Paris.<\/i><\/p>\n
As I write this, we still don\u2019t know who was responsible for the horrific bombing attack in Boston. Perhaps it will turn out to be the work of home grown rightwing nuts; perhaps it\u2019s the act of foreign terrorists. But, whatever the source, what strikes me is the number of times the barbaric assault is being denounced as \u201ccowardly\u201d<\/p>\n
As in Boston Police Commissioner Ed Davis\u2019s\u00a0warning<\/a>\u00a0that \u201cThis cowardly act will not be taken in stride.\u201d<\/p>\n Indeed, \u201cCowardly\u201d is the epithet being used by political figures across the United States; it was used by an editorial writer in\u00a0Kansas City Star<\/a>\u00a0and a\u00a0spokesman for<\/a>\u00a0the United Maryland Muslim Council in Baltimore.<\/p>\n \u201cCowardly\u201d is the term being used in messages of support from abroad, from the Prime Minister of\u00a0India<\/a>\u00a0to the Prime Minister of\u00a0Italy.<\/a><\/p>\n After all, what could be more cowardly than for some unknown, unseen, unannounced\u00a0\u00a0killer to blow apart and maim innocent men women and children, without any risk to himself.<\/p>\n But, if that be the definition of cowardice, what could be more cowardly, than the now clich\u00e9 image of the button-down CIA officer agent driving to work in Las Vegas to assume his shift at the controls of a drone circling high over some dusty village on the other side of the world?<\/p>\n How different are the images produced by such attacks\u2014shattered bodies, dismembered limbs, severed arteries, frantic aid givers and terrified survivors\u2014how different from the moving images of the tragedy in Boston now being broadcast and rebroadcast on TV stations around the globe?<\/p>\n With those scenes in mind, I would ask you to read a portion of\u00a0a blog on<\/a>\u00a0Drone Wars I posted a few weeks ago, citing the\u00a0fact that<\/a>\u00a0over the past few years, U.S. drones have made mincemeat out of an estimated 3000 to 4000 people in Pakistan, Afghanistan, Yemen, and Somalia.\u00a0\u00a0At least 200 of them were children.<\/p>\n \u201cThe figures are very rough because no one\u2013certainly not the U.S. government\u2013is releasing an accurate count.\u00a0\u00a0The\u00a0London based<\/a>\u00a0Center for Investigative Reporting, which attempts to track the drone strikes, has been able to identify by name only a few hundred of the actual victims. Who knows what their political affiliations really were? Or even less, what considerations\u2014legal and otherwise\u2014went into justifying their demise?<\/p>\n \u201cIt\u2019s a terrifying situation.\u201d Jennifer Gibson told me. She\u2019s an American lawyer in London with Reprieve, an organization taking on the \u201cdrone war\u201d issue. \u201cThere are villages in Pakistan,\u201d she says \u201cthat have drones flying over them 24 hours a day. Sometimes they\u2019ll stay for weeks. But my clients and people there have no way of knowing if they are being targeted. Or what kind of behavior is likely to get them killed.<\/p>\n \u201cThey don\u2019t know if the person riding beside them in a car or walking with them in the marketplace may be a target. It\u2019s terrorizing entire communities. Even after an attack, there is no acknowledging by the U.S. government, no response at all, absolutely no accountability. And the vast majority of casualties don\u2019t even have names attached to them.\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cChristof Heyns, the UN special rapporteur on extrajudicial killings, summary or arbitrary executions,\u00a0told\u00a0a conference in Geneva that President Obama\u2019s attacks in\u00a0Pakistan, Yemen and elsewhere, carried out by the CIA, would encourage other states to flout long-established human rights standards. He suggested that some strikes may even constitute \u201cwar crimes\u201d.<\/p>\n \u201cBut, few Americans seem to carry about U.N. rapporteurs. It\u2019s only when\u00a0Americans<\/i>\u00a0are potential targets for those drones, that Congress and the media get stirred up.<\/p>\n \u201cAnd they\u2019re probably right. A\u00a0recent poll<\/a>\u00a0taken by Farleigh Dickinson University\u2019s Public Mind, found that by a two to one margin (48% to 24%) American voters say they think it\u2019s illegal for the U.S. government to target its own citizens abroad with drone strikes.<\/p>\n \u201cBut, when it comes to using drones to carry out attacks abroad \u201con people and other targets deemed a threat to the U.S.\u201d voters were in favor of a margin of six-to-one [75% to 13%].\u201d<\/p>\n UPDATE:<\/b><\/p>\n Since I first posted \u00a0this story, a reader, Jim Rissman has sent me the\u00a0link to\u00a0<\/a>a brief news article about a drone strike in Pakistan on Sunday\u2013the day before the Boston attack:<\/p>\n A US drone strike killed four militants on Sunday in the Datta Khel tehsil of North Waziristan Agency.<\/b><\/p>\n A security official said the US drone fired two missiles at a compound in Manzar Khel area of Datta Khel, some 40 kilometres towards west of Miramshah, the headquarters of the agency.<\/p>\n Tribesmen recalled seeing six drones hovering in the air since the afternoon, spreading panic and fear in the area. One of the drones fired two missiles at around sunset, killing at least four militants.<\/p>\n The compound caught fire after the strike leaving all the bodies burnt.<\/p>\n The last drone strike occurred in the agency on March 22, when US drones targeting a vehicle in Datta Khel killed four militants.<\/p>\n A UN envoy last month said US drone attacks violate Pakistan\u2019s sovereignty.<\/p>\n ________________________<\/p>\n Barry Lando<\/i>\u00a0is a former producer for 60 Minutes who now lives in Paris. He can be reached at:\u00a0barrylando@gmail.com<\/a>\u00a0or through his\u00a0website<\/a>.<\/i><\/p>\n