Pakistan: Differing Views On U.S. Drones

Written by CBS News' Farhan Bokhari

Guldasta Khan pointed towards the freshly painted graffiti which read "down with America" outside his slum dwelling on an outskirts of Islamabad, the Pakistani capital, and cited that as evidence of "America's growing unpopularity in Pakistan."

On Monday, Khan was once again frantically calling up his family residing in Pakistan's Waziristan region along the Afghan border, just after news came in of the latest attack by a U.S. unmanned drone aircraft.

For Khan, who left his native village behind in Waziristan two years ago, there is a constant struggle to keep track of his wife and their seven children. Driven to work in Islamabad as a shoe polisher, Khan was forced to leave his children behind, unable to rent a home on his meager income of 200 Rupees ($2.50) a day. Now he shares a one room slum dwelling with three other laborers, who also traveled from Waziristan.

"These drone attacks have made America very unpopular. Not everyone in my area is a terrorist and not every victim is guilty," he told CBS News in an interview.

Standing along a dusty track across the road from Islamabad's suburban vegetable and fruit market, Khan claims his neighborhood has many men who have similarly traveled from the border region, driven away by almost six years of fighting between Pakistani troops and militants linked to al Qaeda and the Taliban.

Khan believes there is "no one [in the border region] who does not resent the use of drones," adding that a nickname for drones which is "killer mosquitoes" among some locals in the border region, "does not do justice to their menacing effect."

For others such as Kashkol Khan, a carpenter who also traveled from Waziristan to Islamabad last year to earn a living, the feelings are similar. "In the old days when we did not have modern weapons, incoming enemy planes could be confronted by Pakistan's air force. But there is no defense against these drones," he said in a CBS News interview.

Analysts and western diplomats however come across with a different view. In the past week, Pakistani media have widely reported that Pakistan has quietly given its consent to the U.S. to use drones over its territory. This was subsequent to an assessment made by the Pakistani military some years ago which concluded that it was very difficult for Pakistan's troops to quickly become deployed in remote locations where the militants have entrenched themselves firmly. Those reports were subsequently denied by Pakistani government officials.

"Imagine, not having to drive hundreds of troops to a remote location and then having to be in a hand to hand combat in certain situations. Which do you prefer? The use of a drone or hand to hand fighting," asked a senior western diplomat based in Islamabad.

Pakistani government officials play down the significance of largely vocal protests by those opposed to the use of drones, notably Islamist politicians and nationalists. There have been some public protests on this issue, though they have largely remained peaceful.

"It is of course offensive to see planes of another country come to your territory and kill your people. But this is a unique situation where we don't have the technology and the U.S. has that technology," said one senior Pakistani government official speaking to CBS News on condition of anonymity. "While you see much graffiti in parts of Pakistan, so far people haven't protested in the extreme. We haven't had million people marching against the use of drones," concluded the government official.

Written by Farhan Bokhari