US Drone strikes in Pakistan are illegal under international law.

[GUNNER]

4 Killed In Drone Strike

MIRANSHAH, Pakistan, Sept 20, 2010 (AFP) - Four militants were killed in a US drone strike in Pakistan's northwestern tribal belt near the Afghan border on Monday, security officials said.

A drone fired three missiles at Darazinda village, 40 kilometres (25 miles) northeast of Miranshah, the main town in North Waziristan region, they said.

"The drone fired one missile on two militants riding on a motorbike and when two of their colleagues rushed towards them, two more missiles were fired," a security official told AFP. "All four militants were killed."

Two other security officials confirmed the casualties, saying the missiles were fired by the pilotless aircraft.

 

[CAPTAIN AMERICA]

Drone strikes aren't really a good way to do this... a lot of civilians end up dying too.

Do you think less civilians or more would die if troops were sent in.

 

[GUNNER]

Officials: US drones kill 6 militants in Pakistan

By RASOOL DAWAR (AP)

MIR ALI, Pakistan — Suspected U.S. drones fired missiles at militant targets in northwestern Pakistan on Monday, killing six people in the 15th such attack this month, the most intense barrage since the strikes began in 2004, said intelligence officials.

U.S. officials do not publicly acknowledge firing the missiles, much less comment on who they are targeting. It is unclear why the attacks have spiked.

They target Pakistan's border regions with Afghanistan — home to al-Qaida terrorists plotting attacks on the West, insurgents battling the Pakistani government as well as militants behind attacks on NATO troops in Afghanistan.

On Monday, three missiles struck a house and vehicle linked to militants in a village near Mir Ali, a town in the North Waziristan tribal area that is under effective militant control, said the officials, speaking on condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to speak to the media.

Noor Khan, a resident in the village, said he saw drones in the sky before the strike.

Pakistani intelligence officials have said most of this month's strikes have targeted forces led by Jalaluddin Haqqani, an Afghan commander whose forces are one of the greatest threats to foreign troops in Afghanistan.

 

[muse]

It's interesting that the strikes are focusing on the Haqqani network and not on the TTP.

While AQ rank and file are targeted whenever they raise their heads, TTP types seems immune from such attacks - one hopes this will change.

 

[GUNNER]

It's interesting that the strikes are focusing on the Haqqani network and not on the TTP.

While AQ rank and file are targeted whenever they raise their heads, TTP types seems immune from such attacks - one hopes this will change.

Indeed. That's perhaps because TTP wasn't originally considered a threat by the US. But that perception has undergone a change recently with the CIA bombing and Faisal Shahzad case. There have been hits on the TTP as well but the main target of the Drones still appears to be Haqqani's and AQ networks. Therein lies the differences in priorities.

 

[TaimiKhan]

It's interesting that the strikes are focusing on the Haqqani network and not on the TTP.

While AQ rank and file are targeted whenever they raise their heads, TTP types seems immune from such attacks - one hopes this will change.

This is not happening now, its been happening since a long time, since the day these drone attacks started.

I did a while back posted the stats of the drone attacks in both regions, nearly majority of the strikes were in the NW area, and not SW where TTP was based. I remember, something like 95% targets were hit in NW, while hardly 8-10 strikes happened in the SW region, and i can assure you the BM strike was by mistake, thanks to ISI. I am not at liberty to disclose things, but i have heard some very astonishing details of some of the on goings in that region.

 

[TruthSeeker]

Missile strike kills 4 militants in N. Waziristan

SAMAA News, 25 Sep 10 06:56 PM

MIRANSHAH: A missile strike by a US drone on Saturday killed four militants in tehsil Datta Khel, North Waziristan.

The missile strike hit Datta Khel village area near Miranshah, the main town of North Waziristan tribal district, officials said.

"A US drone fired three missiles. The target was a vehicle carrying militants. Three militants were killed," said a senior security official in Peshawar.

The vehicle was completely destroyed in attack.

Separately, a political agent in North Wazirsitan has announced an indefinite curfew in the region.

The strike was the 17th suspected U.S. missile assault this month in Pakistani tribal regions, the most intense barrage since they began in 2004.

 

[GUNNER]

Two Killed In North Waziristan Drone Strike

MIRANSHAH, Pakistan, Sept 27, 2010 (AFP) - A US drone strike killed two militants Monday while targeting a rebel compound in Pakistan's lawless tribal badlands along the Afghan border, local security officials said.

The strike took place in Khushali Toorikhel village southeast of Miranshah, the main town in North Waziristan tribal district known as a stronghold for Taliban and Al-Qaeda-linked militants.

"A US drone fired two missiles on a militant compound, killing two rebels," a senior Pakistani security official told AFP on condition of anonymity.

Another security official confirmed the attack and the death toll.

 

[muse]

ISAF has used "right to self defense" as justification -- Most respondents here seem to be thinking that the Pakistani security apparatus does nto approve of this action by ISAF -- but what if they do approve? What if they find the political atmosphere entirely unhelpful and think the ISAF will not have similar constraints?

Or lets agree that the Pakistani security apparatus does not approve, how would it respond, to "right to self defense"?

 

[GUNNER]

ISAF has used "right to self defense" as justification -- Most respondents here seem to be thinking that the Pakistani security apparatus does nto approve of this action by ISAF -- but what if they do approve? What if they find the political atmosphere entirely unhelpful and think the ISAF will not have similar constraints?

We don't know for sure right now. We can only speculate. There is every possibility that the heli strikes in North Waziristan may have tacit approval from this side, as in case of drone strikes, since there isn't much the forces can do on the ground there despite requests from the US.

But i'm not sure why NATO would have come out in the open with it, knowing it would create problems for political government.

Or lets agree that the Pakistani security apparatus does not approve, how would it respond, to "right to self defense"?

The official response will be out soon. Let's wait till then !

 

[GUNNER]

Drones Target Terror Plot

CIA Strikes Intensify in Pakistan Amid Heightened Threats in Europe

By SIOBHAN GORMAN

WASHINGTON— In an effort to foil a suspected terrorist plot against European targets, the Central Intelligence Agency has ramped up missile strikes against militants in Pakistan's tribal regions, current and former officials say.

The strikes, launched from unmanned drone aircraft, represent a rare use of the CIA's drone campaign to preempt a possible attack on the West.

The terror plot, which officials have been tracking for weeks, is believed to target multiple countries, including the U.K., France, and Germany, these officials said.

The exact nature of the plot or plots couldn't be learned immediately, and counterterrorism officials in the U.S., Pakistan and Europe are continuing to investigate.

There have, however, been multiple terror warnings in recent days in France, Germany and the U.K.

"There are some pretty notable threat streams," said one U.S. military official, who added that the significance of these threats is still being discussed among counterterrorism officials but that threats of this height are unusual.

Homeland Security Secretary Janet Napolitano plans to discuss the current European terrorism intelligence with her European counterparts at a U.N. aviation security meeting this week in Montreal. "We are in constant contact with our colleagues abroad," she told a Senate panel last week. "We are all seeing increased activity by a more diverse set of groups and a more diverse set of threats. That activity, much of which is Islamist in nature, is directed at the West generally."

The CIA has launched at least 20 drone strikes so far this month in Pakistan's Federally Administered Tribal Areas, a lawless region neighboring Afghanistan. That is the highest monthly total in the past six years, according to a tally by the New America Foundation think tank. The previous monthly high was 12 strikes in January, following the December suicide attack that killed seven CIA agents on an agency base in eastern Afghanistan.

The latest known drone strike occurred Monday, hitting a house in Northwestern Pakistan. Four people were killed in that attack, the Associated Press reported.

Separately, Pakistan on Monday protested NATO helicopter strikes that killed more than 70 militants, saying the attacks breached its air space. NATO said it attacked in self defense. Unlike the CIA drone strikes, manned attacks are rare in the region.

Not all of the drone strikes in the latest wave are connected to the suspected European plot. But many have targeted militants who are part of the Haqqani network, a militant group connected to al Qaeda. The group controls a key region abutting Afghanistan, where U.S. defense and intelligence officials believe Osama bin Laden could be hiding.

Since al Qaeda has been under pressure from the drone campaign and other counterterrorism operations, it has come to rely increasingly on affiliates in the region as well as in countries like Yemen and Somalia. The failed Christmas Day attack on a Detroit-bound Northwest flight, for example, was hatched in Yemen, authorities believe.

Last week, France stepped up its level of vigilance over what was thought could be an imminent al Qaeda threat. Authorities said that they had uncovered a suicide bombing plot to attack the Paris subway linked to al Qaeda's North African affiliate. They said the threat might be connected to France's recent vote to ban the wearing of burqas, the head-to-toe garb worn by the most conservative Muslim women.

Earlier this month, the Eiffel Tower was evacuated due to a bomb scare, but that was determined to be a false alarm.

In recent weeks, intelligence officials in the U.K. have issued warnings that the al Qaeda threat remains high.

While it couldn't be learned who is believed to be behind the plot against European targets, the targeting of the Haqqani network suggests it could be involved.

"There have been some actionable targets, including Haqqani targets, that have presented themselves," said one U.S. military official.

If the Haqqani network were involved in a European terror plot, it would be the first known instance where it sought to launch attacks outside of South Asia, said Bruce Hoffman, a professor at Georgetown University who has written extensively on terrorism. The Haqqani group's involvement would be particularly worrisome, he said, because "you're talking about one of the more skilled and competent groups spreading its wings." The Haqqani network is also believed to have been involved in the December attack on the CIA base.

A U.S. official declined to speak about the strikes this month or a connection to the suspected European plot. The official vowed to continue to keep the pressure on al Qaeda and affiliated militant groups in Pakistan.

"Our operational tempo has been up for a while now, we have good information driving it, and—given the stakes involved—we hope to keep the pressure on as long as we can," the official said. "The mix of threats isn't new. Sometimes it's groups like the Haqqanis, and sometimes it's al Qaeda or the Afghan or Pakistani Taliban."

U.S. officials believe that conducting attacks in an area where militants are present can disrupt planned attacks, even if they do not hit the precise cells plotting the attack.

In advance of the Afghan elections, the military increased both targeted special operations attacks against Taliban leaders, and increased more general operations in areas considered insurgent strongholds, in hopes of making it more difficult for militants to attack polling centers on the day of the election.

While targeting militants involved in planning an attack is the most effective way to disrupt a plot, stepped up operations forces other militants to communicate less and act more carefully, making it more difficult for them to carry out plans.

"The strikes are a product of precise intelligence and precise weapons," the official said. "We've been hitting targets that pose a threat to our troops in Afghanistan and terrorists plotting attacks in South Asia and beyond."

The drone campaign has come under increasing legal pressure in recent months, with civil-liberties and human-rights groups filing suit to press for more transparency about the campaign.


CIA Steps Up Missile Strikes in Pakistan - WSJ.com

 

[muse]

Interesting -- especially what they have to say about the Haqqani network, if they can make the case that the Haqqani is the same as Al-Qaida, interesting to see how Pakistan may respond to that.

 

[muse]

September 27, 2010
C.I.A. Steps Up Drone Attacks on Taliban in Pakistan
By MARK MAZZETTI and ERIC SCHMITT

WASHINGTON — The C.I.A. has drastically increased its bombing campaign in the mountains of Pakistan in recent weeks, American officials said. The strikes are part of an effort by military and intelligence operatives to try to cripple the Taliban in a stronghold being used to plan attacks against American troops in Afghanistan.

As part of its covert war in the region, the C.I.A. has launched 20 attacks with armed drone aircraft thus far in September, the most ever during a single month, and more than twice the number in a typical month. This expanded air campaign comes as top officials are racing to stem the rise of American casualties before the Obama administration’s comprehensive review of its Afghanistan strategy set for December. American and European officials are also evaluating reports of possible terrorist plots in the West from militants based in Pakistan.

The strikes also reflect mounting frustration both in Afghanistan and the United States that Pakistan’s government has not been aggressive enough in dislodging militants from their bases in the country’s western mountains. In particular, the officials said, the Americans believe the Pakistanis are unlikely to launch military operations inside North Waziristan, a haven for Taliban and Qaeda operatives that has long been used as a base for attacks against troops in Afghanistan.

Beyond the C.I.A. drone strikes, the war in the region is escalating in other ways. In recent days, American military helicopters have launched three airstrikes into Pakistan that military officials estimate killed more than 50 people suspected of being members of the militant group known as the Haqqani network, which is responsible for a spate of deadly attacks against American troops.

Such air raids by the military remain rare, and officials in Kabul said Monday that the helicopters entered Pakistani airspace on only one of the three raids, and acted in self-defense after militants fired rockets at an allied base just across the border in Afghanistan. At the same time, the strikes point to a new willingness by military officials to expand the boundaries of the campaign against the Taliban and Haqqani network — and to an acute concern in military and intelligence circles about the limited time to attack Taliban strongholds while American “surge” forces are in Afghanistan.

Pakistani officials have angrily criticized the helicopter attacks, saying that NATO’s mandate in Afghanistan does not extend across the border in Pakistan.

As evidence of the growing frustration of American officials, Gen. David H. Petraeus, the top American commander in Afghanistan, has recently issued veiled warnings to top Pakistani commanders that the United States could launch unilateral ground operations in the tribal areas should Pakistan refuse to dismantle the militant networks in North Waziristan, according to American officials.

“Petraeus wants to turn up the heat on the safe havens,” said one senior administration official, explaining the sharp increase in drone strikes. “He has pointed out to the Pakistanis that they could do more.”

Special Operations commanders have also been updating plans for cross-border raids, which would require approval from President Obama. For now, officials said, it remains unlikely that the United States would make good on such threats to send American troops over the border, given the potential blowback inside Pakistan, an ally.

But that could change, they said, if Pakistan-based militants were successful in carrying out a terrorist attack on American soil. American and European intelligence officials in recent days have spoken publicly about growing evidence that militants may be planning a large-scale attack in Europe, and have bolstered security at a number of European airports and railway stations.

“We are all seeing increased activity by a more diverse set of groups and a more diverse set of threats,” said Homeland Security Secretary Janet Napolitano before a Senate panel last week.

The senior administration official said the strikes were intended not only to attack Taliban and Haqqani fighters, but also to disrupt any plots directed from or supported by extremists in Pakistan’s tribal areas that were aimed at targets in Europe. “The goal is to suppress or disrupt that activity,” the official said.

The 20 C.I.A. drone attacks in September represent the most intense bombardment by the spy agency since January, when the C.I.A. carried out 11 strikes after a suicide bomber killed seven agency operatives at a remote base in eastern Afghanistan.

According to one Pakistani intelligence official, the recent drone attacks have not killed any senior Taliban or Qaeda leaders. Many senior operatives have already fled North Waziristan, he said, to escape the C.I.A. drone campaign.

Over all the spy agency has carried out 74 drone attacks this year, according to the Web site The Long War Journal, which tracks the strikes. A vast majority of the attacks — which usually involve several drones firing multiple missiles or bombs — have taken place in North Waziristan.

The Obama administration has enthusiastically embraced the C.I.A.’s drone program, an ambitious and historically unusual war campaign by American spies. According to The Long War Journal, the spy agency in 2009 and 2010 has launched nearly four times as many attacks as it did during the final year of the Bush administration.

One American official said that the recent strikes had been aimed at several groups, including the Haqqani network, Al Qaeda and the Pakistani Taliban. The United States, he said, hopes to “keep the pressure on as long as we can.”

But the C.I.A.’s campaign has also raised concerns that the drone strikes are fueling anger in the Muslim world. The man who attempted to detonate a truck filled with explosives in Times Square told a judge that the C.I.A. drone campaign was one of the factors that led him to attack the United States.

In a meeting with reporters on Monday, General Petraeus indicated that it was new intelligence gathering technology that helped NATO forces locate the militants killed by the helicopter raids against militants in Pakistan.

In particular, he said, the military has expanded its fleet of reconnaissance blimps that can hover over hide-outs thought to belong to the Taliban in eastern and southern Afghanistan.

The intelligence technology, General Petraeus said, has also enabled the expanded campaign of raids by Special Operations commandos against Taliban operatives in those areas.


Rod Nordland and Alissa J. Rubin contributed reporting from Kabul, Afghanistan, and Ismail Khan from Peshawar, Pakistan.

 

[GUNNER]

Al-Qaeda Leader killed In US Drone Strike

Sheikh Fateh Al-Misri, allegedly chief of Al-Qaeda's Pakistan chapter, has been killed in a recent US drone strike in Pakistan.

The Al-Qaeda leader was killed two days ago, when a drone struck in North Waziristan Agency, the troubled taliban heartland.

Security sources claim Fateh was the master-mind of several suicide attacks in Pakistan and Afghanistan.

US has increased the frequency of CIA-operated drone strikes in North Waziristan in the recent months, with an all-time record number of strikes in the month of September alone. US drones have carried out at least 20 strikes in September.

 

[GUNNER]

^^^^

Good riddance i believe.

Here is a back-grounder on the guy. Looks like he also master-minded the attack on Qadiyanis.


Al-Qaeda's new man eyes Pakistan

By Syed Saleem Shahzad

ISLAMABAD - One chapter in the Afghan war came to an end with the killing in May of al-Qaeda's number three and Afghan operations chief Mustafa Abu al-Yazid in a drone attack in Pakistan's North Waziristan tribal area.

The appointment of a new commander, Egyptian Sheikh Fateh al-Misri, previously not an al-Qaeda member and in Afghanistan only as a battle-hardened Arab fighter, marks the beginning of a shift in al-Qaeda's strategy that aims for a more focused guerrilla war in Afghanistan. Al-Qaeda's Pakistan operations will be used to complement the battle against foreign forces across the border.

A previous al-Qaeda commander, Libyan Abu Laith al-Libi, also killed in a drone attack in Pakistan, in January 2008, had a similar background to Misri as he had not initially been a member of al-Qaeda and commanded his own Libyan groups that were active in Pakistan and Afghanistan. He was appointed operational commander in 2007 and in a short time proved himself in battle. He also developed close coordination with various other groups.

According to militant contacts who spoke to Asia Times Online, the militants believe that while Misri will focus on tweaking Afghan strategy, he realizes that the war there cannot be separated from Pakistan.

Misri unleashed the attacks in which at least 95 members of the Qadyani sect were killed and nearly 100 injured at their places of worship in Lahore. Apart from the immediate horror of the attacks, the militants aimed to monitor the response of the security and rescue forces. In the immediate aftermath of the incident, dozens of militants poured into Lahore. They included men from nearby areas, members of a militant cell in the southern port city of Karachi, as well as people from Khyber Pakhtoonkhwa, previously North-West Frontier Province.