Recent revelations that the White House keeps a secret terrorist kill list, which it uses to target al Qaeda leaders, have spurred a debate over drone warfare…As the political drama unfolds in Washington, however, the United States is intensifying its drone campaign in the arid mountains and remote plateaus of Yemen…

Critics argue that drone strikes create new adversaries and drive al Qaeda’s recruiting. As the Yemeni youth activist Ibrahim Mothana recently wrote in The New York Times, “Drone strikes are causing more and more Yemenis to hate America and join radical militants; they are not driven by ideology but rather by a sense of revenge and despair.” The Washington Post concurs…The ranks of al Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula (AQAP) have tripled to 1,000 in the last three years, and the link between its burgeoning membership, U.S. drone strikes, and local resentment seems obvious…

Opposite conclusions appear among journalists, activists, politicians on the ground in Yemen.

Yemeni journalists, particularly…shared this view: “I opposed the drone campaign until I saw what al Qaeda was doing in Jaar and Zinjibar,” an independent reporter in Aden said. “Al Qaeda hates the drones, they’re absolutely terrified of the drones … and that is why we need them.”

My interviewees also offered deeper insight into the sentiments described by Western journalists and Yemeni activists. In their view, public opposition to drones had little to do with a desire for revenge or increasing sympathy for al Qaeda. Instead, they argued, ordinary Yemenis see the drones as an affront to their national pride. “Drones remind us that we don’t have the ability to solve our problems by ourselves,” one member of the Yemeni Socialist Party said. “If these were Yemeni drones, rather than American drones, there would be no issue at all…”

None of these reactions address the legal dimensions of drone warfare….First, as long as drones target legitimate terrorists, Yemenis grudgingly acknowledge their utility. And second, the more Yemenis perceive the United States as a serious partner, the less drones will pique their national pride.

This research also offers another lesson. Despite deeper engagement and closer coordination, Americans and Yemenis are fighting the same war from different premises.

RTFA for the interviews and anecdotal briefs highlighting these conclusions. You may have to register to have free access to this article and more. It’s worth it. Christopher Swift and his peers are a valuable starting point for folks who want to construct an informed opinion.