A single US drone attack recruited more militants than three months of Taliban effort.
Evidence
Evidence provided by a Pakistani Taliban leader, Baitullah Mehsud, illustrates the apparent truth of that thesis: “I spent three months trying to recruit and only got 10–15 persons. One US attack and I got 150 volunteers.” This pattern seems to have been forgotten by the American forces, which is particularly surprising since it appears printed in black and white in the military’s own handbooks: “Confrontational military action, in exclusion, is counter-productive in most cases; it risks generating popular resentment, creating martyrs that motivate new recruits, and producing cycles of revenge.” But is it really a case of forgetfulness? — Grégoire Chamayou, A Theory of the Drone, 284
Categorization
- QUESTION: Chamayou ends with ‘is it really forgetfulness?’ — invites investigation into why US forces persist despite known counterproductivity.
- XREF: connects to: A single drone strike recruited ten times more Taliban volunteers than months of effort