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NBC: here’s the Obama administration’s white paper legitimizing drone strikes!

By: Moe Lane (Diary)  |  February 5th, 2013 at 12:30 PM  | 

RESIZE: AAA

NBC News has gotten its hands on a white paper that’s being used to legitimize the Obama administration’s drone policy, and it’s a… doozy. Short version: members of terrorist groups actively attacking the United States (or our interests) can expect to be shot on sight; and that includes the members of terrorist groups that happen to also be American citizens. And the administration does not have the inclination, and does not feels that it has the need, to particularly clear with anybody their taking the shot if a suitable target hoves into view.

Mind you, I don’t disagree with the basic argument*… but then, I’m a neoconservative. I knew that my faction had won the foreign policy debate – shame it’s no longer being implemented by somebody competent – but I didn’t realize that it was this comprehensive a win. I in particular never expected to encounter this argument from this White House:

…the condition that an operation leader present an “imminent” threat of violent attack against the United States does not require the United States to have clear evidence that a specific attack on U.S. persons and interests will take place in the immediate future. Given the nature of, for example, the terrorist attacks on September 11, in which civilian airliners were hijacked to strike the World Trade Center and the Pentagon, this definition of imminence, which would require the United States to refrain from action until preparations for an attack are concluded, would not allow the United States sufficient time to defend itself.

(pause)

Yes. From there it really is only a short jump to concluding And that’s why it was all right to topple the Hussein regime in Iraq.

Read the whole thing – and, if you’re a member of the antiwar movement, I have a personal request: video record yourself reading it. I’ve never actually watched somebody’s soul die a little, inside, and I’m morbidly curious to see what it looks like.

Moe Lane (crosspost)

PS: I also should note: anybody can inflict pain. Being truly unpleasant requires only modest talent. Skill at inflicting mental cruelty is something that can be acquired through mere perseverance. But to use Hamdan v. Rumsfeld as your primary justification for drone strikes? That is the sadism one would expect from an artist.

*I have a problem on a practical level, though: drone strikes kill, but do not capture. There is a limited amount of information that you can get out of a burning corpse, and still less out a grease stain on the wall.

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COMMENTS

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  • earlgrey

    I know it sounds stupid, but I feel a little less comfortable traveling overseas as a result of this. I am stocking up on Obama t-shirts to wear for my next trip.

  • http://www4.webng.com/rickbull/lostlucky/ rickbull

    Moe, if you’re really interested in watching “somebody’s soul die a little, inside,” I suggest going to youtube and checking out the videos that the liberal activists made of themselves after the Wisconsin recall effort. They were *quite* entertaining.

  • http://applescorneroftheorchard.blogspot.com/ Pomme

    In the immortal words of 1600 Penn Ave’s President Gilchrist: “I have robots that roam the skies!”

  • commonsenseobserver

    Certainly, there is a place for the use of drones, but we should explore other options to allow us to gather intelligence instead of just killing people from the sky, and there ought to be stringent oversight.

  • funwithknives

    …and in a similar vein, we’re being made ‘aware of intent’ as-regards Drone Usage here in the good old U S A .
    Somebody tell me again, why me owning a 20 MM Oerlikon is BAD Idea…?
    I swear I’ll only use it in self-defense……….

  • silentnomore

    The white paper may have been leaked on purpose.
    What purpose? …To get more American citizens to fear their government.

  • conservative_dan

    This is despicable just as it is, but then to consider that Dems are the ones who were all over W for doing much, much less than this trampling of the Constitution. God help us……..PLEASE!!

  • joehatfield37

    Sooo…..is anyone here still under the delusion that “We, the People” are NOT the enemy of the current administration??

  • http://www.BillBowenAuthor.com RightinSanFrancisco

    Process is important.
    1. What is the approval process – who?; how?; what criteria?; how much collateral damage is acceptable?
    2. What is the “after the fact” review process – who? what third party involvement? how public?
    I wouldn’t trust any individual to be able to go down this path alone, without review by a disinterested party. Not Reagan; not Lincoln; certainly not Obama.
    www.RightinSanFrancisco.com

  • pbeck

    The late-great Billy Mays would recommend using OxyClean to get that unsightly grease stain out.

  • gmat

    I like the tactic and I’m not even a neoconservative, just a regular old realist.

  • pbeck

    Could it be that Mr. Obama knows that he has to further
    destroy the U.S. job market (CBO projects a 1.4% GDP growth in 2013) so that
    the “people” that are ordered by Mr. Obama’s administration to carry out his
    anti-American fiat government would be more likely to do so because they fear
    the less-comfortable unemployment line? It’s like the USFS federal employees in
    the Rockies carrying out absolutely
    counter-productive measures regarding forest management, fire control and
    wolf/bear/predator control. Those middle-aged Forest Service employees have
    very poor prospects of finding equal paying jobs if they refuse to do as they
    are told, so they’ll do it even when evidence is starring them in the face that
    what they are being instructed to do will not work. If the U.S. economy was in
    good shape, Obama’s ideas would be laughed at. There was a chap in Bavaria
    not all that long ago who was able to introduce otherwise lunatic ideas because
    of poor economic conditions.

    The word for the day? The word for the day is,
    “struthious”. Don’t be “struthious”.

  • whitetop

    The Clinton administration put the citizens on notice that the government could kill citizens without intervention; remember Waco and Ruby Ridge? They also showed they could remove children and send them back to their country of origin as in the case of young Cuban child. Obama is just building on what Clinton started.

  • tlhanger

    What is the problem with this? Read it twice. Seems to be serving notice to the homegrown terrorist.

  • rationalanalyst2

    Suspect that No Terrorist – - either Foreign or Domestic – - will be immune from Attack. The Government just had better have the pictures and the proof.
    With the progress in Drone development; soon the Government and Law Enforcement will have the means to find anyone, any time, and, in any place. And, if you have been keeping up; you must know that Robots and AI, are making huge advancements. Coming to a street corner in YOUR Neighborhood – - a Robo Cop – - maybe one on every Block.
    The REAL COMING THREAT will be mechanization of millions of jobs. Any action that is repetitive, can be programmed. As an example, say, “Good Bye,” to: most Retail Employees; Soft White Collar Office Workers; Blue, Green, and Pink; low paid Hospital Workers; most all hired hand Farm help; all domestic help – - cleaning, lawn care; veggie and fruit picking. Must not forget transportation maintenance; robots will not miss much; safer cars, buses, airplanes, etc. Robotic Machines are already driving Cars, Accident Free, from Coast to Coast. (Pay attention Truckers.) And . . . so much more . . .

  • bevfromnyc

    Personally, I am extremely unconfortable with anyone murdering people in countries to which we are not at war. If any other President tried this( even Clinton), all of the collective heads of all the collective liberal minds were spontaneously explode. Yet, it is fascinating that they are A-Okay with Obama going around the world ordering the summary execution of people he deems a threat – sovereign borders and Geneva Conventions be damned!

  • nosurrender

    Drone strikes outside of war zones the US is engaged in, is inexcusable in all but the most extraordinary of circumstances.

  • Ari

    This whole issue begs the question: Why No DRONE was on scene at BENGHAZI?

    We could have wiped out the mortar and grenade actors and saved 4 brave Americans…

    Even without the Naval support forces that were told to stand down. Makes me wonder what the Ambassador and 3 CIA had on this administration that made them unworthy of defense by the highest in command?

    Was it something about the surface to air missiles that Israel took out in Syria?
    Or 20,000 more lost in Libya? What a “spring” that would make on world wide air travel.

  • aardvar

    I am upset with the Republican Party and their US Senators on this issue. In an attempt to discredit Obama and his CIA nominee, the GOP is criticizing the drone policy of the White House. I don’t care who initiates the policy, gets credit for it, or anything else. This is the one weapon that Obama and the Dems seem willing to utilize to kill terrorists. And that’s all I want – to kill the terrorists, any and all of them, everywhere. So get off it! If a GOP President was using drones to this extent, we’d cheer!

    I wholly recognize that such a policy is intended to keep the ranks at Gitmo low for Obama and that we also do not receive new intelligence from dead terrorists. But the only good terrorist is a dead one – so again I don’t care if we lose some minimal intelligence that we might gleam.

    The worse suggestion that I have heard is to place a judge in the process. Oh my golly, whenever has a lawyer ever made a decision. All you get are opinions. I may detest Obama to the core but I’d rather that any President have the call on targets versus judges. Get serious people. We do this now and you’ll never get out of court when we again have a GOP President.