Sport makes an attractive target for terrorism. Media is already assembled, and the terrorist goal, to achieve a shocking change in events, is all the more readily achieved. The 1972 Munich massacre was the classic example, with the Boston Marathon bombings being the most recent -- in this country.
But terrorism prospers abroad, and no more so than in our supposed ally, the country of Pakistan. Today comes word that gunmen, wearing the uniforms of the Pakistani rural police, have killed 9 people at a mountain climbing base camp for Nanga Parbar, the 9th highest mountain in the world. The nine persons killed included 5 Ukrainians, three Chinese, and one Russian.
It seems unlikely that the persons at the base camp would have expected such an attack. The place was so remote that it appears that was necessary for the attackers to kidnap a pair of guides to lead them to the camp. Many of of the attacks mounted in or from Pakistan have focused on urban areas, such as the 2008 Mumbai attacks, where there exist a large number of potential victims and the concomitant chance to use the terrorist weapon of choice, the bomb, to the greatest effect. (See here for a list of the numerous attacks in Pakistan in 2012 alone.)
For terrorists, attacks on sport and on tourism carry the obvious benefit of weakening the government by attacking the economic well-being of the country. But in this case, there is another reason from the terrorist point of view for committing the attack.
According to the Huffpo article:
Pakistan Taliban spokesman Ahsanullah Ahsan claimed responsibility for the attack, saying their Jundul Hafsa group carried out the shooting as retaliation for the death of the Taliban's deputy leader, Waliur Rehman, in a U.S. drone attack on May 29.
"By killing foreigners, we wanted to give a message to the world to play their role in bringing an end to the drone attacks," Ahsan told The Associated Press by telephone from an undisclosed location.
This illustrates the vulnerability of the drone program -- while the drone operators are completely invulnerable to attack, retaliation against persons perceived as associated with the bombing power becomes the course of action by the party under attack.
Consequently while drone warfare can quite effectively eliminate a large number of people, it cannot bring peace to a country.
In this particular case, I expect that the terrorists expected, or at least hoped, to be able to kill an American climbing party. Coming so soon after the Boston marathon attacks, the inevitable focus of the enormous power of the American media on such an attack would make it a prime achievement, if that word is appropriate, of terrorism.
But the narcissistic American media cares little about harm suffered by the people of other nations, and in any case it seems unlikely that either Russia or China, who are both working on their own drone warfare programs, would be influenced against drone warfare by this type of attack.
If anything, attacks upon their nationals abroad could be used by their own drone warfare proponents as an excuse to accelerate their development. See here for Vladimir Putin's views on drone warfare, which appear to be largely indistinguishable from President Obama's.
Consider this article from National Defense Magazine (May 2013):
There are already 4,000 different unmanned aircraft platforms in circulation on the global market.
There are concerns about that level of proliferation, primarily because UAVs can be used for lethal purposes. But only sophisticated models like the Global Hawk and Predator drones, over which the U.S. military and industry holds a virtual monopoly, are capable of such feats. The majority of remotely piloted aircraft will be smaller and perform intelligence, surveillance and reconnaissance missions, analysts agree.
I would look for armed drone warfare to become more prevalent, as other powers besides the U.S. acquire the ability to produce such weapons. Just as the atomic bomb could not be confined to the U.S., armed drone technology will pass into the hands of others. Terrorist attacks such as those at the Nanga Parbar base camp will not hinder drone warfare, but rather encourage its growth.