Secret Killings
Only a fool would have taken Barack Obama for some kind of peacenik, but I had figured his reach for more extensive wartime powers would not have extended as far as McCain’s. I’m less sure of that speculation with each passing day. The Washington Post reports that “the Obama administration urged a federal judge early Saturday to dismiss a lawsuit over its targeting of a U.S. citizen for killing overseas, saying that the case would reveal state secrets.” Glenn Greenwald summarizes what this means: “…not only does the President have the right to sentence Americans to death with no due process or charges of any kind, but his decisions as to who will be killed and why he wants them dead are “state secrets,” and thus no court may adjudicate their legality.” We’d be fools to trust President Obama, anyone else, or any governmental body with this power.
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There is also reason to think that the Bush admin discussed the potential scenario of a target on US soil, but that the Obama admin has taken it a step further and actually authorized action against approved targets no matter where they are found, including in the US… there were disturbing press reports regarding leaked information along those lines a while back that the mainstream chose not to cover.
It’s an ominous development. It actually came out a few months ago. What first worried me is that shortly after he took office the Department of Homeland Security issued a document on potential right wing domestic terrorism. I met most of the criteria which included strong pro-life views, having been to pro-life demonstrations, former military, pro-second amendment. I’m no threat to anyone, but the fact that I disagree with the administration is enough.
The gathering of intrusive government power under the Bush administration is only expanding. Instead of rolling it back, Obama has embraced it for its utility. It’s so convenient to just kill someone rather than go to the trouble of capturing, jailing, and prosecuting someone. We have become a warfare-welfare state, and if we continue we will suffer the consequences. I pray for my children’s future. I sometimes wonder if the best option is to simply withdraw to a life of prayer and not become a target by speaking out. Maybe not yet, but I think the day may be coming.
I think we need a few distinctions here.
Generally assassinations are illegal in international law and the domestic law of most it not all countries.
Assassination be defined as a killing in the absence of hostilities or a civilian official during hostilities. However, duing hostilities “by name targeting” of military personnel is legal. Thus the WWII attempt to kill Field Marshal Rommel was legal because he was a member of the German Army, wore the uniform on a regular basis, and was armed.
Al Queda is unusual situation. Technically it has no right to wage war, it is not a government. But they have declared war on the US and have taken military actions against the US. Since AQ has no right to wage war the international law meaning of a declared war cannot exist (a priori). But it’s actions are illegal hostilities, but a lawful state of hostilities exists agai8nst AQ for the US and within reason and subject to certain restraints.
The problem with “by name” targeting here is that AQ does not appear to have neat structures of military and civilian roles. Osama bin Laden is in the habit of appearing in military cloathing with weapons and claims to be the commander and others in the organization have said as much. If we should ever get a good GPS location on him and it is otherwise acceptable it would be perfectly legal to drop a smart bomb on him.
From the point of law if war much the same applies to Nasser al-Aulaqi, by all reports he is an AQ military commander. If a bomb falls on him by the laws of war that is his problem. Our problem is that he is also a US citizen. If he were not there would be no problem with a “by name” targeting. But for the US government to order the “by name” killing of a US citizen, even if allowable in the Law of War, seems to me anyway, if not explicitly illegal in domestic law to push the constitution and domestic law in an unacceptable direction.
We need to keep the international law and domestic law consideration separate because they are different.
If it were up to me I would say that US domestic law would preempt whatever right in the law of war we have to “by name target.”
(And you need not remind me that International Law’s correspondence with the Just War Doctrine is often coincidental – at best.)
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Glenn Greenwald makes it sound like Obama can draw up a hit list and have anyone he wants assassinated. However, here are two key paragraphs (which I have quoted before) from the New York Times account of the story about Anwar al-Awlaki
So it is the CIA and the military who make up the “hit lists,” and they must be approved by the National Security Council:
I wouldn’t say that there are no good arguments against granting that much power to the CIA, the military, and the National Security Council, but on the other hand, I wouldn’t say the president has the power to sentence Americans to death with no due process or charges of any kind.
As a matter of US law, it is of course very relevant that Anwar al-Awlaki is a citizen. As a matter of morality, I don’t see why those who are not citizens should be any easier to assassinate than those who are.
Hank,
Fair point about definitions. I’ve revised the post’s title.
David,
Yes, Greenwald (and I) could have been more precise. I agree with you that there is no moral difference between killing citizens and non-citizens.
“Yes, Greenwald (and I) could have been more precise. I agree with you that there is no moral difference between killing citizens and non-citizens.”
But the president is a legal entity and it is his legal power that we should be rightly interested in. The point, as I understood it, is that the president now has a new legal power that he did not have before, and that this is a deplorable state of affairs. There is always an individual’s conscience to act as a check on action, but now there is one less legal check.
This s bad.
Another issue which relates to this at the national level is the suspension of Habeus Corpus (spelling?) which Obama promised to reinstate before his election but which he reneged on after his election…It was meant for “terrorists” but in fact could invoked on any American citizen – this kind of power is also extremely dangerous yet I don’t hear anyone really talking about it anymore…sad..we have been stripped of one of our most cherished rights and the frogs in the heating pot are silent.
David,
What sort of due process is it if all of those making the decisions are political appointees of the president who answer to him? Not much. Further, as a point of constitutional law, all the executive powers of the united states are more or less vested in the president, thus lesser executive officials do not a check or balance make.
I really want to be able to trust the president to do the job as commander-in-chief in a reliable and trustworthy way. Yet, I just can’t seem to muster up that level of trust in much of anyone these days.
Interesting point – is a commander-in-chief a legitimate target in time of war? It would seem that is likely so. I know that was part of the justification for targeting a certain former dictator of Iraq…
This, naive Americans, has nothing at all to do with Obama and EVERYTHING to do with the sort of state you live in, are patriotic to, and have to balance with your faith.
Please make it easier on yourself by admitting that Obama is not the first and to this and will not be the last.
There is no such thing as American exceptionalism, except in the mind of Americans.
What sort of due process is it if all of those making the decisions are political appointees of the president who answer to him? Not much.
smf,
I am not sure it counts as due process at all. My point was that the president isn’t making up hit lists for the military and the CIA. The CIA and military are making up their own hit lists, apparently without high-level approval, and in this one case, since the person involved is a citizen, they had to go to the National Security Council for approval.
What you might want to be concerned about is that the CIA and the military have the apparent right to put on their hit lists anyone from the 95.48% of the world population who are not American citizens. Viewed from that angle, at least there is some check on the power of the CIA and the military, if only when it comes to targeting American citizens.
With all his faults, I am a lot more comfortable with Barack Obama fighting the wars he inherited than I was with Bush and Cheney, who started these two unnecessary wars. I may not be happy with the way Obama is executing these wars, but until he starts two new unnecessary wars of his own, in my eyes he will be far preferable to Bush-Cheney.
I am not enough of a historian to answer this, so I will just make it a question. Has any American president aside from George Bush started two wars of choice in their first term?
Given the choice between McCain and Obama, if I had it to do over again, I would unhesitatingly vote for Obama again. This does not mean Obama should not be criticized. I am disappointed in him. But I’d much rather have him as president currently that McCain, who, were he in office right now, might very well feel it necessary to cater to the Tea Party the way he is doing right now in Arizona.
The only war we ever fought that could not in some way be described as a war of choice was the second world war, since in it we were directly attacked in a fashion that could not be overlooked. All others, from the war of Independence, war of 1812, barbary wars, quasi-war with france, mexican-american war, spanish-america war, civil-war, first world war, korean, war, vietnam war, gulf war, afghan war, iraq war, and the invasions of panama and greneda, the interventions in bosnia, kosovo, yugoslavia, somolia, lebenon, etc, etc were all wars of choice in the sense that we could have avoided them in some way without the world ending.
What is the difference between Obama authorizing that this guy be killed and Bush calling for bin Laden to be killed, over which I observed precious little outrage or hand-wringing.
Several presidents didn’t technically “start” wars, but got the US involved in ongoing wars in which our involvement was not strictly necessary.
smf @9/28/10, 12:36 p.m., is exactly correct.