John Brennan, Obama's killing czar, opposes drone war?

President Obama listens to Brennan's report. Credits: Public domain.

John O. Brennan's official title is Deputy National Security Advisor for Homeland Security and Counterterrorism, as well as assistant to the president.  Unofficially, the Atlantic's Conor Friedersdorf has dubbed Brennan the Obama Administration's Killing Czar. And according to Friedersdorf, even Brennan has qualms about the drone war:

In Djibouti, a small East African country on the Gulf of Aiden, the United States launches killer drones that strike in Yemen, Somalia and elsewhere. Last spring, as one of the drones sat on a runway, it suddenly came alive "without any human direction, even though the ignition had been turned off and the fuel lines closed," the Washington Post reports. "Technicians concluded that a software bug had infected the 'brains' of the drone, but never pinpointed the problem." It's an anecdote that underscores how easily things can go wrong as America rapidly expands drone fleets and missions. It isn't just that drones are frequently crashing, sometimes on urban neighborhoods, in the part of the world where John Brennan, the top counterterrorism adviser to President Obama, says that he's been most successful controlling the unmanned program. It's that a drone there isn't or wasn't entirely under the control of its minders!

With that in mind, let's turn to Pakistan, where America has carried out more drone strikes than anywhere else. Remarkably, the man who has more power than anyone save Obama over America's kill list has unwittingly made an air-tight argument that the drone war, as presently waged, is deeply problematic. That's what I gleaned from a close reading of the three-part Washington Post series on kill lists, which quotes Brennan and others familiar with his thinking at length.

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“The president of the United States is not the Godfather”

Official White House photo by Pete Souza.

It’s odd, you know, when I first read in the NY Times of President Obama’s personal culpability in selecting targets for death by drone, I was stunned.  I believed this would effectively end Obama’s hopes for a second term. Americans simply would not stand for this. 

After all, Obama was originally elected on the basis of his anti-war speech as an Illinois state representative. Recall also that shortly after his inauguration, he received a Nobel peace prize for his lofty vision. We had a right, I thought, to expect this man to lead the nation toward a more ethical and just role in the world.

So then I began to read accusations from Republicans that the Administration intentionally leaked the story to the Times to bolster Obama’s image as a tough, macho leader who had no qualms about dealing death to alleged enemies and any noncombatants who happened to be within range of his drone-fired missiles.

Could this be true?

Washington Post columnist Richard Cohen writes:

What is remarkable about the recent leaks is the coincidence -- it can only be that -- that they all made the president look good, heroic, decisive, strong, and even a touch cruel -- born, as the birthers long suspected, not in Hawaii but possibly on the lost planet Krypton. The leak that displayed all these Obamian attributes was the one that said the president personally approves the assassinations of terrorists abroad. He gives his OK and the bad guys are dispatched via missiles from drones.

Cohen continues:

The leak that troubles me concerns the killing of suspected or actual terrorists. The triumphalist tone of the leaks -- the Tarzan-like chest-beating of various leakers -- not only is in poor taste but shreds a long-standing convention that, in these matters, the president has deniability. The president of the United States is not The Godfather.

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The President’s Big Speech: Obama Attempts to Quell Critics on Both the Left and the Right

Guantanomo Prison

In the Highs and Lows of Obama’s Big Speech, the Washington Post’s Dan Froomkin offers a comprehensive analysis of the president’s attempt to quell critics on both the left and the right in response to several of his recent policy moves.

In hitting the lows, Froomkin contends:

But in some parts of his speech, Obama appeared to be defending actions and even taking positions that didn't live up to his own professed standards.

When it came to what to do with the detainees at Guantanamo, he declared that he would work to create a system that would enable the indefinite detention without trial for a limited number of people whom the government is unable to prosecute for past crimes, but whom are nevertheless considered to be threats to the country. Even though he spoke of establishing lawful standards and periodic reviews, that's a dangerously extreme policy proposal. He once again expressed his intention to use a reformed military commission process for some detainees -- but gave no reason to think it won't run into many of the same legal challenges that Bush's process did. He spoke of sending many detainees to face trial in federal courts -- but then promised that no one would be released who endangers our national security. The whole point of a fair judicial system is that the executive can't guarantee the results.

Obama spoke passionately about his commitment to transparency, but offered up the same lousy and unpersuasive excuses he did last week for his decision to fight the court-ordered release of more photos of prison abuse. In particular, the weight he put on his responsibility not to release information that would inflame our enemies was deeply disturbing.

He offered no additional clarity regarding his position on the state secrets doctrine, where his lofty promises still stand in dramatic conflict with what his administration is actually doing.

And in continuing to oppose the creation of an independent commission that would fully investigate the abuses of the Bush administration, he marginalized those of us who want to find out what happened as polarizers, much like those who continue to doggedly defend Bush policies. He said the recent debate has obscured the truth -- when all we want is to let it free.

Froomkin has more to say on Obama’s disrespect for those who support at least an investigation of possible war crimes by the Bush Administration.

On how those nutty people who want to find out what really happened are really only interested in finger-pointing, and are just as bad as the Bush dead-enders:

"It's no secret that there is a tendency in Washington to spend our time pointing fingers at one another. And it's no secret that our media culture feeds the impulse that lead to a good fight and good copy. But nothing will contribute more than that than an extended relitigation of the last eight years. Already we've seen how that kind of effort only leads those in Washington to different sides to laying blame. It can distract us from focusing our time, our efforts and our politics on the challenges of the future.

"We see that above all in the recent debate -- how the recent debate has obscured the truth and sent people into opposite and absolutist ends. On one side of the spectrum, there are those who make little allowance for the unique challenges posed by terrorism and would almost never put national security over transparency. And on the other end of the spectrum, there are those who embrace a view that can be summarized in two words: 'Anything goes.' Their arguments suggest that the ends of fighting terrorism can be used to justify any means, and that the president should have blanket authority to do whatever he wants, provided it is a president with whom they agree.

"And both sides may be sincere in their views, but neither side is right. The American people are not absolutist, and they don't elect us to impose a rigid ideology on our problems."

Read Froomkin’s column in its entirety here.

SOS Clinton Will Anchor National Security Team

Gen. James Jones, Sen. Hillary Clinton, and Secy. of Defense Robert Gates, photo credits: Huffington Post

Update from the NY Daily News: "WASHINGTON - Hillary Clinton passed on becoming boss of the superpowerful Senate Appropriations Committee to pursue the more prestigious secretary of state job with President-elect Barack Obama, the Daily News has learned."

Peter Baker at the NY Times writes: “At a time when the country remains engaged in two wars and still faces the threat of international terrorism, Mrs. Clinton will anchor a national security team with more of a centrist character than some of Mr. Obama’s liberal supporters once hoped to see. In addition to her, Democrats said, Mr. Obama plans to announce that he is keeping Defense Secretary Robert M. Gates, who has run the Pentagon for the last two years, and will appoint Gen. James L. Jones, a retired Marine commandant, as national security adviser.

“Rounding out his national security team, Mr. Obama will name former Deputy Attorney General Eric H. Holder Jr. as his choice for attorney general and Governor Janet Napolitano of Arizona as secretary of homeland security, the Democrats said. Mr. Obama also will nominate Susan E. Rice, his foreign policy adviser and a former assistant secretary of state, as ambassador to the United Nations, a job that will be given cabinet rank, as it had under President Bill Clinton.”

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Torture Erodes National Security and Democracy

I’ve been waiting for this. In the Nov. 14th edition of the Christian Science Monitor, Alison Brysk, professor of political science at the University of California, Irvine, and co-editor of "National Insecurity and Human Rights," provides a comprehensive argument against the Bush Administration’s underhanded use of torture in its intelligence-gathering activities in the war on terror.

Titled Torture Doesn't Work, Brysk’s article begins:

"A morally bankrupt foreign policy. A degeneration of democratic checks and balances. Those are just a few of the disturbing facets of the state of the US government revealed by the debates over the confirmation of Attorney General Michael Mukasey and his views on whether waterboarding constitutes torture.

"But the deepest irony of the Bush administration's ambivalent stance on such medieval tactics – practiced in the name of defending national security – is that torture is not only wrong, it's also a stupid strategy that undermines the defense of democratic societies against terror."

I'll not attempt to paraphrase the remainder of Brysk’s argument here; instead, I’ll just list the subheadings and urge you to to read the entire article:

"Torture is an ineffective counterinsurgency strategy.

Torture escalates conflict.

Torture blocks international cooperation against terror among valuable democratic allies.

Torture drives out legitimate policing.

Torture undermines the rule of law and corrupts democratic institutions."

I believe Brysk's article will be helpful in standing up to the Neocons. Nontheless I continue to feel ashamed that Americans have been dragged into this horrible discussion in the first place - before Dubya, torture was simply not an option for our country.