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Which countries saw the most drone strikes authorized by Trump compared to Obama?
Executive summary
The available reporting shows that during Donald Trump’s presidency drone strikes — and broader counter‑terror air operations — increased in several countries compared with Barack Obama’s years, with particularly large upticks cited in Yemen, Somalia, and Afghanistan (examples: Yemen: 176 strikes in Trump’s first two years vs. 154 over all eight years of Obama; Somalia: strikes roughly doubled under Trump in the first year), and overall counts from trackers indicate more strikes early in Trump’s term than over Obama’s full tenure (examples from Bureau of Investigative Journalism and other outlets) [1] [2] [3] [4]. Coverage is uneven and datasets differ; transparency rules were revoked in 2019, which complicates precise cross‑administration comparisons [5] [1].
1. Trump’s apparent geographic shifts: Yemen, Somalia, Afghanistan
Multiple outlets and think‑tank tallies document that Yemen and Somalia saw marked increases in strikes early in the Trump era: one count puts 176 strikes in Yemen during Trump’s first two years compared with 154 strikes across all eight years of Obama [2] [6]. Reporting and analysis also note that Trump’s threshold and geographic designations shifted so Yemen and Somalia were treated as “areas of active hostilities,” enabling more frequent action and reduced reporting requirements [7] [5] [8].
2. How analysts and trackers reach different totals
Different groups publish different strike counts. The Bureau of Investigative Journalism was cited by the BBC as finding 2,243 strikes in Trump’s first two years vs. 1,878 in Obama’s full eight years — a headline figure that highlights divergent methodologies and scope [1]. Other outlets rely on The Daily Beast, Long War Journal, Airwars, or AP counts and therefore report varying country tallies; this variation is why simple comparisons can be misleading without agreeing on definitions and sources [3] [4] [9].
3. Policy changes that altered counting and authority
A central reason comparisons are fraught is policy change: in March 2019 the Trump administration revoked an Obama executive order requiring annual public accounting of civilian deaths from strikes outside war zones, and the administration also broadened “areas of active hostilities” — both moves that reduce transparency and change how strikes are authorized and reported [5] [1]. Analysts say Trump’s rules allowed wider geographic application and gave commanders more latitude, which both increased strike frequency and obscured oversight [10] [3].
4. Which countries show the clearest increases in reporting
Across the sources, Yemen and Somalia are singled out repeatedly for sharp increases in strike counts under Trump versus Obama — Bureau of Investigative Journalism, AP, Chicago Sun‑Times, and other compilations highlight tripling or doubling in those theaters in the early Trump period [1] [4] [6]. Afghanistan, Iraq, and Syria are also referenced as areas where U.S. strikes surged or remained significant during Trump’s term [6] [8].
5. Limits, disagreements, and methodological caveats
Reporters and researchers explicitly disagree about totals and causal interpretation. Some analyses count all “counter‑terror airstrikes, drone strikes, and ground raids,” while others limit to strikes clearly labelled drones or run by particular agencies (CIA vs. Pentagon) [7] [9]. The revocation of reporting requirements and the administration’s reclassification of operational areas mean post‑2017 counts may omit actions previously disclosed — a methodological complication noted by PBS and BBC [5] [1].
6. What the sources do not settle
Available sources do not provide a single authoritative country‑by‑country table that cleanly attributes every strike to Obama vs. Trump; instead, they offer counts and patterns from different trackers and journalists that point to increases in specific countries [1] [2] [3]. Precise totals, civilian casualty breakdowns by country, and full accounting of which agency carried out each strike are not consistently available in the cited reporting [5] [7].
7. Takeaway for readers seeking clarity
If you want an apples‑to‑apples country comparison, you must pick a single tracker and definition (e.g., Bureau of Investigative Journalism, AP, Long War Journal) and accept its methodological limits; otherwise, you will see conflicting but consistent signals that Yemen and Somalia — and to a lesser extent Afghanistan/Iraq/Syria — experienced notable upticks in strikes early under Trump relative to Obama, and that transparency changes make exact comparisons difficult [1] [2] [3].
If you’d like, I can pull together a side‑by‑side table using one specific tracker’s dataset (e.g., Bureau of Investigative Journalism or The Daily Beast) to show country counts attributed to each presidency and note the tracker’s caveats.