The Pew Global Attitudes Survey illustrates how unpopular the drone program is around the world:
In 33 of the 39 surveyed countries, a plurality of people say they oppose the drone program in the United States. That means more people disapprove than approve of targeted killings in 85 percent of the countries surveyed.
Last week, Mark Mazzetti reported (NYT) that the Senate “quietly stripped a provision from an intelligence bill that would have required President Obama to make public each year the number of people killed or injured” in drone strikes. David Cole is aghast:
The Senate’s decision is particularly troubling in view of how reticent the administration itself continues to be about the drone program. To date, Obama has publicly admitted to the deaths of only four people in targeted killing operations. That came in May 2013, when, in conjunction with a speech at the National Defense University, and, in his words, “to facilitate transparency and debate on the issue,” President Obama acknowledged for the first time that the United States had killed four Americans in drone strikes. But according to credible accounts, Obama has overseen the killing of several thousand people in drone strikes since taking office. Why only admit to the four Americans’ deaths? …
[I]f the US government’s targeted killings are lawful, we should have no hesitation in making them public. Surely the least we can do is to literally count and report the lives we’ve taken. Yet even that, for “the most transparent administration in history,” is apparently too much.
