Anwar al-Awlaki, American-Born Qaeda Leader, Is Killed in Yemen

[Dreadnought]

Do you want a year of President Biden?

But seriously Ron Paul would make the zero look good...

Oh HELL no, That would be like wishing Gore was a President for a year.

[JAD_333]

Update. Note: US never claimed Asiri was killed as reported by Yemen.

AQAP's senior bomb maker Asiri not killed in strike that killed Awlaki
By Bill RoggioOctober 2, 2011


Al Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula's top bomb maker was not killed in the US airstrike in Yemen that is thought to have killed American citizens and AQAP operatives Anwar al Awlaki and Samir Khan. But two other AQAP operatives killed in the strike have been identified.

Ibrahim Hassan Tali al Asiri "was not killed nor targeted in this operation," a senior Yemeni official who wishes to remain anonymous told The Long War Journal. Asiri was thought to have been killed, but his death was not confirmed by US officials.

Read more: AQAP's senior bomb maker Asiri not killed in strike that killed Awlaki - The Long War Journal

[gunnut]

I think it is, and I'll try to explain why.

True, a citizen has rights, both the criminal and the victim, and among them is the right to due process. But if a citizen presents a clear and present danger to others his right to due process becomes secondary to the principle of public safety. We've see that over and over, such as when a SWAT sniper shoots someone holding a hostage at gunpoint. No trial; no proof of quilt.

What about someone who plans the murder of another? Who openly issues death threats, but is not "in the act" of carrying out that threat? Does the police break down the door and shoot him? Or does the police arrest the guy and then hands him over to the DA for trial?

Al Awlaki, at the time of his death, did not have a gun or a knife pointed at another American. No one was in imminent danger.

We accept this as reasonable because law enforcement has a lawful duty to protect citizens when there is a clear and present danger to their lives. We don't hear Ron Paul and the ACLU complaining when the police do it in the US. My question to them is, what's different about killing a member of an paramilitary organization that has not only killed many innocent US citizens as a matter of policy, but openly plots to kill more?

Oh ACLU complains about it alright.

If a man is plotting the murder of someone, we arrest him and put him on trial. If a man is accused of murdering someone, we arrest him and put him on trial. The only time we execute someone without a trial is when someone else is in imminent danger and the only way to defuse that danger is to kill that someone.

Paul and like-minded critics seem to believe that due process is a rigid system of unyielding requirements. But in truth it is not. Ask any professor of law
whether a citizen who is a clear and present danger to a fellow citizen and to the security of the nation must first pull the trigger or detonate the bomb before any legal action can be taken to stop them.

Point well taken, but that is not the case here. If the subject is a hostage-taker holding his victim at gunpoint, proving his guilt in a court of law is problematic. Saving innocent lives demands quick action, and obviously the niceties of due process can't come first.

And consider the fact that cops don't carry guns just to protect themselves. They also use them to apprehend dangerous criminals and prevent all sorts of violent crimes when no other recourse is available. Many a criminal is killed before ever seeing a courtroom. I wouldn't say they were denied due process.

Awlaki's group would kill planeloads of US citizens if it could. Chances are the longer they are around, the more they will try, and sooner or later, they'll succeed. If that is not a clear and present danger that warrants deadly action, I don't know what is.

I think this is a slippery slope. I cheer for the killing of Al Awlaki, but also troubled at the same time. He was a US citizen. Unless he renounced it, he should be afforded due process, even a trial in absentia. I have no problem with assassination of OBL or other non-American terrorists.

[troung]

I think this is a slippery slope. I cheer for the killing of Al Awlaki, but also troubled at the same time. He was a US citizen. Unless he renounced it, he should be afforded due process, even a trial in absentia. I have no problem with assassination of OBL or other non-American terrorists.

AQ Terrorists overseas out of the reach of law enforcement. No different then shooting a German American fighting for the Nazis. The conservative justices on the SC would no doubt come down on this being legal.

[gunnut]

AQ Terrorists overseas out of the reach of law enforcement. No different then shooting a German American fighting for the Nazis. The conservative justices on the SC would no doubt come down on this being legal.

That also comes down to "imminent danger" for our servicemen.

We shoot and kill enemy soldiers because they are a threat to our people. We do not shoot and kill enemy soldiers if they surrender, even if they have killed our people, and plan to do so in the future if given a chance. If they have committed war crimes against us like that of Malmady massacre, then we give them a trial and then execute them.

How about a military tribunal that could try Americans fighting against the US overseas, in absentia? At least everything will be on record and technically given them due process.

[troung]

How about a military tribunal that could try Americans fighting against the US overseas, in absentia? At least everything will be on record and technically given them due process.

Would violate DPC in and of itself. And merely get in the way of an already legal target.

We shoot and kill enemy soldiers because they are a threat to our people. We do not shoot and kill enemy soldiers if they surrender, even if they have killed our people, and plan to do so in the future if given a chance. If they have committed war crimes against us like that of Malmady massacre, then we give them a trial and then execute them.

He hadn't surrendered. He was still "under arms" as an enemy combatant. It wouldn't matter if he were taking a dump, running away, or shooting at NATO troops.

He need not be planting a bomb to justify hitting him with a Hellfire.

[JAD_333]

What about someone who plans the murder of another? Who openly issues death threats, but is not "in the act" of carrying out that threat? Does the police break down the door and shoot him? Or does the police arrest the guy and then hands him over to the DA for trial?

Al Awlaki, at the time of his death, did not have a gun or a knife pointed at another American. No one was in imminent danger.

Oh ACLU complains about it alright.

If a man is plotting the murder of someone, we arrest him and put him on trial. If a man is accused of murdering someone, we arrest him and put him on trial. The only time we execute someone without a trial is when someone else is in imminent danger and the only way to defuse that danger is to kill that someone.

I think this is a slippery slope. I cheer for the killing of Al Awlaki, but also troubled at the same time. He was a US citizen. Unless he renounced it, he should be afforded due process, even a trial in absentia. I have no problem with assassination of OBL or other non-American terrorists.

Gunnut:

I understand your concern. I agree we have to be extremely careful in using deadly force against individuals and groups even when they are a clear and present danger to us.

As Trong pointed out, the enemy in this case was not located in the US where domestic law enforcement could possibly have rooted him out alive. That accounts for the extreme method of eliminating him, but not principle by which we did so in the first place.

We reason from the premise that AQ is a sworn enemy of the US; it has declared war on the US; it has a long record of successful attacks on the US; it is actively plotting and attempting to carry out attacks as we speak. Therefore, eliminating its leaders and operatives is justified.

Paul is wrong because he believes the citizenship of the enemy is material. That to me is a formula whereby AQ can exploit US citizenship. It already recruits US citizens for missions. It could begin putting them in positions of leadership with the expectation that they will not be targeted by US forces.

Citizenship of the enemy does not matter. When tried in US courts for murder, conspiracy to commit murder and so on, the defendant's citizenship is not a factor. Everyone gets due process. In war it is the same. During WWII, US citizens were killed fighting for NAZI Germany; US citizens have been killed in earlier drone attacks; US citizens defected as far back as the US-Mexican war and were killed. What's different here? The enemy was high profile.

[troung]

Paul is batshit crazy....

Ron Paul: Government could begin to target media, just like it has with terrorist Anwar al-Awlaki

BY Aliyah Shahid
DAILY NEWS STAFF WRITER

Thursday, October 6th 2011, 8:31 AM
Republican presidential candidate Rep. Ron Paul blasted the U.S. killing of U.S.-born terrorist Anwar al-Awlaki at the National Press Club on Wednesday.

Ron Paul is still mad as hell over America's killing of U.S.-born terrorist Anwar al-Awlaki - and he's warning that members of the media could be next on the government's target list.

The Republican presidential hopeful told an audience at the National Press Club on Wednesday that if citizens do not protest al-Awlaki's death, the country could start broadening its threat list to include reporters.

"Can you imagine being put on a list because you're a threat? What's going to happen when they come to the media? What if the media becomes a threat? ... This is the way this works. It's incrementalism," the 76-year-old Texas congressman said.

"It's slipping and sliding, let me tell you," Paul added.

The libertarian-minded politician made national headlines after he blasted the Obama administration last week for killing al-Awlaki in Yemen without a trial. He said the death of the New Mexico native-turned-terrorist-recruiter was akin to "assassination."

During his latest speech, Paul compared al-Awlaki, and Samir Kahn, another American killed in the attack, to Nazi war criminals.

"All the Nazi criminals were tried. They were taken to court and then executed," said Paul. "The reason we do this is because we want to protect the rule of law."

President Obama, like several lawmakers, called al-Awlaki's death by U.S. drone strikes a major blow to Al Qaeda.

While Paul was criticized by some for his remarks, Paul's supporters don't seem to be fleeing from him. At the speech, he announced that his team has raised a sizeable $8 million for the third quarter.

With News Wire Services

Read more: Ron Paul: Government could begin to target media, just like it has with terrorist Anwar al-Awlaki

[JAD_333]

Thank you Ron Paul. AQ in Yemen has picked up on his theme. For a group that doesn't care whose citizens it blows up, their concern for US principles is rather ironic.

October 10, 2011, 8:59 pm
Al Qaeda Group Confirms Deaths of Two American Citizens
By CHARLIE SAVAGE

WASHINGTON – Al Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula on Monday issued a statement on Islamist Web sites confirming the deaths of Anwar Al-Awlaki and Samir Khan, two American citizens who were killed in a drone strike in Yemen last month, while saying that their killings “contradicted” the principles that the United States says it was founded upon and stands for.

“The Americans killed the preaching sheikh Anwar al-Awlaki and Samir Khan, and they did not prove the accusation against them, and did not present evidence against them in their unjust laws of their freedom,” the statement said, according to the SITE Intelligence Group, which monitors and translates jihadist online forums.

Al Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula, an affiliate of the original Al Qaeda, was behind the attempted bombing of a Detroit-bound airliner on Christmas Day 2009 and other attempted terrorist attacks, as well as an effort to blow up two cargo jets last year.

American counterterrorism officials have said Mr. Awlaki, a radical Muslim cleric, was involved in both plots. Mr. Awlaki was apparently the target of the strike, but three other companions – including Mr. Khan, who produced a Web-based magazine for the group promoting terrorism – also died in the blast on Sept. 30.

The Obama administration has resisted growing calls that it make public its legal rationale for the strike, and declined to comment about the matter again on Monday.

The New York Times on Sunday published a report that contained numerous details about a still-secret memorandum by the Justice Department’s Office of Legal Counsel. Completed around June 2010, it concluded that it would be lawful to target Mr. Awlaki if he were to be located and it was infeasible to capture him.

The description of the memorandum was based on accounts from people who had read it. They spoke on condition of anonymity because they were discussing it without authorization.