US citizen killed in US air-strike

[Texashiker]

Abdul-Rahman al-Awlaki, the 21-year-old son of Anwar al-Awlaki was killed in a US air-strike.

http://www.foxnews.com/world/2011/10/15/yemen-says-local-al-qaeda-media-chief-six-others-killed/

I do not know if Abdul-Rahman al-Awlaki was the target of the strike, or if he was at the wrong place and at the wrong time.

 

[iGas]

Abdul-Rahman al-Awlaki, the 21-year-old son of Anwar al-Awlaki was killed in a US air-strike.

http://www.foxnews.com/world/2011/10/15/yemen-says-local-al-qaeda-media-chief-six-others-killed/

I do not know if Abdul-Rahman al-Awlaki was the target of the strike, or if he was at the wrong place and at the wrong time.

It is not the first and wont be the last that the US government kill it own citizens, ie. Kent State massacre.

 

[Double Trouble]

Good riddance to that trash. I have a problem with the US government just executing citizens without due process, but when the US is at war with extremist groups and you hang out with the enemy and help the enemy then you become an enemy soldier and you become a fair target just like any other enemy soldiers.

 

[guyver01]

Good. More Dead Terrorists.

Terrorists and Their Supporters should die.

bomb the shit out of them.
spread their guts over the countryside.

let them all burn in hell.

 

[Rainsford]

Good riddance to that trash. I have a problem with the US government just executing citizens without due process, but when the US is at war with extremist groups and you hang out with the enemy and help the enemy then you become an enemy soldier and you become a fair target just like any other enemy soldiers.

Agreed. I personally would extend that farther and say there are limits to how we treat captured extremists, US citizens or otherwise. But when you're out in the world, actively engaged in a war against the US, I feel like that makes you pretty fair game. And on a more practical note, it's not reasonable to make trying to capture those actively waging war on us the ONLY option we have.

 

[Gamingphreek]

Definitely echo what others have said. Awlaki and now this guy are WITH Al Qaeda extremests who have attacked (and continue to attack) the United States -- they are enemy combatants.

Are we going to now say that police aren't allowed to use their guns and HAVE to bring a criminal in even they have initiated deadly actions towards the officer?

 

[bfdd]

Definitely echo what others have said. Awlaki and now this guy are WITH Al Qaeda extremests who have attacked (and continue to attack) the United States -- they are enemy combatants.

Are we going to now say that police aren't allowed to use their guns and HAVE to bring a criminal in even they have initiated deadly actions towards the officer?

as a citizen he's still allowed his due process. for instance when we have caught traitors, we just don't instantly kill them. they go on trial for treason.

 

[guyver01]

as a citizen he's still allowed his due process.

IMO, once you begin 'fighting for the other side' .. you have effectively renounced your citizenship.

once he joined al-quaida, he no longer was a US Citizen.

I believe the legal term is Denaturalization.

The most severe form is the "stripping of citizenship" when denaturalization takes place as a penalty for actions considered criminal by the state, often only indirectly related to nationality, for instance for having served in a foreign military.

 

[Moonbeam]

I understand how constipated you are and how much trouble you are having to take a shit and I feel for you. It has come as a great shock to your system to discover that your most deeply held illusions look like big compacted turds to normally functioning people. You will get used to that in time. Remember, there really is a good that you feel is behind what you believe, but it isn't the good you think it is. You believe that the Constitution is a noble and perhaps sacred document, but if a terrorist can hide behind it to kill innocent people then that document becomes an evil. No President will allow that to happen even if idiots call for him to be impeached. This is what primates do instinctively. Human apes preserve the lives of innocent people in any way they can unless somehow they've become very mentally ill. You would likely do the same if you had to face the situation, yourself, for real.

 

[Gamingphreek]

as a citizen he's still allowed his due process. for instance when we have caught traitors, we just don't instantly kill them. they go on trial for treason.

Sure if he wasn't hanging out in a hostile territory, with multiple terrorists, in a position impossible/improbable to extract him, then yes maybe we try and prosecute him in a military tribunal as an enemy combatant (As was said earlier, denaturalization took place - he doesn't get tried in the criminal justice system).

Very similar to police having to shoot someone for pulling a gun. Would they have liked to bring him in (and in the case of a terrorist, question him)... sure! Unfortunately, he took the decision out of the police officers hand.

 

[grebe925]

as a citizen he's still allowed his due process. for instance when we have caught traitors, we just don't instantly kill them. they go on trial for treason.

His right to due process stops at my right to board a plane without fear of it being brought down along with hundreds by him or his cohorts packing a bomb in their underwear and setting it off over a densely populated area. People of his ilk are U.S. citizens only in name.

 

[EagleKeeper]

He chose to plan in the mud. Did he expect that he would not get dirty?

Accord to the enemies the same rules of warfare that they choose to use.

 

[Schadenfroh]

Mixed feelings on this, but in the end, I agree with Obama.

On one hand, he knew the risks of hanging out with terrorists in Yemen (basically a war zone) and joined an organization that is waging jihad against America.

On the flip side, I'm uncomfortable with US citizens being executed without a trial when not a direct threat (IE police shooting someone who is armed and resisting arrest).

Were German-Americans (US Citizens) that returned to Germany before the onset of WW2 to enlist in the Wehrmacht not killed alongside their comrades by American bombers when hostilities between the US and Germany broke out?

 

[guyver01]

Were German-Americans (US Citizens) that returned to Germany before the onset of WW2 to enlist in the Wehrmacht not killed alongside their comrades by American bombers when hostilities between the US and Germany broke out?

if you enlist in a foreign army... you're no longer a US Citizen.

 

[Wreckem]

IMO, once you begin 'fighting for the other side' .. you have effectively renounced your citizenship.

once he joined al-quaida, he no longer was a US Citizen.

I believe the legal term is Denaturalization.

Other than renouncing your citizenship or being convicted of treason, there is no mechanisim for "denaturalization" of a natural born US citizen.

By all account these two never renounced their citizenship and obvious werent tried for treason.

 

[guyver01]

there is no mechanisim in the US law or constitution that allows for your citizenship to be stripped from you by the government.

Tell that to these people:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_denaturalized_former_citizens_of_the_United_States

According to a February 2, 2011 release from the United States Department of Justice, since 1979, the federal government has stripped 107 people of citizenship for alleged involvement in war crimes committed during World War II through the efforts of the Office of Special Investigations (OSI).http://forums.anandtech.com/#cite_note-0

 

[Wreckem]

Tell that to these people:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_denaturalized_former_citizens_of_the_United_States

Reading Comprehension for the win

This is a list of denaturalized former citizens of the United States, that is, those who became citizens through naturalization, and had either been stripped of citizenship, voluntarily renounced it, or were unable to get their passports renewed while outside the United States.

Again, a US citizen by birth can only lose their citizenship by being convicted of treason or renouncing their citizenship.

Beyond that there is no method to revoke a natural born US citizen of their citizenship. Even the White House/DoJ came to that conclusion during their secret meetings to add the US citizen to the hit list.

 

[guyver01]

Again, a US citizen by birth can only lose their citizenship by being convicted of treason or renouncing their citizenship.

and you're arguing that JOINING a terrorist force and waging terror against the united states is neither Treason nor voulintarily renouncing citizenship???


all fucking terrorist supporters should fucking burn in hell.

 

[Wreckem]

and you're arguing that JOINING a terrorist force and waging terror against the united states is neither Treason nor voulintarily renouncing citizenship???


all fucking terrorist supporters should fucking burn in hell.

Treason requires a trial in US federal court.

Renounciation of citizenship requires written/verbal affirmation of such. Being a member of an organization doesn't renounce your membership, unless said organization requires you to renounce.

Again by all accounts he was still a US citizen when the US ordered the strike. Even the White House believed so, they used other laws to justify the killing, but statutory law does not trump constitutional law.

I am not a terrorist supporter. I am a supporter of the US Constitution. Under the cosntitution, what the White House did was likely unconstitutional. What they did was a coordinated strike to kill a US citizen without due process. It would be different if he was killed while they tried to capture him or if they werent purposefully targeting him. But they did not try to capture and they did specifically target him.

By far the biggest issue is they have a fucking secret panel that can decide, on their own with no oversight or due process afforded, that an american citizen can be targeted for assination.

 

[Moonbeam]

The citizenship issue is meaningless. Nothing saves you if your aim is to kill innocent people. Stop pretending they aren't really citizens if they do x y and z. If they join organizations or support organizations that secretly plot to kill innocent people, they're dead if you have only that means to stop them. Nobody with any responsibility and the means to stop you is going to allow you to live just because you are an American citizen. The Constitution can't be used as a shield to advance the death of innocent people, because to allow that would be evil.

We want to have as much transparency in this as national security will allow, but no more or else again, the desire to do good will result in evil. An implacable enemy who will kill innocent people creates just those same rules for him, an implacable need to stop him by at the first opportunity one has.

 

[Wreckem]

So what you are saying is if someone kills someone or is part of a group who has killed someone, or has tried to kill someone, they should be executed without due process of law. Because giving them due process of law is evil.

 

[woolfe9999]

We don't even know if the citizen here was the target. In fact, we may not even have known he was there.

In a broad sense, I prefer to see us fighting terrorism with this method rather than the neo-con method of invasion/occupation/nation building which has proven to be expensive and not terribly effective.

 

[Moonbeam]

So what you are saying is if someone kills someone or is part of a group who has killed someone, or has tried to kill someone, they should be executed without due process of law. Because giving them due process of law is evil.

Doh!

 

[guyver01]

So what you are saying is if someone kills someone or is part of a group who has killed someone, or has tried to kill someone, they should be executed without due process of law. Because giving them due process of law is evil.

He joined a group whose goal is to kill American Citizens EN MASS .. and on September 11,2011 performed an act tantamount to declaration of war.

yes. they should be executed. on site.
they gave up DUE PROCESS of American law, when they declared war on the united states.

 

[JSt0rm]

The people that are against this stuff are just highly partisan and want to attack obama on EVERY issue. Thats the real issue.