# Does the US have government assassins

**URL:** <https://boards.straightdope.com/t/does-the-us-have-government-assassins/683495>\
**Category:** Factual Questions\
**Created:** [March 12, 2014, 1:38am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/does-the-us-have-government-assassins/683495 "2014-03-12T01:38:57Z")\
**Posts on this page:** 1\
**Page:** 2

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**Author:** ![SenorBeef](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/senorbeef/32/2220_2.png) [@SenorBeef](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/SenorBeef)\
**Post date:** [March 12, 2014, 6:19pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/does-the-us-have-government-assassins/683495/21 "2014-03-12T18:19:34Z")

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> [@njtt](#):
>
> It makes it so much more moral if you kill lots of innocent or insignificant people at teh same time. :rolleyes:

No, but it’s safer for the politicians. If nations began trying to assassinate each other’s leaders, there would be potential retaliation, and in general create a world in which targeting leaders was more acceptable. This directly affects the safety of the politicians setting the policy, so instead we steer clear of pure assassinations and dress them up as full legit military operations.

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