Friends,
Four members of Maryland Peace Action met today with the foreign policy aide of Rep. Dutch Ruppersberger [MD-2], Elliott Phaup. I informed Elliot that two of us on today’s call, Janice and I, were in the courtroom during Daniel Hale’s sentencing.
I was very surprised that Phaup indicated that he was monitoring the case for the Congressperson. I pointed out that anyone with a bit of knowledge of the legal system would recognize that killer drone strikes are illegal, immoral, unconstitutional and against international law. My guess is that Barack Obama, when he was teaching constitutional law at the University of Chicago, explained that due process is a cornerstone of US jurisprudence. Yet, it seems that the former law professor, when he was developing the Kill List in the White House, forgot about this idea that a person is innocent until proven guilty.
Kagiso, Max
Drone Whistleblower Gets 45
Months in Prison for Revealing Ongoing US War Crimes
Contract workers push a U.S.
Air Force MQ-1B Predator unmanned aerial vehicle after it flew a mission from
an air base in the Persian Gulf region on January 7, 2016.JOHN MOORE / GETTY
IMAGES
July 28, 2021
PART OF THE SERIES
Human Rights and Global Wrongs
On July 27, a federal district
court judge in Alexandria, Virginia, sentenced former U.S. Air Force
intelligence analyst Daniel Hale to 45 months in prison for revealing evidence
of U.S. war crimes.
In 2015, Hale, whose job involved
identifying targets for drone strikes, provided journalist Jeremy Scahill with
secret military documents and slides that exposed shocking details about the
U.S. drone program. Hale’s revelations became the basis of “The
Drone Papers,” which was published on October 15, 2015, by The
Intercept.
Although the government admitted
it had no evidence that direct harm resulted from Hale’s revelations, in 2019,
the Trump administration charged Hale with four counts of violating the
Espionage Act and one count of theft of government property. Facing up to 50
years in prison, Hale pled guilty to one count that carries a maximum sentence
of 10 years.
The leaked documents disclosed the “kill
chain” the Obama administration used to determine whom to target. Countless
civilians were killed using “signals intelligence” in undeclared war zones:
Targeting decisions were made by following cell phones that might not be
carried by suspected terrorists. The Drone Papers divulged that half of the
intelligence used to identify potential targets in Yemen and Somalia was based
on signals intelligence.
During one five-month period
during January 2012 to February 2013, nearly 90 percent of those killed by
drone strikes were not the intended target, according to The Drone Papers. But
civilian bystanders were nonetheless classified as “enemies killed in action” unless
proven otherwise.
Hale
said, “It’s stunning the number of instances when selectors [used to
identify “terrorist” targets] are misattributed to certain people.” Calling a
missile fired at a target in a group of people a “leap of faith,” he noted, “it’s
a phenomenal gamble.” Hale added, “Anyone caught in the vicinity is guilty by
association.”
The Drone Papers reveal that
reliance on drones actually undermines U.S. intelligence gathering. Drones
terrorize communities, breeding resentment against Americans and making the
United States more vulnerable to violence. Indeed, Hale wrote in his 11-page pre-sentencing letter, “the war had
very little to do with preventing terror from coming into the United States and
a lot more to do with protecting the profits of weapons manufacturers and
so-called defense contractors.”
Drone strikes shield U.S. military
members from harm in order to minimize Americans’ opposition to war. But drone
operators who make or carry out remote targeting decisions nevertheless suffer
from post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD).
At his sentencing hearing, Hale told U.S. District Judge Liam
O’Grady, “I believe that it is wrong to kill, but it is especially wrong to
kill the defenseless.” Hale said he revealed what “was necessary to dispel the
lie that drone warfare keeps us safe, that our lives are worth more than
theirs.”
“You had to kill part of your
conscience to keep doing your job,” Hale added.
In November 2013, I participated
in a panel on the illegality of drones and targeted killing at a drone summit in Washington, D.C. Hale
also spoke on a panel at that conference. He described how he located a man
riding a motorcycle in the mountains who then met up with four other people and
they sat around a campfire, drinking tea. Hale relayed information that
resulted in a drone strike, killing all five men. He said he realized that he “was
no longer part of something moral or sane or rational.” He had heard someone
say that “terrorists are cowards” because they used improvised explosive
devices (IEDs). “What was different,” Hale asked, “between that and the little
red joystick that pushes a button thousands of miles away?”
Hale told the sentencing judge
about this incident in his pre-sentencing letter, writing, “Despite
having peacefully assembled, posing no threat, the fate of the now tea drinking
men had all but been fulfilled. I could only look on as I sat by and watched
through a computer monitor when a sudden, terrifying flurry of hellfire
missiles came crashing down, splattering purple-colored crystal guts on the
side of the morning mountain.”
Hale’s revelations did not pose a
threat to national security, even by traditional interpretations. Harry P.
Cooper, a former senior CIA official, wrote in a declaration in Hale’s case
that “the disclosure of [the Drone Papers], at the time they were disclosed and
made public, did not present any substantial risk of harm to the United States
or to national security.”
Presidents George W. Bush, Barack
Obama, Donald Trump and Joe Biden have used armed drones to drop bombs on other
countries in violation of international law. All four administrations have
killed and are still killing untold numbers of civilians.
It is estimated that U.S. military and CIA
drone operations have killed 9,000 to 17,000 people since 2004, including 2,200
children and many U.S. citizens. But those numbers are likely low because the
U.S. military labels all individuals killed in those operations as presumptive “enemies
killed in action.”
Bush authorized about 50 drone strikes that
killed 296 alleged “terrorists” and 195 civilians in Pakistan, Yemen and
Somalia. Obama vastly increased the number of people killed with drones.
Obama presided over 10 times more drone strikes than his
predecessor. According to the Bureau of Investigative Journalism, during his two
terms in office, Obama carried out 563 strikes — largely with drones — in
Pakistan, Yemen and Somalia, killing between 384 and 807 civilians.
Obama’s 18-page Presidential Policy Guidance (PPG) was
made public after a Freedom of Information Act request by the ACLU and
resulting court order. It purported to outline targeting procedures for the use
of lethal force outside “areas of active hostilities.” The PPG required that a
target pose a “continuing imminent threat.” But a secret 2011 Justice
Department white paper leaked in 2013 permitted the
killing of a U.S. citizen even without “clear evidence that a specific attack
on US persons and interests will take place in the immediate future.” The bar
was presumably lower for non-U.S. citizens.
Obama’s PPG also mandated that
there be “near certainty that an identified HVT [high-value terrorist] or other
lawful terror target” is present before lethal force could be used against him.
But the Obama administration mounted “signature strikes” that didn’t
necessarily target individuals, but rather men of military age who were present
in an area of suspicious activity.
It was also necessary to have “near
certainty that non-combatants [civilians] would not be injured or killed.” But
the revelations of The Drone Papers call into question the Obama
administration’s compliance with that requirement as well. Plus, activists have
emphasized that “near certainty” is a dangerous barometer when it comes to the
decision of whether to take a human life.
Trump lowered the bar even further for drone
strikes. His administration reduced the requisite level of confidence that a
target was present in a strike zone from “near certainty” to “reasonable
certainty.” Under Trump, targets were not limited to “high-value terrorists” but
could include foot soldiers. Whereas decisions about drone bombings had been
made at the highest levels of government — with Obama having the final say
about who would be targeted — Trump allowed commanders in the field to make targeting
decisions. Trump gave increased authority to the Pentagon and CIA to conduct
drone strikes. He weakened the targeting rules in large areas of Somalia and
Yemen by designating them as “areas of active hostilities.” And Trump
eliminated the government’s commitment to report on civilian casualties.
During his first two years in
office, Trump launched 2,243 drone strikes, compared to 1,878 in
Obama’s eight years in office.
Biden Continues Drone Bombings
In March, Biden secretly set temporary limits on drone strikes outside
of recognized battlefields. He has ordered a comprehensive review of whether to
keep Trump’s relaxed rules in place, or return to Obama-era rules, or impose
some middle ground. In any event, it is doubtful that Biden would comply any
better than Obama did with the tighter rules.
Meanwhile, the United States conducted a drone strike against Shabab “militants”
in Somalia on July 20. The White House had rejected some requests by the U.S.
military’s Africa Command to conduct drone strikes against Shabab targets in
Somalia because they didn’t meet the new rules. However, White House approval
was considered unnecessary here because the Africa Command has authority to
carry out strikes in support of allied forces under what the military calls “collective
self-defense.” But that does not constitute lawful collective self-defense
under the United Nations Charter.
Although Biden is withdrawing U.S.
troops from Afghanistan, he is continuing to launch airstrikes, including drone strikes, there. “We’ve
been doing it where and when feasible, and we’ll keep doing it where and when
feasible,” an official involved in operational planning said, speaking on
condition of anonymity. Gen. Kenneth E. McKenzie Jr., the top U.S. general in
charge of Afghanistan, refused to say whether airstrikes would
continue past the cutoff date of August 31.
The Air Force is requesting $10
billion to perpetuate the U.S. imperial footprint in South Asia and the Middle
East.
On June 30, 113 organizations,
including Veterans for Peace, wrote a letter to Biden, “to demand an
end to the unlawful program of lethal strikes outside any recognized
battlefield, including through the use of drones.”
Drone Strikes Violate International Law
The UN Charter requires that
international disputes be settled peacefully. It allows a country to use
military force only in self-defense after an armed attack or with the consent
of the UN Security Council. Neither the U.S. war in Iraq nor in Afghanistan complied with the Charter’s
mandates.
“Outside the context of active
hostilities, the use of drones or other means for targeted killing is almost
never likely to be legal,” Agnès Callamard, UN special rapporteur on extrajudicial,
summary or arbitrary executions, tweeted. She added that “intentionally lethal
or potentially lethal force can only be used where strictly necessary to
protect against an imminent threat to life.” Thus, Callamard said, the United
States would need to demonstrate that the target “constituted an imminent
threat to others.”
Targeted or political
assassinations — also known as extrajudicial executions — violate international
law. Willful killing is a grave breach of the Geneva Conventions and is
punishable as a war crime under the U.S. War Crimes Act. Civilians must never
be the target of military strikes. A targeted killing is only lawful if it is
deemed necessary to protect life, and no other means — including capture or
nonlethal incapacitation — is available to protect life.
Yet the Obama, Trump and Biden
administrations have all prosecuted whistleblowers for revealing evidence of
U.S. war crimes. In addition to Hale, those courageous folks include Chelsea Manning, Julian Assange and John Kiriakou, who
revealed that CIA officials used waterboarding, which constitutes the war crime
of torture.
Misuse of the Espionage Act
The Espionage Act of 1917 was
enacted to prosecute foreign spies. It was never intended for use against
whistleblowers. Nevertheless, Obama charged eight whistleblowers with violating
the act, more than all prior presidents combined.
But although Obama refrained from
indicting Assange for publishing evidence of U.S. war crimes (for fear of
setting a dangerous precedent), Trump indicted Assange for 17 charges under the
Espionage Act. Assange now faces 175 years in prison. A British judge denied
Trump’s request that Assange be extradited to the U.S. to stand trial for those
charges. But Biden has continued Trump’s appeal of the denial of extradition,
notwithstanding the grave threat Assange’s prosecution poses to the First
Amendment right to freedom of the press.
Hale is the first person sentenced
under the Espionage Act during the Biden administration and he probably won’t
be the last.
Ironically, Hale told the sentencing judge that he
was a descendent of Nathan Hale, who was executed by the British for spying
during the Revolutionary War. “I have but this one life to give in service of
my country,” Hale said, quoting his ancestor.
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"The master class
has always declared the wars; the subject class has always fought the battles.
The master class has had all to gain and nothing to lose, while the subject
class has had nothing to gain and everything to lose--especially their lives."
Eugene Victor Debs
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