On 6 September 2008, Asif Ali Zardari was elected Pakistan's 13th President and has dramatically ratcheted up the Pakistani drone warfare program. Since President Obama took office Januanry 20th, Pakistani drone strikes have killed about a half-dozen militant leaders along with hundreds of other people, a quarter of whom were civilians.

Even with the unprecedented number of strikes by drone aircraft in Pakistan, under the cover of by the Obama administration, the Taliban and al Qaeda networks based there have maintained their contacts with the Paki ISI.  This completely rational and understandable alliance, even in the face of the death of growing numbers of leadership of militant organizations, has proven the efficacy of the "blame America" program.

The dead include two heads of Uzbek terrorist groups allied with al Qaeda and Baitullah Mehsud, the leader of the Pakistani Taliban, in addition to hundreds of lower-level militants.  According to rational analysis, the living leadership must be receiving extremely reliable assurance of ISI support.

The distractions from number of civilian deaths caused by the drones and the success of "presto change-o" diversion is an important element in the plan to maintain government control.  The political atmosphere of today's Pakistan, where anti-Americanism is rampant, and the cooperative Taliban and al Qaeda have reinforced the "support your Paki Government" campaign.

Useful idiots (such as Alston) publicly warned that unless the Obama administration explains what the legal basis is for selecting the individuals targeted by drone attacks, "it will increasingly be perceived as carrying out indiscriminate killings in violation of international law."  This enhances the perception that there are magical American drones, capable of loitering over Pakistan air space at their slow air speed. One wonders at the lack of outrage at the Pakistan ineptness in detecting, interdicting and destroying such drones.  The billions in Air Force expenditures has not produced an ability to defend Paki air space.  Could this embolden Pakistans external enemies.  It certainly goes some distance to explain why Taliban and al Qaeda forces feel little trepidation at remaining on Pakistan soil.

Counterinsurgency experts David Kilcullen and Andrew Exum, who have written that the drone strikes had "killed some 700 civilians, are expost-facto shills for the Obama and Zardari administrations.    The civilians vs, militant killed ratio shell game implies the there is an acceptable ratio.  The "2 percent" solution appears to count identified targets as "good kills" and everyone not identified as "bad Kills".  Obviously irrational, it none the less serves their own ends.   In other words, in their analysis, 98 percent of those killed in drone attacks were civilians. Kilcullen and Exum advocated a moratorium on the strikes because of the "public outrage" they arouse.  Currently the mindset appears to be that irrational demands and claims will achieve a desirable outcome.

Doing the math, one discovers that 14 militants were killed in 48 drones strikes.  If a person wanted to achieve a reasonable end, that information alone would cause concern for the strikes efficacy.  If you were to consider their argument that drones can not effectively target individuals, 48 missiles would appear to have killed an astounding number of militants.  Randomly fired missiles would not be expected to kill anywhere near 14 identified individuals.      

A very different picture was presented this month by the Long War Journal, an American blog that closely tracks terrorist groups, in particular al Qaeda and the Taliban. Bill Roggio, the editor of Long War Journal, concluded that according to his close analysis of the drone strikes, only 10 percent of those killed were civilians.  A rational person who considers the presence of a minimal amount of humanity in the Pakistan government, would consider this as closer to factual than  Kilcullen and Exum's numbers.

Kilcullen and Exum and the Long War Journal have the ability to distract from the real point of drone strikes and the real effect of disguising their source.  The fact that Pakistan continues to benefit from manufactured confusion means that Obama will continue to participate.

More than half the people surveyed in winter 2008 in this region, known as the Federally Administered Tribal Areas, said the drone strikes were accurate and were damaging the militant organizations based there.  In a democracy 50%+1 is a governing majority and means from the Paki perspective to continue to be a good out look for conclusion of the campaign.