What is the Point of the New Drone Targeting Rules?
Published by The Lawfare Institute
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Another tidbit from the NYT story Ben just flagged:
It is unclear what Mr. Obama’s position is on whether Mr. Shami should be targeted. American officials said that as part of the new rules ordered by Mr. Obama, the Pentagon, rather than the C.I.A., is supposed to carry out any lethal strike against an American overseas, a provision intended to allow government officials to speak more freely about the operation after it is carried out. (My emphasis)The “new rules” as they are applied in practice make no sense to me. By all accounts (though for reasons I do not understand), DOD-controlled drone strikes have for a while resulted in more (perhaps many more) targeting errors than CIA-controlled strikes. And in fact, government officials do not talk more freely about DOD strikes than about CIA strikes.
Jack Goldsmith is the Learned Hand Professor at Harvard Law School, co-founder of Lawfare, and a Non-Resident Senior Fellow at the American Enterprise Institute. Before coming to Harvard, Professor Goldsmith served as Assistant Attorney General, Office of Legal Counsel from 2003-2004, and Special Counsel to the Department of Defense from 2002-2003.
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