From Roots Action:
President Obama told CNN this week that he can kill Americans or non-Americans, the difference being that with Americans their killing amounts to their Constitutionally guaranteed due process.
CNN asked Obama how he chooses names for his kill list, but he declined to say. Obama claimed that there are checks on his power, pointing only to checks by his own subordinates, not by courts, not by Congress, and not by the public — which he reassures with vague statements that amount to “trust me.”
Obama claimed that his preference is to capture people rather than to kill them. This does not fit with cases like that of Tariq Khan, a 16-year-old killed by drone strike following his participation in a conference at which he could have easily been captured. It does not fit with the lack of criminal charges against virtually any of the people killed.
Obama claimed that he avoids killing civilians, yet careful research has documented large numbers of civilians killed, including this week in Yemen.
President Obama claims to have the power to kill anyone anywhere in the world, including Americans, based on a secret memo written by the Office of Legal Counsel (OLC) in the Department of Justice. This is the same process used by the Bush administration to claim that torture was all of a sudden legal. Unlike the Bush torture memos, Obama’s “kill list” memo remains classified.
Some drone war terms that have become public.
“Personality strike” – An attack aimed at named, so-called “high-value terrorists” (and their families).
“Signature strike” – An attack that targets allegedly suspicious compounds in areas controlled by “militants.”
“Double tap” – Following a drone strike with a second attack on first responders and rescuers, or later on the funeral for victims of the original attack.
“Combatant” – The Obama administration considers any military-age male in the vicinity of a bombing to be a combatant unless proven otherwise.
Michael V. Hayden, former head of the CIA (referring to the Bush administration’s program of torture):
“I have lived the life of someone taking action on the basis of secret O.L.C. memos, and it ain’t a good life. Democracies do not make war on the basis of legal memos locked in a D.O.J. safe.”
Dennis Blair, the former Director of National Intelligence, explains the attraction of waging war by drone:
“It is the politically advantageous thing to do — low cost, no U.S. casualties, gives the appearance of toughness,” he said. “It plays well domestically, and it is unpopular only in other countries. Any damage it does to the national interest only shows up over the long term.”
On the 11th anniversary of the 9/11 attacks, it might be a good time to debate the tactics and strategy of drone warfare. Unfortunately, both major political parties seem to be in agreement, so there is no debate.
More info: Secret ‘Kill List’ Proves a Test of Obama’s Principles and Will
UPDATE: Senator Rand Paul: ‘Bomb Everybody Tomorrow’ Is ‘Typical’ Republican Policy
UPDATE: Yemen Claims Death Of Al-Qaeda Regional Head (possibly a drone attack, though not reported as such).
#1 by Nathan Erkkila on September 10, 2012 - 12:35 pm
I’d rather have selective drone strikes than invade a country.
#2 by Richard Warnick on September 10, 2012 - 12:40 pm
Nathan–
I agree with you on principle, but…
(1) The available evidence suggests drone strikes are not all that “selective.”
Jeremy Scahill:
(2) There is no legal authority that we know of for these air strikes. They clearly go beyond the scope of the September 2001 AUMF. They clearly violate the Geneva Conventions and the Law of Land Warfare. If we ever get to see President Obama’s classified OLC memo, it is unlikely that the lawyers that wrote it managed to circumvent our laws in any credible way. Certainly Bush’s torture memos were riddled with errors and omissions.
(3) The U.S. Constitution quite clearly states:
President Obama is the first president in history to assert the power to kill American citizens wherever they are, even if it is far from any battlefield, using an extra-judicial process that he made up.
(4) Last but not least, remember than UAVs are cheap and available to almost anyone. Iran has them. Hezbollah has them. If another country or a terrorist organization did what we are now doing, would you call it terrorism?
#3 by Shane on September 10, 2012 - 5:56 pm
The real problem that the opposition party should be checking, and that so called teabagger patriots could be up in arms over. Something actually wrong, against the constitution, and that Obama actually does. Instead they complain about the taxes they think he raised and ask for his birth certificate.
….meanwhile the “intellectuals” on the right complain Obama has followers that think he can do no wrong, no matter how often we bitch about these problems.
#4 by cav on September 10, 2012 - 7:55 pm
And Obama may very well take those responsibilities seriously, tempering them mightily. That does not preclude some other, less scrupulous (and, yes there those), from being heinously abusive – yet still within the law as it seems to be being translated today.
#5 by Richard Warnick on September 11, 2012 - 12:44 pm
The problem is that once a President gets away with breaking the law, it becomes unlikely that future Presidents will be called to account. The failure to impeach President George W. Bush had consequences. The failure to do anything about President Obama’s violations of the Constitution and international law (aka treaties that are the supreme law of the land according to the U.S. Constitution) will also have consequences.