By Cliff May
Thursday, October 31, 2013
Note: This column was coauthored by Bill Roggio.
In 1996, al-Qaeda founder Osama bin Laden issued a formal
declaration of war against the United States. No serious strategy was developed
for defeating what most government officials dismissed as a bunch of fanatics
living in mud-brick villages in Afghanistan, shaking their fists at the
greatest power on Earth.
Almost two decades later — following attacks from New
York to Nairobi to Dar es Salaam to Bali to Riyadh to London to Sana’a to
Timbuktu to Benghazi — the U.S. still lacks a coherent plan for neutralizing
al-Qaeda and its now-multiplying affiliates. The U.S. does, however, have one
weapon that it has been deploying to keep al-Qaeda off balance — and to thin
the organization’s top ranks.
Unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs), more popularly known as
drones, were originally used for surveillance, in particular by the CIA
following 9/11. Before long, however, they were adapted to fire computer-guided
missiles. Armed UAVs quickly became President Obama’s weapon of choice in
Afghanistan and Yemen.
Last week, both London-based Amnesty International (AI)
and New York–based Human Rights Watch (HRW) issued reports charging that
America’s use of drones has violated international law, killing scores of innocent
civilians and targeting suspected terrorists in ways that, AI asserts, “may
constitute extrajudicial executions or war crimes.”
AI and HRW are non-governmental organizations with no
legal authority. Nevertheless, White House spokesman Jay Carney responded to
their charges, saying the president “would strongly disagree” with the
allegations. “U.S. counterterrorism operations,” he said, “are precise, they
are lawful, and they are effective.”
The concern of AI and HRW for al-Qaeda commanders is
misplaced. It is neither moral nor helpful to award unlawful combatants, a.k.a.
terrorists, more rights than are due honorable soldiers who abide by the laws
of war. And make no mistake, AI and HRW are proposing exactly that: They want
al-Qaeda commanders to be treated as innocent-until-proven-guilty suspects,
entitled to all the constitutional rights due an American citizen in a domestic
judicial proceeding.
More pertinent is the groups’ distress over civilian
casualties — the most tragic component of any war. Intentionally targeting
civilians is among the practices that distinguish terrorists from law-abiding
soldiers — at least for those not so befuddled as to insist that “one man’s
terrorist is another man’s freedom fighter.” But AI and HRW present no evidence
that American drone operators are doing that — though, indisputably, mistakes
can and do happen.
How many civilians have been killed by American UAVs
remains a matter of debate — and definition: Should an al-Qaeda commander’s
driver be considered a civilian? How about his doctor or his cook? His wife or
son? The use of non-combatants as human shields is a clear violation of the
laws of war — a fact that does not appear to raise the blood pressure of AI and
HRW activists.
Since 2004, the use of drones has succeeded in
eliminating at least 94 top leaders and operatives of al-Qaeda and affiliated
groups in Pakistan, according to research by The Long War Journal. Those killed
have been replaced by other operatives from al-Qaeda’s deep bench. Those
operatives have continued to plot attacks against the U.S. and its allies, and
they have expanded into new theaters.
Kenneth Roth, executive director of HRW, argues that
al-Qaeda is currently capable of mounting only “sporadic, isolated attacks,
carried out by autonomous or loosely affiliated cells. Some attacks may cause
considerable loss of life, but they are nothing like the military operations
that define an armed conflict under international law.”
Roth further asserts that “the war against al-Qaeda is
over” and that the U.S. should therefore stop using drones and revert to a
strict “law enforcement” paradigm. The paradox he fails to recognize: Doing so
would allow al-Qaeda to reconstitute its ability to wage the war that Roth
claims the U.S. has won thanks in large measure to the use of drones.
And since Roth believes that al-Qaeda should be fought
only with “law enforcement” methods, he ought to explain how that would work in
the garden spots where al-Qaeda operatives live and conspire. Would he propose
that police forces enter Pakistan’s tribal areas — much of which are now under
al-Qaeda and Taliban control — and attempt to handcuff suspects? Whose police
will be assigned that mission? What happens when governments refuse to enforce
the laws (Pakistani authorities don’t want the job, which is why they have
secretly consented to American drone strikes) or are incapable of enforcing the
law (as is the case in Yemen)?
Another example of fallacious reasoning: Amnesty
International asserts that U.S. drone policy sets a dangerous precedent “that
other states may seek to exploit to avoid responsibility for their own unlawful
killings.” Do AI executives really believe that the rulers of Sudan, Syria,
Iran, and similar states are taking into account American precedent before
deciding on the most effective means to slaughter those they regard as enemies?
Its pushback against the charges leveled by AI and HRW
notwithstanding, the Obama administration does seem conflicted over its drone
policy. After 9/11, Congress passed an Authorization to Use Military Force
(AUMF) — a sort of Declaration of War Lite — affirming the president’s power to
fight al-Qaeda not with warrants and subpoenas but with drones and other lethal
weapons. But four months ago, Obama called for the repeal of the AUMF,
explaining: “Our systematic effort to dismantle terrorist organizations must
continue. But this war, like all wars, must end.”
If there’s no war and no AUMF, he would have diminished
legal authority to use drones to “dismantle terrorist organizations.” And those
implying that President Obama and other Americans are war criminals would have
a much more persuasive case. Why the White House would favor such an outcome is
a puzzle.
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