The Drone Attack In Pakistan
I've been following the story regarding the Unitded States' attack on a suspected terrorist dinner in Pakistan using three Predator drones armed with missles.
It seems undisputed that 13-18 civilians, including women and children were unintentionally killed as part of the attack. What remains to be determined is whether the attack resulted in the deaths of dangerous terrorists as well.
Initial reporting (a Brian Ross/ABC News Exclusive) raised hopes that Al Qaeda bigwig Zawahiri was among the dead. When evidence of this diminished and it began to appear that only civilian casualties occurred, large protests began to spring up in Pakistan and questions started to rise about whether or not this was a Fuck-Up.
Feeling the heat, the Pakistanis responded two-fold. They made the assertion, improbable to me, that they were not involved nor informed about the U.S. operation. They also suggested that 4-5 unnamed terorists were, in fact, killed and that Zawahiri still might be among the dead.
Given that vague references to unnamed terrorists isn't going to satisfy the skeptical and feeling the heat on some more concrete word about Zawahiri, we now have been treated to another bizarre installment on this story with ABC's Brian Ross proudly and unequivocally proclaiming in a headline - U.S. Strike Killed Al Qaeda Bomb Maker. But wait ... it turns out that Ross' story that the strike killed Abu Khabbab (I shit you not, that's the guy's street name) is based on unnamed Pakistani intelligence officials. As to Zawahiri, the back away is buried down in the story with a statement that his death is now believed "unlikely."
CNN ran its own story stating:
CNN goes on to quote anonymous U.S. officials who will only say known terrorists were "in the area."
Certainly we remain a long way from determining whether the strike was a success or a failure. But that hasn't stopped the likes of Rightwingclueless from declaring the strike "A hit."
I hope questions will continue to be asked but suspect - with the waters sufficiently muddied - the mainstream media will wander away. And - lo and behold - today, as if on cue, we have a new Bin Laden tape.
But make no mistake, I hope that forthcoming is definitive evidence of a successful strike on known Al Qaeda bad guys and not of a fuck up which resulted solely in the waste of civilian lives.
On a related note, Kevin Drum uses this strike to pose the interesting moral question as to whether, assuming Al Qaeda's top bomb maker was in fact present, the strike would be justified even with 13-18 deaths of innocent bystanders? With Kevin's assumptions and assuming there was no other less damaging manner for taking him out, I would say "Yes." Anyone else want to weigh in? Do you think it would afect the opinion of most Americans if we were talking about 18 innocent Ameericans as collateral damage as opposed to Pakistanis?
It seems undisputed that 13-18 civilians, including women and children were unintentionally killed as part of the attack. What remains to be determined is whether the attack resulted in the deaths of dangerous terrorists as well.
Initial reporting (a Brian Ross/ABC News Exclusive) raised hopes that Al Qaeda bigwig Zawahiri was among the dead. When evidence of this diminished and it began to appear that only civilian casualties occurred, large protests began to spring up in Pakistan and questions started to rise about whether or not this was a Fuck-Up.
Feeling the heat, the Pakistanis responded two-fold. They made the assertion, improbable to me, that they were not involved nor informed about the U.S. operation. They also suggested that 4-5 unnamed terorists were, in fact, killed and that Zawahiri still might be among the dead.
Given that vague references to unnamed terrorists isn't going to satisfy the skeptical and feeling the heat on some more concrete word about Zawahiri, we now have been treated to another bizarre installment on this story with ABC's Brian Ross proudly and unequivocally proclaiming in a headline - U.S. Strike Killed Al Qaeda Bomb Maker. But wait ... it turns out that Ross' story that the strike killed Abu Khabbab (I shit you not, that's the guy's street name) is based on unnamed Pakistani intelligence officials. As to Zawahiri, the back away is buried down in the story with a statement that his death is now believed "unlikely."
CNN ran its own story stating:
The U.S. network ABC News reported on its Web site that he was killed in the attack, quoting "Pakistani authorities." However a number of Pakistani officials have told CNN they cannot confirm whether Abu Khabab was killed in the strike.
CNN goes on to quote anonymous U.S. officials who will only say known terrorists were "in the area."
Certainly we remain a long way from determining whether the strike was a success or a failure. But that hasn't stopped the likes of Rightwingclueless from declaring the strike "A hit."
I hope questions will continue to be asked but suspect - with the waters sufficiently muddied - the mainstream media will wander away. And - lo and behold - today, as if on cue, we have a new Bin Laden tape.
But make no mistake, I hope that forthcoming is definitive evidence of a successful strike on known Al Qaeda bad guys and not of a fuck up which resulted solely in the waste of civilian lives.
On a related note, Kevin Drum uses this strike to pose the interesting moral question as to whether, assuming Al Qaeda's top bomb maker was in fact present, the strike would be justified even with 13-18 deaths of innocent bystanders? With Kevin's assumptions and assuming there was no other less damaging manner for taking him out, I would say "Yes." Anyone else want to weigh in? Do you think it would afect the opinion of most Americans if we were talking about 18 innocent Ameericans as collateral damage as opposed to Pakistanis?
posted by Macswain at
11:35 AM
3 Comments:
Macswain:
You ask:
"Do you think it would afect the opinion of most Americans if we were talking about 18 innocent Ameericans as collateral damage as opposed to Pakistanis?"
RU nuts? Of course it matters. Americans could care less about foreign lives. Hundreds of thousands of African children can starve or be butchered, and it's not even covered by the media. Yet if one little girl falls down a well or, god forbid, a nice WHITE girl goes missing in the Caribbean, a national mania ensues.
By
Anonymous, at 3:46 PM
An interesting thing to think about is this. Conservatives are quite fond of saying that Clinton had the chance to take out Osama Bin Laden.
In truth, the opportunity presented itself twice... Sort of. In one instance, the presence of Osama Bin Laden was only suspected, not confirmed. In the second instance, OBL was confirmed, but the twist was, the confirmed location of Bin Laden was adjacent to a civillian hospital. The logistics of the scenario would necessitate an air strike using missile fire to essentially take out the building, and Bin Laden with it. Also gone would have been the Hospital.
"Off with his head," bellow the right, and they could be referring to both Bin Laden, and Bill, but let's take an honest look at this. We contemplate the moral grounding behind killing over a dozen civillians while possibly taking out a top member of Al Quaeda in a post 9/11 world as the right likes to term the world we currently live in.
But that is not the world we lived in when Clinton gave OBL "a pass". I think the opposition to such an act now would be minimal... OBL, and a hospital, ah well. But back then, do you think that you could politically survive by taking out a highly dangerous terrorism coordinator that no one ever heard of by blowing up a hospital?
Doubtful.
The interesting thing about the world we live in today is the currency in which we appraise human life. How many civillians does a terrorist cost? What kind of civillians? But then again, from the beginning it has always been a matter of valuing the people who live over there at less than we value ourselves.
Despite the psuedo noble sentiments of freeing Iraqi people, and spreading democracy, the doctrine of "fighting the terrorists over there so we don't have to fight them here" has always indicated that this was never an altruistic campaign.
By
Kyle E. Moore, at 9:11 AM
I agree with J Andrew. This is low. And it sends the message that Pakistani lives don't matter to the US. No wonder there is so much anger against us in the Muslim world.
I doubt that any readers here would think that it's OK for a foreign government to kill innocent US civilians in an attempt to get rid of terrorists. (Maybe I am giving some of the right-wing kooks too much credit.) So why should we think it's OK to kill Pakistani civilians? I don't think this was the right move for the US at all.
By
Anonymous, at 8:03 PM
Post a Comment
<< Home