I have no problem with drone strikes.
If we have a legitimate chance to capture a high-value target and interrogate him, we should do that.
If we don't have that opportunity, then killing him is just fine.
And it seems pretty obvious that anyone we're using a drone to hit, we don't have that opportunity.
I would have been happy for Shrub to have stepped up drone strikes.
I'm guessing the reasons why it is happening now are (1) we are getting more and more drones, and (2) after getting out of the human intelligence business under Clinton, it has taken us this long to rebuild the humint capability needed to target drone strikes.
I remember Colin Powell describing our strategy for Desert Storm as cutting off the snake's head and then killing the snake.
I thought that was a great approach, but I didn't think what we actually did looked like that.
I don't think that what we did in Afghanistan or Iraq 2 looked like that either.
This does, and I'm fine with that.

(02-10-2010 05:17 AM)Owl 69/70/75 Wrote:  I'm guessing the reasons why it is happening now are (1) we are getting more and more drones, and (2) after getting out of the human intelligence business under Clinton, it has taken us this long to rebuild the humint capability needed to target drone strikes.

I'd suspect (1) is right, but as for (2) I think the only reason we can step this up is greater cooperation from ISI. The reason that we may be getting greater cooperation now is more organic ... ISI didn't care as much before because the Taliban weren't their problem, therefore the Taliban grew in power and became a problem for Pakistan. Now they care and feed us more intelligence. That, and I suspect that WMD is probably right and someone's getting rich. The Pakistani military supposedly has a stranglehold on the Pakistani economy so this may be just another moneymaking opportunity to them.

But, point (2) also is contradictory to the thesis of the article I linked.

Even granting all of the points of the article, it's clear the intention is to withdraw in two years - that means withdrawal whether there are Taliban on every street corner or every village or withdrawal with the Taliban in disarray and ruin or withdrawal with al Qaeda training camps dotted throughout Pakistan and Afghanistan.

With those circumstances, and with greater presence to pick off rank and file, it seems to me to make strategic sense to step up drone attacks, even if it will mean destroying our intelligence into the post-Obama future. Those are the cards we're dealt at this stage.

The article does seem to point to certain consequences of current events ... everything is a choice and what we're doing now has obvious short-term benefits. It's worth understanding what we lose in the process.

edit: It's worth pointing out, Robert, that Foreign Policy Magazine is put out by the Carnegie Institute for Peace and is generally a liberal magazine - moreso that most MSM.