Obama want Congress to have access to classified drone info

WASHINGTON (AP) — President Barack Obama has directed the Justice Department to give Congress' intelligence committees access to classified legal advice providing the government's rationale for drone strikes against American citizens working with al-Qaida abroad, a senior administration official and Democratic lawmakers said Wednesday.

A drumbeat of demands to see the document has swelled on Capitol Hill in recent days as the Senate Intelligence Committee prepares to hold a confirmation hearing for John Brennan, who helped manage the drone program, to be CIA director.

Those demands were only intensified by the leak this week of an unclassified "white paper" on how decisions are made to target U.S. citizens abroad that the Justice Department confidentially sent to key lawmakers last year. The unclassified memo says it is legal for the government to kill U.S. citizens abroad if it believes they are senior al-Qaida leaders continually engaged in operations aimed at killing Americans, even if there is no evidence of a specific imminent attack.

The senior official said Obama decided to send lawmakers the classified rationale on Wednesday as part of his "commitment to consult with Congress on national security matters." Obama directed the Justice Department provide the Senate and House intelligence committees access to classified advice from its Office of Legal Counsel that the white paper is based on, the official said.

Legal opinions produced by the legal counsel's office are interpretations of federal law that are binding on all executive branch agencies.

The administration official spoke on condition of anonymity because he was not authorized to discuss the matter by name.

Earlier Wednesday, White House spokesman Jay Carney said Obama was engaged in an internal process deliberation to determine how to balance the nation's security needs with its values. He said Obama was committed to providing more information to Congress, even as he refused to acknowledge whether the drone memo even existed.

"He thinks that it is legitimate to ask questions about how we prosecute the war against al-Qaida," Carney said. "These are questions that will be with us long after he is president and long after the people who are in the seats that they're in now have left the scene."

Eleven senators, including Democrat Ron Wyden of Oregon, called on Obama to provide lawmakers "any and all legal opinions" that outline the president's authority to use legal force against Americans.

Wyden, a member of the Senate Intelligence Committee, told The Associated Press that Obama called him Wednesday evening to alert him to the decision to release the legal opinions. The president pledged to launch a "very extensive" public discussion on the government's ability to target Americans abroad, Wyden said.

"This is an encouraging first step," Wyden said. "There is now an opportunity to build on it."

Sen. Dianne Feinstein, D-Calif., committee's chairman, said in a statement that the legal opinion would be provided to her committee by Thursday morning. The confirmation hearing will be held Thursday afternoon.

Justice's unclassified 16-page white paper says that it is lawful to target al-Qaida linked U.S. citizens if they pose an "imminent" threat of violent attack against Americans and that delaying action against such people would create an unacceptably high risk. Such circumstances may necessitate expanding the concept of imminent threat, the memo says.

"The threat posed by al-Qaida and its associated forces demands a broader concept of imminence in judging when a person continually planning terror attacks presents an imminent threat," the document added.

READ THE REST OF THE STORY HERE

Iran releases "RQ-170" video recovered from downed stealth drone.

Editors note: Although the video looks authentic showing what looks like the RQ-170 landing at a forward American base (complete with temporary US military pre-fab hangars and a SOF C-130 ) it doesn't necessarily mean Iran has the capability to un-encrypt video feeds or the video stored on board the drone.

The footage shows video during the landing cycle (local radio-controlled link) and not the video usually uplinked via military satellite, which is encrypted. 

 None the less - it does show that Iran is making considerable strides (probably with help from China) dissecting data found on the almost completely intact RQ-170 drone and highlights severe vulnerabilities which are most likely being addressed in future UAV designs.

 How about building in a self-destruct mechanism guys!








Note the addition of a dramatic sound track and stock  footage of another drone (not the RQ-170) and satellite photos (most likely Google Earth)  in this obvious propaganda video, aimed at sticking a thumb in the eye of the Pentagon.

UPDATE: I was able to match up a video still with a Google Earth image of Kandahar Air Base:

VIDEO STILL showing temporary drone shelters, Predator Drone (far left) and what looks like an Avenger  Predator (C)  in the foreground. You can also see the antenna array for (local) control of drone takeoff, landing and taxiing.

Avenger (Predator C) 

The footage also matches this video taken of drone operations at Kandahar Air Base - the shelters and buildings match. Now I just have to verify that the video is not footage from another type of drone.
  

North Korea "may" be preparing for double nuke test

The Telegraph:

By Julian Ryall, Tokyo

Analysis of recent satellite images has shown new activity on the southern edge of the Punggye-ri nuclear test site, while preparations at a second tunnel to the west were apparently completed earlier, a South Korean government source told the Chosun Ilbo newspaper.

The paper quoted a military official as saying, "There is a chance that the southern tunnel is a decoy, but we are not ruling out that the regime will conduct nuclear tests simultaneously at both tunnels."

There is a widespread belief that North Korea will go ahead with what would be its third nuclear test in the near future, with the regime still angrily denouncing criticism by the United Nations Security Council for the launch in December of what Pyongyang claims was a rocket to put a satellite into orbit.

That protestation has been undermined by North Korea putting on display in Pyongyang a section of fuselage from an identical vehicle and labelling it as a ballistic missile.

READ THE REST OF THE STORY HERE

Obama wants power to kill American citizens with drones

By Michael Isikoff 

National Investigative Correspondent, NBC News

A confidential Justice Department memo concludes that the U.S. government can order the killing of American citizens if they are believed to be “senior operational leaders” of al-Qaida or “an associated force” -- even if there is no intelligence indicating they are engaged in an active plot to attack the U.S.

The 16-page memo, a copy of which was obtained by NBC News, provides new details about the legal reasoning behind one of the Obama administration’s most secretive and controversial polices: its dramatically increased use of drone strikes against al-Qaida suspects, including those aimed at American citizens, such as the  September 2011 strike in Yemen that killed alleged al-Qaida operatives Anwar al-Awlaki and Samir Khan. Both were U.S. citizens who had never been indicted by the U.S. government nor charged with any crimes.  

The secrecy surrounding such strikes is fast emerging as a central issue in this week’s hearing of White House counterterrorism adviser John Brennan, a key architect of the drone campaign, to be CIA director.  Brennan was the first administration official to publicly acknowledge drone strikes in a speech last year, calling them “consistent with the inherent right of self-defense.” In a separate talk at the Northwestern University Law School in March, Attorney General Eric Holder specifically endorsed the constitutionality of targeted killings of Americans, saying they could be justified if government officials determine the target poses  “an imminent threat of violent attack.”

But the confidential Justice Department “white paper” introduces a more expansive definition of self-defense or imminent attack than described  by Brennan or Holder in their public speeches.  It refers, for example, to what it calls a “broader concept of imminence” than actual intelligence about any ongoing plot against the U.S. homeland.    

“The condition that an operational  leader present an ‘imminent’ threat of violent attack against the United States does not require the United States to have clear evidence that a specific attack on U.S. persons and interests will take place in the immediate future,” the memo states.

Read the entire 'white paper' on drone strikes on Americans

Instead, it says,  an “informed, high-level” official of the U.S. government may determine that the targeted American  has been “recently” involved in “activities” posing a threat of a violent attack and “there is  no evidence suggesting that he has renounced or abandoned such activities.” The memo does not define “recently” or “activities.” 

As in Holder’s speech, the confidential memo lays out a three-part test that would make targeted killings of American lawful:  In addition to the suspect being an imminent threat, capture of the target must be “infeasible, and the strike must be conducted according to “law of war principles.” But the memo elaborates on some of these factors in ways that go beyond what the attorney general said publicly. For example, it states that U.S. officials may consider whether an attempted capture of a suspect  would pose an “undue risk” to U.S. personnel involved in such an operation. If so, U.S. officials could determine that the capture operation of the targeted American would not be feasible, making it lawful for the U.S. government to order a killing instead, the memo concludes.

The undated memo is entitled “Lawfulness of a Lethal Operation Directed Against a U.S. Citizen who is a Senior Operational Leader of Al Qa’ida or An Associated Force.”  It was provided to members of the Senate Intelligence and Judiciary committees in June by administration officials on the condition that it be kept confidential and  not discussed publicly.

Although not an official legal memo, the white paper was represented by administration  officials as a policy document that closely mirrors the arguments of classified memos on targeted killings by the Justice Department’s  Office of Legal Counsel, which provides authoritative legal advice to the president and all executive branch agencies. The administration has refused to turn over to Congress or release those memos publicly -- or even publicly confirm their existence. A source with access to the white paper, which is not classified, provided a copy to NBC News. 

“This is a chilling document,” said Jameel Jaffer, deputy legal director of the ACLU, which has sued unsuccessfully in court to obtain administration memos about the targeted killing of Americans.  “Basically, it argues that the government has the right to carry out the extrajudicial killing of an American citizen. … It recognizes some limits on the authority it sets out, but the limits are elastic and vaguely defined, and it’s easy to see how they could be manipulated.”

In particular, Jaffer said, the memo “redefines the word imminence in a way that deprives the word of its ordinary meaning.”  

A Justice Department spokeswoman declined to comment on the white paper. The spokeswoman, Tracy Schmaler, instead pointed to public speeches by what she called a “parade” of administration officials, including Brennan, Holder, former State Department Legal Adviser Harold Koh and former Defense Department General Counsel Jeh Johnson that she said outlined the “legal framework” for such operations. 

Pressure for turning over the Justice Department memos on targeted killings of Americans appears to be building on Capitol Hill amid signs that Brennan will be grilled on the subject at his confirmation hearing before the Senate Intelligence Committee on Thursday. 

On Monday, a bipartisan group of 11 senators -- led by Democrat Ron Wyden of Oregon — wrote  a letter to President Barack Obama asking him to release all Justice Department memos on the subject. While accepting that “there will clearly be circumstances in which the president has the authority to use lethal force” against Americans who take up arms against the country,  it said, “It is vitally important ... for Congress and the American public to have a full understanding of how  the executive branch interprets the limits and boundaries of this authority.

READ THE REST OF THE STORY AT NBC NEWS

Iran boasts they've built stealth fighter - looks fake

Iran yesterday revealed its most recent indigenous fighter jet — the “Qaher 313″. The prototype Q-313 was presented to President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, as a ceremonial gift during the country's Ten-Day Dawn celebration. The festivities commemorate the 1979 revolution when the U.S. embassy in Tehran taken by force.

In the previous days, the Iranian Defense Minister Brigadier General Ahmad Vahidi had said, “The aircraft will be different from the other fighter jets Iran has already made.”

Indeed, based on the first photographs released by the FARS News Agency, the new stealthy jet has a peculiar design. It features hard edges and those distinctive edges and angle of the U.S. F-22 and the twin tail shape much similar to that of the F-35 Lightning II.

The Q-313 has large, seemingly fixed canards, and little wings whose external section is canted downward, while the canopy material is at least odd (based on its transparency, it looks like Plexiglas or something like that).

The cockpit seems basic (a bit too much for a modern plane – note the lack of wiring behind the front panel).

The Defence Minister, Ahmad Vahidi, said: "Qaher is a fully indigenous aircraft designed and built by our aerospace experts.

"This is a radar-evading plane that can fly at low altitude, carry weapons, engage enemy aircrafts and land at short airstrips."

He said it was Iran's best stealth plane.

However, some reports suggest Iran's program relies on equipment supplied by major international defence contractors and that it incorporates parts made abroad or uses outside engineered technologies in its domestic designs.

Pictures of the Qaher released by the official IRNA news agency and pictures on state TV showed a single-seat jet. They described it as a fighter-bomber that can combat other aircraft and ground targets.