US releases report on counterterrorism strike deaths – with glaring omissions

Tellingly, the report was released late on Friday before the July 4 holiday weekend – a tactic usually reserved for the grudging release of embarrassing information, writes Taimur Khan.

The document fails to meaningfully address the long list of concerns about the use of armed drones. Eric Gay, File/AP Photo

ABU DHABI // After months of anticipation over an ongoing review by the Obama administration of civilian deaths caused by US drone strikes, the White House has quietly issued a short report that raises far more questions than it answers.

The report, which draws on the review’s findings, says the US military and CIA carried out 473 counterterrorism strikes “outside of areas of active hostilities” between January 2009, when president Barack Obama took office, and the end of 2015.

These strikes killed between 64 and 116 innocent civilians, and between 2,372 and 2,481 “combatants”, according to the three-page report, which was released by the Office of the Director of National Intelligence (ODNI) late on Friday.

The report did not state in which countries outside of Afghanistan, Iraq and Syria the strikes occurred, but they are known to include Pakistan, Yemen, Somalia and Libya.

The figures given for civilian deaths are far below the estimates from every credible research and watchdog group that tracks such killings during US counterterrorism operations, including those that the ODNI report used for compiling its figures. Those estimates range from 200 to 1,000.

In 2013, in the face of mounting criticism over civilian deaths, Mr Obama announced counterterrorism guidelines that placed greater emphasis on avoiding such casualties and limiting strikes to suspects who pose an immediate threat to the United States.

But despite this, drone strikes have remained a key tool of the Obama administration and is expected to play a major role in the counterterrorism efforts of future administrations also. Meanwhile, an increasing number of governments around the world are attempting to emulate the US counterterrorism model due to its focus on eliminating militants with minimal risk and reducing the need for deploying troops.

The US model has been highly effective at eliminating Al Qaeda, Taliban and ISIL leaders. But critics say overreliance on drones creates blind spots that may outweigh the short-term benefits of their use. These include an increased risk of negative consequences from civilian deaths, less focus on the more difficult military and political aspects of counterterrorism, and the fact that militant groups have adapted to the frequent killing of leaders.

Indeed, the threat posed by terrorist groups has only spread and metastasised during Mr Obama’s tenure.

The ODNI report was released in tandem with a new executive order by Mr Obama that requires the US government to issue an annual report disclosing the number of civilians killed in counterterrorism operations each year. The order – which can be discarded by future presidents – aims to increase the accountability and transparency surrounding drone strikes, the White Hosue said.

But the move is little more than a fig leaf intended to cover a larger conundrum at the heart of Mr Obama’s presidency, months before he leaves office: that a progressive civil liberties advocate will have institutionalised the acceptability of extrajudicial killings, in some cases of US citizens, in countries where the United States is not at war.

Tellingly, the report was released late on Friday before the July 4 holiday weekend – a tactic usually reserved for the grudging release of embarrassing information.

The document fails to meaningfully address the long list of concerns about the use of drones. It does not even distinguish the method by which operations were carried out – either by drone, manned aircraft or other means, such as special forces raids. It also does not list where the strikes took place, when they occurred, or who the intended target of each attack was – all omissions that seem intended to limit the scope of accountability.

"ODNI did not provide data on a strike-by-strike basis, so it is difficult to reconcile the discrepancies between our data and that provided by [the] US government," said Bill Roggio, a researcher at the Long War Journal, part of the Foundation for Defense of Democracies think tank.

He has tracked the strikes for the past decade and estimates that about 200 civilians have been killed since 2009.

“Without examining each strike on an individual basis, it is impossible to close the information gap,” Mr Roggio said.