A
aesop081
Guest
tomahawk6 said:
One day, you might be able to think past today's events................maybe.
One day, you might be able to think past today's events................maybe.
- Reaction score
- 0
- Points
- 210
tomahawk6 said:
Agreed. And Omar was almost killed while in actively in play, as was his father- killed in combat.
I see the parallel youre trying to draw- but if he had been killed in a strike ordered by the Primeminister I would also expect the reasons, where they didnt compromise state secrets and the intelligence gathering apparatus, to become public.
We expect access to details like what their offices spend on "extras" and trips but we dont expect them to open the books on killing someone? Im starting to go in circles on this so Im done- but I understand your point.
And its not that killed the bad guy- its that in the future, should they kill more ambiguous bad guys, the process is ripe for abuse. And its abuse that can be easily diffused- so I see a responsibility of people to demand that it addressed PRIOR to it happening.
- Reaction score
- 1
- Points
- 210
tomahawk6 said:
When did Khadr's family have a predator drone drop a present on them in Canada?
Sure Omar himself was a combatant, he had thrown a grenade that had killed someone, and he was still taken alive. Awlaki was never put through court, the best conviction they had against him was that his writing "inspired people". Jesus we have that going on in both of our countries NOW, and we don't even take action?
How can we here in the West preach the right to fair trials, then turn the cheek in these countries. So much for setting an example, and we wonder why "they" hate us.
- Reaction score
- 0
- Points
- 210
Awlaik chamged to being actively engaged in recruiting people, in a very public fashion, for terrorist missions like the christmas plane bomber fellow. Hardly the same as the inspirational terrorists that we have operating in the open round these parts.
The one thing they have said about Awlaki is that he had recently changed from passive to active. So going on about a Khadr comparison really starts to break down.....
The one thing they have said about Awlaki is that he had recently changed from passive to active. So going on about a Khadr comparison really starts to break down.....
- Reaction score
- 6,312
- Points
- 1,260
I'm on the horns of my own dilemma: I, broadly and generally, favour (carefully) targeted assassinations - I think they work on two levels: they, obviously, take a "bad guy" out of service (we know he's a "bad guy" because our targeting is careful) but, additionally, they weaken the morale of all the other "bad guys" by reminding them that they are never safe and they can never retire.
But my "favour" rests, I suppose, on the assumption that the "bad guys" are aliens with whom we are at (some sort of) war.
We have spent 1,500+ years depriving the state, the monarch, the dictator or president or whatever of the legal means to arbitrarily kill subject, citizens, etc. Suddenly Barack Obama appears to have regained this power. As a matter of principle, no one, in any country worth the name, ought to have the power, for any reason at all, to arbitrarily kill a citizen - it negates our most fundamental natural right, it gives the state power which no state should ever have, under any circumstances. It sets civilization, itself, back more than 1,000 years.
Home;and security was a stupid concept when it was conceived - and yes, I'm happy with word "stupid" - and, in the USA, it has been managed in a ham-fisted and now dangerous way.
America is allowing mindless fear to trump fundamental law, justice and right. No state, no president, no judge, not even a whole nation in arms has the right to deprive its citizens of their fundamental rights ...
"We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness. --That to secure these rights, Governments are instituted among Men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed, --That whenever any Form of Government becomes destructive of these ends, it is the Right of the People to alter or to abolish it, and to institute new Government ..."
Maybe it's time the people of the USA read their own foundation document and altered and abolished their government which is, clearly, destructive of their inalienable rights. But, perhaps bin Laden won the "war on terror," perhaps Americans are so terrified that they will give up what matters to assuage their fears.
My :2c:
But my "favour" rests, I suppose, on the assumption that the "bad guys" are aliens with whom we are at (some sort of) war.
We have spent 1,500+ years depriving the state, the monarch, the dictator or president or whatever of the legal means to arbitrarily kill subject, citizens, etc. Suddenly Barack Obama appears to have regained this power. As a matter of principle, no one, in any country worth the name, ought to have the power, for any reason at all, to arbitrarily kill a citizen - it negates our most fundamental natural right, it gives the state power which no state should ever have, under any circumstances. It sets civilization, itself, back more than 1,000 years.
Home;and security was a stupid concept when it was conceived - and yes, I'm happy with word "stupid" - and, in the USA, it has been managed in a ham-fisted and now dangerous way.
America is allowing mindless fear to trump fundamental law, justice and right. No state, no president, no judge, not even a whole nation in arms has the right to deprive its citizens of their fundamental rights ...
"We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness. --That to secure these rights, Governments are instituted among Men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed, --That whenever any Form of Government becomes destructive of these ends, it is the Right of the People to alter or to abolish it, and to institute new Government ..."
Maybe it's time the people of the USA read their own foundation document and altered and abolished their government which is, clearly, destructive of their inalienable rights. But, perhaps bin Laden won the "war on terror," perhaps Americans are so terrified that they will give up what matters to assuage their fears.
My :2c:
- Reaction score
- 66
- Points
- 530
I said this at the outset,IF Awlaki and Khan had remained in the US providing support to AQ,they would be alive today. Instead they decided to practice what they preached and they were killed. I dont know why this is so hard to understand. Citizens have certain rights,but they dont have the right to deprive other citizens of their lives. With citizenship comes responsibility.
A
aesop081
Guest
tomahawk6 said:
I can say the same about you.
Do they somehow stop having those rights because they are outside the US ?
Exactly. Be careful, you are close to agreeing here.
- Reaction score
- 6,312
- Points
- 1,260
tomahawk6 said:
No question about either point and no argument, either.
But the nation, the people and president have responsibilities, too, and the individual citizen's individual rights must, always, trump the states 'right' to defend itself against him (or her). That's what 3,000 years of liberal tradition mean. That some, too many, Americans are willing to toss aside rights for (ephemeral) security speaks poorly for their intellect and moral courage.
J
jollyjacktar
Guest
But, if you are a law abiding citizen who is not trying to cause, or cheerleading to cause, or recruiting to cause the murder and mayhem of your fellow citizens as this shitrat was, you should have no reason to fear the state. He brought it upon himself, and reaped what he had sown. I appaud the results, method and decision that made it so from the state's side of this little drama. Maybe it's time the state got some teeth back.
A
aesop081
Guest
jollyjacktar said:
I agree but governments never make mistakes, right ?
You and T6 are suffering from the same shortsightedness. Not a single person here is shedding a tear for Awlaki.
How much teeth is acceptable to you ? What will you say next time a US citizen is killed by the US Government but is only a suspected bad guy ?
No need to answer that last one, i'm sure we will have such a topic to comment on in the near future.
It's a curious situation. I belief there is somewhat of a legal gulf that exists between the domestic criminal law jurisdiction, and the jurisdiction traditionally imposed over conventional war. The law, bluntly put, has not caught up to the fact that a war that is real in every sense that matters can be waged by non-state entities.
In this instance we have an American born citizen who has declared himself an enemy of his own country, and was an active belligerent. He need not pick up an AK and fight; in war an enemy's command and control, communications, and logistical infrastructure is all fair game. You need not seek a judicial warrant to launch an artillery barrage on an enemy's command post in the field. Conversely, to arrest a criminal suspect you generally do.
So where do we draw the line with regards to an active belligerent in a war (one which has been, moreover, as formally 'declared' as an entity such as Al Qaeda that lacks a legislative or head of state is able to) who is beyond the geographical jurisdiction of American law enforcement, and where even a special forces raid on Yemeni soil could de jure been considered an act of war?
There is a clear constitutional issue with Obama ordering the targeted killing of American citizens. That's unquestionable. At the same time, is it realistic to attempt to constrain every manifestation of counter terrorism to existing legal constructs? While this must inevitably return to the legislature to offer new clearly legitimate options (or to decisively state 'thou shalt not'), in the interim something must still be done by America about those who are actively seeking to kill American citizens. al-Awlaki appears to have been the ideological figure behind Malik Nidal Hassan, for instance, who took so many lives at Fort Hood (a conventionally 'acceptable' military target, I would note as a point of curiosity). Planner/operational figure or however he is defined, he is as much a combatant as the G3 Operations branch of an armed force, whether those soldiers ever leave their desks or not.
I lean, perhaps predictably, to the side that if one has declared war on a state, even if a citizen, that individual should perhaps be taken at face value, particularly when there are demonstrable links between them and an organization such as Al Qaeda. I think that in the longer term a comprehensive legislative approach is necessitated to provide for proper powers of war against non state actors. In the interim, where one is clearly a belligerent, and where it does not appear feasible for traditional custody to be effected, exigent circumstances exist that fall outside that which has been anticipated by existing law. The constitutional questions, and the minor risk to the rule of law are within what I'd deem proportionate to the protection of the lives of American citizens against an individual who has long demonstrated him by his actions to be a clear and present danger to national security.
If the world were black and white, a black and white way to kill him as a combatant would already have existed.
In this instance we have an American born citizen who has declared himself an enemy of his own country, and was an active belligerent. He need not pick up an AK and fight; in war an enemy's command and control, communications, and logistical infrastructure is all fair game. You need not seek a judicial warrant to launch an artillery barrage on an enemy's command post in the field. Conversely, to arrest a criminal suspect you generally do.
So where do we draw the line with regards to an active belligerent in a war (one which has been, moreover, as formally 'declared' as an entity such as Al Qaeda that lacks a legislative or head of state is able to) who is beyond the geographical jurisdiction of American law enforcement, and where even a special forces raid on Yemeni soil could de jure been considered an act of war?
There is a clear constitutional issue with Obama ordering the targeted killing of American citizens. That's unquestionable. At the same time, is it realistic to attempt to constrain every manifestation of counter terrorism to existing legal constructs? While this must inevitably return to the legislature to offer new clearly legitimate options (or to decisively state 'thou shalt not'), in the interim something must still be done by America about those who are actively seeking to kill American citizens. al-Awlaki appears to have been the ideological figure behind Malik Nidal Hassan, for instance, who took so many lives at Fort Hood (a conventionally 'acceptable' military target, I would note as a point of curiosity). Planner/operational figure or however he is defined, he is as much a combatant as the G3 Operations branch of an armed force, whether those soldiers ever leave their desks or not.
I lean, perhaps predictably, to the side that if one has declared war on a state, even if a citizen, that individual should perhaps be taken at face value, particularly when there are demonstrable links between them and an organization such as Al Qaeda. I think that in the longer term a comprehensive legislative approach is necessitated to provide for proper powers of war against non state actors. In the interim, where one is clearly a belligerent, and where it does not appear feasible for traditional custody to be effected, exigent circumstances exist that fall outside that which has been anticipated by existing law. The constitutional questions, and the minor risk to the rule of law are within what I'd deem proportionate to the protection of the lives of American citizens against an individual who has long demonstrated him by his actions to be a clear and present danger to national security.
If the world were black and white, a black and white way to kill him as a combatant would already have existed.
J
jollyjacktar
Guest
CDN Aviator said:
- Reaction score
- 8,547
- Points
- 1,160
Really, I'm sorry. I just can't care enough of the political and legal nuances surrounding this individual.
I do, however, care enough that I'm glad this fucking gluebag is dead and I don't care how it was done or who did it.
I do, however, care enough that I'm glad this fucking gluebag is dead and I don't care how it was done or who did it.
The killing of foreign nationals is not new. I don’t think it ever really stopped. What do you think Delta Force or the Seal Teams have been doing for the last 40 years? “Training exercises,” ya right. Ignorance is bliss. So pretending that these things don’t happen regularly,…
My preference would be for an in absentia trial for treason with a possible death sentence. Because we said he was bad but it’s a secret so trust us does not really cut it for me. One bad election and that power turns into an Argentina style nightmare with no recourse but armed revolt.
My preference would be for an in absentia trial for treason with a possible death sentence. Because we said he was bad but it’s a secret so trust us does not really cut it for me. One bad election and that power turns into an Argentina style nightmare with no recourse but armed revolt.
A
aesop081
Guest
recceguy said:
Playing ostrich and sticking your head in the sand is a common response.............
recceguy said:
The political and, moreso, the legal nuances are exactly what separate free societies bound by the rule of law from states where the exercise of violent force is purely arbitrary and unaccountable.
It's never the easy cases that challenge legal or moral principles. It's the complex ones.
Brad Sallows
Army.ca Legend
- Reaction score
- 10,559
- Points
- 1,040
>a black and white way to kill him as a combatant would already have existed.
Noncombatant status is pretty easy to determine. Was he a noncombatant?
Noncombatant status is pretty easy to determine. Was he a noncombatant?
- Reaction score
- 8,547
- Points
- 1,160
Brihard said:
CDN Aviator said:
And neither of you is morally superior to myself. You just think you are.
I'm not sticking my head in the sand. I just don't care in this particular case. Feel free to go work at the UN.
recceguy said:
I have not claimed to be morally superior. I'm merely not so casually dismissive of our society's underlying principles, such as rule of law and due process. Apply whatever judgements you wish to that, but they're your words, not mine.
My greatest thrust of argument in this particular case has simply been acknowledging that 'realpolitik' in the form of a hellfire has filled in because of a demonstrable gap in clear laws; a gap that must be filled legislatively and judicially to allow for more clarity in the future. Where the constitutionality of an action is heavily in question that is clearly a problem. The current legal definitions surround hostilities are not sufficiently developed in the case of non state actors.
Note that I'm not saying the wrong thing was done, merely that the proper legal system needs to be put into place, since that's how free countries that are worth defending work. I question how anyone can not be at least somewhat concerned that a free state can kill one of its own citizens outside of a proper legal framework. It's the inevitable 'slippery slope' of governments taking on more authority than they have been given. That authority needs to be given for these cases, and it needs to be done properly.
Similar threads
