As reports are coming in that a British citizen has been killed by an America drone strike in Pakistan, the New America Foundation and Terror Free Tomorrow have conducted the first comprehensive public opinion survey covering sensitive military and political issues in the Federally Administered Tribal Areas (FATA) of Pakistan.
According to the survey, more than three-quarters of FATA residents oppose American drone strikes. Indeed, only 16 percent think these strikes accurately target militants; 48 percent think they largely kill civilians and another 33 percent feel they kill both civilians and militants.
This latest survey contradicts an earlier survey, reported by the BBC, by the Ariana Institute in Islamabad which suggested that 80% of FATA residents felt that drone strike were accurate.
No doubt we will hear a lot more on these two stories
Even this survey (*see below) reports that half of FATA residents would be happy with drone use if perpetrated by Pakistani Army. I do not think it constitutes a mass rebellion against them – even by those in the areas targeted and who might be forgiven for more than a modicum of antipathy.
* the authors are repectively an organisation which denies that climate change is significant and that we need do little about the energy crisis (New America Foundation) and one with Sen John McCain as an advisor (terror free tomorrow). I respectfully suggest that the Ariana Institute (Islamabad) report as reported by the BBC has greater integrity.
I
Study: Pakistanis Actually Favor CIA Drone Bombings. By Professor Williams (University of Massachusetts) reported by AOL News.
EXCERPT: “Since terrorist groups took over the largely autonomous northwest regions of Pakistan, they’ve imposed a strict, fundamentalist law, closed all-girls schools and executed those who dared to voice their opposition. ‘The Taliban and al-Qaida have turned their back on the Pakistani people,’ Williams says. So he went to work with a Pakistani colleague, devising a survey that asked hundreds of these civilians what they thought of their lives and the CIA drone attacks. The study concludes that 52 percent of respondents felt the strikes were accurate; 58 percent thought they did not cause anti-American sentiment; 60 percent felt militants were ‘damaged’ by the strikes; and 70 percent thought the Pakistani military should carry out its own strikes against the terrorists. The civilians in the tribal regions ‘see the drones as their liberator,’ the study says.”
Full Story: http://www.aolnews.com/article/study-pakistanis-actually-favor-cia-drone-bombings/19666696