According to a former senior intelligence official, there are four reasons why the strikes have increased: more resources, better methodology, a lower threshold for who is targeted, and, perhaps, a higher tolerance for collateral damage. The New America Foundation think tank estimated earlier this month that up to 40 percent of those killed in Pakistan strikes are civilians.
But there are indications that the new strikes are no more successful than the old ones despite their greater frequency, said a second former intelligence official.
“We’ve been given the impression that with more strikes, there’s been more success,” said the official. “They’re not more successful, they’re less successful. They have not improved their ability to kill high-level al-Qaeda targets.” According to the official, the U.S. plays a numbers game by making more requests so that the Pakistanis will approve more. The targeting, however, is not actually based on better intelligence.
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