[Peace] US drone killing program

[Carl G. Estabrook]

"During his Presidential campaign, Donald J. Trump said that he would continue the Obama Administration’s drone killing program.  Indeed, drone strikes <http://www.cnn.com/2017/01/23/politics/drone-strikes-president-trump/index.html> against Al Qaeda in Yemen on January 19, 20, and 21 overlapped the Obama and Trump Presidencies.

"President Trump did not sign off on any of these attacks.  The strikes were conducted under the authority President Obama had delegated to CENTCOM commander General Joseph Votel.    Still, a Trump-authorized drone strike even this early in his Administration would not break with precedent established by Obama.  Micah Zenko <http://blogs.cfr.org/zenko/2017/01/20/obamas-final-drone-strike-data/> of the Council on Foreign Relations reminds us that:  'On January 23, 2009, just three days into his presidency, President Obama authorized his first kinetic military action, two drone strikes, three hours apart, in Waziristan, Pakistan, that killed as many as twenty civilians.'   According to the Bureau of Investigative Journalism <https://www.thebureauinvestigates.com/2017/01/17/obamas-covert-drone-war-numbers-ten-times-strikes-bush/>, there were ten times as many drone strikes under Obama than under President George W. Bush.  The Bureau also notes that there were more drone strikes during Obama’s first year in office than during eight years of the Bush Administration.  To some extent, these facts reflect Bush’s preference for capturing Al-Qaeda and Taliban rather than killing them.

"Thank goodness for the Obama Nostalgia Industry which had gotten into high gear even before Obama left the White House.  They have been busily burnishing Obama’s legacy as a Man of Peace.  Thanks to them, we can rest comfortably in the knowledge that even when Obama killed innocent foreigners with Hellfire missiles he killed them peacefully…”



http://www.counterpunch.org/2017/01/26/the-year-in-drones-2016/ <http://www.counterpunch.org/2017/01/26/the-year-in-drones-2016/>

—CGE




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