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Hawkeye
climber
State of Mine
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let me try this again,
The Authorization for Use of Military Force Against Terrorists (Pub.L. 107-40, 115 Stat. 224, enacted September 18, 2001), one of two resolutions commonly known as "AUMF" (the other being "Authorization for Use of Military Force Against Iraq Resolution of 2002"), was a joint resolution passed by the United States Congress on September 14, 2001, authorizing the use of United States Armed Forces against those responsible for the attacks on September 11, 2001. The authorization granted the President the authority to use all "necessary and appropriate force" against those whom he determined "planned, authorized, committed or aided" the September 11th attacks, or who harbored said persons or groups. The
not sure what part of this confuses people. this language can be used to cover everything. no american laws violated. i dont know about international, but then hey, they can see our lawyer.
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Karl Baba
Trad climber
Yosemite, Ca
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Debating whether it was legal or not is a different debate than whether we should have broken the law or not. The US seems to be breaking all kinds of laws anyway (drone strikes in Waziristan is more or less the same sovereignty offense)
And some people want to distinguish between international law and US law. Only matters a little, presidents now break laws with impunity. (and nobody seems to think congress needs to declare a war unless we plan on nuking the world)
But whatever, The US DOES harbor people other nations consider terrorist. Let me repost from a few pages back for those who missed it
Regarding the legality of us going in a sovereign nation to get Bin Laden and that being legal.
For those that say yes, what would you say if Cuba or Panama sent a hit squad into the US and killed Luis Posada, the terrorist who downed a Cuban Airliner among other things, and whom the US had been harboring?
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Luis_Posada_Carriles
Ok?
Now, it could well be that we cleared this raid with the Pakistanis and they just politically don't want to admit it. I already heard one Pak official say they were working with us on it and yet others deny it. We don't get the truth but what politics demand be said.
It has been pointed out that Pakistan (being a democracy) probably doesn't have anyone legally entitled to allow us to kill somebody on their soil. Good point.
We're breaking lots of laws anyway these days, the real question is which laws could we not get away with breaking. As long as Obama does get a BJ in the oval office, he's probably safe.
Peace
karl
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John Moosie
climber
Beautiful California
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John, if we were knowingly harboring someone who made it their goal to terrorize another soverign state, and we did not do anything about it, then by all means that country has the "right" to capture or kill said terrorist (despite how legal it might be, and despite the fact that they might lose their people in the process). i like to think that comparing us to pakistan is not a fair comparison. call me patriotic or whatever.
The reason I question these type actions is that I want to fully understand everything that we are opening ourselves up to. I think that is the same motivation that drives DMT. Who gets to decide what a terrorist act is? Wasn't Salman Rushdie considered to be a type of terrorist by some Muslims? If he was in America, should we have turned him over to whatever country demanded him?
When we do acts like these, there are all sorts of repercussions. One is that it opens us up to others saying they should be allowed to do the same thing. It ends up justifying their illegal action. At least in their minds. This is why Blahblah is focusing on the legality.
Maybe we are a country with higher morals, so we are better then Pakistan, but when we break international laws, then we open ourselves up to all kinds of attacks.
What if Pakistan went crazy? What if they launched a nuclear attack against us? Sure we would wipe them out, but what city would you be willing to give up just to assert our right to go after terrorist? SF, New York.. What if their missile went off course and took out Yosemite? Would you be willing to risk losing Yosemite just to get someone like Bin Laden?
These are just rhetorical questions, but the reality is that pakistan does have nukes, and all of our actions will have repercussions. When we place ourselves above the law, we open the door for other countries to make their own interpretations.
And I am not saying that we absolutely broke international law. I think a case could be made that we didn't based on what Obama said about trying to capture him.
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HighDesertDJ
Trad climber
Swimming in LEB tears.
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The legality of our incursion into Pakistan is probably murky as hell given international law and the fact that Pakistan has been letting us do all kinds of things in there for the last 10 years. Anyone in this thread who can pretend to know if it was actually illegal or not is a moron.
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Hawkeye
climber
State of Mine
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good point John.
HD, dude, where are all the LEB tears? what happened to her? i can hear her now on this thread weaving in some cat story or something innane.
karl, good point. we ought to hand that person over to Cuba. we have treated cuba like crap and frankly, i dont get it. our moral high ground is a slippery slope at times and hopefully it wont crumble into the sea.
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Gene
climber
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Reuters has posted pictures of three men killed during the raid. OBL not included.
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Karl Baba
Trad climber
Yosemite, Ca
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They'll leak the photos, just wait. Best of both worlds. Maybe he got so stoked by owning Trump on the Birther thing that he want's the conspiracy doubters to get worked up over whether Bin Laden was actually killed or not, before he releases the long form photos of him.
(and he said the doubters wouldn't be convinced anyway)
Personally, I accept that I'm never going to know what's true in politics anymore.
Obama is on a roll. He's got LEB locked up in Gitmo.
Peace
karl
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Hawkeye
climber
State of Mine
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ron the beef is feedin the fish!
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corniss chopper
climber
breaking the speed of gravity
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Obama is not releasing the pictures of dead Osama?
Send Trump to negotiate their release!
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Hawkeye
climber
State of Mine
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Hawkeye, does that translate to they can not be tried "and"
they did not commit murder?
sure, they can be tried. i suggest that whomever wants to do so file the papers in NYC on 9/11/2011. then perhaps we will have another court case of violence.
since dmt did not like playing maybe you will.
some dude kills your mom. he then threatens to kill your dad and will not stop unitl your entire family is killed. if you go after him and he resists and you kill him is it murder? not where i was raised it isnt.
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HighDesertDJ
Trad climber
Swimming in LEB tears.
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Fatty said I've forgotten to put you on the list of those crying over this event. I'm so proud that President Obama violated international law to eliminate that Enemy Combatant.
Uh what? Who is crying man? Chalk up another to point for you completely misunderstanding reality. I guess you can add one more for not actually reading my post. You can keep them in the same drawer as your "we are invading Syria like any minute now" and your "Obama has no idea how to handle foreign policy and will get us all killed" predictions. Don't get them confused with your Nostradamus award for "I basically know everyone in the Mossad as well as half of the Knesset and they are telling me that Israel will bomb Iran in the next month" posts.
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shut up and pull
climber
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Obama owes thanks, and an apology, to CIA interrogators
By Marc A. Thiessen, Wednesday, May , 9:26 AM
Wash Post
In normal times, the officials who uncovered the intelligence that led us to Osama bin Laden would get a medal. In the Obama administration, they have been given subpoenas.
On his second day in office, Obama shut down the CIA’s high-value interrogation program. His Justice Department then reopened criminal investigations into the conduct of CIA interrogators — inquiries that had been closed years before by career prosecutors who concluded that there were no crimes to prosecute. In a speech at the National Archives, Obama eviscerated the men and women of the CIA, accusing them of “torture” and declaring that their work “did not advance our war and counterterrorism efforts — they undermined them.”
Now, it turns out that the very CIA interrogators whose lives Obama turned upside down played a critical role in what the president rightly calls “the most significant achievement to date in our nation’s effort to defeat al Qaeda.”
It is time for a public apology.
U.S officials have acknowledged that the key piece of intelligence that led the CIA to bin Laden — information on the al-Qaeda leader’s principal courier — came from detainees in CIA custody. According to a senior administration official, “detainees in the post-9/11 period flagged for us individuals who may have been providing direct support to bin Laden and his deputy, [Ayman al-] Zawahiri, after their escape from Afghanistan. One courier in particular had our constant attention. Detainees gave us . . . his nickname and identified him as . . . a protege of Khalid Sheikh Mohammed.” The nickname was Abu Ahmed al-Kuwaiti. KSM was taken into CIA custody in 2003 and refused to talk. Only after undergoing enhanced interrogation techniques did he confirm knowing al-Kuwaiti.
The following year, another senior al-Qaeda operative named Hassan Ghul was captured. U.S. officials say he told the CIA that al-Kuwaiti was close to KSM’s successor, Abu Faraj al-Libi — a revelation officials described as the “linchpin.” In May 2005, al-Libi was finally taken into CIA custody. After being subjected to enhanced interrogation techniques, he provided credible information on al-Qaeda’s courier networks, how they chose and employed couriers, and specific individuals. But he became evasive when asked about al-Kuwaiti. Some have suggested this shows his interrogation did not work. Quite the opposite, this was a red flag that led the agency to recognize al-Kuwaiti’s importance and focus its attention on identifying and hunting him down. It took years to actually find al-Kuwaiti and follow him to bin Laden’s compound. But without the information the CIA elicited from these high-value terrorists, the agency would not have known to look for him in the first place.
Already, critics are desperately trying to play down the CIA interrogation program’s role in the bin Laden operation. Many are pointing to an Associated Press report that KSM “did not discuss al-Kuwaiti while being subjected to the simulated drowning technique known as waterboarding, former officials said. He acknowledged knowing him many months later under standard interrogation, they said, leaving it once again up for debate as to whether the harsh technique was a valuable tool or an unnecessarily violent tactic.”
This statement demonstrates ignorance of how CIA interrogations worked. Interrogators would never have asked about the names of couriers during waterboarding. As I explain in my book, “Courting Disaster,” enhanced techniques were not used to gain intelligence; they were used to elicit cooperation. According to former CIA director Mike Hayden, as enhanced techniques were applied, CIA interrogators would ask detainees questions to which the interrogators already know the answers — allowing them to judge whether the detainees had reached a level of compliance. “They are designed to create a state of cooperation, not to get specific truthful answers to a specific question,” Hayden said.
Once interrogators determined a terrorist had become cooperative, the techniques stopped and traditional, non-coercive methods of questioning were used. Moreover, the use of enhanced techniques wasn’t needed for two-thirds of the detainees in CIA custody . Just the experience of being brought into CIA custody — the “capture shock,” arrival at a sterile location, the isolation, the fact that they did not know where they were and that no one else knew they were there — was enough to persuade most of them to cooperate.
Thanks to President Obama, this program, which helped lead us to bin Laden, is no longer part of America’s counterterrorism arsenal. Indeed, outside of the war zones of Afghanistan and Iraq, there have been no reported U.S. detentions of high-value terrorists since Obama took office. Earlier this year, Umar Patek, the highest-ranking terrorist captured alive at this point in the Obama administration, was taken into custody by Pakistani authorities. Patek had traveled from Southeast Asia to Abbottabad — the same place where bin Laden was hiding. Coincidence? What was Patek doing in Abbottabad? With whom did he meet and what did they discuss? He should be in CIA custody answering such questions.
The time has come for Obama to restore the CIA interrogation program that made bin Laden’s demise possible — and to instruct Eric Holder to end his witch hunt against the heroes who helped lead us to bin Laden’s lair. That is the least Obama can do for the men and women responsible for the crowning achievement of his presidency. They don’t deserve a special prosecutor, Mr. President. They deserve the Presidential Medal of Freedom.
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bvb
Social climber
flagstaff arizona
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Who is this shutupandpull character?
dunno but we should all chip in and buy him a new keyboard 'cause his capslock key is clearly broken.
ftw.
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lostinshanghai
Social climber
someplace
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Rumor is that the SEALs involved in Sunday's mission are back in the U.S. at Andrews Air Force Base outside Washington for final debriefing on the raid.
“The team will likely be invited to the White House to meet the president and attend a private, small ceremony acknowledging their grand
achievement.“
No one will know, pictures taken but we will not see them, they will go home see their family, could be they will go to the ceremony, who knows? Until operation becomes declassified we will really won’t know?
Salute: No Fuc#ing slack
Wonder if Uncle Bush will attend, Cheney? Look for the Press on this one. National Enquire might get first crack.
Oh! and Fattie [Walter Mitty of ST] funny you wait till Israel makes the correct statement to change your view. Noticed at least you are reading better analysis with FA. Still will take years to get into the loop.
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Karl Baba
Trad climber
Yosemite, Ca
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Shutupandpull...Why do you hate America!?
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Mighty Hiker
climber
Vancouver, B.C.
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Apparently Fox News is blaming incompetent liberals for failing to find Obama faster. "He's been in the West Wing all this time", they report.
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John Moosie
climber
Beautiful California
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illegal military action.
You haven't proved its illegal. And stop trying to set yourself up to be able to justify to lies the Bush admin told to get us into Iraq.
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Gene
climber
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If the raid was illegal, what’s the crime other than entry into Pakistan without a proper visa?
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