Hakimullah Mahsud confirmed dead. Wingnuts heads explodes

[impik]

Even when it comes to the war against Al Qaeda, president Obama is 20 levels better than the stupid-ass that was in the WH before him.


...The Pakistani Taliban confirmed Tuesday that their leader, Hakimullah Mahsud, died from injuries suffered in a U.S. drone missile strike last month, an attack that forces the insurgency to find a new leader for the second time in six months.

The death of Mahsud, engineer of a devastating series of suicide attacks and raids on markets, mosques and security installations across Pakistan in the latter half of 2009, gives the U.S. another major victory in its ongoing campaign of drone missile strikes against top Taliban and Al Qaeda leaders...

http://www.latimes.com/news/nation-and-world/la-fg-hakimullah-mahsud10-2010feb10,0,5680962.story

[Pirate Smile]

1. My favorite - Rumsfeld cronies complaining that Obama is killing terrorists too fast.

Dead Terrorists Tell No Tales
Is Barack Obama killing too many bad guys before the U.S. can interrogate them?

The CIA reportedly succeeded in killing the head of the Pakistani Taliban -- the most recent in a flurry of drone attacks the agency has launched in South Asia and the Middle East. Another strike in Pakistan reportedly took out one of the FBI's most wanted terrorists; another in Pakistan took out a master bomb-maker for the al Qaeda affiliate in the Philippines, Abu Sayyaf; and a strike in Yemen targeted a senior military leader of al Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula, the group behind the Christmas Day attack (his fate has yet to be determined).

http://www.foreignpolicy.com/articles/2010/02/08/dead_terrorists_tell_no_tales

[Clio the Leo]

3. Oh good grief! NT

[impik]

4. Heeeeeeeeeee! Best. Wingnuts. Craziness. EVER!!!

[Peacetrain]

7. Say what? They are like Whirling Dervishes they spin so much

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GJIofU-0jC0

(apologies to the Dervishes for the comparison)

[Pirate Smile]

8. I just posted a thread on it:

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=433x176219

[SoxFan]

12. This. Is. Pathetic.

If you need any proof that some of these knobs put partisan gamesmanship ahead of national security, look no further.

[Blue_Tires]

20. holy DAMN...you may want to make that it's own post....

[vaberella]

29. I believe it was. Craziness. n/t

[EmeraldCityGrl]

23. just unbelievable...

Obama could save a child from a burning building and they
would complain he's getting in the way of firefighter's jobs.

They really make me so sick.:puke: :puke: :puke:

edit: for obscenity

[Kdillard]

2. K and R. He is also doing it without bragging.

[impik]

5. And without having the country on the edge of nervous breakdown every other day

[Bragi]

6. This "victory" is meaningless

Seriously folks, using drones to create yet another martyr is meaningless. AQ has lots of bench strength, and no-one is Pakistan supports US use of drones in their country. Progress will be made when the US indicates it will no longer use drones in Pakistan.

As Helen Thomas wrote, Obama does have a foreign policy, it's called war. He will be no more successful with it than Bush. A new approach is needed.

[Cha]

11. She called President Obama

"a coward" too..but, that doesn't mean shit coming from her.

She's lost her credibility with me.

She's entitled to her opinion but not her own set of facts.

[vaberella]

30. Yeah, her statements towards the Pres, makes me wonder what's so amazing about her.

She's ridiculously short-sighted.

[BeyondGeography]

21. "A new approach is needed"

A suitably empty way to end a bullshit post.

The Cairo speech was a new approach.

Letting the FBI handle interrogations instead of the military is a new approach.

In fact, de-militarizing the entire confinement, investigatory and prosecution processes as it relates to suspected terrorists is a new approach.

Transitioning out of Iraq? New approach.

Surge and planned withdrawal from Afghanistan in 2011? New approach.

Not scaring the piss out of Americans for political profit? New approach.

You and Helen (and too many others) act as if Obama is nothing more than a mere continuation of Bush. It's laughable.

[Bragi]

22. How about an approach that doesn't involve war crimes

That would be refreshing change for US foreign policy, wouldn't ya' think?

- B

[Number23]

24. What war crimes has Obama committed?

[Bragi]

25. Sorry to have to say it, but...

I believe that you'll find that firing lethal rounds into locations known to be or likely to be occupied by civilians is a violation of the Geneva convention, and a war crime. The fact that this has become a routine operating practice for the U.S military does not change this fact.

- B

[vaberella]

28. Actually it's not. Even Jonathan Turley said by normal standards it's not.

If you read the law literally. He says it is but that's because drones are not addressed since they weren't used in such a way before Obama. So it's a way Obama bypassed the laws of the Geneva convention. So no, it's not illegal. It's been discussed.

It's like the bible not discussing something like cloning directly but most will say it's immoral. However there is nothing yet to define that.

[Bragi]

32. I respectfully disagree

What Turley and others point out (correctly in my view) is that use of drones, in and of themselves, is not a violation of the Convention as these weapons are not envisioned or mentioned in the Convention.

Regardless of this, however, if a military willingly chooses to use its weaponry to knowingly kill civilians in pursuit of bad guys, then this is a potential breach of the Convention. The choice of weaponry doesn't change that. It's illegal to knowingly choose to kill civilians. Period.

- B

[vaberella]

33. Interesting then it would be illegal to use bombs....

When you're dropping a bomb from a high altittude you don't know who you're killing but you know Civilians will perish....then it would have to do away with the use of bombs and basically most military personel.

[Bragi]

34. Yes, knowingly bombing civilians is illegal /nt

[vaberella]

36. The thing is...you'd be bombing civilians if you throw down any bomb---end of story.

You don't bomb without the intent to kill. The problem I have with the argument is that you basically can't go to war since all of it would be illegal by geneva convention standards. Personally, I'm fine with no war---but it's unrealistic to assume deniability in any situation where war or battle is taking place because civilian casaulties are inevitable.

[mkultra]

37. I disagree, eventually they will run out of competent leadership

and the organization will become so disjointed that it will splinter. The problem with AQ is that is a splinter group itself that gained prominence through a cult of personality. Once that has been diminished, the extremism will fade.

[Deep13]

9. Still waiting for the major terrorist attack that was supposed to happen...

...within six months of Obama taking office. The 'nad bomber doesn't count.

[cherokeeprogressive]

14. Is that the one the VP predicted?

[Deep13]

16. A RW idiot I knew in high school predicted it.

He bet me it would happen. When I pointed out he was betting against the United States, he denied it.

[cherokeeprogressive]

17. Here's a quote from Joe Biden.

“Mark my words. It will not be six months before the world tests Barack Obama like they did John Kennedy. The world is looking,” Biden said.

“Remember I said it standing here. if you don’t remember anything else I said. Watch, we’re gonna have an international crisis, a generated crisis, to test the mettle of this guy. And he’s gonna have to make some really tough — I don’t know what the decision’s gonna be, but I promise you it will occur. As a student of history and having served with seven presidents, I guarantee you it’s gonna happen,”.

http://www.google.com/#hl=en&source=hp&q=biden+quotes+about+obama+being+tested&aq=f&aqi=&oq=&fp=baa94940edcea411

[Deep13]

18. Well, he was right.

The bottom fell out of the economy before Obama even took office and it went downhill from there. And Obama did okay considering the gravity of the problem and the fact that he did not even have a chance to sit down before it hit. It wasn't a terrorist attack. It was much worse.

[mkultra]

38. the pirate incident meets this criteria.

[Fire1]

10. Mixed emotions, here. But good job, Mr. President. n/t

[berttheturk]

13. Mine are mixed too. I'm concerned about innocent civilians who may have been killed in this attack.

The article the poster references mentions "... at least a dozen drone strikes in northwest Pakistan have taken place, killing at least 100 people." We're not told how many of these other people were civilians.

[Bragi]

15. Estimated 50:1 Civilians to Militants Kill Ratio

One estimate last fall was that the US kills 50 civilians with drones for every militant it gets.

See http://edition.cnn.com/2009/OPINION/10/29/bergen.drone.war/index.html

Knowingly killing civilians is a war crime.

- B

[berttheturk]

19. Do you think these latest drone strikes have resulted in civilian casualties? n/t

[harkadog]

26. Were Roosevelt and Truman war criminals?

They knowingly ordered air attacks on civilians and killed hundreds of thousands of them in France, Germany, Italy, and Japan. (I know I am leaving out some of the smaller areas).

[Hippo_Tron]

31. If we had lost the war, they probably would've certainly been tried for war crimes

Don't get me wrong, nobody could reasonably argue that FDR, Truman, and Churchill committed atrocities on the level of Hitler. The Allies were the morally superior, period. But they nonetheless committed serious atrocities during the war.

Creating a system of "rules of war" is extremely difficult because there is no authority that can fairly enforce these rules. These rules are good in the sense that they cut down on the total number of atrocities due to the fact that states tend to follow international rules when it's convenient. But getting states to follow the rules when it's inconvenient is another matter entirely.

[mkultra]

40. All other methods of approach will result in worse civilian deaths

I have no doubt that boot on ground, or god forbid, bombings, would produce higher casualty rates.
Drones are used because they are the MOST accurate, not the least.

[Bragi]

41. May I inquire as to any evidence supporting your subject line assertion? /nt

[mkultra]

39. Your own link debates your statement

It is not possible to differentiate precisely between militant and civilian casualties, because the militants live among the population and don't wear uniforms and because the militants have the incentive to claim that all the casualties were civilians, but government sources tend to claim the opposite.

However, of those killed in drone attacks from 2006 through mid-October 2009, approximately 500 to 720 were described in reliable press reports as militants, or roughly two-thirds of the total killed.

[vaberella]

27. He's pretty amazing. I can't over he knows how to sing. Ugh, he's too cool. n/t

[MadHound]

35. Oh boy, more illegal attacks across the border,

But hey, we killed him, right, that's all that mattered. Never mind the fact that there is already another in his place. Never mind that we violated our own Constitution and international law. Never mind that by using these tactics not only will we not win, but we'll just increase the strength of those who oppose us.

Stupidity, stupidity, bloodlust and money for the MIC.

Meanwhile at home we the people continue to sink under the weight of an economy that is based on death rather than helping the living.

And the people cheer on:puke: