Those Drones

The worst thing about those drone strikes is Obama’s moral preening and hypocrisy

Bookworm on Feb 06 2013 at 4:35 pm | Filed under: Barack Obama, Muslim violence

There’s been a lot of upset in the conservative blogosphere about Obama’s drone strike policy. The way the administration phrased it, as “legal,” “ethical,” and “wise,” got a lot of hackles up, especially when Michael Isikoff let slip how little oversight there is — including oversight over decisions to kill American citizens.

A lot of people are very worried about this, because they see a government that feels unfettered by the protections accorded citizens under the Bill of Rights. The problem, as conservatives see it, isn’t so much what the administration does, but the attitude it has when it does it. Thus, the administration manifestly refuses to acknowledge that the rights stated in the Bill of Rights are inherent in all citizens and that the government has the burden of proving good cause to implicate or limit those rights in any way.

Instead, in every instance, the Obama administration takes the position that government has the inherent power to impinge upon and limit citizen’s freedoms, or even take their lives, leaving citizens with the burden of proving that the government has overreached. To the extent that the attitude inverts both the Declaration of Independence and the Bill of Rights, people who care about those documents and the unalienable rights they establish and protect are going to view anything the administration does with a jaundiced eye.

Rusty Shackleford, however, who knows as much about Al Qaeda and other Islamist extremists as anyone else on this earth, tells conservatives not to get too uptight about those American citizens that the Obama administration targets for drone killing. These people aren’t just any old Americans. Instead, they are citizens who have deliberately thrown their lot in with al Qaeda, thereby taking upon themselves enemy status:

If you think it’s unconstitutional or immoral to kill a member of a terrorist organization living abroad then you and I have very different readings of the Constitution and very different sets of moral standards.

Moreover, it’s just basic common sense that in warfare you don’t stop to ask the person you’re about to shoot for a copy of their passport. Who gives a rat’s ass if bin Laden was Saudi or if he was born in Colorado?

Please, go read the report. Nowhere in it is there even a smidgen of a hint that drones could be used against Americans … in America.

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Bottom line: there are few things more loathsome than someone who yells at you and humiliates you for doing something, then does the same thing himself, and, if you call him upon it, says that the mere fact that it is he who’s doing it, not you, makes it all right.

"I am pleased that the president has agreed to provide the Intelligence Committee with access to the OLC (Office of Legal Counsel) opinion regarding the use of lethal force in counterterrorism operations," the California Democrat said in a statement. "It is critical for the committee's oversight function to fully understand the legal basis for all intelligence and counterterrorism operations." The announcement came shortly after an administration official said that President Barack Obama had yielded to demands that he turn over to Congress the classified Justice Department legal advice that seeks to justify the policy.

The developments came the night before confirmation hearings are to be held for Obama's CIA director nominee, John Brennan, and amid complaints from senators, including several Democrats, about secrecy surrounding the drone policy. "Today, as part of the president's ongoing commitment to consult with Congress on national security matters, the president directed the Department of Justice to provide the congressional Intelligence committees access to classified Office of Legal Counsel advice related to the subject of the Department of Justice White Paper," an administration official said.


The U.S. MQ-9 Reaper unmanned aerial vehicle has been used to take out key targets in the war on terror.

The 16-page white paper -- titled "Lawfulness of a Lethal Operation Directed Against a U.S. Citizen who is a Senior Operational Leader of Al Qaida or an Associated Force" -- is a policy paper rather than an official legal document. The president, the official said, was turning over the information because he believes the scrutiny and debate is healthy.

In a 2012 speech at the Woodrow Wilson International Center for Scholars in Washington, Brennan asserted that the drone strikes are legal both under the Authorization for Use of Military Force resolution passed by Congress after the September 11 attacks and because, "There is nothing in international law that bans the use of remotely piloted aircraft for this purpose or that prohibits us from using lethal force against our enemies outside of an active battlefield, at least when the country involved consents or is unable or unwilling to take action against the threat."

More Obama to give white paper on targeted killings to Congress - CNN.com

to malign George Bush and our troops as rabid killers

With a direct eye on Taiwan, the Chinese military may be moving into the large-scale deployment of unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs) or drones. The Associated Press reported over the last few days that Chinese aerospace firms had developed dozens of drones, that its technology was maturing rapidly and that they were “on the cusp” of widespread use for surveillance and combat strikes. “Taiwan should be concerned about China’s development of large numbers of sophisticated military UAVs,” Ian Easton, a research fellow at The Project 2049 Institute, told the Taipei Times.

Easton, co-author of a recent report on Chinese drones, said there were signs that the Taipei government was taking the situation seriously and “preparing accordingly.” Intelligence from Taipei on the Chinese UAV fleet indicated that the Military Intelligence Bureau “may have conducted successful operations against China that specifically focused on collecting information about UAVs,” Easton said. He said that China hides its military aircraft in extensive networks of camouflaged hangers and underground bunkers at virtually every air base across the Taiwan Strait.

Considering that, the bureau could not have gotten its information from satellite imagery and would have had to have used some other measure — “agents on the ground or perhaps cyber espionage,” he said. Easton said that Chinese UAVs would be deployed in any naval blockade or missile campaign scenario directed against Taiwan. “They would also support any invasion of Kinmen, Matsu or Dongyin [Isle],” he said. “Given the close proximity of these Taiwanese islands to China, they are probably under Chinese UAV surveillance already, just as the Senkakus [Diaoyutai Islands] and the Spratly Islands [Nansha Islands, reportedly are,” Easton said.

The People’s Liberation Army (PLA) Air Force Base near Shuimen Village in China’s Fujian Province, has UAVs stationed there — very close to several of Taiwan’s off-shore islands. Easton said Taiwan’s main defensive advantages against Chinese UAVs were geography and technology. “Taiwan has built a remarkable homeland air and missile defense network using its mountainous terrain to protect key facilities and station long-range radars at high elevations,” he said. “Taiwan’s close relationships with the US military and intelligence community — and Taiwan’s own world-class technology sectors — provide it with some truly cutting edge capabilities for targeting and intercepting attack aircraft, missiles and UAVs,” Easton said.

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