Top Secret Intel Docs Betray Obama Claims on Drone Targeting (McClatchy)

[KoKo]

Last edited Wed Apr 10, 2013, 01:11 PM - Edit history (1)

Top Secret Intel Docs Betray Obama Claims on Drone Targeting
US drone war kills all kinds of people beyond Al Qaeda and
- Jon Queally, staff writer

Based on their review of leaked top-secret intelligence reports, McClatchy is reporting that the Obama Administration has long been guilty of misrepresenting the kind of groups and individuals it has targeted with its fleet of armed Predator and Reaper drones in Afghanistan and Pakistan.


McClatchy also explores the broadly held view that the US drone attacks are exacerbating conflicts, not solving them, in the regions where they take place.

Obama, they think, is misinterpreting international law, including the laws of war, which they say apply only to the uniformed military, not the civilian CIA, and to traditional battlefields like those in Afghanistan, not to Pakistan’s tribal area, even though it may be a sanctuary for al Qaida and other violent groups. They argue that Obama also is strengthening his executive powers with an excessively broad application of the September 2001 use-of-force resolution.

The administration’s definition of “imminent threat” also is in dispute. The Justice Department’s leaked white paper argues the United States should be able “to act in self-defense in circumstances where there is evidence of further imminent attacks by terrorist groups even if there is no specific evidence of where such an attack will take place or of the precise nature of the attack.” Legal scholars counter that the administration is using an exaggerated definition of imminence that doesn’t exist in international law.

“I’m thankful that my doctors don’t use their (the administration’s) definition of imminence when looking at imminent death. A head cold could be enough to pull the plug on you,” said Morris Davis, a Howard University Law School professor and former Air Force lawyer who served as chief prosecutor of the Guantanamo Bay terrorism trials.

Since 2004, drone program critics say, the strikes have killed hundreds of civilians, fueling anti-U.S. outrage, boosting extremist recruiting, and helping to destabilize Pakistan’s U.S.-backed government. And some experts warn that the United States may be setting a new standard of international conduct that other countries will grasp to justify their own targeted killings and to evade accountability.

MORE with links to McClatchy's full report at:

http://www.mcclatchydc.com/2013/04/09/188062/obamas-drone-war-kills-others.html#storylink=cpy

[CrispyQ]

1. In our name, by our Nobel Peace prize winning, democratic president.

Forty-three of 95 drone strikes reviewed for that period hit groups other than al Qaida, including the Haqqani network, several Pakistani Taliban factions and the unidentified individuals described only as “foreign fighters” and “other militants.”

During the same period, the reports estimated there was a single civilian casualty, an individual killed in an April 22, 2011, strike in North Waziristan, the main sanctuary for militant groups in Pakistan’s tribal areas.

Read more here: http://www.mcclatchydc.com/2013/04/09/188062/obamas-drone-war-kills-others.html#storylink=cpy

Must be that 'new math.'

[KoKo]

3. Thanks for reply...sounds like you are on top of this...

[kenny blankenship]

2. A govt that claims the prerogative of assassinating US citizens + their children would lie to us?

Who could have foreseen something like this?!?!

[KoKo]

4. Yep...as Condi Rice famously said: "Who Could Have Known...

We would be Attacked?"

It's ALWAYS: "How Coulda' Known these days...from Banking Crisis to suddenly SS being "Insolvent" and other issues inbetween.

"WHO COULD HAVE KNOWN?"

WELL IT'S YOUR FUCKING JOB TO KNOW!!!

[Ash_F]

5. Political killings

This has been obvious to anyone who's been paying attention to Afghan and Pakistani politics for the past 10+ years. These leaks merely confirm that even the government recognizes it as such.