This month, The Bureau of Investigative Journalism, based in London, found that CIA drone strikes in Pakistan target rescuers from previous drone strikes as well as funerals and mourners, resulting in the deaths of civilians.

Since 2004, the CIA has employed unmanned Predator and Reaper drones in the counterterrorism effort in Pakistan.

If you haven’t heard about this or are unsure if you’ve understood what it means, it’s pretty much that robot planes are being sent into Pakistan and dropping bombs.

These attacks target the semi-autonomous Federally Administrated Tribal Areas near the Afghanistan border. Reports from various news sources give spotty numbers regarding the consequences of these strikes.

The Bureau released a report in August 2011, which is the only investigative effort to discover whom these strikes target and whom they kill.

The report is based on witness testimonies, field reports, leaked intelligence documents, as well as journalist and former intelligence officers’ accounts. However, according to an article in The New York Times, American officials say that the reports might be unreliable.

Obviously I’m in no position to know who was really killed in these drone strikes. My question is, how does anyone really know besides the people living in the target areas?

If counter terrorism officials and involved politicians have been carefully assessing the level of damage that’s been done, they certainly haven’t disclosed their methods.

President Obama didn’t even admit to U.S. involvement in the strikes until last month, when he was asked about the attacks in a video chat with Google+ and YouTube users.

U.S. officials and President Obama try to reassure us with a snappy tone, indicating that it is ridiculous to consider the possibility that a U.S. military operation might not be entirely justified or effective.

But they offer no proof to counter high civilian casualties, except for vague reassurances about the caution employed by the U.S. military.

In The New York Times’ article, an unnamed American counterterrorism official says, “One must wonder why an effort that has so carefully gone after terrorists who plot to kill civilians has been subjected to so much misinformation. Let’s be under no illusions – there are a number of elements who would like nothing more than to malign these efforts and help Al Qaeda succeed.”

This manipulative sort of rhetoric attempts to corral people into blindly accepting U.S. policies but does not tell us solidly what good these attacks have done or how many civilians they’ve killed.

When commenting on the drone strikes, Obama said, “I think that there’s this perception that we’re just sending in a whole bunch of strikes willy nilly…it is important for everybody to understand that this thing is kept on a very tight leash.” But how can we really understand this with no further information?

Obama didn’t openly refute the Bureau’s report. He said that the “drones have not caused a huge number of civilian casualties,” but he didn’t specify what number of civilian casualties would qualify as huge.

The Bureau’s report estimates between 2,347 and 2,956 deaths, most of which were low-level militants. Between 392 and 781 of the casualties were civilians, 175 of these children. Obama claimed that the drone strikes are “a targeted, focused effort at people who are on a list of active terrorists.”

However, according to The New York Times, “American officials familiar with the rules governing the strikes and who spoke on the condition of anonymity said that many missiles had been fired at groups of suspected militants who are not on any list.” Human Rights Watch is calling for the United States to end these strikes because they lack legal justification.

The most disturbing thing about this is how little accountability there is for attacks that aren’t even carried out by human beings. The U.S. government is taking lives without putting Americans immediately at risk (although who knows the long term consequences of anti-American venom the United States is creating?).

Obama claims that other kinds of military operations would be even more invasive. However, other kinds of combat would at least make both sides of the battle feel the consequences of attacks. Those executing attacks are not even subject to public opinion. As the Times’ article reveals, most of the operatives behind these attacks remain anonymous.

If war technology that is remote and impersonal is going to be employed, then those employing it must counter by becoming doubly aware of its effects.

However, unless we hold our own governments accountable for their actions, they will continue to kill at nobody’s discretion but their own.

Hannah Green is Weinberg senior. She can be reached at [email protected]