Distressing revelations
We knew president Bush had little legal, moral misgivings about international laws, but Obama has gone one better.
The writer was Pakistan’s ambassador to the EU from 2002-2004 and to the US in 1999 tariq.fatemi@tribune.com.pk
The past week could not have been a pleasant one for Americans, at least for those few that take an interest in matters of state policy or have some understanding of the admirable principles enshrined in the Constitution.
For a start, we had the sad spectacle of defence secretary-designate Chuck Hagel being grilled during his confirmation hearings by Republican senators, but not about his views on the department’s budget or even about the war in Afghanistan. These issues held little interest to these honourable elected representatives. Instead, their effort was to “bully him into a rigid position on Israel policy”, as commented by The New York Times. It is, therefore, no surprise that this newspaper, which has been a strong advocate for Israel, was constrained to lament that “the sad truth is that there is more honest discussion about American-Israeli policy in Israel, than in this country”.
We were then greeted with the news that a secret legal review on the use of cyber weapons had come to the conclusion that the president has the power to order a pre-emptive strike if the US detects credible evidence of a major digital attack looming from abroad. While details have been kept a closely guarded secret, US officials have admitted that President Barack Obama did authorise the only known use of cyber weapons by one state against another. This was early in his first term when he ordered the use of cyber-attacks against Iran’s nuclear enrichment facilities.
The US has thus entered into a gray zone of international law, which permits a country to defend itself against threats, but not to unleash an attack on the mere presumption of an adversary’s motives or intentions. In particular, the right of pre-emption has been severely criticised for undertaking armed action on conjecture, as was evident in Bush’s decision to attack Iraq.
The same week, we were treated to a rather ingenious assertion by White House officials that drone attacks were “legal, ethical and wise”. This was prompted by media criticism of the leaked Justice Department memo which claimed that it was legal to kill US citizens abroad, if believed that they were senior al Qaeda leaders who posed an “imminent” threat of violent attack against Americans. Of course, the memo adopts an elastic definition of an “imminent” threat, while rejecting any role for courts to review or restrain such decisions.
The memo was released as Obama’s counterterrorism advisor and nominee for CIA Director was preparing for confirmation hearings before the Intelligence Committee. Not surprisingly, the American Civil Union characterised the paper as “a profoundly disturbing document” and one that was “hard to believe was produced in a democracy built on checks and balances”. A number of senators have also questioned the president’s power to authorise the killing of Americans, without due process of law.
As if all this was not enough to send a shudder down the spine of those who believed that the US was not only a democracy but one strongly committed to supremacy of law and therefore, different from authoritarian states that disposed off their citizens with nary a second thought, it was also revealed that the US had used its enormous powers to not only browbeat such dictatorial regimes as those of Pervez Musharraf and Hosni Mubarak, but even such icons of democracy as Canada, Australia and Denmark, to offer their services and facilities to run secret detention, rendition and interrogation programmes. Incidentally, the Senate Intelligence Committee’s 6,000-page report on CIA’s programme remains classified. So much for this bastion of freedom and human rights!
While we all knew that former president George Bush had little, if any legal or moral misgivings about violating the sanctity of international laws, his much trumpeted successor has gone one better, claiming for the executive extraordinary powers, without review by either the legislature or the judiciary, of the kind never envisaged by the founding fathers. Dictatorial regimes must surely be rejoicing.
Published in The Express Tribune, February 13th, 2013.
For a start, we had the sad spectacle of defence secretary-designate Chuck Hagel being grilled during his confirmation hearings by Republican senators, but not about his views on the department’s budget or even about the war in Afghanistan. These issues held little interest to these honourable elected representatives. Instead, their effort was to “bully him into a rigid position on Israel policy”, as commented by The New York Times. It is, therefore, no surprise that this newspaper, which has been a strong advocate for Israel, was constrained to lament that “the sad truth is that there is more honest discussion about American-Israeli policy in Israel, than in this country”.
We were then greeted with the news that a secret legal review on the use of cyber weapons had come to the conclusion that the president has the power to order a pre-emptive strike if the US detects credible evidence of a major digital attack looming from abroad. While details have been kept a closely guarded secret, US officials have admitted that President Barack Obama did authorise the only known use of cyber weapons by one state against another. This was early in his first term when he ordered the use of cyber-attacks against Iran’s nuclear enrichment facilities.
The US has thus entered into a gray zone of international law, which permits a country to defend itself against threats, but not to unleash an attack on the mere presumption of an adversary’s motives or intentions. In particular, the right of pre-emption has been severely criticised for undertaking armed action on conjecture, as was evident in Bush’s decision to attack Iraq.
The same week, we were treated to a rather ingenious assertion by White House officials that drone attacks were “legal, ethical and wise”. This was prompted by media criticism of the leaked Justice Department memo which claimed that it was legal to kill US citizens abroad, if believed that they were senior al Qaeda leaders who posed an “imminent” threat of violent attack against Americans. Of course, the memo adopts an elastic definition of an “imminent” threat, while rejecting any role for courts to review or restrain such decisions.
The memo was released as Obama’s counterterrorism advisor and nominee for CIA Director was preparing for confirmation hearings before the Intelligence Committee. Not surprisingly, the American Civil Union characterised the paper as “a profoundly disturbing document” and one that was “hard to believe was produced in a democracy built on checks and balances”. A number of senators have also questioned the president’s power to authorise the killing of Americans, without due process of law.
As if all this was not enough to send a shudder down the spine of those who believed that the US was not only a democracy but one strongly committed to supremacy of law and therefore, different from authoritarian states that disposed off their citizens with nary a second thought, it was also revealed that the US had used its enormous powers to not only browbeat such dictatorial regimes as those of Pervez Musharraf and Hosni Mubarak, but even such icons of democracy as Canada, Australia and Denmark, to offer their services and facilities to run secret detention, rendition and interrogation programmes. Incidentally, the Senate Intelligence Committee’s 6,000-page report on CIA’s programme remains classified. So much for this bastion of freedom and human rights!
While we all knew that former president George Bush had little, if any legal or moral misgivings about violating the sanctity of international laws, his much trumpeted successor has gone one better, claiming for the executive extraordinary powers, without review by either the legislature or the judiciary, of the kind never envisaged by the founding fathers. Dictatorial regimes must surely be rejoicing.
Published in The Express Tribune, February 13th, 2013.