They don’t need to know anything about the policy the executive branch is using to establish the laws. The congress has power over the CIA. They’re just afraid to exert it.
Food for thought: Should an armed drone be dispatched to kill Christopher Dorner?
It’s hard to imagine a drone will be any worse at target recognition than LAPD has already turn out to be.
Yeah, they’ve been pretty horrible…Apparently folks in LA are resorting to this:
http://http://img.gawkerassets.com/img/18eciq41fzwd9jpg/xlarge.jpg
Found another sign, and a bumper sticker!
Bananas!
This story would make a great movie!
The LAPD is not, and cannot, be in a war with Dorner. So the LAPD can’t kill as a measure of first resort. He’s a murderer, and needs to be apprehended and tried in court. If he resists apprehension with force, the LAPD can respond with equal force.
This linked article’s comparison is about the same as the OP’s.
OTOH, the US government could, if it chose, concoct a bullshit story that while Dorner was in the military, he was recruited by Al Queda and is now acting as a domestic terrorist for them. The beauty of it is that it all seems to be beyond judicial review, so they don’t actually have to prove anything, or even gin up fake evidence to support it. All they would need is a press release and a set of brass balls.
The U.S. is not in a declared state of war with anybody, least of all Pakistani schoolchildren, so in what sense does the fact that the LAPD lacks the authority to declare war have anything to do with it?
It’s not legally possible for US States to go to war - so they lack the authority.
However, the US Executive states they are in an Armed Conflict with Al Qaeda/Associates and the US Congress has authorized the President to kill those groups. Sometimes I just say “war” instead of that.
If you’re referring to a formal declaration of war, that’s not necessary to attack another country and with the start of the United Nations/illegality of war (with exceptions - UN Approved or Self Defense) it has completely fallen out of style.
Congress funding acts of war seem to be sufficent to qualify as a Declaration of War. There hasn’t been any seriously accepted argument against that for a long time now. The Dorner case has a good possibility of leading to his killing from the imminent danger of him killing those who try to capture him. While we can all agree on the definition of ‘imminent’ that will be used in that case, my inartfully phrased OP was meant to bring up the question of how ‘imminent’ would be defined in war. Are we to wait for out enemies to fire on us before we can fire on them?
I don’t think anything takes the place of Declarations of War. The declarations just are not necessary to start a war and aren’t used since the UN Charter was employed. But this is another thread.
The leaked White Paper is a jumbled mess. It presents itself as legal justification, when it’s really just policy. For instance, there’s no way someone has to be a senior level operative before they can be legally killed in an Armed Conflict - that’s pure policy.
The memo makes clear the President is operating during an Armed Conflict.
Along those lines, imminence is also jumbled. There’s LAPD/Dorner imminence. Dorner literally has to be ready to threaten someone’s life. He has to be armed. He cannot be killed based on his manifesto or even prior killings. Of course, those will amplify future actions he makes - so if he has a hostage and Dorner goes to take a leak - a sniper could shoot him; or if he’s surrounded and tries to run, they’ll probably kill him and it’ll be justified because he is such a violent criminal (this scenario is tricky and could go either way). There’s no set rules and context is everything. However, he is just a criminal and can only be killed if he presents a true non-armed conflict (civilian, or International Human Rights Law) imminent threat to life. It applies outside an Armed Conflict.
But that’s not what the leaked White Paper memo is talking about. It’s talking about jus ad bellum imminence. That basically is about a Nation’s right to go to war (not the laws once you’re inside a war). At least that’s how the Memo comes across. That imminence is extremely broad. It allows preemptive attacks, ect. We don’t have to take the first strike and can kill you without you firing a shot.
And of course using that analysis is odd for a targeting memo, because it doesn’t make sense. The Executive already believes we’re in a very long Armed Conflict with Al Qaeda - we’re not starting and stopping new Armed Conflicts based on new threats/rights to self defense as jus ad bellum imminence suggests. It’s one long war. If you want to do it for policy reasons fine, but not because it’s a legal requirement.
It’s difficult to make sense of when it’s presented as the legality after stating very clearly the Executive/memo believes we are in an Armed Conflict with al qaeda - which means jus ad bellum imminence is not required. So I’m unclear what imminence is actually required for the killing to be legal (and not just policy).