Two drone strikes kill seven in southern Yemen - local official

[xchrom]

http://uk.reuters.com/article/2013/06/01/uk-yemen-drones-idUKBRE95006K20130601

(Reuters) - Two drone strikes killed seven suspected al Qaeda militants in southern Yemen on Saturday morning, a local official said, nine days after U.S. President Barack Obama said he would only use such strikes when a threat was "continuing and imminent".

Washington views al Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula (AQAP) as the movement's most dangerous wing after it attempted to launch bomb attacks on international airliners.

The official said the seven were in two cars driving in the al-Mahfad district of Abyan Governorate in southern Yemen where the Islamist militant group has a strong presence.

Islamists linked to al Qaeda seized control of some towns in southern Yemen in 2011 after Arab Spring protests weakened the government in Sanaa. However, the Yemeni army and local tribal militias recaptured the towns last year with U.S. assistance.

[Bonobo]

1. Shouldn't SOMEONE have the burden of showing SOME evidence

that the "threat" was continuing and imminent?

Wouldn't that be like, ummm, a check on unbridled power? At least in theory if not in practice?

Doesn't our system of government hold such a check as a core principle?

[Lucky Luciano]

2. Better to take out the trash remotely than for us to put our troops in harms way.

[Bonobo]

3. Yeah, so, umm, how do you know they were trash?

Forget it, you don't so don't bother answering.

[LittleBlue]

14. We should just nuke them

>Get all the trash
>0 troops lost

[Nanjing to Seoul]

4. Until they use that logic on us and forego trials and just execute by drone.

[Comrade Grumpy]

7. Spoken like a true Tea Partier.

[Lucky Luciano]

11. Yawn. Spoken like Obama.

Insults are not cool. Would you prefer ground troops?

[Comrade Grumpy]

12. I'd prefer we not be messing around in Yemen.

Does Obama speak of "taking out the trash"? That kind of talk smacks of Tea Party ideology.

Flying killer robots or ground troops? Why can you only see perpetual war?

[KG]

5. whew! can't tell yas how much safer I feel!

[byeya]

6. I find this interesting: All five were #2 in Al Qaeda

[snarf, snarf]

[quinnox]

8. how convenient they are always those evil "militants"

even when they aren't.

[Octafish]

9. CIA has been killing leaders since Eisenhower's day.

Allen Dulles hired the Mafia to take out Castro in 1960.

Odd how that doesn't get mentioned in the reporting or in the history books or just about ever.

Oh -- and Dulles was on the Warren Commission which was charged with investigating the killing of another leader, the last Democratic liberal interested in putting people ahead of profit, the same guy who fired Dulles for lying him into the Bay of Pigs.

[byeya]

10. And Allen Dulles's wretched brother, SoS John Foster was instrumental in persuading Ike to renege

on the 1954 unification vote in Viet Nam, which was a contributing factor to the US's involvement in the war against the people of South Viet Nam.

[Octafish]

13. They respected tyrants, rather than democracy.

More money in it, especially for them. They Likely use the profits to attack democracy at home, too, seeing how things have changed.

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=show_mesg&forum=389&topic_id=6918706&mesg_id=6918706