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The Assassination Complex

Inside the Government's Secret Drone Warfare Program

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The Assassination Complex

By: Jeremy Scahill, The Staff of The Intercept, Glenn Greenwald, Jeremy Scahill - introduction
Narrated by: George Newbern
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About this listen

 “A searing, facts-driven indictment of America’s drone wars and their implications for US democracy and foreign policy. A must-read for concerned citizens” (Library Journal, starred review) from bestselling author Jeremy Scahill and his colleagues at the investigative website The Intercept.

Drones are a tool, not a policy. The policy is assassination. But drone strikes often kill people other than the intended target. These deaths, which have included women and children, dwarf the number of actual combatants who have been assassinated by drones. They have generated anger toward the United States among foreign populations and have even become a recruiting tool for jihadists.

The first drone strike outside a declared war zone was conducted more than twelve years ago, but it was not until May 2013 that the White House released a set of standards and procedures for conducting such strikes. However, there was no explanation of the internal process used to determine whether a suspect should be killed without being indicted or tried, even if that suspect is an American citizen. The implicit message of the Obama administration has been: Trust, but don’t verify.

The Assassination Complex reveals stunning details of the government’s secretive drone warfare program based on documents supplied by a confidential source in the intelligence community. These documents make it possible to begin the long-overdue debate about the policy of drone warfare and how it is conducted. The Assassination Complex allows us to understand at last the circumstances under which the US government grants itself the right to sentence individuals to death without the established checks and balances of arrest, trial, and appeal—“readers will be left in no doubt that drone warfare affronts morality and the Constitution” (Kirkus Reviews). Freedom & Security Military Military Science Political Science Politics & Government War & Crisis Weapons & Warfare National Security Middle East Assassin Military Policy War Africa Government Warfare Iran

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All stars
Most relevant
If you want to know how the Obama admin worked in the GWOT it's a great insigne.

It's simply a great book.

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Clear & succint account of use of drone warfare by the USA to spy on and attack supposed terrorists worldwide, especially in the middle east. Based on leaked documents & interviews with various experts, the authors build up a chilling picture of how drone operators see their work and how the whole drone programme is more of an industry than an effective way of accomplishing the declared goals of the USA. The point is well made that drone warfare serves mainly as an instigator of militancy in the communities being attacked, resulting in ever more recruits to anti American organisations like Al Quaeda. The afterword by Greenwald indites Obama as having completely betrayed the stance he took prior to his election as president.

Drone nightmare

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This is not a particularly easy read, with a multiplicity of authors and a style that that often lacks narrative clarity. Nevertheless, it's an unusually revealing insight into the way that the later-stage war on terror was conducted. Whilst giving a huge amount of very useful detail about the uses and abuses of drone warfare, the book's fundamental flaw is that it criticises without recommendation. There's no real attempt to reconcile the very valid critique offered with a counter factual narrative describing an alternative political solution. Despite this shortcoming, veering towards condemnation over constructive criticism nevertheless give readers a range of useful and interesting insights. Expect to look into the murky abuses of state power, the passive cruelty of the mechanistic bureaucracy of warfare, and the degree to which even idealistic liberals become corrupted into quasi-autocrats by the powers of high office.

Detailed but unbalanced

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