"Legal, ethical and wise" assassination

Extra-judicial drone killings are legal, ethical, wise: White House

The White House has defended its drone strikes to kill people, even US citizens, inside the United States, saying such targeted assassinations are “legal, ethical and wise.”

A US Predator drone (file photo)

Press TV,

6 February, 2013

“Sometimes we use remotely piloted aircraft to conduct targeted strikes against specific al-Qaeda terrorists in order to prevent attacks on the United States and to save American lives,” White House Press Secretary Jay Carney told reporters on Tuesday.

“We conduct those strikes because they are necessary to mitigate ongoing actual threats, to stop plots, to prevent future attacks and, again, save American lives. These strikes are legal, they are ethical, and they are wise,” he said. 

Carney also claimed that US President Barack Obama takes seriously his responsibility to protect the United States and its citizens and that he believes it is entirely appropriate to target suspected terrorists anywhere in the world regardless of their nation of origin.

A recently-leaked Justice Department memo offered justification for an increase in the number of drone strikes in recent years - including those aimed at US citizens - under the Obama administration.

“Targeting a member of an enemy force who poses an imminent threat of violent attack to the United States is not unlawful. It is a lawful act of self-defense,” reads the undated memo, titled Lawfulness of a Lethal Operation Directed Against a US Citizen who is a Senior Operational Leader of al-Qaeda or an Associated Force.

“The condition that an operational leader present an ‘imminent’ threat of violent attack against the United States does not require the United States to have clear evidence that a specific attack on US persons and interests will take place in the immediate future,” the document read.

The memo has come under fire by the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU), among other groups, for using executive authority to justify the killing of US citizens without a due process of the law.

“It’s hard to believe that it was produced in a democracy built on a system of checks and balances. It summarizes in cold legal terms a stunning overreach of executive authority - the claimed power to declare Americans a threat and kill them far from a recognized battlefield and without any judicial involvement before or after the fact,” ACLU National Security Project director Hina Shamsi said in a written statement.

Washington uses assassination drones in several countries, claiming that they target “terrorists.” According to witnesses, however, the attacks have mostly led to massive civilian casualties.