I request Ambassador Anne. W. Patterson, who I hear is on extended stay here until 2013, to spare us the drone strikes in FATA until the floods are over. I dont insist that she stop them completely because these, in a complicated way, are good for us too. If these were not so, our government would never have allowed drones to operate from our own runways. Since the floods caught us unawares, FATA has been hit twice by drones. Presently, we are being hit on two fronts, from air by drones and on ground by floods. Just when we scurry to rescue our families and cattle out of raging floods, Mr Obama sends in his air-vultures. I know in Washington these days, the menacing duo of Panetta and Holbrook probably calls the shots on this but there is no harm pleading they hold their drones while we brace out the floods. -MIRZA TUFTAN BAIG, Lahore, August 23.