[Peace-discuss] Obama administration's drone lies - and Durbin's drone hearing, now set for April 23rd

Sun Apr 14 08:01:30 UTC 2013

Durbin is such a lapdog for mainstream Democrat hushuobadao
that I can't imagine that his "hearings" are anything more
than a mock inquiry designed to exonerate the Obots from
any wrongdoing.

But I have anticipated some hypothetical answers below.
>
> On 04/14/13 6:17, Stuart Levy wrote:
>
> Sen. Durbin is holding hearings on drone use and policy soon.   It's 
> encouraging that they're even undertaking such a thing - they are 
> empowered to ask questions that will make the Administration 
> uncomfortable, which it should be.  And maybe if pushed they will 
> actually do that.
>
> Robert Naiman spoke about doing just this at the ACLU-CU meeting last 
> weekend.   He proposes calling Durbin's office and urging that Durbin 
> - as chair of the Constitution subcommittee of the Sen. Intelligence 
> Cmte - raise at least these four specific questions:
>
>   1- How many civilians have US drone strikes killed in Pakistan, and 
> why has this number been classified?
>        (Naiman mentioned that he'd learned last year that such a count 
> *is* being kept, *and* that it is classified, from Richard Hoagland of 
> the US Embassy in Pakistan.)

That is classified information.  We don't release the reasons for 
classifying information
as classified as that is also classified information.

>
>   2- Is it true that the US has performed *secondary strikes* in 
> Pakistan?   (... where a strike at some site is followed, after other 
> unknown people have arrived to help those hurt, by a second strike)    
> Hoagland told them that this is not happening, but mainstream press 
> reports allege that it has on a number of occasions.   It would be a 
> clear war crime, if true.

We consider all drone strikes to be primary.
Of course there will be some geographic overlap,
and it depends upon how you consider the time frame.
We consider the bombing of Dresden to have been either a clustered 
series of primary strikes
or a single prolonged primary strike.  We consider time to be a
non-constraining variable in our analysis.

It could not be a clear war crime since we clearly are not at war with 
Pakistan.

>
>   3- Is it true - as reported in the NYTimes last May - that the CIA 
> counts any military-aged male killed by a drone strike as a presumed 
> militant?    (Sen. Feinstein, chair of the full Intelligence Cmte, 
> later claimed she was unaware of such a report.)   If this is true, 
> what does it mean for the estimates of civilians killed?

We usually try to count the number of smoldering sandals, boots, and 
other footwear
in the reconnaissance zone and divide by two to get the kill count.  Of 
course
there is a margin of error in such estimates due to factors like infants 
and children
and pregnant women without footwear, and individuals with a leg missing 
due to
a previous primary strike.  Sen Feinstein suffers from the mathematical 
equivalent
of dyslexia.  Her opinions do not affect our estimates.
By the way, we consider "full intelligence committee" to be just a name,
not really an oxymoron.

>   4- What fraction of those killed by drone strikes in Pakistan have 
> been high-level militants?
>   (The strikes' stated purpose had been to kill specifically those 
> people.  Yet other estimates (including from the Knuckey and 
> Sonnenberg report, http://www.livingunderdrones.org/report/ and 
> detailed reporting from the Bureau of Investigative Journalism such as 
> this, 
> <http://www.thebureauinvestigates.com/2013/04/02/march-2013-update-us-covert-actions-in-pakistan-yemen-and-somalia/> 
> suggest only about 2% of the 2500-3500 people killed by US drone 
> strikes since 2004 were high level militants.  Some 10-30% of those 
> killed were reported to be civilians, including 5% children.)

Not all of those killed are high-level per se.
Some were in valleys, some were crouching behind donkeys and pushcarts,
some were lying flat in ditches and behind rocks.  We got 'em anyway.

It is really difficult to determine the civilian/military percentage of 
a dead Pakistani.  Some
of the dead individuals are totally hardened against our aggression (100%)
and some only have smoldering antipathy (50% or less).  We consider 
those children
that flee from the drones to have relatively low committment
so we give them a 5% rating.  Not many children are all that willing to 
stand up
to an incoming drone attack so we think our scaling is appropriate.

Any more questions?

Thank you for your interest in Senator Dick. Durbin.

>
> Durbin's office phone numbers -
>    Washington, DC:   202-224-2152.   or if that's busy, you can also 
> call his ...
> Springfield, IL:  217-492-4062.
>
>
> On 4/13/13 11:27 AM, C. G. Estabrook wrote:
>> http://www.commondreams.org/view/2013/04/12-2
>>
>> For years, senior Obama officials, including the president himself, have been making public claims about their drone program that have just been proven to be categorically false. The evidence of this falsity is so conclusive that even establishment sources are using unusually harsh language - including "lies" - to describe Obama's statements. McClatchy's national security reporter, Jonathan Landay, obtained top-secret intelligence documents showing that "contrary to assurances it has deployed US drones only against known senior leaders of al-Qaida and allied groups, the Obama administration has targeted and killed hundreds of suspected lower-level Afghan, Pakistani and unidentified 'other' militants in scores of strikes in Pakistan's rugged tribal area." That article quotes drone expert Micah Zenko of the Council on Foreign Relations as saying  that "McClatchy's findings indicate that the administration is 'misleading the public about the scope of who can legitimately be targ
>>   eted.'"
>>
>>
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>
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