President Obama's second term begins amid intense criticism of the drone strikes being conducted by the United States in Pakistan. Much of this criticism is based on claims that drones are doing more harm than good.

A recent Stanford/NYU study concluded that drones cause excessive civilian casualties and frequently fail to hit leadership targets, and that the presence of drones spreads fear and anxiety among the civilian population, disrupts civilians' daily lives, limits public gatherings and disrupts access to education. Other critics cite the Taliban's detention and execution of suspected "spies" who assist drone targeting.

Like many such studies, the NYU/Stanford one did not attempt to interview a single member of the U.S. military. Had it done so, it might have learned that (at least in Afghanistan) there have been instances of Taliban or Al Qaeda forces killing civilians and placing their bodies at the site of drone attacks to increase civilian casualty counts. Yet the study's only attempt to gain the government's perspective was a letter requesting a meeting with the National Security Council. Because the council did not reply within a month, the U.S. government's perspective was excluded from the report.

The report's discussion of civilian casualties adopts the highest estimate offered by any of the three sources that compile such information — the Bureau of Investigative Journalism. And it consistently describes civilian casualties in the aggregate since the beginning of the drone program rather than examining recent trends. Even the bureau estimates that only seven civilians have been killed in about 60 strikes conducted over the last 13 months. These same strikes are estimated to have killed 250 to 400 militants.

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