This may turn out to be a Great Debate, who knows. If so, moderators, feel free to move it (as if you needed my permission ;)). I looked there first and this doesn’t seem to be being discussed there yet, so…
They’re conducting an online poll asking, “Should U.S. law be changed to allow the assassination of hostile foreign leaders?”here. (Well, at least they were a minute ago, because I just took it. Now it’s a poll about what you’re going to do when the stock market opens on Monday. Ah well, even more reason to poll people here, I guess. Perhaps they’re rotating them and it will be available again later.)
Also, just FYI, anyone interested in really having their opinion heard on this issue need only click here to contact your Representative in Congress - (especially if you don’t know who your Representative is. That website allows you to enter your State and Zip Code to find out), or here to contact your Senate Representatives.
P.S. to the non-American Dopers: I’d be very interested to know how the rest of the world views the U.S. as possible assassins, as well.
On the one hand, if it is clearly proven that Bin Laden is responsible for this atrocity, assasination would hopefully prevent more innocent people from being killed.
On the other hand, it is really important to me that we not become that which we abhor. Which in this case is a terrorist.
So I guess that for me to say yes, I would need for Bin Laden to have been tried in an international court of law and have been convicted in absentia. But that would be better than finding and trying him, because it is clear to me that many innocent lives are going to be lost in finding and arresting him. If it can even be done.
As to what capacitor said, I think that the President is already most certainly a target of assassination by terrorist groups. The only question is whether our doing this (assassination) would justify to some people having it be done to us.
It is a very difficult question. I don’t know the answer. I just hope that the people running this country can make the right decision…I wouldn’t want their job for ANYTHING.
As I heard someone say on the news, it’s absurd that we will bomb a country and end up killing civilians, but we won’t take out the leader of the group.
Wouldn’t we still have to find him in order to punish him? Convicting him with no possibility of actually passing sentence is pretty much the same as never trying him.
Today on some news talk show (they’re all blurring together now), VP Cheney said that this is not only an option, but may be possible to do w/o rescinding the order.
Of course, IANAL, and I haven’t read the order, but my bet would be that it states that the US or its operatives may not assassinate government officials
bin Laden, of course, is not a gov official.
In this case, I would think it’s justified. I’m still not sure it’s the best course of action, though. Seems making him a martyr would only lead to more acts committed in his name. IMHO, a better fate would be rotting away in a supermax prison with no contact wth the outside world. Then at age 80 he can look back on his wasted life and on his precious movement that he almost single-handedly destroyed and decide if it was worth it.
I’ve been thinking about this question for quite a while now. I don’t think I’ve really come up with an answer.
Like many, I’d prefer a targeted assassination over bomb and missile strikes that kills a lot of innocent people.
However, thinking beyond the current crisis, would we have assassins spread around the globe waiting for the order to kill even before we are thinking of using other deadly force?
Also, is it our right to topple governments because we don’t like them? Sanctions are to try to convince the people to rise up against their government, but with assassinations, we are taking in our own hands.
Also, what do our allies think of us allowing assassinations? Our enemies have few qualms about assassinations, but our friends might. But, would it send a message to the governments that are harboring terrorist that we are serious?
This is a simplistic overview of my thoughts. I suppose I’m for rescinding the order until it causes a problem.
Only if it is our OWN government. Check it out, it’s in the Declaration of Independence.
The rejection of assassination is one of the few reasons the US can claim the moral high ground in international politics. For us to rescind this policy will make us as bad as the terrorists, we will become murderers for political causes. The difference is only in quantity, not quality.
I guess it’s because killing a leader would plunge a country into god knows what, destabilizing everything. If every leader is fair game, then we’ve got a hell of an unstable global political environment.
On the other hand, I think about when Kings used to ride to war. Would leaders be so quick to send troops and commit military actions if THEIR ass was first in line, instead of the lives of faceless thousands?
As Mayflower said…It is disturbing to think that because we’re unwilling to punish the leader of a country, the person absolutely responsibly for political decisions we object to, we instead find it more “moral” to drop bombs on people who had very little to do with what we object to. It’s maddening.
Along similar lines, if the terrorists were so damn pissed off about something our government did, go after the damned people responsible! Kill the all the senators who voted for the last Israeli aid package, if that’s your beef. Leave the people in the trade center alone. Okay, I didn’t mean they should kill anyone, certainly not our elected leaders. I just mean it’s perverse that the people who died, as in many acts of war, didn’t have much to do with the people who pissed the enemy off.
I think not. Assassination may work when you are trying to destabilize a government that is top-heavy with power, but it cannot work with a religious organization with members spread throughout the world, especially when the leader has already picked out four or five different people to succeed him.
Can you say martyr?
Can you say massive retaliation throughout the world by people unafraid to die for their cause?
I don’t think we should. I also don’t think it applies to bin Laden anyway. He’s not a leader of a nation and he declared war on us. He seems like a “soldier” to me. And therefore a legitimate target.
We don’t assassinate because in order to have diplomatic relations, we need governments. Even if they are governments that we don’t like, it is in the best interest of the world that people with whom we can deal with through diplomatic channels be in power. Beyond, that, people have an inherent right to self-government. If we don’t dig that government, we can commit to war. War is terrible, but assassinations can be even worse. At least war ensures that a nation is fully committed to it’s cause, and that it’s actions are scrutiable to the international public. If we just covertly offed everyone we didn’t like, there would be no international accoutablity, and chaos would soon reign.
Yeah but…everybody who’s talking about how we have no right to overthrow governments or destabilize countries is missing the point (also aready made) that Bin Ladan is not the leader of any country or part of any government.
In fact, from what I’ve just heard about it, the orginal order was specifically regarding assasination of “heads of state”. Bin Laden in NOT a head of any State. That said, the order has subsequently been interpreted broadly, and expanded to include all forms of assasination- and I would suppose include the kind of leader bin Laden is. But it would not take a recinding of the entire order (or a feild day on soveriegn goverments) if we wanted to go after bin Laden.
THAT said, how much good would it actually do us, I wonder? From what I’ve heard about what we know of his operation (and mostly I’ve heard we don’t know nearly enough) he’s more of a nexus and organiser (and financer) of many anti-American than the Furhur behind it all. getting rid of him would distrupt the system for a time, but would it destroy the web?
Or, to go with another image, if we lop off one bin Laden, would three grow back in his place?
earlier today former prez clinton belched something to the effect that this doesnt apply since bin ladan is not a head of state, he’s a terrorist. and we would be gunning for him…
