Call off drone war in Pakistan, demands former US Intel Chief

[Respect4Respect01]

"The former US intelligence chief, Dennis Blair, has demanded to stop drone attacks in Pakistan.



“Call off the unilateral US drone war in Pakistan and rethink the idea of spending billions of dollars to pursue al-Qaida.” These aren’t the words of some human rights activist, or some far-left Congressman. They’re from retired admiral and former Director of National Intelligence Dennis Blair — the man who was, until recently, nominally in charge of the entire American effort to find, track, and take out terrorists. Now, he’s calling for that campaign to be reconsidered, and possibly even junked.



The drone attacks take out some mid-level terrorists, Blair said. But they’re not strategically effective. If the drones stopping flying tomorrow, Blair told the audience at the Aspen Security Forum, “it’s not going to lower the threat to the US” Al-Qaida and its allies have proven “it can sustain its level of resistance to an air-only campaign,” he said.



It’s one of many reasons why it’s a mistake to “have that campaign dominate our overall relations” with countries like Pakistan, Yemen, and Somalia. “Because we’re alienating the countries concerned, because we’re treating countries just as places where we go attack groups that threaten us, we are threatening the prospects of long-term reform,” Blair said.



The “unilateral” strikes in Pakistan have to come to an end, he added, and be replaced with operations that had the full cooperation of the government in Islamabad. The effort needed “two hands on the trigger,” Blair said. And strikes should be launched only when “we agree with them on what drone attacks” should target.



The statements won’t exactly win Blair new friends in the Obama administration, which forced him out of the top intelligence job about a year after he was nominated. Not only has Obama drastically escalated the drone war — there’ve been 50 strikes in the first seven months of this year, almost as many as in all of 2009. Defense Secretary Leon Panetta called the remotely-piloted attacks the “only game in town in terms of confronting or trying to disrupt the al-Qaida leadership.”



Plus, American relations with the Pakistani government are at their lowest point in years. And every time Washington tries to tip off Islamabad to a raid, it seems, the targets of the raid seem to conveniently skip town. No wonder the US kept the mother of all unilateral strikes — the mission to kill Osama bin Laden — a secret from their erstwhile allies in Pakistan.



But Blair believes the cooperation – not only with Pakistan, but with the government in Yemen and whatever authorities can be found in Somalia — are the only way to bring some measure of peace to the world’s ungoverned spaces. “We have to change in those three countries,” he said."

Dunya TV Print: Call off drone war in Pakistan, demands former US Intel Chief

 

[third eye]

Most Govt officials become wise after they quit.

Where were such thoughts when he was in the chair and under pressure to perform & deliver ?

 

[AgNoStiC MuSliM]

Most Govt officials become wise after they quit.

Where were such thoughts when he was in the chair and under pressure to perform & deliver ?

The statements won’t exactly win Blair new friends in the Obama administration, which forced him out of the top intelligence job about a year after he was nominated.

That would appear to indicate that he perhaps did support the position against unilateral drone strikes he has articulated here, and paid the price - much like Pakistan's Foreign Minister Qureishi did.

BTW, Dennis Blair has echoed arguments against the effectiveness of the drone strikes that some of us on this forum have been making for years now.

 

[salmakh84]

So many Pakistani's are going like WTF??? We want drones. We like to kill people without trial, even if we dont know who is actually getting killed.

Oh and i agree with the 1st comment by third eye... ppl do become wise after they quit govt... even in our country :S

 

[Jihad]

The incompetence of the government of Pakistan is the sole reason that our nation is in disarray and people are confused whether these drone strikes are effective or not, whether they're legal or under any sort of agreement.

The U.S. isn't taking the GoP serious, and there's nothing those morons running our nation can do about it, except tell our people more lies to cover up and hide their own huge shortcomings.

Where are straightforward politicians? No two-faced talkers.

These drone strikes have made us a laughing stock. And together with the U.S. raiding and killing OBL have put us even more in the negative spotlights.

I guess the people of Pakistan have alot of patience with the current government in charge.

 

[Solomon2]

Hmm, Blair didn't criticize drones' tactical effectiveness, only their strategic ineffectiveness. Yet how can any anti-terror policy can be strategically effective unless Pakistan and the U.S. share the same strategic goals? For now, they don't: Pakistan sees Afghanistan as "strategic depth" - near-anarchy to be dominated by its sponsored terror proxies - whereas the U.S. seeks an Afghanistan that is a functioning state. So like Panetta says, right now the drones are the only game in town.

 

[Meengla]

Most Govt officials become wise after they quit.
Where were such thoughts when he was in the chair and under pressure to perform & deliver ?

It may be called career-ism. Why risk your family's bread and butter by being 'objective' about issues? Most people in the world are like that.

 

[GOD OF WAR]

Hmm, Blair didn't criticize drones' tactical effectiveness, only their strategic ineffectiveness. Yet how can any anti-terror policy can be strategically effective unless Pakistan and the U.S. share the same strategic goals? For now, they don't: Pakistan sees Afghanistan as "strategic depth" - near-anarchy to be dominated by its sponsored terror proxies - whereas the U.S. seeks an Afghanistan that is a functioning state. So like Panetta says, right now the drones are the only game in town.

Now we're talking semantics... Blair criticizing the drones is a matter of debate between 'necessary cause and sufficient cause'. No one can criticize it as a weapons system, but Hill(billy) Clinton blatantly shrugging off the innocent lives lost as 'acceptable colateral damage' is just reprehensible to say the least. Secondly would u be so kind enough as to elaborate the line hi-lighted above? WHY is the US soooo desperate about have a functional government in Afghanistan when countries likes Barundi will even welcome your efforts? If it is indeed about the WOT, then why did the US refuse to accept extradition of OBL as offered by Taliban? You're not welcome in Pakistan and certainly not in Afghanstan, so what are the REAL REASONS behind ur vacation in the sand box? And please don't say its because the US wants to uphold democracy and fight terrorism or any of that crap. Its a flaw in the US foreign policy that other sovereign states don't and won't buy anymore. Please save the pseudo rightous lectures and let us know WHY Afghanistan is so important for you.

The next time you portray Pakistan as a country having vile strategic intentions in Afghanistan, take a good hard look in the mirror, and you'l discover that if the US can have strategic goals so can any other sovereign state, and deceit will only get you so far

 

[GOD OF WAR]

It may be called career-ism. Why risk your family's bread and butter by being 'objective' about issues? Most people in the world are like that.

What do you have to say about Richard Holbrooke's dying words and the inumerous papers and books written by Gen Wesley Clark. While I do agree with your take on careerism, US inteligensia are criticizing this whole WOT delusion in retrospect. Its been termed the '2nd 'Nam' and 'USSR Part 2'. Many notable US stalwarts are questioning US policy.

 

[VCheng]

What do you have to say about Richard Holbrooke's dying words.................................

“You’ve Got To Stop This War In Afghanistan”?

YOU, as in the Pakistani involvement? Why did he not say WE if he meant the US war?

I must be confused as usual.

 

[VCheng]

from: Drones in Pakistan: Out of the blue | The Economist

Drones in Pakistan
Out of the blue
A growing controversy over the use of unmanned aerial strikes

Jul 30th 2011 | Islamabad | from the print edition

ONE day in March an American drone circled above Pakistan’s North Waziristan tribal area, zeroed in on a gathering of village men, some of whom were armed, and unleashed three missiles in quick succession. It turned out to be a meeting to settle a dispute over a chromite mine. Most of the 40 or so killed were civilians, according to accounts, though a dozen Taliban also died in the attack, including a local commander, Sherabat Khan. The Taliban nowadays often adjudicate quarrels in the tribal areas, a wild buffer zone that runs along Pakistan’s border with Afghanistan.

The attack illustrated two problems with the drone war in the tribal regions: the risk of civilian casualties, and Pakistan’s ambiguous attitude towards America’s use of drones. Pakistan’s army chief, Ashfaq Kayani, called the strike a “complete violation of human rights”. For Pakistan, the difficulty went beyond civilian casualties. Khan was a lieutenant of a notable warlord, Gul Bahadur. But Pakistan considers Mr Bahadur to be a “good Taliban”, ie, one who has agreed to fight only in Afghanistan, not on Pakistani soil. After the strike, he threatened to tear up the deal.

Relations between the governments in Islamabad, Pakistan’s capital, and Washington, DC, are deeply troubled by the issue of drones. Though it publicly denounces the drone strikes, Pakistan certainly does not want all of them stopped. Indeed, the co-operation of Pakistani intelligence is crucial to employing the drones. But the army wants the number of strikes reduced, concentrating on targets both countries can agree on. America has told Pakistan bluntly it must either flush the Taliban and other jihadists out of their safe havens in North Waziristan, or it will continue with what amounts to an assassination campaign there. Pakistan says it cannot launch a ground offensive in North Waziristan because its armed forces are already stretched.

The drone attacks, a supposedly “secret” programme started by the CIA in 2004, have been ramped up over the past three years, with a record 118 strikes last year and 50 so far in 2011. The drones started under President Pervez Musharraf, the former military ruler. There were just nine strikes from 2004 to the end of 2007. According to Pakistani officials, it was supposed to be a highly selective programme for eliminating terrorist leaders in the tribal areas, under an understanding that gave the Americans the use of at least one remote Pakistani air base for the drones. The drones also take off from Afghanistan, but are operated thousands of miles away by a “pilot” at a desk in America, watching a video feed from the aircraft. A successful hit is known in the CIA as a “bugsplat”. It is all horribly like a video game.

The New America Foundation, a Washington think-tank, found that up to 2,551 people have been killed in the strikes since 2004. Based on press reports, it estimates that 80% of them were militants, rising to a pretty astonishing 95% in 2010. In recent months, there has been a move away from blowing up compounds to targeting vehicles, where militants can more easily be hit without killing civilians. Even for compounds, smaller missiles are used to try to limit the damage to the separate male living quarters. Perceptions on the ground, however, are often different. The foundation’s own poll in the tribal areas last year found only 16% believe the drones accurately target militants. But many locals privately support the strikes against extremists who have overrun their homeland.

Accepting the figure for the success rate in killing militants nevertheless means that fully 500 or so Pakistani civilians have been killed since 2004. Unlike, say, in the war in Afghanistan, there is no investigation of civilian casualties, and no compensation paid. Transparency and accountability are absent, and some question the legal basis of the attacks. The programme is a charade because the CIA never admits to it and Pakistan pretends that it does not co-operate. A legal action launched this month, initially in Pakistan, with the backing of Reprieve, a campaigning group, seeks the arrest of a former CIA lawyer, John Rizzo, who boasted in a magazine interview this year that he used to approve a monthly list of some 30 individuals to be targeted by the drones.

Whatever the outcome of that case, a debate will grind on about whether the strikes are harming al-Qaeda and related groups, or spurring on Afghanistan’s powerful insurgency. According to the New America Foundation, out of the 2,600-odd deaths, 35 were recognised militant chiefs, or just 1.3% of the total. Among the successes was the fearsome leader of the Pakistani Taliban, Baitullah Mehsud, who was the country’s number one public enemy. Still, the vast majority of targets have been low-level fighters. All the while, the number of suicide attacks in Afghanistan, many launched from Pakistan, has soared over the past year or more.

from the print edition | Asia

 

[AAtish]

“You’ve Got To Stop This War In Afghanistan”?

YOU, as in the Pakistani involvement? Why did he not say WE if he meant the US war?

I must be confused as usual.

I guess YOU represents people in power.. We (him) is out of power right now

 

[VCheng]

I guess YOU represents people in power.. We (him) is out of power right now

Could be that you are correct, but he was addressing his Pakistani surgeon, was he not?

 

[AAtish]

Could be that you are correct, but he was addressing his Pakistani surgeon, was he not?

The drone attacks take out some mid-level terrorists, Blair said. But they’re not strategically effective. If the drones stopping flying tomorrow, Blair told the audience at the Aspen Security Forum,

The Institute is based in Washington, DC, Aspen, Colorado, and on the Wye River on Maryland’s Eastern Shore and has an international network of partners. Link

Perception?

 

[VCheng]

The Institute is based in Washington, DC, Aspen, Colorado, and on the Wye River on Maryland’s Eastern Shore and has an international network of partners. Link

Perception?

No, those are facts. How you perceive what they are quoted as saying in The Economist is perception on your part.