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Clinton approved CIA drone assassinations with her cellphone, report says

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Re: Clinton approved CIA drone assassinations with her cellphone, report says

#71

Post by return0 »

gonvaled wrote: post #19
Fuxy wrote: post #17

Whenever I hear something about US drone Strikes I always think how long until the other side starts getting drones developed and and easy way to mass produce them and smuggle them into the US assemble them and start launching drone strikes from within the US on US persons of interest like politicians and CIA officials. Drone parts are getting cheaper and cheaper and easier to get it's only a matter a time someone st…

Which of course is the only bad thing about drone strikes, right? That they could ever hit the "right guys"? Who cares that hundreds of innocent civilians are killed, if they are not american citizens? Disgusting, really. EDIT, for the downvoters you'll have to justify what in my comment you do not like. The parent is making the case that what worries him/her is that drone strikes will eventually be used to attack am…

> you'll have to justify what in my comment you do not like.

Off topic, but i see this line over and over all the time lately. Nobody has to justify anything. I get downvoted all the time, and would never dream to complain about it. We can disagree without being confrontational/preachy.

Re: Clinton approved CIA drone assassinations with her cellphone, report says

#73

Post by coldtea »

factorialboy wrote: post #46
cyberferret wrote: post #2

She could have approved drone strikes using smoke signals or carrier pigeons... - it all boils down to the same thing - execution of human beings without a trial...

Question is are you in a state of war? Are these considered casualties of war? If yes, then execution without trial is a given.

There are war laws too you know. And execution without a trial is a war crime.

Death in combat is another thing altogether.

Re: Clinton approved CIA drone assassinations with her cellphone, report says

#74

Post by 7952 »

m_eiman wrote: post #9
golergka wrote: post #4

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This description fits almost any action that you can perform when you're at war. So, either you advocate that war courts review cases of all the enemy soldiers before aithorizing an attack, or you have to come up with a more precise definition of what is exactly wrong here. Clarification: I'm not a fan of CIA assasinations, far from it; but "execution without a trial" isn't logically justifiable complaint: we do it i…

Saying that the US is at war with various groups of people in the country side of Pakistan is a rather generous definition of the concept of war, isn't it? It's more like "the US is blowing up people who may or may not be those intended, but it's kinda hard to tell since they're doing it all by remote control".

"the US is blowing up people who may or may not be those intended, but it's kinda hard to tell since they're doing it all by remote control".

Sounds like a good description of war to me. It is pretty common in conflict for civilians to suffer higher casualty rates than actual combatants. Mostly leaders don't mean that to happen, but that is hardly any excuse.

There has always been a disconnect between the moral intent of leaders and the actions of men on the ground. I am sure many Kings of England were good christians but there men still raped and pillaged. At least drones don't rape people.

Re: Clinton approved CIA drone assassinations with her cellphone, report says

#75

Post by tremon »

Fuxy wrote: post #17

Whenever I hear something about US drone Strikes I always think how long until the other side starts getting drones developed and and easy way to mass produce them and smuggle them into the US assemble them and start launching drone strikes from within the US on US persons of interest like politicians and CIA officials. Drone parts are getting cheaper and cheaper and easier to get it's only a matter a time someone st…

it's only a matter a time someone start using them as assassination tools

Then how would you say they're used now?

Re: Clinton approved CIA drone assassinations with her cellphone, report says

#76

Post by coldtea »

tomjen3 wrote: post #69
cyberferret wrote: post #2

She could have approved drone strikes using smoke signals or carrier pigeons... - it all boils down to the same thing - execution of human beings without a trial...

Using this results in a lot fewer civilian casualties compared to carpet bombing the area. War will always have civilian casualties and it will always be with us.

Easy to say when your side is the one causing them...

Re: Clinton approved CIA drone assassinations with her cellphone, report says

#77

Post by wslh »

Fuxy wrote: post #17

Whenever I hear something about US drone Strikes I always think how long until the other side starts getting drones developed and and easy way to mass produce them and smuggle them into the US assemble them and start launching drone strikes from within the US on US persons of interest like politicians and CIA officials. Drone parts are getting cheaper and cheaper and easier to get it's only a matter a time someone st…

Drones are already being used by Hamas [1] and Hezbollah [2] and intelligence companies the problem is how to smuggle advanced UAV on US territory.

[1] http://www.haaretz.com/news/diplomacy-defense/.premium-1.605...

[2] http://www.haaretz.com/report-iran-admits-supplying-hezbolla...

Re: Clinton approved CIA drone assassinations with her cellphone, report says

#78

Post by rorykoehler »

imgabe wrote: post #48
gonvaled wrote: post #19

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Which of course is the only bad thing about drone strikes, right? That they could ever hit the "right guys"? Who cares that hundreds of innocent civilians are killed, if they are not american citizens? Disgusting, really. EDIT, for the downvoters you'll have to justify what in my comment you do not like. The parent is making the case that what worries him/her is that drone strikes will eventually be used to attack am…

Showing concern for one group of people does not imply a lack of concern for another group. You're drawing conclusions that are not supported by the original comment and being needlessly antagonistic. That's why you're getting downvoted.

In fairness whenever you hear an American politician speak it's always about saving American lives. You hear them talk about the great tragedy of a few thousand soldiers dying (remember these are professional killers who signed up knowing they will be in the theatre of war) but never a squeak about the million plus Iraqi civilians who died.

All this and we wonder why we have enemies?

Re: Clinton approved CIA drone assassinations with her cellphone, report says

#79

Post by chriswarbo »

rottyguy wrote: post #57
richmarr wrote: post #45

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Black and white decisions are a luxury... Yes and no. In this case a lot of the 'grey' in these decisions is caused directly by wilful and callous foriegn policy, in which Clinton has played her part. You don't see the Prime Minister of Sweden executing foreigners on his Apple Watch

Except life is not like writing a program where you've coded down some rabbit hole and realize you should have done X several layers up and are able to go back and fix it. It's more of hack as you go and hope the whole thing doesn't blow up until you, possibly, get a chance to rewrite or build an improved version

> It's more of hack as you go and hope the whole thing doesn't blow up until you, possibly, get a chance to rewrite or build an improved version

That's certainly true a lot of the time. I disagree regarding legal/political cases like this though, since a "the whole thing blowing up" (in the sense of public outcry) is the rewrite/improvement. The aim of the game is to accrue as much power, capability, mindshare and precedent as possible, but slowly enough that the frog doesn't jump out of the water.

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