Repost: John Brennan and Bush’s interrogation/detention policies

[EFerrari]

Yesterday, the administration sent John Brennan out to defend its drone prolicy.

Obama's counter-terrorism advisor defends drone strikes

Counter-terrorism advisor John Brennan says drone strikes in Pakistan, Yemen and Somalia have saved American lives and that civilian casualties have been rare.

http://www.latimes.com/news/nationworld/world/la-fg-brennan-drones-20120501,0,4232369.story

Here's Greenwald on Brennan in 2008

Sunday, Nov 16, 2008 06:29 AM PST
John Brennan and Bush’s interrogation/detention policies
Examining the actual record of Obama's top adviser for intelligence policy
By Glenn Greenwald

Last Wednesday, I wrote:

It simply is noteworthy of comment and cause for concern — though far from conclusive about what Obama will do — that Obama’s transition chief for intelligence policy, John Brennan, was an ardent supporter of torture and one of the most emphatic advocates of FISA expansions and telecom immunity.

Yesterday, Andrew Sullivan noted that observation but then linked to this post from James Gordon Meek of the Counterrorism blog, which reported that Brennan — a top CIA aide to George Tenet during most of the Bush administration — is a leading candidate to replace Mike McConnell and become Obama’s Director of National Intelligence. Meek, not providing any links or citations, wrote: ”Among many things Democrats like about the softspoken Brennan are his anti-torture views“ (emphasis added). Andrew is right when he says: “They both can’t be right.”

My statement about Brennan was based on several pieces of compelling evidence. First, there is this detailed New Yorker article on Bush’s secret interrogation programs by Jane Mayer, unquestionably one of the nation’s best and most reliable reporters on these matters. She wrote:

Without more transparency, the value of the C.I.A.’s interrogation and detention program is impossible to evaluate. Setting aside the moral, ethical, and legal issues, even supporters, such as John Brennan, acknowledge that much of the information that coercion produces is unreliable. As he put it, “All these methods produced useful information, but there was also a lot that was bogus.

Mayer explicitly identified Brennan –with whom she spoke concerning these programs — as a “supporter.”

http://www.salon.com/2008/11/16/brennan/

[sad sally]

1. With a US policy that says there's "nothing in international law" that prohibits attacking

"enemies" who are anyplace in the world, the US shouldn't be at all surprised when drone attacks are launched by other countries against the US. Maybe China, if the US gives safe haven to their dissidents?

Since the US has decided it can launch drone attacks any place on planet Earth, regardless if we're at war with the selected target, the gloves are off. The administration has opened a new door with unchartered legal justification.

from Common Dreams:
White House Admission of Drone Strikes Does Nothing to Justify Program’s Legality, ACLU Says
ACLU National Security Experts Warn Program is Unlawful and Dangerous
.........
“But Mr. Brennan supplies legal conclusions, not legal analysis. We continue to believe that the administration should release the Justice Department memos underlying the program – particularly the memo that authorizes the extrajudicial killing of American terrorism suspects. And the administration should release the evidence it relied on to conclude that an American citizen, Anwar al-Aulaqi, could be killed without charge, trial, or judicial process of any kind.”

Brennan maintained the Obama administration was committed to transparency when it came to deciding who would be subject to lethal drone strikes. But Hina Shamsi, director of the ACLU National Security Project, said the program is both unconstitutional and overly broad.

“We continue to believe, based on the information available, that the program itself is not just unlawful but dangerous. This statement makes clear that the administration is treating legal restrictions on the use of force as questions of preference. Moreover, it is dangerous to characterize the entire planet as a battlefield,” Shamsi said.

“It is dangerous to give the President the authority to order the extrajudicial killing of any person – including any American – he believes to be a terrorist. The administration insists that the program is closely supervised, but to propose that a secret deliberation that takes place entirely within the executive branch constitutes ‘due process’ is to strip the Fifth Amendment of its essential meaning.”

http://www.commondreams.org/newswire/2012/04/30-4