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Important to understand.

The Drone Mentality by Glenn Greenwald

An excerpt from the article:

In a New York Times Op-Ed yesterday, international human rights lawyer Clive Stafford Smith describes a meeting he had in Pakistan with residents from the Afghan-Pakistani border region that has been relentlessly bombed by American drones; if I had one political wish this week, it would be that everyone who supports (or acquiesces to) President Obama’s wildly accelerated drone attacks would read this:

The meeting had been organized so that Pashtun tribal elders who lived along the Pakistani-Afghan frontier could meet with Westerners for the first time to offer their perspectives on the shadowy drone war being waged by the Central Intelligence Agency in their region. Twenty men came to air their views; some brought their young sons along to experience this rare interaction with Americans. In all, 60 villagers made the journey. . . .

On the night before the meeting, we had a dinner, to break the ice. During the meal, I met a boy named Tariq Aziz. He was 16. As we ate, the stern, bearded faces all around me slowly melted into smiles. Tariq smiled much sooner; he was too young to boast much facial hair, and too young to have learned to hate.

The next day, the jirga lasted several hours. I had a translator, but the gist of each man’s speech was clear. American drones would circle their homes all day before unleashing Hellfire missiles, often in the dark hours between midnight and dawn. Death lurked everywhere around them. . . .

On Monday, [Tariq] was killed by a C.I.A. drone strike, along with his 12-year-old cousin, Waheed Khan. The two of them had been dispatched, with Tariq driving, to pick up their aunt and bring her home to the village of Norak, when their short lives were ended by a Hellfire missile.

My mistake had been to see the drone war in Waziristan in terms of abstract legal theory — as a blatantly illegal invasion of Pakistan’s sovereignty, akin to President Richard M. Nixon’s bombing of Cambodia in 1970.

But now, the issue has suddenly become very real and personal. Tariq was a good kid, and courageous. My warm hand recently touched his in friendship; yet, within three days, his would be cold in death, the rigor mortis inflicted by my government.

And Tariq’s extended family, so recently hoping to be our allies for peace, has now been ripped apart by an American missile — most likely making any effort we make at reconciliation futile.

This tragedy repeats itself over and over. After I linked to this Op-Ed yesterday on Twitter — by writing that “every American who cheers for drone strikes should confront the victims of their aggression” — I was predictably deluged with responses justifying Obama’s drone attacks on the ground that they are necessary to kill The Terrorists. Reading the responses, I could clearly discern the mentality driving them: I have never heard of 99% of the people my government kills with drones, nor have I ever seen any evidence about them, but I am sure they are Terrorists. That is the drone mentality in both senses of the word; it’s that combination of pure ignorance and blind faith in government authorities that you will inevitably hear from anyone defending President Obama’s militarism. As Jonathan Schwarz observed after the U.S. unveiled the dastardly Iranian plot to hire a failed used car salesman to kill America’s close friend, the Saudi Ambassador: “I’d bet the Saudi ambassador to the U.S. has closer ‘ties’ to Al Qaeda than 90% of the people we’ve killed with drones.”

War Again

Balkan Beat Box: War Again

The Onion: America Gets Set to Enjoy Month Or So Of Libya Seeming Like Symbol of Freedom

GRAND RAPIDS, MI—Americans across the nation told reporters Wednesday that with the collapse of Muammar Qaddafi’s despotic regime, they were preparing to savor the next month or so of Libya seeming like an inspirational symbol of freedom. “We’ve got a nice four weeks of thinking Libya represents a triumph of liberty before the situation begins to deteriorate and some new form of authoritarianism inevitably asserts itself,” said Michigan-based architect Wes Reinhorn, adding that while he was looking forward to the nation potentially serving as a model for other Arab countries, he would eventually realize the situation in the region was very complex, and any hope he had of Libya transforming things for the better would presumably fade away by October. “We should all enjoy this stirring image of Libya as a beacon of democracy before Islamists or a new military strongman moves in to fill the power vacuum.” Other Americans, however, said that after a month of looking to Libya as a symbol of freedom, they planned to simply stop paying attention to the nation altogether.

American foreign policy in a nutshell, courtesy of XKCD

 

http://xkcd.com/938/

American foreign policy in a nutshell.

Musings I

America is the land of freedom

Thus evil can be perpetrated without restraint.

Evil acts first by undermining the principle of rules

Then by subverting the application of rules

Finally, it invents its own application of rules.

The opposite of principles are sins. Without understanding, principles will inevitably degrade towards sin. Certain areas are the birthplaces of principles; their regression involves their transformation into places of sin. This is enacted by an authority undermining the foundation of a particular principle, and applying the ensuing sin, the counterpart, throughout the region he or she commands. With the success of the collusion to fatally undermine a principle, other morally bereft states will imitate the behavior of the perpetrating state, leading to the sudden undermining of principle in vast regions of the United States.

It should be noted that there are multiple principles, and thus there will be multiple centers where there will be degradation of a principle. Each epicenter’s success or failure in conspiracy will lead to either propagation of sin or a re-establishing of principle.

Propagation can be resisted if consciously recognized. Backlash is best generated by educating the populace of the moral degeneracy of the authority, through evidence of actions and decisions aimed at the undermining of principle. Principle is that which exists for the benefit of all; sin is that which exists solely for the benefit of one.

People can also be considered centers or epicenters of principle or sin. In the case of the latter, their removal can considerably slow degradation of principle, or at least enact a temporary period where the corruptive forces must regroup. However, this removal must be non-violent, whether legal or through political pressure. Violent removal has repercussions, most significantly in creating a vacuum of power and an immediate alignment of state forces against public forces, leading to conflict. Additionally, non-violent removal has an inhibitory effect that violent removal often lacks; beyond this, the vacuum created by violent removal is likelier to generate another authority amenable to the degradation of principle than to be occupied by a moral authority.