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A picture of war: the CIA’s drone strikes in Pakistan

September 10th, 2012 | by | Published in Bureau Stories, Covert Drone War, Drone strikes in Pakistan, Drones - graphs  |  1 Comment

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The Bureau has been recording every reported CIA drone strike in Pakistan.  The result is our extensive database which details every known attack and the numbers killed in a covert war that has been bitterly fought since 2004.

Our detailed analysis has found that 344 strikes have killed between 2,562 and 3,325.  This number includes at least 474 civilians – though the true figure maybe as high as 881.
So just what do we know?  Rather than ask you to sift through thousands of lines of data, we’ve done the hard work for you – and these are the facts we’ve found:

 

Related links:

Responses

  1. Austin G. Mackell says:

    September 16th, 2012 at 4:37 am (#)

    This info-graphic takes a rightly conservative approach to numbers, but we can speculate that the percentage of civilian deaths is much higher. See Glen Greenwald’s excellent work on this.

Casualty Estimates

CIA Drone Strikes in Pakistan 2004–2013

Total US strikes: 368
Obama strikes: 316
Total reported killed: 2,541-3,533
Civilians reported killed: 411-884
Children reported killed: 168-197
Total reported injured: 1,173-1,472

US Covert Action in Yemen 2002–2013

Confirmed US drone strikes: 46-56

Total reported killed: 240-347
Civilians reported killed: 14-49
Children reported killed: 2
Reported injured: 62-144

Possible extra US drone strikes: 78-96

Total reported killed: 275-440
Civilians reported killed: 25-48
Children reported killed: 9-10
Reported injured: 76-98

All other US covert operations: 12-76

Total reported killed: 148-366
Civilians reported killed: 60-87
Children reported killed: 25
Reported injured: 22-111

US Covert Action in Somalia 2007–2013

US drone strikes: 3-9

Total reported killed: 7-27
Civilians reported killed: 0-15
Children reported killed: 0
Reported injured: 2-24

All other US covert operations: 7-14

Total reported killed: 47-143
Civilians reported killed: 7-42
Children reported killed: 1-3
Reported injured: 12-20

The Data

Covert Drone War - the Data
The databases of all known secret war strikes in Pakistan, Yemen and Somalia.

Methodology

The methodology behind the research on US drone attacks.

Drone Infographics

Yemen strikes visualised
July 2, 2012 | by | Comments Off
Bureau Visualisations - Emma Slater

A series of data sets on what the numbers mean.

Pakistan drone statistics visualised
July 2, 2012 | by | 6 Comments
Graph - Joakim Sorthe

Graphs of the Bureau's strike tally and casualty estimates from Pakistan.

Interactive timeline of all recorded CIA drone strikes
August 10, 2011 | by | Comments Off
Timeglider tall image

An interactive timeline of drone strikes in Pakistan between 2004 and the present date.

Interactive map
August 10, 2011 | by | 1 Comment
Globe - Flickr / joelthomas

This map details the locations of CIA drone strikes in the remote Pakistani tribal areas.

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