Target Window -- Micah Zenko, Foreign Policy
Time for President Obama to reform drone policy.
The first time I saw what a Predator drone could do was in 2000 when I worked part-time in the Office of Policy Planning at the State Department. On the clunky desktop computer, if someone (not me, of course) was bored or curious, they could watch the full-motion video footage from the Predators hovering over the Kosovo area of Serbia, where they were monitoring the implementation of the NATO-Federal Republic of Yugoslavia and Republic of Serbia Military Technical Agreement. With its narrow field of vision provided by those early electro-optical sensors, it was like seeing a battlefield through a soda straw. However, the monotonous mission of tracking Serbian combat troop movements was ideal for a robot.
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My Comment: I would say that President Obama has already "reformed" America's drone policy by not only making it the essential component in waging war against Al Qaeda and Al Qaeda linked groups in foreign countries, but increasing drone strikes to an unprecedented level .... including the targeted killings of U.S. citizens like American cleric Anwar al-Awlaki.
Should we have this debate .... definitely .... but unfortunately no one in Washington is opening that door and .... I suspect .... no changes until the end of President Obama's term.
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