Commanders like to talk about the "fog of war" as if that excuses indiscriminate killing without consequences. But part of that concept is that you yourself are under threat and have to make immediate decisions with inadequate information, not sitting in an air-conditioned office
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Biden's maudlin and performative sense of empathy seems to end at the US border.
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Pinboard Retweeted 1TVNewsAF
The US military's response to killing children in a country we're not at war with ("my bad"), based on nothing but a gut feeling by someone watching video camera footage, is unacceptable.https://twitter.com/1TVNewsAF/status/1438947100813926411 …
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Remember that we did not withdraw from Afghanistan— our avowed policy is to continue these kinds of strikes (the jargon is "over the horizon capability") indefinitely, based on intelligence that was laughable even when we had tens of thousands of troops occupying the country.
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This is the real asymmetric warfare of the 21st century—low-intensity perpetual bombing of Muslim civilian populations by first-world militaries, coupled with larger-scale punitive operations if the people we bomb dare to attack a military target.
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The only way our forever wars will end is if the targeted populations find a more effective way of killing American soldiers. It is the only deterrent with political impact. We've seen in Yemen how no amount of suffering by innocents has any impact on national security discourse.
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In the meantime, we need a full Congressional investigation of every drone strike conducted in the War on Terror and its victims. The US national security apparatus needs to be held accountable for a two decades long campaign of indiscriminate extrajudicial murder.
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The opening words of the Declaration of Independence proclaim that "all men are created equal, and are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life" There is no way to reconcile those words with murder of innocents of any country by drone.
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This most execrable part of our foreign policy is the one on which there is absolute bipartisan agreement. Military bills sail through a gridlocked Congress, amended only if the amounts are judged too small. For twenty years, there has been no one to vote for to put a stop to it
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Pinboard Retweeted Lucas Tomlinson
"No disciplinary action expected". The proper punishment here is to put the commanders and analysts in a pickup truck and make them drive around Hadhramaut for a few days delivering water and groceries, trying not to look suspicious from above.https://twitter.com/LucasFoxNews/status/1438936911259779080 …
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Lucas TomlinsonVerified account @LucasFoxNewsBREAKING: Gen. McKenzie, head of U.S. Central Command, to announce no ISIS-K fighters killed in U.S. drone strike in Kabul Aug 29. 10 civilians killed, including 7 children in Toyota. No disciplinary action expected, officials say. US military stands by intel leading to strike.1 reply 11 retweets 71 likesShow this thread
Pinboard Retweeted Marc Garlasco
A very interesting thread on how US drone strikes are conducted from a former practitioner:https://twitter.com/marcgarlasco/status/1439000985024794624 …
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in 2011, and in 2015 assisted in a study of airstrikes while deployed on the-
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Replying to @KtTemp
Hola, the unroll you asked for: None of these commanders were "on the ground", the decision to kill a… https://threadreaderapp.com/thread/1438948918302167041.html … Talk to you soon.
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