Mission Impossible: Justifying Assassination by Drone

By Patricia Lee Sharpe

The following is a excerpt from a transcript of a press conference held several days ago in a not entirely friendly country somewhere in the Middle East—although it might have taken place most anywhere else, for that matter. 

A U.S. diplomat whose job description requires him/her to explain U.S. policy to the local media faced an assembly of representatives of said media—print, tv, electronic, et. al.  The diplomat was a highly regarded officer who is at home with twitter, texting, Facebook, etc.  Unfortunately, like all too many foreign service officers filling public diplomacy slots, he/she has no significant training or experience in public diplomacy and he is not an area specialist.  We are told that his/her emotional range during this encounter oscillated provocatively between timidity and belligerence.
 
At this point in the press conference, the Dream Diplomat needed to convince a roomful of fearless, skeptical, articulate, well-informed journalists that it was legally and morally justified  for the U.S. to neutralize U.S.-born Islamist Anwar Al-Awlaki by sending a missile-armed drone to do the job.

The relevant section of the transcript is as follows:

    Journalist: This was obviously a very controversial act.  Could you give us the legal thinking behind it?

    Dream Diplomat: Sorry, that’s classified.  But hey!  We hit the target on the nose this time. No wedding parties.  No sleeping kids.

    Journalist: I thought the CIA said that never happens.

    DD: Yes, well, um—that’s kind of classified, too.  Commenting on it, I mean.  We don’t affirm or deny it.
   
    Journalist: Well, can I conclude that it would be equally ok for Ahmedinajad to take out John Bolton, assuming the Iranians had drones, as everyone will, eventually?  He’s been pushing to get you guys to bomb Iran for years.
   
    DD: Of course not.
   
    Journalist: So Americans can assassinate.  Bin Laden.  Al Awkaki. Whomever. However.  But you object when the Iranians go after the Saudi ambassador to the U.S.  How come?
   
    DD: There’s a difference.  I just can’t discuss it.  You have to trust me.  You have to trust us.
   
    (Laughter.)

    Journalist: On another topic, the Afghans are mistreating prisoners evidently—

    DD: Yes.  And Secretary Clinton has informed them that we disapprove, very strongly, of abusing prisoners.
   
    (More laughter.)

    Journalist: So we really can’t get a copy of that al Awlaki legal justification?

    DD: Sorry.  Even American journalists can’t get their hands on it.  

    Journalist: You mean Americans don’t know what it says either?

    DD:  Nope!  So, no one’s discriminating against you guys!  Now some people say there’s considerable leaking going on, which may or may not be true.  I can’t affirm or deny it.  But you can be pretty darn sure the leakers will get what’s coming to them, once they're  identified.

    Journalist: Jail?

    DD:  Could be.

    Journalist: Must be wonderful—living in a democracy. 

    (Tittering.)

    DD:  It is.  That’s why we want you to copy us.

    Journalist: We are.  Oh, we are.  And that’s no laughing matter.

    DD looks at his/her watch and heaves a sigh of relief:  Time’s up.  Thanks.  And don’t forget to pick up a copy of the press release on chicken farms in Iraq.