On Fri, Mar 22, 2013 at 9:32 AM, Jim Devine <[email protected]> wrote: >> President Obama is reportedly considering moving control of the drone >> program from the Central Intelligence Agency to the Defense Department, >> as questions about the program’s legality continue to be asked. But this >> shift would do nothing to confer legitimacy to the drone strikes. The >> legitimacy problem comes from the secrecy itself — not which entity >> secretly does the killing. Secrecy has been used to hide presidential >> overreach — as the Cambodia example shows. > > then why were some people on the left pushing so hard to shift control > of the drones from the CIA to the Pentagon?
There's no necessary contradiction. Moving them from the CIA to the military, from the point of view of groups like Human Rights Watch, is a means to an end. The end is greater transparency and compliance with international law. There's no guarantee that moving them from the CIA to the military will result in greater transparency and compliance with international law. There is reason to believe that it would, but not reasons for ironclad belief. It depends on choices made in the future. Therefore, moving them from the CIA to the military isn't *intrinsically* a good thing. It's a good thing if it leads to greater transparency and compliance with international law. History shows that CIA control isn't the only way to conduct an illegal and unaccountable policy. That's why there can't be any applause for the move until its consequences can be judged. > -- > Jim Devine / "Segui il tuo corso, e lascia dir le genti." (Go your > own way and let people talk.) -- Karl, paraphrasing Dante. > _______________________________________________ > pen-l mailing list > [email protected] > https://lists.csuchico.edu/mailman/listinfo/pen-l -- Robert Naiman Policy Director Just Foreign Policy www.justforeignpolicy.org [email protected] _______________________________________________ pen-l mailing list [email protected] https://lists.csuchico.edu/mailman/listinfo/pen-l
