasoning, it could be stated "I don't feel sorry for 'civilians' working for the financial entities behind the abuses in our country"
Just thought I should point that out. The twin tower destruction plan was a strategic one, as well as a terrorist attack. Bin Laden may have been an assfuck, but he wasn't a completely stupid one. He chose the trade center because it was a symbol of american led international business activity; something he directly associated with the continuing problems he saw in his part of the world.
The (suspected) muslims in this thead are right: the problem is the US's insatiable desire to control foriegn markets to hold up a faulted domestic business model. That model? "Cheap energy and heavy consumerism are A-OK, and need to continue forever, no matter what the price."
Want to see the hate in the middle east dry up? Multilateral withdrawl of all financial and military interests in the middle east by *all* western powers.
They will exhaust their resources, and poof... dry up and blow away.
The US won't get as many terrorists, we won't have to keep killing brown people, and things will be way better politically.
Oh, but then it would cost you 10$/gal to fill your hummer?
What a shame.
When I read a couple years ago that a strike had killed "mostly" militants, then the next day bombed everyone at the funeral... I felt suddenly empty. Who in their right mind would NOT think badly of the country responsible?
I love my country and consider myself quite patriotic, but these drone attacks are shameful. They should be stopped. Aside from the obvious moral imperative, there is the practicality of it: every time we kill another "al-Qaeda #2" with these cowardly half-blind strikes from the sky we create many more enemies.
Why do I hear so little protest here in the US? What can the average Joe do to raise hell about it?
And where is the press on all this? I'm tired of hearing about Mitt Romney's taxes and President Obama's birth certificate. Let's get real.
We've met the enemy...
I think his point is that the vast majority of Muslims living in America are not actually harassed for their religion. Unlike Christians in Pakistan, who are harassed daily, to the point of being kidnapped, raped, and murdered.
I don't know if he is right, but I believe that is his point.
"First they came for the slanderers and i said nothing."
Also remember that what the Obama administration means when it says "militant", is a man or a boy killed by a drone. It will revert that to civilian if it is conclusively proven after the fact the person was innocent by some mystical secret standard. In other words, a great many of the "militants" really weren't.
http://www.nytimes.com/2012/05/29/world/obamas-leadership-in-war-on-al-qaeda.html?pagewanted=4&_r=2
from page 4
What changed under Obama? Nothing Good
There's no claim that this was a random survey. From the article:
These interviews provided useful information about various things, such as the "double tap" attacks on rescuers:
and the psychological effect of living in an area targeted for aerial attacks:
I think you're confusing "idiots" with "tyrants". Stripping us of our civil liberties without without triggering a revolt or even widespread protests is hardly the accomplishment of an idiot.
--- Most topics have many sides worth arguing, allow me to take one opposite you.