Farhat Taj carried out a survey among Pashtuns from the FATA for the Jamestown Foundation and found that
the majority of the respondents (13 of 15) did not fully see the drone attacks as a violation of the sovereignty of Pakistan. Their argument is very simple: the state of Pakistan has already surrendered FATA to the militants. Therefore Pakistan has no reason to object to the drone attacks. Pakistan will have this right only if it can retake the areas from the militants. Some respondents said that their homeland is used by the militants and the ISI as a launching pad for attacks on ISAF and NATO forces in Afghanistan.75
The Pakistani paper the News published an account of a similar survey in the FATA:
Pakistan’s sovereignty, they [the interviewees] argued, was insulted and annihilated by Al-Qaeda and the Taliban whose territory FATA is, after Pakistan lost it to them. The US is violating the sovereignty of the Taliban and Al-Qaeda, not of Pakistan. Almost half the people said that the US drones attacking Islamabad or Lahore will be violation of the sovereignty of Pakistan, because these areas are not taken over by the Taliban and Al Qaeda.
Over two-thirds of the people viewed Al-Qaeda and the Taliban as enemy number one, and wanted the Pakistani army to clear the area of the militants. A little under two-thirds want the Americans to continue the drone attack because the Pakistani army is unable or unwilling to retake the territory from the Taliban.76
In the article “Why I Support Drone Attacks” on Chowk.com, Raza Habib echoes this sentiment: “Over the years the Pakistani establishment and a series of governments have literally watched helplessly as militants use those safe sanctuaries to promote terrorism in the mainland. If anything, the actual violation of sovereignty is being carried out by the militants rather than the drones which are aimed at eliminating them! Realistically speaking drones are helping the Pakistani state to establish sovereignty.”77
Finally, an article published in the Daily Times titled “In Favor of Drone Attacks” argued,
Civil society in Pakistan is well aware of the fact that the drones are cleansing us of terrorists but sometimes they fail to resist the temptation to speak out against them. This is caused by the extreme right trumpeting warnings of US encroachments on our sovereignty.
First, Pakistan is the US’s frontline non-NATO ally in the war against terror, which means that Pakistan and the US have to willingly extend their best possible support to each other. Drone attacks are now to be considered as committed support in that process. Second, the drones are targeting all those people who are bent upon the real violation of our sovereignty and who are busy in a declared war against our army and state machinery. They are not the ones who, if scared, will respect our sovereignty.
What is our chief security threat? It is terrorism. What should we prioritize? No doubt its elimination. And what are drones doing, except the same? Rather than theoretical terms we need to think in terms of ground reality. We are faced with a severe threat and cannot channel our meager resources to military operations against the militants.
The present government should not get blackmailed by rightist propaganda; it should boldly and publicly acknowledge the agreement with the US [regarding drone attacks] if there is any.78
Thus the conventional wisdom in the West that Pakistanis unanimously see the drone strikes as a violation of their country’s sovereignty does not seem to hold true. A number of FATA natives, as well as Pakistanis elsewhere, see the drone strikes as the best antidote against the terrorists who have truly violated their country’s sovereignty by carving parts of it off into off-limits, fundamentalist shariah law terrorist states. The same certainly holds true for the Pakistani military establishment and government, which have taken much criticism for their backing of the drone strikes but continue to tacitly support them despite their unpopularity.
PASHTUNS (AND OTHER PAKISTANIS) WHO FAVOR THE DRONE CAMPAIGN
Conventional wisdom among antidrone activists in the West is that the drones “make more enemies than they kill” and drive the FATA’s tribemen to actively support the Taliban. There are, however, anecdotal accounts, such as that of Pervez Hoodbhoy, that describe a people who are seething as they suffer from the tyranny of the Taliban. Hoodboy writes,
Many FATA students in my university have seen the barbarity of Taliban militants from close quarters. They want the beasts killed—and they don’t care how and by whom. For example, a physics PhD student from Mohmand told me that he has not been back to his village for 3 years and still lives in constant fear of being kidnapped by militants. His crime? To have protested the public decapitation by the Taliban of 14 members of a neighbour’s family outside the village mosque.
Not surprisingly, Kurram’s Shiite community of about half a million people is also said to be largely supportive of drone strikes. They have suffered an estimated 2,000 deaths at the hands of Taliban militants since 2007. Photographs of severed heads and limbs have been posted on the internet by the Taliban, who think that Shiites deserve nothing less.
A scientific survey of attitudes in FATA in today’s dangerous circumstances is impossible. Nevertheless, the impression one gets in talking to individuals is that tribal people with education generally favour drone strikes. This includes those who have lost relatives. But uneducated people, who form the overwhelming majority, hate them. …
But the Taliban want something immensely more dreadful. They stone women to death, force girl-children into burqa, cut off limbs, kill doctors for administering polio shots, threaten beard-shaving barbers with death, blow up girls schools, and kill musicians. In a society policed by Taliban vice-and-virtue squads, art, drama, and cultural expressions would disappear. The only education would be that of madrassas.79
Similarly, Aamir Latif reported,
Many in tribal areas remain hostile to the Taliban. Hazar says that the Taliban view tribal elders and prayer leaders as their main rivals and keep a close eye on them because they are generally respected by the civilians in the region. “We are better Muslims than the Taliban. We don’t need their advice. We have already been following a decent way of life. What else do they want from us?” says Kamal Shah, a lawyer who heads the anti-Taliban jirga.
Hundreds of tribesmen displaced by the ongoing pitched battles between Pakistani security forces and Taliban militants in the restive northern tribal belt staged an anti-Taliban rally on Monday. This was the first time that the displaced tribesmen demonstrated against the Taliban, dubbing them responsible for their woes.80
Many other Pashtuns would seem to agree with these sentiments. Several studies demonstrate that there is some Pashtun support for the drone strikes against the region’s grim Taliban masters. In 2008 the Pakistan-based Aryana Institute for Regional Research and Advocacy carried out a survey among tribesmen in the agencies of North Waziristan, South Waziristan, and Kurram that led to some surprising conclusions. Following are some of the survey questions and their responses:
■ Do the militant organizations get damaged due to drone attacks? (Yes 60%, No 40%)
■ Do you think the drones are accurate in their strikes? (Yes 52%, No 48%)
■ Do you think anti-American feelings in the area increased due to drone attacks recently? (Yes 42%, No 58%)
■ Should Pakistan military carry out targeted strikes at the militant organisations? (Yes 70%, No 30%)81
In other words, a majority of those questioned said the drones weaken the militants, are accurate, and don’t lead to anti-Americanism. The study further found that
the popular notion outside the Pakhtun [Pashtun] belt that a large majority of the local population supports the Taliban movement lacks substance. The notion that anti-Americanism in the region has increased due to drone attacks is rejected. The study supports the notion that a large majority of the people in the Pakhtun belt wants to be incorporated with the state and wants to integrate with the rest of the world. …
The people I asked about civilian causalities in the drone attacks said most of the attacks
had hit their targets, which include Arab, Chechen, Uzbek and Tajik terrorists of Al-Qaeda, Pakistani Taliban (Pakhtun and Punjabis) and training camps of the terrorists.82
These voices in favor of the drones were not an anomaly in the FATA. In December 2009 a coalition of FATA-based political parties and civil organizations opposed to terrorism issued the “Peshawar Declaration.” Among other provisions, it stated,
■ The conference demands that targeted and immediate operations against all centers and networks of terrorism should be initiated.
■ This conference also demands the elimination of all foreign, nonlocal and local terrorists in FATA.83
The declaration also dealt with the drone attacks in detail:
The issue of Drone attacks is the most important one. If the people of the war-affected areas are satisfied with any counter-militancy strategy, it is the Drone attacks which they support the most. According to the people of Waziristan, Drones have never killed any civilian. Even some people in Waziristan compare Drones with Ababels (The holy swallows sent by God to avenge Abraham, the intended conqueror of the Khana Kaaba). A component of the Pakistani media, some retired generals, a few journalists/analysts and pro-Taliban political parties never tire in their baseless propaganda against Drone attacks.84
There is also a peace movement in the FATA known as Amn Teherek (aka Amn Tehrik) (the Peace Movement). Its platform has been described as follows: “The Amn Tehrek publicly opposes Taliban and Al-Qaida, denounces the ‘strategic depth’ madness, demands the military to conduct targeted operations against the militants in FATA and supports drone attacks. The Amn Teherek has expressed such views almost every month in its socio-political activism. Mainstream Pakistani media largely ignore them.”85 This group has established the Pakhtunkhwa Peace Forum, which had a Facebook page with such messages as “Drone proved its worth in FATA by killing the worst enemies of Pashtun and humanity. … Bravo Mr. drone you are the only source which helped us salvate from terrorists in region.”86
When the CIA commenced a lull in drone strikes in late 2011, a group of Pakistanis launched an online petition calling for the Americans to restart their campaign in order to “save the lives of thousands.”87 Similarly a former Pakistani intelligence agent said, “Most of the population is a sort of hostage, and they know that these people have made our life miserable. They say—if there’s a correct target—good riddance.”88 A 2010 Deutsche Presse Agentur article on the drone strikes offers further evidence that some people in the FATA region who are terrorized by the Taliban and al Qaeda support the drone strikes:
The cooperation from reluctant Pakistani intelligence agencies might be due to constantly increasing pressure from Washington, but many residents in Pakistan’s tribal region have come to see the drones as a blessing.
“These drones give us a sense of protection—that there is someone who is doing something against these people who kill innocent people in the name of Islam,” said a resident of Miranshah, the main town in North Waziristan, who asked to be identified as Shin Gul. Gul, 29, fears Taliban persecution if his real name was known. His brother was murdered two months ago when his father refused to marry his young daughter to a Taliban fighter.
“People in the tribal region have varying opinions on the drone attacks,” said Nasir Dawar, a North Waziristan journalist who has covered dozens of the strikes. “Some people think they are doing some good, and some believe they are killing innocent people and challenge the Pashtu national honour,” he said.
Dawar said he was convinced that the drone aircraft were mainly targeting the militants and that most of the civilians killed in the attacks were either from the extended families of the militants or victims of collateral damage. “I have never seen a missed hit,” Dawar said, adding that the strikes were creating panic and fear among the militants. Once used to moving freely, senior Taliban and al-Qaeda leaders are now being forced to spend their nights in sleeping bags under a tree in the fields or in a mountain cave and hold emergency meetings in a moving vehicle instead of a building, Dawar said.89
A recent report by the Jamestown Foundation based on interviews in the FATA, titled “Drone Attacks: Pakistan’s Policy and the Tribesmen’s Perspective,” supported these conclusions. After interviewing students from the region, the report concluded,
They agree that the government of Pakistan has no writ whatsoever over the tribal agencies. They hold the militant occupation responsible for:
■ Damaging their culture and traditions.
■ Eliminating their entire traditional and indigenous leadership.
■ Weakening the tribal society.
■ Occupying their houses by force.
■ Destroying their traditional and democratic institution of jirga (an assembly of elders that makes decisions based on consensus) and tribal code of Pashtunwali (“The Way of the Pashtuns”), instead replacing it with the militants’ own strict brand of Shari’ah.
■ Bringing destruction to homes and businesses by inciting Pakistani military operations.90
Regarding the drones, the Jamestown Foundation pollsters discovered that the interviewees thought the following:
■ The drone attacks are killing the leadership of those al-Qaeda and other militant groups who have made ordinary tribesmen and women hostages. Ordinary people are powerless against the militants and drones are seen as helpful by eliminating the militants and frustrating the designs of ISI.
■ The drone attacks have resulted in substantial damage to the militants, especially the elimination of the Arab and Punjabi leadership of al-Qaeda.
■ The drone attacks cause a minimum loss of innocent civilians and their property. The respondents appreciated the precision of such attacks.91
In addition the article stated,
The respondents expressed a strong desire for drones as a means to attack the leadership of the local Pashtun Taliban. Half of those who supported drone attacks said that people’s daily lives are affected most by the local Taliban and not the Arabs or other al-Qaeda militants who generally mind their own business, or have perhaps assigned the duty of harassment to the local Taliban. One of the respondents suggested that if only ten people amongst the leadership of the local Taliban were killed, the hierarchy of the organization would collapse like a house of cards.92
Christine Fair, an American scholar who visited the tribal zone, gave an account that backs up the Jamestown Foundation findings:
These FATA residents are strong proponents of the drones. They report that the drones are so precise that the local non-militants do not fear them when they hear the drones above as they are confident that they will hit their target. Locals attribute this precision in part to the placement of “targeting chips” which direct the ordnance to the exact location of the militants in their redoubts. The accurate placement of these chips requires local cooperation to provide the whereabouts of these militants. This has driven an important wedge between the locals and militants with the former shunning the latter.93
As these findings demonstrate, the notion that many in the West and the settled parts of Pakistan have of the FATA region being inhabited by pro-Taliban tribesmen who are driven to join the terrorist group en masse as a result of “indiscriminate” drone strikes is false. In fact evidence suggests that some of the Pashtuns of FATA who are most exposed to both the drones and the Taliban are the Pakistanis that are most tolerant of the former and intolerant of the latter. A journalist writing about the issue for Reuters reported, “What I have noticed is that at least some among the Pashtun intelligentsia say the drone strikes are precise, and that opposition to them increases the further away you get from the tribal areas.”94 Salman Masood, writing for the New York Times, said, “A lot of the people have pointed [out] that there have been lesser protests in the tribal areas over drones as compared to Pakistan proper. The issue has become a bit of a political football.”95 Farhat Taj similarly noticed the tendency for Pakistanis who live across the Indus River in Punjab and Sindh
Provinces to be more intolerant of the drone strikes than the Taliban-dominated tribesmen from the FATA region. In an article in the Pakistani newspaper Dawn, she wrote,
There is a deep abyss between the perceptions of the people of Waziristan, the most drone-hit area and the wider Pakistani society on the other side of the River Indus. For the latter, the US drone attacks on Waziristan are a violation of Pakistani’s sovereignty. Politicians, religious leaders, media analysts and anchorpersons express sensational clamour over the supposed ‘civilian casualties’ in the drone attacks. I have been discussing the issue of drone attacks with hundreds of people of Waziristan. They see the US drone attacks as their liberators from the clutches of the terrorists into which, they say, their state has wilfully thrown them. …
The people of Waziristan have been complaining why the drones are only restricted to targeting the Arabs. They want the drones to attack the TTP leadership, the Uzbek/Tajik/Turkmen, Punjabi and Pakhtun Taliban. I have heard even religious people of Waziristan cursing the jihad and welcoming even Indian or Israeli support to help them get rid of the TTP and foreign militants. The TTP and foreign militants have made them hostages and occupied their houses by force. The Taliban have publicly killed even the religious scholars in Waziristan.
What we read and hear in the print and electronic media of Pakistan about drone attacks as a violation of Pakistan’s sovereignty or resulting in killing innocent civilians is not true so far as the people of Waziristan are concerned. According to them, al Qaeda and the TTP are dead scared of drone attacks and their leadership spends sleepless nights. This is a cause of pleasure for the tormented people of Waziristan.96
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