The Assassination Complex

The Intercept reports on the use of drone warfare--greatly expanded by President Obama. Many more civilians have been killed than intended targets.

While many of the documents provided to The Intercept contain explicit internal recommendations for improving unconventional U.S. warfare, the source said that what’s implicit is even more significant. The mentality reflected in the documents on the assassination programs is: “This process can work. We can work out the kinks. We can excuse the mistakes. And eventually we will get it down to the point where we don’t have to continuously come back … and explain why a bunch of innocent people got killed.”

The architects of what amounts to a global assassination campaign do not appear concerned with either its enduring impact or its moral implications. “All you have to do is take a look at the world and what it’s become, and the ineptitude of our Congress, the power grab of the executive branch over the past decade,” the source said. “It’s never considered: Is what we’re doing going to ensure the safety of our moral integrity? Of not just our moral integrity, but the lives and humanity of the people that are going to have to live with this the most?”

I get a little skeptical when JFK assassination theories are brought into it, and no President is above criticism for their foreign policy decisions, but the idea that a "deep state" consisting of a class of powerful private interests limits the range of policy choices can't just be dismissed. There is too much consistency between Republican and Democratic administrations on the perceived need to preserve United States' dominance in the world.