Tuesday, April 17, 2012

Geneva Conventions "quaint" to Obama?

Via NMC, an article on the use of drones to kill ... well, somebody, and we hope they're terrorists, but HEY we have a country to defend here!

I supose the VC's Kenneth Anderson (no relation, trust me) will post some Yoo-esque rationalization of how this isn't a war crime:
the CIA's more common use of drones – known as "signature strikes" – involves attacks on groups of alleged militants who are behaving in ways that seem suspicious. Such strikes are reportedly the brainchild of the CIA veteran who has run the agency's drone program for the past six years, a chain-smoking convert to Islam who goes by the code name "Roger." In a recent profile, The Washington Post called Roger "the principal architect of the CIA's drone campaign." When it comes to signature strikes, say insiders, the decision to launch a drone assault is essentially an odds game: If the agency thinks it's likely that the group of individuals are insurgents, it will take the shot. "The CIA is doing a lot more targeting on a percentage basis," says the former official with knowledge of the agency's drone program.
Civilians bearing arms against military targets, and the article implies that, by contrast with the "personality strikes" against named targets, or the Pentagon's use of drones pursuant to legal counsel, these "signature strikes" aren't carried out with any guidance as to international law.

Back when Bush violated the Geneva Conventions, there was at least kinda sorta a political party opposed to that. Now that Obama violates them, neither side cares.

3 comments:

  1. I am reminded of a speech by Enoch Powell where he said you can't have one kind of policy to use in Africa and another in the UK. Here the question in my mind is why is no US political leader has spoken up to put an end to this policy. Remember Campbell-Bannerman's "methods of barbarism in South Africa" speech? We need that kind of leadership now.JL

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  2. Yah, C-B took heat for that, but no one not already at the margins has that kind of courage today.

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