Tag: drone war

Watching Senator John McCain foam at the mouth with his calls for war against Syria reminds one that President Barack Obama has done well to resist strident demands from congress and the media to use the U.S. armed forces in a direct role to remove President Bashar al-Assad. Which is not intended to suggest that … Continue reading “Drones and Death Lists: The New Face of Warfare”

Up until recently, we were all laboring under the illusion that U.S. Pakistani “friends” had reluctantly agreed to allow the United States kill al Qaeda and the Afghan Taliban with drone attacks on their soil in exchange for bucket loads of cash in foreign aid. Now we find out that, right from the start, the … Continue reading “Targeted Killings in the Drone War – Illegal and Unconstitutional”

Rand Paul’s marathon 13-hour filibuster was not the end of the conversation on drones. Suddenly, drones are everywhere, and so is the backlash. Efforts to counter drones at home and abroad are growing in the courts, at places of worship, outside air force bases, inside the UN, at state legislatures, inside Congress–and having an effect … Continue reading “Finally, the Backlash Against Drones Takes Flight”

In 1939 Germany blitzkrieged into Poland and France and Britain declared war. The Germans divided the conquered country with their ally, Stalin’s Soviet Union, and the two belligerents mopped up Polish resistance, a process that subsequently included the slaughter of twenty-two thousand Polish officers and intelligentsia by the Russians at Katyn Forest. France missed the … Continue reading “Sitzkrieg on the Potomac”

Although so far, President Obama seems to have less warlike inclinations than George W. Bush (perhaps damning by faint praise) – getting out of Iraq, finally scheduling to mostly pull out of Afghanistan, and going against all national security advisers by refusing to lethally arm Syrian rebels – in one area he seems more bellicose. … Continue reading “Obama’s Drone War Could Legally Kill Americans But Not Anywhere”

In The Lord of the Rings, J. R. R. Tolkien’s classic fantasy trilogy, the center of evil in Middle Earth is the land of Mordor, a desolate and evil country. From there Sauron, the Dark Lord, sends out his spies and agents in pursuit of his goal: the conquest of the world of men, hobbits, … Continue reading “Missiles From Mordor”