Posted on 02/07/2013 12:41:53 PM PST by Sir Napsalot
CHARLES KRAUTHAMMER: I really don't understand this sort of hysteria over the idea of killing Americans who have taken up arms against the United States. Thousands of Americans, Southerners, died in Antietam without any due process. When we stormed the beaches of Normandy on D-day, and Americans approached German bunkers, I don't think anybody asked if they were any German-Americans here, I want to read you the Miranda rights. If you take up arms against the United States you were a target because it was an act of war and you forfeited those rights.
(Excerpt) Read more at realclearpolitics.com ...
Krauthammer: If You Take Up Arms Against The United States You Have Forfeited Your Rights
Sounds good at first but then that’s what the second amendment is all about.
Kraut is dead wrong here.
Question: Do we worry about his "Rights?"
Question: Do we refuse to bomb in areas where he is known to be?
Question: Do order American ground troops refuse to fire back at him?
Question: When his unit is pulled back for rest and resupply do we order our bombers and artillery units to refuse to hit the area where he is supposed to be?
With all due respect to Charles, we are not comfortable with the due process used to determine that a citizen is a traitor.
Will I be determined to be an enemy of the state if I have too many rifles or too much ammunition?
Then what should we do?
“I think that we really have to have an effort in the Congress and in the executive and in the country, have an argument about what are the guidelines, who is the soldier and who loses all rights in this kind of shadow war?”
“And there has to be a national consensus on this.”
I think he’s kind of right there. We need to review the Law of Armed conflict, the Hague Convention, the Geneva Conventions, etc. We need to re-look at the rules we follow in the conduct of war because they don’t seem adequately suitable to the kinds of wars we are fighting, last time I looked anyway.
Hey Charles, the point is the Marxist, Muslim, America-hating thug in the White House will cheerfully ABUSE these powers he has been given (or has given himself) in order to literally murder those he considers a danger to his regime! (By the way, some of the examples you provide are silly, more typically leftists than conservative in nature.)
Obama is utterly untrustworthy in the best of circumstances. But trusting him with choosing who will die and why—with the absolute authority/power of life and death?? NO THANKS!! That’s what the issue is about, Charles.
How about any of a thousand things that lie between those two extremes? Why are we so afraid of individuals who are hiding out in backwaters like Yemen? How are they an imminent threat when they are so bunkered up the only way we can find them is with a drone at 20,000 feet up?
A few things, all of which I shouldn’t be surprised but kinda am Krauthammer elided:
1). What “war” is he talking about? Let’s assume Iraq and Afghanistan were duly declared, even if they weren’t. Does another, bigger “war on terror” actually exist? I mean, moreso than, say, the War on Drugs or the War on Poverty; is it real enough to excuse summary assassination? Seems to me rather elastic policy to say we can bomb anyone, anywhere in the world no matter their legal status and without regard to due process. Wars of endless size, scope, and duration leave me uneasy.
2). Is the standard really that we can kill those who “take up arms”? Even in a metaphorical sense, are we sure that those blown up by robots had taken positive action? Or are they dead because we thought maybe they’ll do something bad eventually? I have no way to tell.
Who’s talking about self-defense and imminent danger, though? Not even most ACLU lawyers would disagree with you catching evildoers in the act in principle, unless you’re a white person killing protected minorities. The controversy is over targeted assassinations of US citizens and others in the absense of a well defined field of combat.
Are we going to pretend like we’re at war with everyone we say we’re at war whenever we say it and wherever and whomever they happen to be? Not only that, but the executive branch alone is in on the decision process, let alone the actual final verdict of what gets blown up. That’s rather wide lattitude. I don’t even think such a thing can be called war.
For the progressive, waterboarding was evil but rendition (involving physical torture) overseas is good. Why isn’t the Nobel committee recalling their Peace Prize from the Citizen of the World?
If the precedent was set, then why was Johnny Taliban prosecuted in US court? No, I don’t think what you describe is accurate. A precedent certainly was set under Bush the Younger that enemy noncombatants we catch on the battlefield do not deserve Geneva protection and can be held indefinitely. But I’m not aware of assassination without due process for US citizens overseas with or without them taking up arms or being in a combat zone.
Could be so, but had it I’d think our ears would still be bleeding from the bloody murder screamed by the left.
Yes, even when we caught German spies landing in US territory from a u-boat, or whatever it was, FDR didn’t summarily have them killed for the heck of it. They were dealt with, but reasons were formulated and proceeds were followed. Not to mention there’s longstanding tradition for killing spies on your turf, unlike blowing up people who may or nay not be doing anything bad halfway around the world with robots.
Krauthammer misses the point. This DOJ memo is so broad that drones could be flying in US skies targeting Obama’s “enemies”. Imagine an armed drone flying over TEA party rallies.
Isn’t the gubmint’s story that we were trying to capture Bin Laden? We all know it was an assassination. Iml mean, come on. But that’s not the official story. If he was “convicted in absentia,” he wasn’t sentenced to death yet. Not legally, anyway.
To be fair Japan had much better chances to successfully invade us, compared to Germany’s zero chance. Not that they were intent on doing so. They weren’t stupid, and not that it justifies internment, anyway.
Who’s being reflexive? The side that is okay with something merely because lefties are against it?
“Americans abroad who have join terrorist groups”
Have they? I wouldn’t necessarily support assassinating them, either. But how do you know they’ve joined terrorist groups? You’re content to take the White House’s word for it? And is merely joining up enough? What if you’ve chatted online and met with a bad guy or two buy haven’t actually done anything, let alone entered the field of combat or done harm to the US? Bombs away?
The courts have punted, that’s one reason. I heard one justice basically say the administration might be wrong, but the tradition of executive privilege since Truman makes it too much trouble to find out.
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.