Coming February 6, 2024 . . .
MURDER, POLITICS, AND THE END OF THE JAZZ AGE
by Michael Wolraich
Pre-order at Barnes & Noble / Amazon / Books-A-Million / Bookshop
Coming February 6, 2024 . . . MURDER, POLITICS, AND THE END OF THE JAZZ AGE by Michael Wolraich Pre-order at Barnes & Noble / Amazon / Books-A-Million / Bookshop |
Click on the image to view the “Out of Sight, Out of Mind” interactive graphic on the drone war in which an estimated 3,105 people have been killed in Pakistan of whom only 47 were so-called “high value” suspected terrorists.
Comments
by A Guy Called LULU on Mon, 03/25/2013 - 9:07pm
Pakistani terrorists killed almost as many civilians in 2009 in Pakistan as the entire body count of the drone program from 2004-2013, a 3021 Pakistan toll of dead from terrorism in Pakistan, for one year in 2009, 3105 for drones over 10 years from your link.
The figures at the link show that 78% of the deaths in the drone program were terrorists, either alleged or high value. Of course, many of the 'children' may have been undergoing training for suicide missions, as the Taliban are known to recruit children, and the highest single total of children killed in one incident was during the Bush administration, in an attack on a 'Madrassa'.
The facts are that the people targeted by the drones are known to have been directly or indirectly involved with killing Americans, NATO troops or others in Afghanistan. After the US troops depart, many there will keep up the killing, as they have done for centuries.
by NCD on Mon, 03/25/2013 - 10:13pm
The Bureau for Investigative Journalism--which I also consider the best source--says that anywhere between 411 to 884 civilians have been killed in the drone attacks since 2004. That's bad, but it is mostly the deaths of civilians that upsets me. It isn't an outrage that only 47 of the dead have been big shots; the laws of war allow you to kill foot soldiers as well as officers(note: I think the Afghan war should have ended before now).
http://www.thebureauinvestigates.com/category/projects/drones/drones-pak...
by Aaron Carine on Tue, 03/26/2013 - 6:55am
I guess it was superfluous to provide a link to the Bureau after NCD already did so.
by Aaron Carine on Tue, 03/26/2013 - 8:34am
I will agree that The Bureau of Investigative Reporting has the best statistics with the caveat that we cannot know that in a case like this that the “best” statistics are necessarily very “good" statistics. That is, that they are very accurate statistics. Also, the correct use of the word “reported" is significant in all cases. Consider the number of total kills in Pakistan, 2537 to 3581 reported. That is a significant range and demonstrates how the best work done with the best of intentions in a case like this is hampered by “The Fog of War”. I accept and support their stated intention in graphically demonstrating the information they have:
“This project helps to bring light on the topic of drones. Not to speak for or against, but to inform and to allow you to see for yourself whether you can support drone usage or not.”
You indicate that while the killing of civilians is bad, you are OK with the killing of the “47 big shots” but do not address the question which the interactive graphic is attempting to help answer, by providing information as to the cost/benefit ratio of the Drone program, which is; Is it worth it to kill so many of the wrong people in a quest to kill a few of the intended targets? [The drone program is often lauded as a way to surgically remove specific individuals without significant collateral damage.] The ratio between deaths of people deliberately killed and those who just got in the way is only one factor that should be used in answering that question but it has an important bearing on the other factors which should be, IMO, also considered.
Total US strikes: 366
Obama strikes: 314
Total reported killed: 2,537-3,581
Civilians reported killed: 411-884
Children reported killed: 168-197
Total reported injured: 1,174-1,465
The 2348 “other” deaths, those other than ones claimed to be adult citizens [535] or children [175] are presumed to be legitimate targets even if only low level ones. I give this particular statistic very little credence. Remember, as an example, that the number of Vietnamese victims at My Lai was initially grossly under-reported and all of them were reported to be VC. You probably already know and believe that but I can assure anyone who doubts it that such reporting was standard practice and I very strongly believe that it still is. I do not doubt that that many were killed, only that anywhere nearly all of them were legitimate targets. A very high percentage of that 2348 number should almost certainly be put into the civilian category.
The number of children killed is probably fairly accurate, most of the time a small dead body, or the remaining identifiable parts, dressed in children’s clothing can be correctly identified as being that of a child. I do not agree with NCD above that we can assume that a single one of them was being trained to be a suicide martyr or with the following statement he made. “The FACTS ARE that the people targeted by the drones ARE KNOWN to have been directly or indirectly involved with killing Americans, NATO troops or others in Afghanistan.” My emphasis. Also this one, “The figures at the link show that 78% of the deaths in the drone program were terrorists, either alleged or high value.” The figures do not show that conclusion in anything close to a demonstrably conclusive way.
Factors outside the range of the interactive graphic which bear on the purpose of aiding a person to see for them self whether they can support drone usage or not include the expanding number of countries in which those drones are being used and who are considered to be high value targets and how this is decided based on what kind of intelligence is available and what laws apply when a death sentence is handed down in the Star Chamber.
by A Guy Called LULU on Tue, 03/26/2013 - 9:22am
I don't know; it seems speculative to say that they got the number of civilian casualties so wrong. In Vietnam, the military counted a lot of dead civilians as VC, but the Bureau is made up of journalists, not military men who are trying to cover up their own atrocities.
I've said myself that one of the problems with the drone program that Obama is claiming unlimited authority when it comes to decisions about who gets killed and when. I think that if most of the dead militants haven't been commanders, then they are probably targeting bases more than individuals.
by Aaron Carine on Tue, 03/26/2013 - 10:19am
It is speculative but informed speculation is mostly the best we have to work with. The Bureau didn't produce a wrong number, it accepted numbers that it couldn't disprove.
The Bureau maintains its integrity and credibility by being conservative in its claims and by only using statistics which can be confirmed with a high level of confidence. They must be careful to not claim data that cannot be supported. Thus the relatively small number of confirmed civilians and a tacit agreement on the number of "others" when they cannot prove that some of the others actually fall into another category. They were not on the ground to count for themselves and so must accept figures which they cannot disprove with convincing evidence. The "reports" which they must accept when they cannot disprove them usually come from sources with strong conflicts of interest. We know that the U.S. considers any male of military age who is killed by a drone to be a legitimate target simply because he was killed in the vicinity of a target which they claim to be legitimate. It has been shown more than once that our government has claimed the nature of a victim to be one thing until it was decisively proven otherwise.
by A Guy Called LULU on Tue, 03/26/2013 - 11:01am
I was going to add (facetiously) to your comment that maybe the world should go back to the glorious days of trench warfare where civilians aren't killed and it's easy to count casualities But the snark wouldn't work. because that wouldn't be true in the least about "the good old days."
To be clear, I agree with you: that it's the lack of rules for use and transparency that are the problem, not the increasingly technological nature of warfare. In most cases, the technology is striving to reduce deaths in war. Is it not the possible intentional targeting of specific civilians the ultimate thing that bothers a lot of people about armed drones being in the hands of political leaders? If not, in the end, one is basically complaining about the results of insurgency and counter-insurgency, terrorism and counter-terrorism, with whatever weapons are used, and not specifically the use of drones. And the increasingly technological (or psychological and economic in the case of terrorists) nature of those kinds of battles actually means fewer civilian deaths than in previous kinds of warfare. That we no longer have "big war" since the Vietnam era means we no longer see massive amounts of both miilitary and civilian death.. Some argue that Hiroshima/Nagasaki caused this, the uber civilian single hit of all times, along the lines of "never again."
I think it was you who, on another thread on drones, focused on the question that is really the crux of the issue: what constitutes a military combatant in this day and age, as opposed to a criminal?
I would add to that something that Emma Zahn focused on in yet another thread:: assassination Because that is where we seem headed: assassination with collateral civiilian deaths instead of war. I'd like to admit that when I was a kid reading history for the first time, I used to wonder: why can't leaders just try to kill each other when they disagree rather than going to war with soldiers and killing millions of people in the process?
by artappraiser on Tue, 03/26/2013 - 4:20pm
Sometimes they tried but it did not always work out too well:
Someone really, really did not want him to be the next Austro-Hungarian Emperor. My bet would be the reigning emperor.
by EmmaZahn on Tue, 03/26/2013 - 5:05pm
Yeah, I've heard people claim that it was only in the 20th century that civilians started being targeted in war. Utter bosh; civilians were getting massacred throughout history. Even in the relatively civilized 19th century, there was plenty of brutality.
by Aaron Carine on Tue, 03/26/2013 - 5:37pm