Questioning The Ethical Legitimacy Of Drone Attacks In Pakistan And Afghanistan

The
count of civilian losses in both Afghanistan and Pakistan has been
routinely lower in U.S. estimates compared to the counts by the
civilian populations within the two countries. The delays in reporting
and denials in the numbers of civilian deaths is a continuation of the
same pattern of behavior from last year. Last August a U.S. bombing in
western Afghanistan caused the deaths of 90 people, most of them in
that instance were children, the U.S. in that case, too, initially
admitted only to killing a small number of civilians adjusting their
count later. As what occurred last year this time around in May's drone
attack large numbers of women and children were killed.

The
military based nature of the U.S. and Coalition Forces engagement in
the region perhaps should be shifted towards a more humanitarian based
operation with primary focuses being on infrastructure, education and
health care development. Primary development of roads, water supply,
agricultural assistance, hospitals and schools, with primary military
operations being focused on protecting the security of these
humanitarian and infrastructure projects should be our primary
objective.

The primary
road out of poverty, underdevelopment and social injustice is the
education of women and girls. The origins of the present day problems
with the Taliban and Al Qaeda had their origin in the U.S. sponsored
and supported Mujahadeen of the 1980's in which many of the Islamic
extremists commited the same kind of attacks on girls' schools and
civilians as the Taliban and Al Qaeda do today. It was as wrong then as
it is now.

Drone or
any other attacks that routinely result in civilian casualties must be
curtailed or the reasons for the U.S. presence and the purpose for the
ongoing war must be, and should be, questioned.