Pakistan selected some Hellfire targets including Mehsud

Dawn:

The Obama administration quietly decided last March to allow Pakistan to choose some of its own targets for drone attacks, according to the New Yorker, a prestigious US magazine.

Earlier last week, the magazine published a piece on the use of unmanned aircraft to target Al Qaeda and Taliban suspects in Fata. On Sunday, its author Jane Mayer gave an online interview to the readers, telling them that the Obama administration agreed to allow Pakistanis to select targets to calm down Islamabad’s protests over the drone attacks.

The change in US policy led to the killing of Pakistani Taliban leader Baitullah Mehsud in August.

The journalist, who interviewed senior US intelligence officials for the interview, wrote that on Aug 5, officials at the Central Intelligence Agency, in Langley, Virginia, watched a live video feed relaying close-up footage of Baitullah Mehsud, the leader of the Taliban in Pakistan.

‘He could be seen reclining on the rooftop of his father-in-law’s house, in Zanghara, a hamlet in South Waziristan. It was a hot summer night, and he was joined outside by his wife and his uncle, a medic; at one point, the remarkably crisp images showed that Mehsud, who suffered from diabetes and a kidney ailment, was receiving an intravenous drip.

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Mehsud was certainly a guy who deserved to die regardless of who decided to target him. His death has put the Taliban in disarray and has led to the current offensive that is impairing the Taliban's operation ability and uncovering a treasure trove of intelligence on al Qaeda and the Taliban.