Fucking CIA, fucking drone war.

[cali]

If one thing will come back to bite us in myriad ways it's the secret drone war that's been waged by the CIA- which has to be the most out of control, repugnant part of our government.

The drone war started under bushco in 2004, but was ramped up dramatically and with increased secrecy by President Obama.

For those who wish to claim that President Obama has not put the drone program on steroids:

http://www.thebureauinvestigates.com/2013/03/25/graphic-new-visualisation-for-cias-drone-war-in-pakistan/

A new interactive graphic, which uses the Bureau’s drone data, has brought a fresh perspective to the CIA’s nine-year drone campaign in Pakistan.

A team of developers has pulled together every known drone strike and casualty from data provided by the Bureau and New America Foundation. This data has been represented in an interactive timeline which allows the viewer to see how the campaign builds over time, as well as the number of people killed.

Pitch Interactive, a California-based commercial web-development studio, has produced the interactive as part of a pro-bono programme.

The project, Out of Sight, Out of Mind, aims to capture the scale and human cost of the drone war in Pakistan through its visual representation of the CIA’s covert Pakistan drone war from the first event in 2004 to the latest strike.

<snip>

We are beginning to see some backlash against the drone targeted murder, er I mean killing. Yes, there's been some opposition since the beginning, but in general it's been ignored. The NYT is running a kickass anti-drone series called Rise of the Predators.

Targeted Killing Comes to Define War on Terror

When Sulaiman Abu Ghaith, a son-in-law of Osama bin Laden, was taken into American custody at an airport stopover in Jordan last month, he joined one of the most select groups of the Obama era: high-level terrorist suspects who have been located by the American counterterrorism juggernaut, and who have not been killed.

<snip>

Despite Mr. Brennan’s protestations, an overwhelming reliance on killing terrorism suspects, which began in the administration of George W. Bush, has defined the Obama years. Since Mr. Obama took office, the C.I.A. and military have killed about 3,000 people in counterterrorist strikes in Pakistan, Yemen and Somalia, mostly using drones. Only a handful have been caught and brought to this country; an unknown number have been imprisoned by other countries with intelligence and other support from the United States.

The drone strikes have become unpopular abroad; in a Pew Research Center poll last year, just 17 percent of Pakistanis supported them against leaders of extremist groups. And domestic critics have attacked from two different directions: Some Republicans in Congress accuse Mr. Obama of adopting a de facto kill preference because he shut down the C.I.A.’s overseas prisons and does not want to send more detainees to Guantánamo Bay, Cuba. Human rights advocates argue that some drone strikes have amounted to extrajudicial killings, the execution without trial of people suspected of being militants whose identities American officials often do not know and who sometimes pose little threat to the United States.

But with the American public, the strikes remain popular. Even as some senior former American security officials question whether the strikes are beginning to do more harm than good, 65 percent of Americans questioned in a Gallup poll last month approved of strikes to kill suspected foreign terrorists; only 28 percent were opposed.

<snip>

http://www.nytimes.com/2013/04/08/world/targeted-killing-comes-to-define-war-on-terror.html?pagewanted=all&_r=0

Editorial:

The Obama administration has floated a plan to shift drone operations from the Central Intelligence Agency to the military. This is supposed to make targeted killings of suspected terrorists more transparent and accountable, but so far it looks as if it would be a marginal improvement.

Popular discontent with the drone program has built slowly as drone missions grew from 50 strikes under President George W. Bush to more than 400 under President Obama, and it dawned on Americans that remote-controlled killing had become a permanent fixture of national policy. The issue came to a head when Mr. Obama named John Brennan, who created his drone policy as chief counterterrorism adviser, to be C.I.A. director and critics raised legal, moral and practical objections. Among the complaints: an American citizen, Anwar al-Awlaki, was killed in Yemen in 2011 without due process; too many civilians have become collateral damage; and drone strikes are increasingly projecting a harmful, violent image of American foreign policy.

<snip>

But most drone strikes have been carried out by the C.I.A. in Pakistan — 365 versus 45 in Yemen and a handful in Somalia — and officials say those will continue. Hence, the proposed change would mean scant improvement in the rules that govern drone strikes. The problem would be similar if more drone operations were shifted to the Pentagon’s Joint Special Operations Command, which is among the least transparent elements of the military.

The biggest impediment to change is that the C.I.A.’s role enables a fiction that has suited the United States, which refuses to acknowledge striking militants in the lawless Afghanistan-Pakistan border region, and Pakistan, which denounces American strikes but actually allows them. As Mark Mazzetti explained in The Times on Sunday, Pakistan’s intelligence service has permitted drone strikes in certain tribal areas under the terms of a secret deal struck with the C.I.A in 2004. If American military forces hit Pakistan, it could be an act of war. But the intelligence agencies operate in a netherworld where the same rules don’t apply.

<snip>

http://www.nytimes.com/2013/04/08/opinion/the-trouble-with-drones.html

The drone war is unconscionable. The more you learn about it, the more aghast you'll be.

[In_The_Wind]

1. I am against Drone Strikes!

[redgreenandblue]

2. K&R

[graham4anything]

3. Richard Clarke- Drones are the most humane form of warfare

Do the people want ground wars and 1000s of deaths for every 1 drone?
Ridiculous.

Plus where is the outrage against a far more important issue- guns and bullets killing 35 people a day in the US and 100 wounded and 1000s of family members affected for each one

More people die in a month from private citizens with guns and bullets, than all of the drone deaths in history

Anyone protesting about drones who doesn't want the streets to be 100% clear of private citizens with guns and bullets, loses my interest in their wedge issue because to quote Mr. Spock "It isn't logical".

[cali]

4. Sick. Trust you to defend this. Actually, trust YOU to defend

anything whatsofucking ever that the administration does or that mainstream dems do.

As for logical, I've seen nothing, and I do mean nothing you've written here that rises above word salad and a string of non sequiturs.

[graham4anything]

5. Simple numbers. 1st grade math. More people die in a month from guns/bullets than drone history

If 1000 people die from guns/bullet, they are dead 100% solely to guns/bullets by private citizens in the USA, and they would not have died any other way

If 3 people in that time period die from a drone, were there NOT drones over 1000 or 10,000 would die plus the 3 people the drones hit in either a ground war with many nations, or by the terrorists or evil leaders that country has.

You do the math.

Who wouldn't have wanted a drone to drop on Tim McV or OBL the day before they killed
all those people?
Can one defend OBL or Tim McV?

True or false- the Alt-Media, and the regular media ALL idolized Richard Clarke right after 9-11, didn't they?

[cali]

7. Simple logic: Comparing the two is simply idotic beyond measure

How you can endlessly defend the murder and other morally reprehensible acts is beyond me. But you are a good little soldier.

[graham4anything]

8. that describes private citizens owning guns and bullets if you ask me

Wars were going on during the dinsaur era, and will a million years from now

but guns/bullets shall be driven from the streets to stop the insanity.
ass that only happens in the USA and is 100% preventable.

[Dragonfli]

9. Yes I am sure that in those "wars that went on in the dinosaur era"

The cavalry was very effective, why just one man mounted on a raptor can do heavy damage.

[graham4anything]

15. Civil wars between the T-Rex's and the McCoys of course

[Dragonfli]

25. Stick to the word salad performance art, it's your funniest schtick

I for one look forward to those installations!

[ohiosmith]

20. This post was alerted on. The jury voted 6/0 to let it stand.

At Mon Apr 8, 2013, 12:59 PM an alert was sent on the following post:

Simple numbers. 1st grade math. More people die in a month from guns/bullets than drone history
http://www.democraticunderground.com/?com=view_post&forum=1002&pid=2634041

REASON FOR ALERT:

This post is disruptive, hurtful, rude, insensitive, over-the-top, or otherwise inappropriate. (See <a href="http://www.democraticunderground.com/?com=aboutus#communitystandards" target="_blank">Community Standards</a>.)

ALERTER'S COMMENTS:

Please, someone shut the endless stream of inane crap from this troll down already.

You served on a randomly-selected Jury of DU members which reviewed this post. The review was completed at Mon Apr 8, 2013, 01:06 PM, and the Jury voted 0-6 to LEAVE IT.

Juror #1 voted to LEAVE IT ALONE and said: No DU rule against stupidity.
Juror #2 voted to LEAVE IT ALONE and said: It doesn't seem to break any rules, its this posters opinion and just because you don't like it doesn't mean you have the right to censor it. This post attacks no one and hurts no one, so it should be left alone.
Juror #3 voted to LEAVE IT ALONE and said: Rather than asking a jury to shut down the poster, the alerter should present a reasoned argument to do so. Leave the post.
Juror #4 voted to LEAVE IT ALONE and said: No explanation given
Juror #5 voted to LEAVE IT ALONE and said: No explanation given
Juror #6 voted to LEAVE IT ALONE and said: I can't even tell wtf the person is trying to say.

Just ignore them. sheesh.


Thank you very much for participating in our Jury system, and we hope you will be able to participate again in the future.

[Newest Reality]

6. Doesn't your

case for drones ignore the diplomatic aspects and incentives for attacks?

If the US were acting as an aggressor, (and it often does) does lessening the risks, costs and troop causalities then impact the decisions made to attack surgically and preemptively less subject to diplomacy and restraint?

Logically, just because drones can be more precise on targeting their kills, that does not mean that they cannot carry payloads that can kill thousands each, or that thousands of drones won't ever be deployed in a full-scale attack.

[tblue]

19. Precise is a relative term.

I see photos of children killed in drone strikes. If that's precision, then we are admitting that they are our target.

[xiamiam]

11. how do you find the time or the stomach to defend this and this administration on every thread?

it is quite unnatural

[Capt. Obvious]

14. Who cares what Richard Clarke has to say

I'm waiting to hear Bloomberg's opinion.

[graham4anything]

22. The alt-media did back after 9-11, now they desert him

[Capt. Obvious]

23. LOL

Maybe they'll get Bloomberg's back

[graham4anything]

27. If you take only his private persona, he is different than the Mayor you know

[bighart]

17. So is your opinion that it is fine to violate the soveerignty of another nation

as long as we only do it with unmanned drones? We can't send troops in to every area where a potential bad guy is hiding, especially when they are an "ally" but it is two thumbs up to fly in and blow the bugger up with an unmanned weapon of war.

Are you going to be ok with this when Mexico starts flying drones in to the US or when Israel takes out a nuke site in Iran with drones?

This is a shitcan we really didn't need to open and at some point there will be serious blow back on us.

[graham4anything]

18. Terrorism means no borders. The old walls do not exist anymore. This is 2013 not 1985

[bighart]

21. So answer my questions.

I am very well aware what year it is and being from a military family I understand the implication of troop deployments.
I get that old tactics won't work in combating terrorism but that does not mean anything goes either.

Are you ok with Mexico using a drones to take suspect drug kingpins that are in the US?
Are you ok with Israel using drones to take out nuke sights in Iran?

[Tierra_y_Libertad]

10. Drones are the politicians and Pentagons way of saying, "See! We didn't really lose another war!"

In real terms, tactically and strategically, they accomplish nothing. But, they do indicate that we're "doing something" other than losing or acknowledging that we lost.

Iraq and Afghanistan are wars that, like Vietnam, were waged for political PR to prove that our leaders were "tough" on the bogeymen of the day.

All three were fiascoes that that we are paying for now around the world because of our need to wave the flag and shout USA! USA! like strutting adolescents in the boy's room.

[G_j]

28. can't end an endless war..

after Vietnam and the war on communism,
we have finally found the war on terrorism.
& the MIC has an endless reason to exist.

[polly7]

12. K & R. nt.

[Floyd_Gondolli]

13. Epsiode *

[graham4anything]

16. YODA was a warrior don't forget. Leader of Team Force

YODA would have dropped drones on the dark side had they been available long ago in a galaxy far far away

[Rex]

24. Fuck the CIA. It is a shame JFK did not

live long enough to get his wish - the dismantling of the CIA AND to make the military accountable for its actions.

FUCKING MEGA-LONG SIGH.

[G_j]

26. Murder Inc. nt