OMNI
DRONE/ASSASSINATION NEWSLETTER # 16. March 29, 2015.
Compiled by Dick Bennett for a Culture of Peace and
Justice.
(Newsletter #1, Dec. 29, 2010;
#2 July 20, 2011; #3 Feb. 16, 2012; #4 May 3, 2012; #5 June 9, 2012; #6 Oct.
12, 2012; #7 Dec. 20, 2012; #8 Jan. 22, 2013; #9, Feb. 16, 2013; #10 May 11,
2013; #11 May 29, 2013; #12 Nov. 1, 2013; #13 Dec. 28, 2013; #14, June 3, 2014;
Feb. 20, 2015.) See Newsletters on ACLU,
Afghanistan War, Air War, Assassinations, Children, CIA, Civilians, Civil Liberties,
Constitution and Drones, Criminal Justice, Democracy and Drones, Extra-Judicial
Killing, Geneva Conventions, Human Rights, International Law, Iraq, Islamic
State (ISIL), Judicial System, Killing Civilians, Media and Drones, Murder and
Drones, Obama, Pakistan War, Pentagon, Privacy, Public Apathy, State Murder,
Surveillance, Terror, War Crimes, Yemen, and more.
What’s
at stake:
“America’s targeted killing program is illegal, immoral, and
unwise.”
Archbishop Desmond Tutu
Blog: War Department/Peace Department
Newsletters:
Index:
Visit OMNI’s Library.
Contents
Drone Newsletter #15 at end
Contents
Drone Newsletter #16
The MQ-9 Reaper at Fort Smith, AR, Arkansas National Guard 188th
Wing, the
Flying Razorbacks
Flying Razorbacks
Dick, Fort Smith, AR, AFB Drones
Obama, Drone Warfare,
Extrajudicial Killing, Google Search
Common Dreams, Obama
Still Not Transparent
Dick, Review: Whittle, Predator
Marjorie Cohn, Drones and Targeted Killing
Chatterjee, Drone
Pilots are Quitting
Veterans for Peace
Protesting Drones at Creech AFB
MQ-9
Reaper
Published
August 18, 2010
1 of 5
MQ-9
Reaper
Published August 18, 2010
The Reaper is larger and more
heavily-armed than the MQ-1 Predator and attacks time-sensitive targets with
persistence and precision, to destroy or disable those targets. (Courtesy photo)
1 of 5DOWNLOAD HI-RES / PHOTO DETAILS
An MQ-9
Reaper sits on a ramp in Afghanistan Oct. 1. The Reaper is
launched, recovered and maintained at deployed locations, while being remotely
operated by pilots and sensor operators at Creech Air Force Base, Nev. (Courtesy photo)
A maintenance Airman inspects an MQ-9
Reaper in Afghanistan Oct. 1. Capable of striking enemy targets with on-board
weapons, the Reaper has conducted close air support and intelligence,
surveillance and reconnaissance missions. (Courtesy photo) http://www.af.mil/AboutUs/FactSheets/Display/tabid/224/Article/104470/mq-9-reaper.aspx
4 of 5DOWNLOAD HI-RES / PHOTO DETAILS
An MQ-9 Reaper, armed with GBU-12
Paveway II laser guided munitions and AGM-114 Hellfire missiles, piloted by
Col. Lex Turner flies a combat mission over southern Afghanistan. (U.S. Air
Force Photo / Lt. Col. Leslie Pratt)
5 of 5DOWNLOAD HI-RES / PHOTO DETAILS
Mission
The MQ-9
Reaper is an armed, multi-mission, medium-altitude,
long-endurance remotely piloted aircraft that is employed primarily as an
intelligence-collection asset and secondarily against dynamic execution
targets. Given its significant loiter time, wide-range sensors, multi-mode
communications suite, and precision weapons -- it provides a unique capability
to perform strike, coordination, and reconnaissance against high-value,
fleeting, and time-sensitive targets.
Reapers can also perform the following
missions and tasks: intelligence, surveillance, reconnaissance, close air
support, combat search and rescue, precision strike, buddy-laser, convoy/raid
overwatch, route clearance, target development, and terminal air guidance. The
MQ-9's capabilities make it uniquely qualified to conduct irregular warfare
operations in support of combatant commander objectives.
Features
The Reaper is part of a remotely
piloted aircraft system. A fully operational system consists of several
sensor/weapon-equipped aircraft, ground control station, Predator Primary
Satellite Link, and spare equipment along with operations and maintenance crews
for deployed 24-hour missions.
The basic crew consists of a rated
pilot to control the aircraft and command the mission, and enlisted aircrew
member to operate sensors and weapons as well as a mission coordinator, when
required. To meet combatant commanders' requirements, the Reaper delivers
tailored capabilities using mission kits containing various weapons and sensor
payload combinations.
The MQ-9 baseline system carries the
Multi-Spectral Targeting System, which has a robust suite of visual sensors for
targeting. The MTS-B integrates an infrared sensor, color/monochrome daylight
TV camera, image-intensified TV camera, laser designator, and laser
illuminator. The full-motion video from each of the imaging sensors can be
viewed as separate video streams or fused.
The unit also incorporates a laser
range finder/designator, which precisely designates targets for employment of
laser-guided munitions, such as the Guided Bomb Unit-12 Paveway II. The Reaper
is also equipped with a synthetic aperture radar to enable future GBU-38 Joint
Direct Attack Munitions targeting. The MQ-9 can also employ four
laser-guided missiles, Air-to-Ground Missile-114 Hellfire, which possess highly
accurate, low-collateral damage, anti-armor and anti-personnel engagement
capabilities.
The remotely piloted aircraft can be
disassembled and loaded into a single container for deployment worldwide. The
entire system can be transported in the C-130
Hercules, or larger aircraft. The MQ-9 aircraft operates
from standard U.S. airfields with clear line-of-sight to the ground data
terminal antenna, which provides line-of-sight communications for takeoff and
landing. The PPSL provides over-the-horizon communications for the aircraft and
sensors.
The primary concept of operations, remote
split operations, employs a launch-and-recovery ground control station for
take-off and landing operations at the forward operating location, while the
crew based in continental United States executes command and control of the
remainder of the mission via beyond-line-of-sight links. Remote split
operations result in a smaller number of personnel deployed to a forward
location, consolidate control of the different flights in one location, and as
such, simplify command and control functions as well as the logistical supply
challenges for the weapons system.
Background
The U.S. Air Force proposed the MQ-9
Reaper system in response to the Department of Defense directive to support
initiatives of overseas contingency operations. It is larger and more powerful
than the MQ-1 Predator, and is designed to execute time-sensitive targets with
persistence and precision, and destroy or disable those targets. The
"M" is the DOD designation for multi-role, and "Q" means
remotely piloted aircraft system. The "9" indicates it is the ninth
in the series of remotely piloted aircraft systems.
General Characteristics
Primary Function: Intelligence
collection in support of strike, coordination, and reconnaissance missions
Contractor: General Atomics Aeronautical
Systems, Inc.
Power Plant: Honeywell TPE331-10GD turboprop
engine
Thrust: 900 shaft horsepower maximum
Wingspan: 66 feet (20.1 meters)
Length: 36 feet (11 meters)
Height: 12.5 feet (3.8 meters)
Weight: 4,900 pounds (2,223 kilograms)
empty
Maximum takeoff weight: 10,500 pounds
(4,760 kilograms)
Fuel Capacity: 4,000 pounds (602
gallons)
Payload: 3,750 pounds (1,701
kilograms)
Speed: Cruise speed around 230 miles
per hour (200 knots)
Range: 1,150 miles (1,000 nautical
miles)
Ceiling: Up to 50,000 feet (15,240
meters)
Armament: Combination of AGM-114 Hellfire
missiles, GBU-12 Paveway II and GBU-38 Joint Direct Attack Munitions
Crew (remote): Two (pilot and sensor
operator)
Unit Cost: $56.5 million (includes four
aircraft with sensors, ground control station and Predator Primary satellite
link) (fiscal 2011 dollars)
Initial operating capability: October
2007
Inventory: Total force, 104
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DICK’S DRAFT STATEMENT RE DRONES
AT FS NATIONAL GUARD AIR BASE begun 2-20-15
Our country continues to face
ever-widening economic disparity, color discrimination and violence, the
militarization of police, more CIA torture revelations, and worst of all them
together—climate change. But US drone
war causes major harm both to the US and to the world, including the incitement of global hatred against our country by
the lawlessness of the innocent people killed and the president’s extrajudicial
executions.
Why do these drone attacks continue; why
are they being prepared in Arkansas? And
why is our Guard, admired for its
help during floods and tornadoes, being tainted by operation of such lethal
weapons for such illegal purposes? Why
would our Guard want to continue bombing the children and families in
Afghanistan, Pakistan, Yemen, Niger, and other nations? Does our Guard not know about the
killings? Do the men and women of the
Arkansas Guard not understand the perpetual trauma of drone weapons and surveillance
hovering over communities and striking without warning? And if our Guard men and women to know, have
they no empathy for that immense suffering?
Well, as the preceding public relations
report reveals, to the men and women of
the 188th Arkansas Air Guard these questions are not relevant. The Reapers are part of the US empire of some
thousand military bases around the world, ten carrier attack groups controlling
the sea lanes, the multiple-boxcar C-130s (also in Arkansas at the Little Rock
Air Force Base) heavy hauling imperial weapons including the reapers, the
military Commands for every part of the planet, and a military budget equal to
all the other major countries combined. Permanent world control and wars are their patriotic
world view. We must not only speak to
the people and to our representatives, which so far has failed to stop the
growth of militarism and empire, but we must employ direct action.
What might you and I do to actively oppose
this militarism and empire? Join the
Conversion Campaign to redirect the military budget to civilian needs. Push our Guard to return to its true service
for human beings, caring and nurturing life, instead of frightening and
destroying it.
We can learn how to advocate and produce these
familiar peaceful goals effectively. See
OMNI’s many newsletters on drones, anti-war, individual US wars, the
military-industrial complex, imperialism, the US security state (http://jamesrichardbennett.blogspot.com/
).
Join one or more of the anti-war,
anti-empire organizations of your choice.
Identify the Congress men and
women who are trying to contain and reverse the waste of our money and natural
resources and immeasurably increasing global violence by endless war.
And remember, the growing militarism and
imperialism of this country since the beginning of WWII will only be increased
by the dire consequences of climate change, unless we stop its growth now. Our response to climate change should be the
conversion from causing more victims to caring for the victims.
OBAMA, DRONE
WARFARE, EXTRAJUDICIAL KILLING, Google Search, Feb. 20, 2015, Page One
www.theguardian.com › Opinion ›
Drones
The Guardian
Jun 11, 2012 - Michael Boyle: Executive privilege has seduced the president
into a reckless 'kill first, ask questions later' policy that
explodes the US ...
www.theguardian.com › Opinion ›
Drones
The Guardian
Feb 17, 2014 - Obama's itchy trigger finger on drone strikes:
what happened to due process? .... admits to killing four Americans as part of
its war on (or is it “war of”?) .... The extrajudicial
killing of an American citizen seemed to him to be ...
www.cfr.org › Counterterrorism
Council on Foreign Relations
Since assuming office in 2009, President Barack Obama's administration
has ... The primary focus of U.S. targeted killings, particularly
through drone strikes, has ... Philip Alston, the former UN
special rapporteur on extrajudicial, summary, ...
www.commondreams.org/.../obamas-dron...Common
Dreams NewsCenter
Jun 11, 2012 - Obama's Drone Wars and the Normalization of Extrajudicial Murder.
Executive privilege has seduced the president into a reckless 'kill first,
ask ...
www.commondreams.org/.../us-forced-rele...Common
Dreams NewsCenter
Jun 23, 2014 - US Forced to Release Memo on Extrajudicial Drone Killing of
US Citizen ... the Bush and Obama administrations to authorize
ongoing war and ...
www.thebureauinvestigates.com/.../dr...
Bureau of Investigative
Journalism
Drone Warfare. The evolving international use of armed drones. More ...
The monthly updates from the Bureau on the covert war. ... Almost 2,500
now killed by covert US drone strikes since Obama inauguration
six years ago: The Bureau's ...
www.foxnews.com/.../obama-drone-warfare-legal-wa...Fox News
Channel
Apr 24, 2014 - “Extra-judicial killing” is a targeted killing of
a victim by someone in the executive branch without due process. The president
wanted the latter, ...
www.slate.com/.../did_obama_s_drone_war_help_cause_yemen_s_...
Slate
Jan 27, 2015 - A U.S. drone strike hit a vehicle in central
Yemen on Monday, killing three ... of a U.S. citizen being targeted for extrajudicial
killing overseas.
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Targeted_killing
Wikipedia
Jump to Obama Administration
position on combat drones - While noting that a moredetailed
... of the U.S. Senate Judiciary committee, Patrick ... Obama defended
the use of drones as just ... targeted killings would
not be a war ...
readersupportednews.org/.../16209-extrajudicial-killings-through-drones
Feb 25, 2013 - ... the US President Barack Obama has broken
all the record of human rights by extrajudicial killings of
the innocent ... attacks, openly admitted that 4,700 people have been killed by
the raids of America's secretive drone war.
|
COMMON DREAMS News & Views | 3.16.15
|
RICHARD WHITTLE, PREDATOR:
THE SECRET ORIGINS OF THE DRONE REVOLUTION.
Henry Holt, 2014. Reviewed by
Howard Schneider in The Humanist March/April
2015)..
thehumanist.com/.../predator-the-secret-origins-of-the-drone-revolution
Book Review by Howard
Schneider • 17 February 2015 ... I can only offer a partial summary of Predator because
the author provides a (adeptly rendered) ...
Comment on review by Dick Bennett:
When I finished reading
this review I thought I had accidentally picked up the Air Force Magazine. Schneider’s
enthusiasm for Whittle’s enthusiasm for drones is unbounded, as though he were
talking about a new automobile technology or weight-loss techno-fix. A moral problem in extrajudicial killing
directly ordered by the President?
Whittle/Schneider dismiss the denunciation by the UN’s Special
Rapporteur on Extrajudicial, Summary, or Arbitrary Executions by quoting
President Bush’s 2001 CIA Memorandum of Notification modifying Pres. Reagan’s
ban on assassinations, and by Pres. Obama’s defense of legality of drones, and
he puts aside the Bill of Rights and established principles and practices of
criminal law with these words: “I think
that Obama’s policy is judicious, and about as civilized as it is possible to
be in this ghastly conflict.”
Furthermore, he thinks his comparison of drones to “other long-range
missiles, artillery, and bombers” absolves drones of their terror, when in fact
he reveals how unthoughtful he is about the killing machines of modern
war. But Schneider’s most damning
revelation of his childlike morality is this statement: “At the very least, opponents of the use of
the Predator ought to know that Whittle offers ample proof that the moral and
legal issues raised by its use have been earnestly contemplated and debated in
the Pentagon and CIA.” Atrocities are
now ethical so long as they have been sincerely discussed in advance? Like those who praise Clint Eastwood’s
glorification of a US sniper, Whittle and Schneider are dazed by permanent war?
What is this review doing in The Humanist?
Drones and Targeted Killing:
Legal, Moral and Geopolitical Issues, edited by Marjorie Cohn;
foreword by Archbishop Desmond Tutu.
2015.
“This book provides much-needed analysis of why America’s
targeted killing program is illegal, immoral, and unwise.”
—from the foreword by Archbishop Desmond Tutu
EXPERT ANALYSIS OF AN ILLEGAL AND IMMORAL PRACTICE
The Bush administration detained and tortured suspected
terrorists; the Obama administration assassinates them. Assassination, or
targeted killing, off the battlefield not only causes more resentment against
the United States, it is also illegal. In this interdisciplinary collection,
human rights and political activists, policy analysts, lawyers and legal
scholars, a philosopher, a journalist and a sociologist examine different
aspects of the U.S. policy of targeted killing with drones and other methods.
It explores the legality, morality and geopolitical considerations of targeted
killing and resulting civilian casualties, and evaluates the impact on
relations between the United States and affected countries.
The book includes the documentation of civilian casualties by the leading non-governmental organization in
this area; stories of civilians victimized by drones; an analysis of the first
U.S. targeted killing lawsuit by the
lawyer who brought the case; a discussion of the targeted killing cases in
Israel by the director of PCATI which filed one of the lawsuits; the domestic
use of drones; and the immorality of
drones using Just War principles.
Contributors include: Archbishop Desmond Tutu, Phyllis Bennis,
Medea Benjamin, Marjorie Cohn, Richard Falk, Tom Hayden, Pardiss Kebriaei, Jane
Mayer, Ishai Menuchin, Jeanne Mirer, John Quigley, Dr. Tom Reifer, Alice Ross,
Jay Stanley, and Harry Van der Linden.
Marjorie Cohn is a professor at Thomas
Jefferson School of Law in San Diego, former president of the National Lawyers
Guild, and deputy secretary general of the International Association of
Democratic Lawyers. Her books include Cowboy
Republic: Six Ways the Bush Gang Has Defied the Law; Rules of Disengagement:
The Politics and Honor of Military Dissent (with Kathleen Gilberd); and the
edited volume, The United States and
Torture: Interrogation, Incarceration and Abuse. Cohn is a recipient of the
Peace Scholar of the Year Award from the Peace and Justice Studies Association.
She testified before Congress about the Bush torture policy.
Olive Branch Press
More Reviews
“Very important book… In a few months we will commemorate the
800th anniversary of Magna Carta, which, despite the limits of the day,
established the founding principle of modern law: presumption of
innocence. Today that principle has been
rescinded. Guilty verdicts are no longer to be rendered by a jury of peers, but
by a White House session deciding who we are going to kill today—along with
whatever unfortunates happen to be in the vicinity of the drone attack. As these valuable essays show, Obama’s global
terror campaign is a menace to the world, and Americans are not likely to
escape unscathed.”
—Noam Chomsky
“Armed unmanned drones have radically reduced the practical
constraints on the use of force, and in so doing present challenging legal,
political and moral issues. This
hard-hitting collection offers multiple critiques of drone targeting, raising –
if not resolving -- many of the questions that must be asked as nations
increasingly develop and deploy unarmed drones as a security tool.”
—David Cole, Georgetown University Law Center
“Just weeks before 9/11, U.S. Ambassador to Israel, Martin
Indyk, told the Israelis: ‘The United States government is very clearly on the
record as against targeted assassinations.
They are extrajudicial killings, and we do not support that.’ This
extraordinary collection shows how two presidents abandoned that principled
stand and, more importantly, the need to reclaim it.”
—Mary Ellen O'Connell, Professor of Law, University of Notre
Dame
“Cogent and powerful… this book is a rapid-fire attack on the US
policy of targeted assassination by drone or other means… Most importantly it
is a reasoned and legalistic addition to the demand that this policy end now
and forever.”
—Ron Jacobs, Counterpunch
“Marjorie Cohn’s new book Drones
and Targeted Killing: Legal Moral and Geopolitical Issues makes the
unanswerable case that targeted killing, off the battlefield, is illegal and
unjustifiable… I wholeheartedly commend this book.”
—Richard Harvey, Socialist Lawyer
Marjorie Cohn - A
member of the board of the Vietnam Agent Orange Relief and Responsibility
Campaign, she has testified in military court-martial proceedings as an expert
witness regarding the legality of war, duty to obey lawful orders and duty to
disobey unlawful orders. She has authored and edited several books, most
recently Drones and Targeted Killing:
Legal, Moral, and Geopolitical Issues (2015). She graduated from
Stanford and Santa Clara Law School
In These Times (March
14, 2015).
The drone war is in crisis, and not because civilians are dying or the
right to wage it is in question in Washington.
BY PRATAP CHATTERJEE
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Friday,
March 13, 2015
Click the image above to view video
Last week, over 50
members of Veterans For Peace traveled to Creech Air Force Base, home of the
CIA drone program, to “Shut Down Creech!” The national mobilization
incorporated daily peace vigils, teach-ins, direct action training, art
builds, and civil disobedience. VFP Board Member and Vietnam
Continuous Objector, Gerry Condon, wrote the message reaching
out to drone operators and support personnel. Members of Veterans For Peace
delivered roughly 50 letters to airmen (and women) who were exiting/entering
the base during the week. On Friday, VFP members marched to the base entrance
shouting a "no drones" cadence. Both entrances to the base where
shut down for about an hour as protesters blocked the gates. Col. Ann Wright read the message over the
bullhorn to military police and base personnel. Ten (10) VFP members
were arrested for crossing the white line outside the base entrance.
For more Creech videos,
articles, etc, click here
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CONTACT PRESIDENT OBAMA
Write or Call the White House
President
Obama is committed to creating the most open and accessible administration in
American history. That begins with taking comments and questions from you, the
public, through our website.
Call the President
PHONE NUMBERS
Comments:
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Comments:
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Office: 202-456-2121
Write a letter to the President
Here
are a few simple things you can do to make sure your message gets to the White
House as quickly as possible.
1. If
possible, email us! This is the fastest way to get your message to
President Obama.
2. If you write a letter, please consider typing it on an 8 1/2 by 11 inch sheet of paper. If you hand-write your letter, please consider using pen and writing as neatly as possible.
3. Please include your return address on your letter as well as your envelope. If you have an email address, please consider including that as well.
4. And finally, be sure to include the full address of the White House to make sure your message gets to us as quickly and directly as possible:
2. If you write a letter, please consider typing it on an 8 1/2 by 11 inch sheet of paper. If you hand-write your letter, please consider using pen and writing as neatly as possible.
3. Please include your return address on your letter as well as your envelope. If you have an email address, please consider including that as well.
4. And finally, be sure to include the full address of the White House to make sure your message gets to us as quickly and directly as possible:
The White House
1600 Pennsylvania Avenue NW
Washington, DC 20500
1600 Pennsylvania Avenue NW
Washington, DC 20500
Contents
Drone/Assassination/Extra-Judicial Murder Newsletter #15
US Drone Warfare
PBS NOVA, “Rise of the Drones” a Pro-Drones History
Bureau of Investigative Journalism (UK), Tracking the Covert Drone War
Democracy Now!, US Drone Warfare Expanding to Niger
Can’t Find Enough “Pilots”
Campaign to End Drone Warfare
Kathy Kelly,
Arrested and Sentenced for Opposition
Google Search: Only a Part of Kelly’s International Presence for Mercy
and
Peace
Peace
Erica Brock, “An Opportunity to
Rejoice,” Story of Mark Colville’s Protests and
Arrest at Hancock Field Air National Guard Base
Arrest at Hancock Field Air National Guard Base
VFP Protest at Creech AFB
Compassion for Child Drone Victim in
Yemen
Jenna Krajeski’s Review of 5 Books
Recent 2015 OMNI Newsletter Contexts
for US Drone Warfare: It’s the War
Department
Department
Contact President Obama
END DRONE NEWSLETTER #16
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