DRONES: Build a Foundation for Our 3-D Future

The future is now
"French high-tech venture Parrot's Japanese PR staff demonstrate a
mini-drone 'Rolling Spider,' equipped with four propellers, a camera
and detachable wheel protector in Tokyo on August 12, 2014."
(Photo: AFP-Yoshikazu Tsuno on Al-Akhbar English)

This week, audiences in Chicago and around the country will be able to see Autómata, a film about a future society in which there are explicit rules about what robots are and are not permitted to do -- and what happens when the rules get broken.

The current decade may well be remembered "The Decade of the Drones," because of the way unmanned aerial vehicals (UAVs, or "drones") have come to dominate the public discourse on national defense and domestic security, as well as beginning to dominate the imagination of university researchers and business innovators and anyone else who likes to ask, "What if . . . ?"


No Drones Network

"Make the drone killing 100% visible."

Several years ago, I began working with activists around the country to lift up the work being done to contest the current U.S. policy of killing with armed drones. There are groups of people working on this problem in nearly every state in the country, and there are websites that help the public learn more and get involved.  People can get a birds-eye view of what's going on at the central No Drones Network site.

People working in the network were able to share strategy and tactics . . . but also some very fundamental realizations.  Perhaps the most fundamental was recognizing that, at the level of phenomenology, something very significant was happening when drones were used to injure people.  For a variety of reasons, the injuries tended to be rendered 100% invisible to the general public. The response that we needed to make as activists was clear: "Make the drone killing 100% visible."

For my own part, I started thinking and writing extensively about this difficult issue. In particular, I began to focus on how drone use had come to undermine the idea that active popular consent is a prerequisite for acts of war -- and, more broadly, for government action of all kinds. (See more links to my posts about drones.)


The Snowden Reset

The major development of 2013 was the set of revelations by Edward Snowden and realization that we have a massive surveillance problem in the U.S.

Wherever you go, whatever you do, whoever you are
YOU ARE UNDER SURVEILLANCE
Department of Homeland Security

What this meant for the public discourse on drones was that two large categories of concern came to be discussed together: concern about violence and concern about surveillance.

There had long been groups working to oppose drone surveillance in the U.S., focusing on the problem of local law enforcement use of drones. Now it became clear that everyone who was concerned about one particular aspect of the drone problem -- e.g. opponents of drone killing -- needed to make common cause with those concerned primarily with other aspects (such as surveillance).

This encouraged a lot of us to connect the dots between the use of military and police force, surveillance, and broader systems of oppression.

Moreover, this development encouraged us all to become much more attuned to unseen possibilities and risks associated with drones.  Of course, it is obvious that physical injury to innocent people is deplorable; but now we started to think more deeply about the effects of drones and drone use that are not so obvious.

How are drones changing us in ways that we aren't even thinking about?


I, Robot

At the same time, we began to see more and more talk of "good uses of drones." The watershed moment was probably the announcement by Amazon that they hoped to deliver packages via drone.  That particular idea may not have been ready for prime time, but it captured people's imaginations.

Of course, when you scratched the surface you found that drone research is going on in a large number of universities.

September, 2014: Drones-eye view of protests in Hong Kong

And now, just in recent days and weeks, I've noticed more and more mainstreaming of talk of use of drones:

September 30, 2014 - "Hong Kong protests: Mesmerising drone footage shows scale of pro-democracy demonstrations " by Lizzie Dearden in The Independent. "Swooping over the Admiralty district, where demonstrations are focused around the Government headquarters, the drone captured images of protesters milling around, distributing food and making signs on Monday."

October 2, 2014 - "Drones vs. Kidneys: Google Autofill on the Economy" by Conor Dougherty in The New York Times. "Mr. Colas has been tracking Google autofill data for a while, and for most of the last three years the top three positions for completing the query, 'I want to buy…' have been won by 'a house,' 'a car' and 'stock.' . . . Last quarter, the top spot went to 'a drone'"

October 5, 2014 - "Regulation Clips Wings of U.S. Drone Makers: FAA Ban, Export Controls Weigh Down American Entrepreneurs, Even as Foreign Rivals Fly High" by Jack Nicas in The Wall Street Journal. "Outside the U.S., relatively accommodating policies have fueled a commercial-drone boom."

October 8, 2014 - "State Farm considering use of drones" by Becky Yerack in the Chicago Tribune. "Property and casualty insurers play a major role in funding the restoration of businesses and communities after major incidents, and the integration of unmanned aircraft into USAA's operations will have immediate, positive effects on the lives of Americans and the business community."

It's hard to argue with. Don't we all want -- at least a little bit -- to be freed from our earthbound existence and start to live a truly 3-D existence?

That's why I think it is particularly important to, once again, ask, "What are the unseen possibilities and risks associated with drones?"

Isaac Asimov proposed "Three Laws of Robotics"

One way to do this is to involve more people -- including the work of thinkers who are no longer living -- that are good at imagining the future and considering previously unimagined possibilities. For instance, Isaac Asimov delved in detail into the need to establish rules -- he called them the "Three Laws of Robotics" -- if we are to be able to safely use machines like drones and robots. In his 1979 essay, "The Robot As Enemy," Isaac Asimov wrote, "Will human beings deliberately build robots without the Laws? I'm afraid that is a distinct possibility . . . " (p. 448). He specifically foresaw the exact developments in the robotization of the military that we are seeing today:

"computerized planes, tanks, artillery, and so on, that would stalk the enemy relentlessly, with superhuman senses and stamina. It might be argued that this would be a way of sparing human beings. We could stay comfortably at home and let our intelligent machines do the fighting for us. If some of them were destroyed -- well, they are only machines. This approach to warfare would be particularly useful if we had such machines and the enemy didn't." (p. 449)

In the end, however, Asimov concludes: "No, I feel confident that attempts to use robots without safeguards won't work and that, in the end, we will come round to the Three Laws."

A lot of people are excited about drones. 

They're enthusiastic about "good" uses, and 

inclined to say "We'll sort out any problems later." 

But "later" is fast upon us.

  

Let's lay the foundation in advance for

what is shaping up to be a 3-D future.

9 More Ideas You Won't Hear

at Chicago Ideas Week . . .

Related posts

I'm marveling at the adjacency of a piece of public art -- one with a very clear message about the risk of human ambition and self-absorption and heedlessness -- to the center of political power in the city of Chicago.

(See NUCLEAR WEAPONS: Who will bring us down to earth? )

In my opinion, the reason to focus on drones is this: when we focus on drones, the general public is able to "get," to an unusual extent, the degree to which popular consent has been banished from the process of carrying out state violence. (Sure, it was banished long ago, but the absence of a human in the cockpit of a drone suddenly makes a light bulb go off in people's heads.) It takes some prodding, but people can sense that drone use somehow crosses a line. And that opens up the discussion about how our consent has been eliminated from the vast range of US militarism.

(See "Why focus on drone attacks?")


Beyond recognizing the inherent contradictions of "pre-emptive violence," we must confront an urgent problem related to technology: the automation of "pre-emptive violence" -- e.g. via drone technology -- is leading to a spiral (or "loop" or "recursive process") that we may not be able to get out of.

(See When "Pre-emptive Violence" Is Automated ....)

The Futurists loved airplanes, and other fast machines. Considering how we, in the U.S. today have been seduced by drones and drone warfare, we would perhaps do well to reflect on why people find these things so appealing.

(See A Future Inspired by Kinetics? )

U.S. "Precision Strikes" in a Nutshell

Signe Wilkinson's latest cartoon for the Philadelphia Daily News is brilliant:

Cartoon by Signe Wilkinson

It depicts a U.S. warplane (or drone) coming in for the attack, with the Barack Obama at the controls, saying, "Target is in sight!"

The only problem is that the "target" is really multiple targets:

* good terrorist
* bad terrorist
* despicable terrorist

. . . as well as . . . 

* lives near a terrorist

. . . and . . . 

* deciding whether to be a terrorist

In other words, pretty much anybody and everybody gets lumped together with "terrorists"; the vaunted "precision" of U.S. military strikes isn't precise at all.

And if those people on the ground weren't our enemies before the Hellfire missile strikes, you can be sure they will be afterwards.

My only quibble with this cartoon is that instead of depicting Obama in the driver's seat, it should make it clear that the warplane is controlled by "Americans." ('Cause we all get to share in the responsibility, the blame, and the consequences of our government's killing spree in the Mideast.)


Related posts

The U.S. has a modus operandi for conducting military strikes while slipping past any genuine public accountability. It's worth a look at the Tuesday, October 29, 2013, New York Times account of a drone strike in Somalia the previous day: "Pentagon Says Shabab Bomb Specialist Is Killed in Missile Strike in Somalia." It's a case study in what's wrong with the U.S. drone wars.

(See October 28 in Somalia: Another Day, Another Drone Killing)




A September 5, 2013, U.S. drone strike in Pakistan killed six people - including Sangeen Zadran -- a "senior militant commander" who was "implicated in a long-running kidnapping drama involving an American soldier."

(See September 5 in Pakistan: Another Day, Another Drone Killing)

The press announced a flurry of drone killings in Yemen over the April 19/20 weekend -- that is, while the rest of us were observing Easter -- and just as with U.S. drone killings in Pakistan and Somalia, the U.S. modus operandi was on full display.

(See April 19 in Yemen: Another Day, Another Drone Killing )

Drones, ISIS, and Permawar

 Let's be clear: there will always be an "ISIS" out there.

The Obama administration had no sooner re-entered the Iraq War, ordering air strikes in northern Iraq against ISIS, than it announced that it "needed" to send the military into Syria.

Oh, we're not doing anything "risky" in Syria - just having a look. In other words, using spy planes and drones to get visual control over even more of the Middle East.

The U.S. narrative goes something like this:

* Somebody "bad" (e.g. ISIS) is doing bad stuff.

* The U.S. wants to "help" -- without overcommitting. We'll just start with a few advisers (to instruct, not to fight) and a few drones (to survey, not to kill).

* One thing leads to another and there's yet another fight. (Lucky we were there . . . )

Does it every occur to us that we've got the narrative (and the causality) backwards? That the truth is something like this?

* Permanent war is what suits us.

* All we need is the next excuse for more war.

* To find an excuse, we need "eyes" there. (Send in the drones.)

* Any bad actor will do as a reason for drone surveillance.

Once again, I return to the wisdom of Michel Foucault. Total surveillance is not just playing an incidental or supporting role in total state control and permanent war. Total surveillance is the infallible and essential heart of total state control and permanent war.


Related posts

In the old order of things, power places itself on display, and hopes that the population sees fit to obey. In the new order of things, power compels every member of the population to display himself or herself . . .  In the new order of things, the courts are bypassed and the instruments of discipline -- observe, classify, examine -- run rampant.

(See "Surveiller et Punir" Indeed!)

The U.S. can get more "bang for the buck" out of each pair of boots it puts on the ground, because -- through the magic of robotics -- it can back up those boots with Hellfire missiles and 500-lb. bombs. For the folks back home, it helps maintain the illusion that the U.S. isn't really intervening in a way that risks escalation. For the population of the affected areas of Iraq, it helps maintain the balance of terror -- because those armed drones are just part of a much larger fleet of drones that is patrolling the skies over Baghdad.  ("Is that drone overhead aiming . . . or just 'looking'?" From the ground, one has to assume they're all aiming . . . . )

(See Armed Drones Over Iraq: A Force Multiplier (Which Is Precisely Why They Are So Dangerous) )


The United States perpetuates a state of permanent war. The names change -- hell, sometimes they change by just a single letter -- but the result is the same. Call it "permawar."

(See #Permawar) 

Why is "Ending the military drone program" a pillar of Campaign Nonviolence?

People around the country are participating in "Campaign Nonviolence" this September to stop war, impoverishment, and climate destruction.

Campaign Nonviolence has articulated concrete goals, one of which is:

Ending the military drone program

Why is "Ending the military drone program" a pillar of Campaign Nonviolence? Some people may feel that the military drone program is just one small corner of the massive US complex of violent militarism.

In one sense they're right: eventually we need to dismantle the whole d*#n thing.

But here's why ending the military drone program is such an essential step, and why it is a vital pillar of Campaign Nonviolence.

Reclaiming our empathy

The US drone program is high-tech, relatively cheap, and flexible. For all those reasons it is an extremely dangerous development. Moreover, it encourages proliferation like no military development in history.

But perhaps the single most significant consequence of the advent of killer drones is that they allow the state to efficiently separate war-making from the emotional involvement of the people of the country using them.

In other words, with the coming of drone warfare, we have been denied the opportunity for empathy with those affected by our (direct and indirect) actions.

In my opinion, the key psychological element of the state's drone program is that invites people to "check out" -- to say, perhaps unconsciously, "Well, at least there's none of our people at risk . . . . "

The faceless fuselage of the Reaper drone has become the perfect embodiment of this affect-less dystopia.

And that's why so much activism has been aimed at helping people reconnect to the people affected by the drone strikes -- and to encourage people to start using their emotions again.

Empathy is like a muscle: once it is allowed to atrophy, it takes real work to get it strong and functioning again.


The larger Campaign Nonviolence challenge

Once one begins to think in this way, it can be seen that there is a connection between the "ending drone warfare" goal and other CNV goals, such as "establishing a $15 minimum wage for all" and even "practicing nonviolence toward the planet."

As long as we continue to allow the instruments of modern living to put distance between ourselves and those around us -- he doesn't matter, he's just a busboy ... it doesn't matter, it will just go in the trash with all the other disposable cups -- we will refuse to acknowledge how our own actions contribute to the violence done to others.

What Campaign Nonviolence is, really, is an invitation to us to (re)experience compassion.

Dozens of Campaign Nonviolence actions will be taking place nationwide during September, 2014, many of them organized by groups with a strong history of protesting drones killings and drone surveillance.

You can help by:

  SHARE: Please share this post with others on Facebook, Twitter, and other social media, so that they can learn about the importance of the "end drone warfare" aspect of Campaign Nonviolence, too!

PARTICIPATE: See the full list of actions nationwide and make a commitment to participate in one near you.

LEAD: Sign up here to help make sure a Campaign Nonviolence event happens in YOUR area.

Related posts

With drones, people become just dots. "Bugs." People who no longer count as people . . . .

(See Drone Victims: Just Dots? Just Dirt? )

In my opinion, the reason to focus on drones is this: when we focus on drones, the general public is able to "get," to an unusual extent, the degree to which popular consent has been banished from the process of carrying out state violence. (Sure, it was banished long ago, but the absence of a human in the cockpit of a drone suddenly makes a light bulb go off in people's heads.) It takes some prodding, but people can sense that drone use somehow crosses a line. And that opens up the discussion about how our consent has been eliminated from the vast range of US militarism.

(See "Why focus on drone attacks?")


As we think about and discuss issues such as distancing ... authority, collateral damage, and pre-emptive violence ... surveillance ... and technology, does theology (e.g. the Creed) help us make choices about responsibility? Does it move us effectively from the "something oughta be done" stage ... through the "I can do something" stage ... up to and including the "I am doing something" stage?

(See Drones: Am I Responsible?)

American Fire: Still Spreading, Still Inextinguishable

The New York Times ran an obituary of Harun Farocki the other day.

Was it a coincidence that I had just been talking about his provocative film, Inextinguishable Fire, which is about napalm? Perhaps not; I find myself talking about that film a lot.

As we work day after day to try to get Americans to recognize some responsibility for the injury done to others in their name -- by drones, for instance, or by various warplanes made by Chicago's star corporate citizen, Boeing -- I frequently think about Farocki's film.

First, there is the famous recognition that being made to look at the injury one is doing is something that one will almost certainly feel a desire to resist.

How can we show you the injuries caused by napalm?

If we show you pictures of napalm burns, you’ll close your eyes.

First you’ll close your eyes to the pictures.

Then you’ll close your eyes to the memory.

Then you’ll close your eyes to the facts.

Then you’ll close your eyes to the entire context.

If we show you someone with napalm burns, we will hurt your feelings.

If we hurt your feelings, you will feel like we’d tried napalm on you.

We can give you only a hint of how napalm works . . . .

(Translation from the German, reproduced from "Harun Farocki’s Inextinguishable Fire" by Ben Davis on ArtNetNews)

This feels so familiar to me from the work we do throughout the country, trying to get people to  confront such phenomena as drone assassinations.

The other part of Inextinguishable Fire that feels so familiar to me is the "interviews" with "employees" of Dow Chemical.

"Because of the intensified division of labor," the narrator explains, "many technicians and scientists can no longer recognize the contribution the have made to weapons of destruction."

"Our department extracts lareic, oleic, and naptha acids . . . . "

"I'm a chemist. What should I do? If I develop a substance, it can be good for humanity . . . ."

"Besides napalm, Dow Chemical produces 800 other products . . . ."

Does this familiar to you?

I invite you to watch Inextinguishable Fire for yourself. I hope that I won't hurt your feelings.


Related posts

"Once the boat went to full pressure, there was really no other option."

(See In Whose Machine Will YOU Be a Cog? )

It is time now to turn to the dirty secret of American life and the primary dilemma of the antiwar movement: the military money that flows to EVERY Congressional district, and in particular the "good jobs" that members of Congress think they are protecting when they vote for ever-higher levels of military spending.

(See Drones, Permawar, and the Problem of "Good Jobs")









People in Chicago like to walk down the street and look the other way, saying, "This doesn't have anything to do with me." When you ask them to take a flyer, or to learn more about this problem, they wave it away with a bland, "I'm good . . . ."

(See This is YOUR War, Chicago! (Boeing F/A-18's Begin Strikes in Iraq) )



As we think about and discuss issues such as distancing ... authority, collateral damage, and pre-emptive violence ... surveillance ... and technology, does theology (e.g. the Creed) help us make choices about responsibility? Does it move us effectively from the "something oughta be done" stage ... through the "I can do something" stage ... up to and including the "I am doing something" stage?

(See Drones: Am I Responsible?)








With drones, people become just dots. "Bugs." People who no longer count as people . . . .

(See Drone Victims: Just Dots? Just Dirt? )

In my opinion, the reason to focus on drones is this: when we focus on drones, the general public is able to "get," to an unusual extent, the degree to which popular consent has been banished from the process of carrying out state violence. (Sure, it was banished long ago, but the absence of a human in the cockpit of a drone suddenly makes a light bulb go off in people's heads.) It takes some prodding, but people can sense that drone use somehow crosses a line. And that opens up the discussion about how our consent has been eliminated from the vast range of US militarism.

(See "Why focus on drone attacks?")

Now that the Israeli government's killings in Gaza are front-page news -- particularly the way military aircraft is being used to mow down innocent men, women, and children -- Boeing's involvement is in everyone's face.

(See Boeing Has an Israel Problem . . . and Chicago Has a Boeing Problem)







When you think "terror" and "gaza," think "Boeing, Lockheed, General Dynamics."

(See USA: Proud Sponsor of T E R R O R in Gaza!)

A Modest Proposal: Turn October 4 Into a "Come Clean On Drones Killing" Deadline!

October 4, 2014 has been set as the date for nationwide action on the problem of drone killing and surveillance.

It seems to me that this is well timed for action vis-a-vis representatives in Congress, most of whom will face a vote on Election Day (Tuesday, November 4, 2014).

A bill currently pending in Congress -- HR 4372: the Targeted Lethal Force Transparency Act -- would require the Administration to "come clean" on the record of its drone killings.

(Lest anyone think simply getting the facts is too modest an ambition, I suggest they consider the level of determined activism that has been required to extract the Senate Select Committee on Intelligence (SSCI) report on torture from the clutches of the government.)

In particular, there is a core of members of Congress that call themselves "progressive" -- and a handful of them have, in fact, stepped up to the plate to get this bill passed. But the majority of them are MIA on this important effort to get the facts of U.S. drone murders out in the open.

So my proposal is simple: Want to exercise practical power in the struggle to rein in the drones? Turn October 4 into a "come clean on drones killing" deadline!


Some key dates

September 21- 27 - Campaign Nonviolence Week of Action

October 4 - Global Action Day Against the Use of Drones for Surveillance and Killing

October 13 - 1 Year Anniversary of UN Report calling for transparency on US drone use

November 4 - Election Day


Related posts

Fall 2014 events in the movement to rein in drones have begun to be announced -- including the Global Action Day Against the Use of Drones for Surveillance and Killing -- October 4

(See Fall 2014 Events in the Movement Against Drone Killing and Surveillance )

A 2013 U.N. report makes it clear that the U.S. has to report fully on all its drone attacks.

(See 2014: The Year of Transparency (for U.S. Drone Use)?)

Numerous additional co-sponsors have joined to support the Schiff/Jones HR 4372: the Targeted Lethal Force Transparency Act. Now we need the rest of our Represenatives to step up!

(See SUPPORT the "Come Clean on Drone Killings" Act (Schiff/Jones HR 4372: the Targeted Lethal Force Transparency Act) )

Why GROUNDED Is Soaring: Putting Drone Dilemmas In Your Face

Grounded ended its run at the Greenhouse Theater Center on July 13, and my summer wish is that it can be brought back for an extended stay.

Gwendolyn Whiteside in GROUNDED

You can get lots of detail on the production in Tony Adler's review in The Reader ("A pilot brings the war home in American Blues Theater's Grounded: George Brant scores a direct hit with his one-woman play"); what I want to stress here is:

Gwendolyn Whiteside is an amazing actress. I was sitting 2 feet away from the stage, and I found myself attracted and scared at the same time. I kept wanting to get a word in edgewise, interrupt her cocky assertions, but also just hoping to be able just to sidestep her. I had to remind myself again and again that the wasn't a real fighter/drone pilot, that this wasn't really happening to me . . . .

The play itself is pitch-perfect. Gwendolyn Whiteside has help delivering an amazing performance because every word in this play works. And the other aspects of the production - staging, sound, video projections - all contribute to putting you in the boots of a "pilot" who drives back and forth through the Nevada desert every day . . .  shuttling . . . between home (sincere husband and pink-pony-wielding toddler) . . . and "combat" (a dark, air-conditioned trailer where she stares at images of the putty-colored Middle East terrain transmitted by a Reaper drone's cameras).

Grounded raises tough questions. I was hoping that the play would challenge the idea that killing people with drones is good. It's a reflection of the seriousness of this work that that is just one of the issues it raises; others include our society's willingness to destroy the people who we employ to "serve" ("serve our country," serve us in general), our culture's worship of violence / use of force, and the consequences of pervasive surveillance.

Find a way to see Grounded. And tell others.


[UPDATE November 15, 2014 - A quick check on Google indicates that GROUNDED is being produced in numerous productions around the country.  Look for one near you -- and if there isn't a nearby production, talk to a theater company in your area and ask, "Why not?"]

[UPDATE May 17, 2015 - Anne Hathaway takes GROUNDED to Broadway: http://www.nytimes.com/2015/04/27/theater/anne-hathaways-solo-turn-as-a-fighter-pilot-in-grounded-at-the-public-theater.html ]

Anne Hathaway in GROUNDED at the Public Theater

Related posts

At the end of the day, is surveillance bad if no harm comes of it? Foucault understood this to be symptomatic of the much larger project of societal rule. To Foucault, prior to the physical and bodily aspects of control and manipulation, there are aspects that have to do with seeing, knowing, naming, and categorizing.

(See Drones, 1984, and Foucault's Panopticon)





Leveling Up is the creative work that demonstrates just how thoroughly America's new ways of warfare have become intertwined with the other dominant strands in our culture.

(See Level Up, Step Up, Grow Up, Man Up . . . Wake Up)












In Chicago on Good Friday, 2013 (March 29), a cast consisting of long-time Chicago antiwar activists was joined by a NY playwright (and defendant in actions against US drone bases), Jack Gilroy, for one of the events kicking off a month-long campaign of anti-drones events across the country: a performance of Gilroy's play, The Predator.

(See "The Predator" in Chicago - Good Friday, 2013 - "A Passion Play for the Drones Era")

Armed Drones Over Iraq: A Force Multiplier (Which Is Precisely Why They Are So Dangerous)

It happened faster than I expected.  Armed U.S. drones are being used over Iraq.

The U.S. has committed "just" 300 "advisors" -- of which about half are already on the ground. The foot in the door . . . .

Today came the announcement that armed drones are now "supporting" the work of those advisors in Baghdad -- "protecting" them.

In other words, the U.S. can get more "bang for the buck" out of each pair of boots it puts on the ground, because -- through the magic of robotics -- it can back up those boots with Hellfire missiles and 500-lb. bombs.

For the folks back home, it helps maintain the illusion that the U.S. isn't really intervening in a way that risks escalation.

Armed?
Unarmed?
(Feelin' lucky?)

For the population of the affected areas of Iraq, it helps maintain the balance of terror -- because those armed drones are just part of a much larger fleet of drones that is patrolling the skies over Baghdad.  ("Is that drone overhead aiming . . . or just 'looking'?" From the ground, one has to assume they're all aiming . . . . )

Make no mistake: whereas the Bush administration went into Iraq without a clue about how it was all going to play out, the Obama administration knows exactly what it's doing. When you see "advisers . . . oh, yes, er . . . advisers supported by drones" piling into Iraq, you can be sure the U.S. is setting itself up to be there calling the shots for a long time to come.


Related posts

In my opinion, the reason to focus on drones is this: when we focus on drones, the general public is able to "get," to an unusual extent, the degree to which popular consent has been banished from the process of carrying out state violence. (Sure, it was banished long ago, but the absence of a human in the cockpit of a drone suddenly makes a light bulb go off in people's heads.) It takes some prodding, but people can sense that drone use somehow crosses a line. And that opens up the discussion about how our consent has been eliminated from the vast range of US militarism.

(See "Why focus on drone attacks?")

Isn't "adviser" just another word for "pre-escalation"?

(See Military Advisers to Iraq: What Could Go Wrong? )











The United States perpetuates a state of permanent war. The names change -- hell, sometimes they change by just a single letter -- but the result is the same. Call it "permawar."

(See #Permawar)

A Layman Reads Obama's "Targeted Killing" Memo

Memo author Barron: Lots and lots of "trees"

Now that it is available online, every American should read the Justice Department memo approving the targeted killing of Anwar Al-Awlaki.

There is a lot in the memo, much of it recitation of precedents, and teasing apart of legal categories like "non-international armed conflict" and "public authority," and the parsing of the precise definition of terms like "taking no active part in hostilities" and "unlawful killing."  Readers with law degrees could spend years dissecting it.  And once you get into it, it can be easy to miss the forest for the trees.

That's where being a non-lawyer comes in handy. Because if you don't know enough about legal theory to become fascinated with the minutiae, you are more inclined to sense the big thing that is missing here, namley, the "facts" upon which the government based its decision to go to war against Anwar Al-Awlaki.

The memo seeks to circumvent the rule of law -- in which a person is charged with a crime, a trial is conducted (including presentation of evidence, contesting of evidence, and findings of fact and findings of law), a verdict is reached, and in the event of a guilty verdict a sentence is passed, after which the sentence is carried out -- and replace it with a justified act of war.

But what is missing in the "targeted killing" memo are the evidence, the contesting of the evidence, and the finding of fact. And by offering nothing to make up for the jettisoning of these parts of the process, the U.S. government leaves us unconvinced that abandoning legal process can be justified.

Let's face it: the Obama administration and the rest of the U.S. government know that they have a big problem: they want to go to war against anyone they suspect is an enemy -- and skip the rule of law. They wish that a miracle could happen and everyone would just let them do it.

The closest they can come is some hand-waving and fast talk, ending with the words, " . . . and that's why we can skip legal process and go to war against (fill in name here)," and then hoping like hell that Americans fall for it.

But Americans aren't such pushovers.  Sure, not every American has figured out what's going on yet. But they will. And when they do, there will be political consequences for the leaders that have been trying to pull the wool over all of our eyes.

Related posts

If the public will join us in asking the question "Who decides?" about drone executions, I believe they will rapidly come to realize that they are utterly dissatisfied with what the government is saying.

(See Who Decides? (When Drones are Judge, Jury, and Executioner) )











Eric Holder addressed a group of Northwestern Law students and others. Afterward one audience member summed up the speech as he left: "He pretty much said he can kill anyone he wants." The details of that speech will turn you more topsy-turvy than anything Alice experienced when she ventured through the looking glass.

(See Eric Through the Looking Glass)

By now, everyone knows about the New York Times article describing Barack Obama's personal administration of drone killing around the world. What few people are willing to face up to is that Obama 2012 partisans actually see this as a way to get a lot of Americans to like Obama: "This is the candidate; you MUST support him!"

(See Being a Team Player for "Mr. Forceful": Obama and the Dems )