{"id":35753,"date":"2013-05-24T01:09:46","date_gmt":"2013-05-24T00:09:46","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/rinf.com\/alt-news\/breaking-news\/obama-frames-covert-drone-war-as-necessary-evil\/35753\/"},"modified":"2013-05-24T01:09:46","modified_gmt":"2013-05-24T00:09:46","slug":"obama-frames-covert-drone-war-as-necessary-evil","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/rinf.com\/alt-news\/breaking-news\/obama-frames-covert-drone-war-as-necessary-evil\/","title":{"rendered":"Obama Frames Covert Drone War as Necessary Evil"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"\"President Barack Obama reacts as his speech is interrupted by CODEPINK founder Medea Benjamin, Thursday, May 23, 2013, at the National Defense University at Fort McNair in Washington. (AP Photo\/Pablo Martinez Monsivais) <\/span><\/span>Barack Obama has made it clear that the US will continue with its controversial targeted killing programme.<\/p>\n

In a major speech\u00a0the US president also announced that he has signed into force a new \u2014 and secret \u2014 rule book for lethal action that provides \u2018clear guidelines, oversight and accountability\u2019 for covert drone strikes.<\/p>\n

Obama insisted that civilian deaths were sometimes a necessary risk.<\/span><\/p>\n

Journalists\u00a0briefed on the contents of the Presidential Policy Guidance reported that\u00a0much-criticised attacks on groups of men based on their patterns of behaviour \u2014 so-called \u2018signature strikes\u2019 \u2014 may come to an end. And counter-terrorism officials indicated that\u00a0control of covert drone strikes will progressively pass from the Central Intelligence Agency to the Pentagon.<\/p>\n

According to the New York Times<\/a>, the rules will also\u00a0\u2019impose the same standard for strikes on foreign enemies now used only for American citizens deemed to be terrorists\u2019.<\/p>\n

Impassioned defence<\/strong><\/p>\n

Speaking for an hour<\/a>\u00a0in front of an invited audience at the National Defense University in Washington DC, Obama made an impassioned defence of the US targeted killing programme, insisting that it was both effective and legal.<\/p>\n

He addressed head-on controversies surrounding civilian casualties. Acknowledging that there was a \u2018wide gap\u2019 between US and non-governmental assessments, he bluntly conceded that civilians have died in US strikes. Obama said that for himself and \u2018those in my chain of command, these deaths will haunt us as long as we live\u2019.<\/p>\n

He declared: \u2018before any strike is taken, there must be near-certainty that no civilians will be killed or injured \u2014 the highest standard we can set.\u2019<\/p>\n

But he also insisted that civilian deaths were sometimes a necessary risk. \u2018As Commander-in-Chief, I must weigh these heartbreaking tragedies against the alternatives. To do nothing in the face of terrorist networks would invite far more civilian casualties \u2014 not just in our cities at home and facilities abroad, but also in the very places \u2014like Sana\u2019a and Kabul and Mogadishu \u2014 where terrorists seek a foothold.\u2019<\/p>\n

Bureau estimates<\/a>\u00a0indicate that since 2002, at least 2,800 people have died in 420\u00a0covert drone strikes in Pakistan, Yemen and Somalia. Of those killed, more than 400 are likely to have been civilians.<\/p>\n

Obama has so far carried out seven times more covert drone strikes than his predecessor, George W Bush. However, the number of reported strikes has\u00a0declined steeply<\/a>\u00a0over the past year, along with\u00a0reported civilian casualties<\/a>.<\/p>\n

\u2018Boots on the ground\u2019<\/strong><\/p>\n

Insisting that his administration had \u2018a\u00a0strong preference for the detention and prosecution of terrorists\u2019, Obama said there were occasions when only lethal drone strikes would suffice.<\/p>\n

At times \u2018putting US boots on the ground may trigger a major international crisis\u2019 and inflame local civilian populations, he said. Suspects may also \u2018hide in caves and walled compounds\u2019 in areas where there was little or no governance.<\/p>\n

But he acknowledged that the use of drones was not without constitutional risk: \u2018The very precision of drones strikes, and the necessary secrecy involved in such actions can end up shielding our government from the public scrutiny that a troop deployment invites. It can also lead a President and his team to view drone strikes as a cure-all for terrorism.\u2019<\/p>\n

President Obama announced that he would work with Congress towards greater oversight of the targeted killing campaign. And he said he would be seeking to \u2018refine, and ultimately repeal\u2019 the Authorization to Use Military Force (AUMF) passed by Congress in 2001, which the US asserts is the legal bedrock for its covert drone campaign.<\/p>\n

Unlocking Guantanamo<\/strong><\/p>\n

The president also used the speech to challenge Congress to aid him in closing the detention facilities at Guantanamo Bay, calling on members to end the ban on detainee transfers to prisons on the US mainland. \u2018I know the politics are hard. But history will cast a harsh judgment on this aspect of our fight against terrorism, and those of us who fail to end it,\u2019 he said, adding that nobody had ever escaped a US supermax jail.<\/p>\n

Obama announced the end of a moratorium on transferring detainees to Yemen: instead, transfers will be examined on a case-by-case basis.\u00a0At least 84 current Guantanamo inmates are Yemeni.<\/p>\n

The speech was repeatedly interrupted<\/a> at one point by Code Pink protester Medea Benjamin. Obama was forced to pause and wait three times for Benjamin to finish comments including references to the death of Anwar al-Awlaki\u2019s 16-year-old son in a drone strike in Yemen. As Benjamin was escorted out, he recovered his poise \u2014 joking that he was being forced to depart from his script, but saying she raised \u2018tough issues\u2019.<\/p>\n

Read Obama’s full prepared remarks here<\/a>.<\/em><\/p>\n

\u00a9 2013 Bureau of Investigative Journalism<\/p>\n

This article originally appeared on: Common Dreams<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

President Barack Obama reacts as his speech is interrupted by CODEPINK founder Medea Benjamin, Thursday, May 23, 2013, at the National Defense University at Fort McNair in Washington. (AP Photo\/Pablo Martinez Monsivais) Barack Obama has made it clear that the US will continue with its controversial targeted killing programme. In a major speech\u00a0the US president […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[487],"tags":[],"class_list":{"0":"post-35753","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","6":"category-breaking-news"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/rinf.com\/alt-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/35753","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/rinf.com\/alt-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/rinf.com\/alt-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/rinf.com\/alt-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/rinf.com\/alt-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=35753"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"http:\/\/rinf.com\/alt-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/35753\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/rinf.com\/alt-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=35753"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/rinf.com\/alt-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=35753"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/rinf.com\/alt-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=35753"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}