For those of us who remember Eric Holder and Barack Obama decrying waterboarding of three known foreign terrorists who provided information that saved American lives and played a role in the killing of Osama bin Laden, it is with some interest to hear the attorney general said the U.S. government has the right to order the killing of American citizens overseas if they are senior al-Qaeda leaders who pose an imminent terrorist threat and cannot reasonably be captured.
“Any decision to use lethal force against a United States citizen — even one intent on murdering Americans and who has become an operational leader of al-Qaeda in a foreign land — is among the gravest that government leaders can face,” Holder said in a speech at Northwestern University’s law school in Chicago. “The American people can be — and deserve to be — assured that actions taken in their defense are consistent with their values and their laws.”
As the Washington Post points out, Holder’s discussion of lethal force against U.S. citizens did not mention any individual by name, but his address was clearly animated by the targeting of Anwar al-Awlaki, a senior figure in al-Qaeda’s Yemeni affiliate. Awlaki, who was born in New Mexico, was killed in a U.S. drone strike in Yemen in September.
The attorney general said the president is not required by the Constitution to delay action until some “theoretical end stage of planning — when the precise time, place and manner of an attack become clear.” Holder further argued that a careful and thorough executive branch review of the facts in a case amounts to “due process” and that the Constitution’s Fifth Amendment protection against depriving a citizen of his or her life without due process of law does not mandate a “judicial process.”
“Where national security operations are at stake, due process takes into account the realities of combat,” Holder said. He added that the question of “whether the capture of a U.S.-citizen terrorist is feasible is a fact-specific, and potentially time-sensitive, question.”
“Given the nature of how terrorists act and where they tend to hide,” he continued, “it may not always be feasible to capture a United States-citizen terrorist who presents an imminent threat of violent attack. In that case, our government has the clear authority to defend the United States with lethal force.” Holder added that “because the United States is in an armed conflict, we are authorized to take action against enemy belligerents under international law . . . and our legal authority is not limited to the battlefields of Afghanistan.”
As for labeling such operations as “assassinations,” Holder said, “They are not, and the use of that loaded term is misplaced,” the attorney general insisted. “Assassinations are unlawful killings. Here, for the reasons I have given, the U.S. government’s use of lethal force in self-defense against a leader of al-Qaeda or an associated force who presents an imminent threat of violent attack would not be unlawful — and therefore would not violate the executive order banning assassination or criminal statutes.”
Holder said “it is preferable to capture suspected terrorists where feasible — among other reasons, so that we can gather valuable intelligence from them — but we must also recognize that there are instances where our government has the clear authority — and, I would argue, the responsibility — to defend the United States through the appropriate and lawful use of lethal force.”
About the attorney general’s comments, I have several reactions.
The first is that Holder and the man he serves, Barack Obama, continue to discover that governing is a good deal harder than ignorantly popping off during elections, which they did plenty of in 2008. They didn’t know nearly as much as they thought they did and were not nearly as wise as they thought they were.
My second reaction is that Holder and Obama’s positions are morally indefensible, at least based on their previous standards. How on earth could they bemoan Enhanced Interrogation Techniques of three terrorists who (a) survived the ordeal and (b) elicited information that saved many innocent American lives while giving the green light to kill American citizens overseas, and to do so without the benefit of a trial?
A third reaction: Where is the outrage of the left? You remember the left – men and women who wrote and spoke out almost on a daily basis that EITs were staining America’s reputation, a violation of human rights and international law, and a moral offense of the highest order. Yet here we have Obama’s attorney general defending the targeted killing of American citizens. This shows you how deeply partisan, and ultimately insincere, the concerns were for many who feigned moral outrage during the Bush years.
When he ran for president, it was clear Obama was a man of astonishing moral arrogance. Now we can add moral hypocrite to his faults.
There is a plain difference between "enhanced interrogation techniques" (i.e. imposing physical suffering to extract information) of a terrorist who has already been detained and poses no ongoing threat and killing a terrorist who is at large as is at war with the United States. The former involves using a human being as a means to an end, whereas the latter is self-defense. To put the issue in the domestic context, there is plainly a difference between hacking off a criminals leg to get him to identify his accomplices and shooting a criminal in the leg while he robs a liquor store.
Well, technically, the "means" is the EIT, not the human being; as well, EIT can be done in and for self-defense (to gather critical information about an ongoing threat) just as much as can be surgical strike against far-off citizen combatants. n nBut I agree that there isn't what I'd call "moral hypocrisy" here, if such is what you would eventually say (there being no moral hypocrisy because there is enough moral distinction between the two actions, or enough moral distinction for multiple minds to find one acceptable and the other unacceptable).
waterboarding a terrorist at Gitmo is just as much self-defense as killing a terrorist with a drone in Kandahar. it's just a lot more sanitary the way Obama likes to do it. keeps his hands clean. and btw, I have absolutely no problem with "using a human being as a means to an end" if that end is we save innocent American lives. no problem at all.
Harming one person so as to stop another person is not self-defense, at least not as classically conceived. At the point where a terrorist is in custody, they no longer pose an imminent threat. They might have knowledge of other imminent threats, but that knowledge is not the same thing as posing the threat themselves.
Question ….on what basis do you conclude killing the AQ leader by drone is "self defense"? n nOr that the person who pulls the trigger is the last word on what is "self defense" and what isn't? n nIMO, the distinction between the two is "The people who ordered the second are pure of motive because they hold to the 'right' ideas, therefore whatever they do in service of those 'right' ideas is permissible."
I theory, the Al Qaeda member is in the process of attacking the United States. Once the Al Qaeda member is captured, he is no longer a threat. This is why it is morally permissible to kill enemy soldiers on the battlefield, but a war crime to fail to care for them once they are detained. I agree that terrorists deserve less protection than soldiers, but the basic principle is the same.
Who is the hypocrite here? Lighten up.
In my view, torture is either causing extreme pain to, or maiming of the prisoner. Water-boarding does neither. So it is not torture !
"Holder further argued that a careful and thorough executive branch review of the facts in a case amounts to 'due process'…." Wow! The Kremlin and the Reichstag put people through a "thorough executive branch review" before their exterminations, too! It's the judiciary that offers due process, not the executive. nThat the U.S. Citizen in question was an insurgent and, much like Confederate soldiers in the Civil War, had taken up arms against the U.S. would not have been hard to show in court.
I really hate to agree with Holder on any matter since he has proven to be absolutely corrupt, but (and it's a big but) if an American citizen breaks into your house to kill you then you should take all necessary actions to protect yourself without consideration for due process. If that American citizen, in concert with like-minded hoodlums, is trying to kill you from afar, the same conditions seem reasonable.