When are assassinations legal and morally justified?

[tekisui]

Two assassinations were carried out this past week. Saif al-Arab Gaddafi in a airstrike in Libya and of course Osama bin Laden Sunday night in a special forces operation.

It is a much easier argument to make the case for bin Laden. It is more attenuated for Gaddafi, or his son. The order is still out on American citizen Anwar al-Awlaki in Yemen.

My question is where is the line? Is there a line? In what cases is it legal and justified?

Who is next on the list? When can we act without the support, or even without the knowledge or against the will, of the country of residence?

[Electric Monk]

1. Where is the line? Shrub snorted it.

[Puregonzo1188]

2. Never. International law bans extra-judicial executions and in US law assassinations are barred by

an executive order. There are also arguably Constitutional issues of due process, but that might not apply overseas if it's a non-citizen.

[BzaDem]

6. As Holder said, the killing of Bin Laden and other leaders of Al Queda are clearly legal examples of

defending our country under international law.

[Puregonzo1188]

23. And the previous Attorney General said water boarding was.

Extra-judicial execution is outlawed under international law. The US, under both the Bush and Obama administrations, have been in violation of that law and have been condemned by the UN Rapporteur on Extra-Judicial Killings and all of the leading human rights groups.

[BzaDem]

45. The previous attorney general was wrong. The current attorney general is correct. Not complicated.

[BzaDem]

3. I don't think the knowledge or permission of the country of residence is all that important.

If I lived in another country that housed terrorists, who's intelligence service would likely leak any intelligence to the target in question, I would congratulate the US for taking out the terrorist.

In any event, the country issue will always end up being dealt with between the countries. The US needs to weigh the benefits and consequences of going in with or without informing or asking permission of the host country, and act accordingly. For most countries who's intelligence services don't harbor terrorist, we likely would either allow the host country to capture or get easily obtained permission in advance.

[tekisui]

7. In a way, it is tacitly admitting that we are at war, at least with elements

of a country.

[pnwmom]

4. It's not an assassination if the target is reaching for a weapon.

This makes sense -- who could imagine a man like OBL not keeping a weapon always nearby?

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2011/05/04/osama-bin-lade...

WASHINGTON -- President Barack Obama ordered grisly photographs of Osama bin Laden in death sealed from public view on Wednesday, declaring, "We don't need to spike the football" in triumph after this week's daring middle-of-the-night raid. The terrorist leader was killed by American commandos who burst into his room and feared he was reaching for a nearby weapon, U.S. officials said.

Several weapons were found in the room where the terror chief died, including AK-47 assault rifles and side arms, the officials said. They spoke on condition of anonymity as they offered the most recent in a series of increasingly detailed and sometimes-shifting accounts of bin Laden's final minutes after a decade on the run.

Obama said releasing the photographs taken by the Navy SEAL raiders was "not who we are" as a country. Though some may deny his death, "the fact of the matter is you will not see bin Laden walking this earth again," the president said in an interview taped for CBS' "60 Minutes."

He said any release of the photos could become a propaganda tool for bin Laden's adherents eager to incite violence.

SNIP

[tekisui]

9. That is irrelevant. He wasn't coming out alive.

Even one from top to bottom knew it. It really doesn't matter and it is splitting hairs about what body motion he made. The SEAL team was not there to arrest him.

I don't have a problem with that, honestly. They really couldn't take any chances at the operational level. It doesn't make since to expect or assume that once in the house they could take any chances of anything going wrong.

My question is not the scene in the bedroom. Bin Laden was a legitimate target, I don't contest that. What I am asking is who else? And where else?

[pnwmom]

11. It's not irrelevant -- it's what makes it not an assassination.

But the general questions you ask are valid and thoughtful. I wish I knew the answers.

[Old and In the Way]

33. Who else? Where else? My answer - it depends.

I kind of think OBL was a special case. He was recognized, fairly or not, as the prime mover of the events of 9/11. I don't think there was a modern precedent for a foreign national ever commiting such a henious crime of this scale in any country. To an extent, I think the overwhelming majority of the general public has had a positive reaction to the news. And that may be the ultimate test of such a policy. Would Obama (or any President) have risked the consequences of moving unilaterally against a terrorist in, say, London, who was responsible for shooting a police office in Memphis? I'd say no - the risks, internally and externally, would be much higher than the rewards of such an extra-legal action. In this case, the reward of bringing OBL to justice far outweighed the risk.

Actually, the risk of failure was almost entirely on Obama's shoulders. He'd have been taken apart by the Republicans and the corporate media the mission failed. Remember Carter's experience with the Iranian hostages? Except this generation of Republicans would have been far more vicious in their reaction. I wouldn't rule out House Republicans writing up articles of impeachment against Obama had this occurred...because this is how they operate. On that basis alone, I think Obama's decision to take decisive action was even more courageous. He had real skin in the game to lose. A lesser, more calculating President might have punted it to the Paki's and, if they blew it, he could have blamed them for screwing up the opportunity.

[joshcryer]

42. I say there is every possiblity in the world that he could have surrendered.

You cannot prove otherwise.

[TheKentuckian]

10. Right on. What is it, hypothetically speaking, if the target is captured and whacked?

By no means am I saying that is what happened but seeing where the living values line may lie.

That would be mine or there abouts.

[EFerrari]

15. You do realize that "reaching for a weapon" is the same lame excuse

that every cop who has ever clocked anyone for no reason has used, right?

[tekisui]

19. The Commander report to Congress tells a slightly different story, as well.

There were more obstacles on the stairs going up to where bin Laden and his family lived. When the SEALs found them, children ran out of the room. Bin Laden's wife rushed at the lead SEAL who shot her in the leg. That left the man who once boasted he would never be taken alive standing alone in the middle of the room. The lead SEAL shot him in the chest and a second seal finished him off with a shot to the head. Bin Laden was unarmed but the SEALs later found a pistol and an AK-47 in the room.

http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2011/05/04/eveningnews/main20059854.shtml

Also, the two shots came so quickly that is was hard to say which one was first, from two different shooters. It was shoot on sight, most likely.

[EFerrari]

21. Yep. This is in all likelihood one of the teams that trained

in McChrystal's assassination program. That's why they got the mission and not someone else. That is their job.

[FarPoint]

5. We can draw the line..stop when

Terrorism is no longer a threat to America. Until then...business as usual for me...I prefer covert operations over war and deployment of mass troops.

[Fuzz]

8. We'd have to draw the line sooner than that. Terrorism will never stop, it's a tactic.

However, I do agree that covert operations are much preferred over the mass deployment of troops and the invasion of countries.

[dkf]

12. I'd say when they have the means and they threaten us directly.

Then we have the right to take them out.

No one in Libya has threatened us. We have no business there.

[tekisui]

14. How do you define 'the means'?

[dkf]

35. Means could be anything if we find they have the intent and a plan.

And especially if they are connected to people who have said they want to harm us

[Gamow]

13. ObL was a military target, not a political target

Bin Laden was not the head of any state, he was a declared enemy with hostile intent towards US citizens and military.
I would not call that an assassination.

[EFerrari]

18. It's still an assassination.

"Assassinations may be prompted by religious, ideological, political, or military motives. Additionally, assassins may be prompted by financial gain, revenge for perceived grievances, a desire to acquire fame or notoriety (that is, a psychological need to garner personal public recognition), a wish to form some kind of "relationship" with the public figure, a wish or at least willingness to be killed or commit suicide in the attack."

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Assassination

[Trajan]

27. You might call it an assassination ...

It doesn't mean it was ....

Yes ... They intended to kill him IF he refused to come along quietly ... Osama bin Laden preached hatred of christians and westerners in general ... There is ample evidence tying him to the killings of at least HUNDREDS of people outside of the WTC tragedy ....

IF someone is suspected of a crime, as OBL was, and their location becomes known, as OBL was assumed to be, then it is common for those who would affect an arrest to be resisted ...

Everybody knows that many will never 'come quietly' when confronted with arrest .... It happens all the time ....

The OBL apologists use him as a foil to express their own inner political predilections .... He is a murderous thug .... He should gain no quarter from the mild and the liberal ...

[EFerrari]

29. Oh, please. They sent in a JSOC assassination team.

What do you think they were there for, to give him a stern talking to?

For someone who is so gung ho on this action, you sure have a hard time owning it. Of course it was an assassination. He was not coming out of there alive. Period.

Apologist, my @ss. I'm not the one dancing around the word.

[Trajan]

31. They were going to take custody of him, if possible ....

But let's hold no illusions .... Nobody assumed he would ever go quietly ...

Your assertion that this action was intended ONLY as an 'assassination' would preclude ever attempting an arrest, which, given the state of the evidence, is ample enough to justify arrest in most quarters of the sane and reasonable ... It's as if no legitimate enforcement of international law could EVER occur as long as the primary suspect were dedicated to resisting arrest ...

Frankly, it would be preposterous for the rest of us to wait for your 'OK' signal in order to proceed against evil bastards like this motherfucker was .... I have no problem whatsoever with the fact that Osama bin Laden was NOT taken alive .... It is preposterous to believe he would be ...

I dont have to own the term assassination .... that is your appellation, and it is not automatically warranted just because you said so .... and it is not your right to hang it around my neck, so bugger off ...

[EFerrari]

32. They did not want him alive, that's why this team was used.

They didn't want him alive, they didn't want him in custody, they didn't want him on trial, they didn't even want to take charge of his body.

Mission rules all but assured the killing of bin Laden

Read more: http://www.kansascity.com/2011/05/03/2847890/officials-say-mission-rules-all.html#ixzz1LSDxP4F8

What I think or want or signal has nothing to do with it.

[MrMickeysMom]

16. On the other hand... this may have been a test...

... of how desensitized Americans behave when after our decision to invade countries by coop d'etat and set up little dictators


1) We buy off and work with dictators as they starve and slaughter their own people... until we decide they "go too far"

2) We hang dictators and publicly air it on the internets (that'll show em)

3) We assassinate CIA created monsters we trained in Afghanistan who turn out to be rouge elements like OBL because later on everyone will salivate over his dead body singing.. "WOOH-HOOH!" , and "Go USA! USA! USA!"

Yes, we're quite morally justified at this point, aren't we?

[Amonester]

17. Officials: SEALs thought bin Laden went for weapon (in LBN)

There: http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=102x4839769

Now, I HOPE this will put this subject to rest for good.

[tekisui]

20. That puts nothing to rest at all.

I am saying which other individuals are legal targets. When does it matter where they are?

[EFerrari]

24. They took in JSOC teams trained in assassination

but it's not an assassination because bin Laden moved?

[coalition_unwilling]

30. It actually raises way more questions than it puts to rest, starting

with how come they initially made OBL into a Superman engaging in a firefight and simultaneously a chickenshit using a human shield, only to retract each element and replace them with the tired old cliche "afraid he was reaching for a weapon"?

Actually, I don't really want to discuss this with you, as I can see you have no problem with extra-judicial assassinations as long as it's the US doing it to others.

So welcome to my Ignore list.

[Old and In the Way]

39. If you exercise that ignore list much more .you'll be having a conversation with only yourself here

:rofl:

I think there's an explainable reason why certain story elements were added, then revised as more details became known. Making OBL out to be a rich (million dollar mansion) coward (hiding behind a woman shield) probably defused some of the initial reactions for the ME audiences. That's when the emotional reaction would have been the most volatile and unpredictable. I think psychological deflation may have been a primary factor in salting the initial reports with unflattering, even wrong facts about the OBL operation.

[Canuckistanian]

22. IOKIYAA

It's OK if you're American.

[Raksha]

25. I don't know that assassinations are ever legally or morally justified.

But in the case of an international criminal and mass murderer, there are times when they are definitely less reprehensible than at other times. For example: I can't say I'd be overwhelmed with grief and outrage if Bush or Cheney met with an "unfortunate accident" while traveling overseas. But then that's why they don't travel overseas...or do they?

[EFerrari]

34. They risk arrest.

There's a group dedicated to serving them and others but I'm sorry, I can't remember their name.

[joshcryer]

41. Swiss authorities were asked to arrest him if he went to Europe, this was in Feb '11, too!

http://www.salon.com/news/politics/war_room/2011/02/07/bush_amnesty_arrest

The EU doesn't fuck around with this sort of thing and Bush will likely never be able to visit. Boo hoo.

[Trajan]

26. I do not believe OBL was assassinated ....

Nor do I believe Saif was specifically targeted because he was Saif .... Places aren't 'assassinated' ... Saif was in the wrong place at the wrong time ... (I am still not quite sure where I stand on Libya ... I do know that innocents should NEVER be targeted in any case)

OBL was culpable for his crimes, and I, born in Lodi, NJ, where a number of First Responders and WTC workers lived before they were killed on that fateful day; I am quite glad that they found him, and as much as I would wish he were taken alive, I would consider this end an acceptable alternative .... That rat bastard religious extremist gets no sympathy from me ....

[Rex]

28. Obama already said he was okie-dokies with assassination.

Where have you been? That was last year.

[liberalpragmatist]

36. This New Yorker piece goes over some of these issues

You may or may not buy it, but it's worth reading just to see the case made. Basically, the argument is that Bin Laden is an active military target, though it gets more detailed than that.

Link: http://www.newyorker.com/online/blogs/newsdesk/2011/05/bin-laden-the-rules-of-engagement.html

When using lethal force within a field of combat, the military’s Rules of Engagement have historically defined two kinds of acceptable targets. The most common are known as “combat-based targets.” In a long article that I wrote for The New Yorker in 2009, titled “The Kill Company,” I described them as:

People who act in a hostile manner or display hostile intent. Hostile actions are easy to identify. (If a cabdriver fires a rifle at a soldier, he instantly becomes a combatant.) Establishing hostile intent is harder. (If a cab is racing toward a soldier, is the driver’s intent hostile, or is he drunk?) Whenever a soldier uses force, the rules say, his reaction must be proportional to the threat. In part because judging intent and proportionality are subjective, the Army scrutinizes every incident in which one of its weapons is discharged.

Had bin Laden been armed and shooting at the time of the raid, he would have very easily met the standard of a combat-based target, and could legally have been killed. But as Jay Carney, the White House spokesperson, said the other day, “Resistance does not require a firearm.” Bin Laden could have been legally killed if he were holding a weapon and not firing—or if he were holding no weapon at all. Any soldier seeing bin Laden and recognizing him could make a reasonable assumption that he had “hostile intent.” After all, Al Qaeda bodyguards were nearby, and they were shooting at the Navy SEALs to defend him. “This is a guy who’s extremely dangerous,” John B. Bellinger III, legal counsel at the National Security Council and State Department in the Bush Administration, told the New York Times. “If he’s nodding at someone in the hall, or rushing to the bookcase or you think he’s wearing a suicide vest, you’re on solid ground to kill him.” Military law tends to recognize that soldiers must confront myriad, and potentially lethal, ambiguities amid the heat of battle.

That being said, the legality for killing bin Laden is not especially dependent upon his behavior during the raid because, in his case, an alternate (and more relevant) aspect of the Rules of Engagement applies. There is no military circumstance where an Al Qaeda operative of bin Laden’s stature could merely be a “combat-based target” in the way a low-level insurgent at a roadside checkpoint would be, because he is also a high-value target, and his status as such matters. In 2009, I also described why:

For many years, soldiers have also been permitted to kill people because of who they are, rather than what they are doing—such people are “status-based targets.” During the Second World War, an American infantryman could shoot an S.S. officer who was eating lunch in a French café without violating the Law of War, so long as he did not actively surrender. The officer’s uniform made it obvious that he was the enemy. In Iraq, the R.O.E. listed about two dozen “designated terrorist organizations,” including Al Qaeda, and, if it can be proved that someone is a member of one of these groups, that person can legally be killed. For a time, the R.O.E. designated as a status-based target any armed man wearing the uniform of the Mahdi Army—the militia led by Moqtada al-Sadr. (After Sadr called a truce, in 2004, the militia was provisionally taken off the list.) But most insurgent groups in Iraq don’t wear uniforms, so their members must be “positively identified” by informants or other forms of intelligence before they can legally be killed. An insurgent is positively identified if there is “reasonable certainty” that he belongs to a declared hostile group.

What was true in Iraq and in the Second World War also applies in the ongoing conflicts in Afghanistan and Pakistan. Targeted air strikes are status-based operations. The drone strikes are status-based operations. Raids conducted by Special Forces to kill key militants—as in the case of Abu Musab al Zarqawi, who was killed in Iraq by Special Forces working under the command of General Stanley McChrystal—are status-based operations. A status-based target can become a non-combatant (that is, illegal to kill) only if he is wounded to the point where he no longer poses a threat, or if he is in the process of surrendering. This is why Eric Holder said, during a recent Congressional hearing, that if bin Laden “had surrendered, attempted to surrender, I think we should obviously have accepted that, but there was no indication that he wanted to do that, and therefore his killing was appropriate.” In such a circumstance, the law suggests that the onus is on the target to immediately revoke his combatant status. Soldiers do not have to wait.

[NYC Liberal]

37. Killing Osama bin Laden was justified. nt

[Old and In the Way]

38. Here's a hypothetical.

What if an Israeli rightwing extremist is fingered for the bombing of a key religious mosque in Tehran that kills a few thousand Muslims. The person lives quietly in this country, but has major political friends in our government that protect him...because the evidence is not quite perfect and a little circumstantial, he's free to go as he pleases here. One night his estate home is obliterated and the President of Iran announces the next day that Iranian SO forces executed the operation and justice was served.

Are we, as a country, prepared to accept this same action from a foreign country on our soil? We have established the precedent, no? It can no longer be considered an act of war when a targeted individual is taken out on similar lines of justification IMHO.

[Liquorice]

44. In this scenario, has Iran been giving the US billions of dollars in aid? That

changes things, IMO.

[guitar man]

40. The problem with guys like OBL and co.

Is an operational problem. In a perfect world I'd like to see us be able to go arrest them and bring them back for trial. The problem is, these guys have been running, among other things, Suicide Bombers Inc. When you're going after them you're facing a high likelihood of facing suicidal as well as homicidal maniacs in the process. They could, at any time be wearing explosives or they might just have the whole damn joint wired to blow and be waiting for everybody to get inside before hitting the detonator.

So just because they're standing there with their hands in the air without guns doesn't mean there's no danger. You take a guy like Ayman al-Zawahiri who has already been sentenced to death in Egypt, he doesn't have a lot to lose. As much as i'd like to see everything go down like it would on a perfect world, I'd like it a lot less if our guys got blown up trying to get them. So if they go in and double tap every one of them in less than 3 seconds, I'm not going to blame them. If you've got SEAL Team 6 coming to get you, you've probably made some pretty bad life choices to begin with.

[SoDesuKa]

43. When We're Hard Up For Something to Cheer About

Let's face it, we're pretty hard up for something to cheer about when we applaud the success of a hit squad. It's an awful precedent, one that we certainly wouldn't welcome if other nations sent their commandos in after political targets here.

USA! USA! Bring it on.

[malaise]

46. Why are some moral and others

terrorism?

[seabeyond]

47. war. they didnt know what they were walking into. 5 unarmed, 20-30 armed and ready

as they go thru the house, clear it out and precede to objective

this is what war is.