The Power to Assassinate

Even by this deferential metric, however, the Soleimani strike raises serious questions. While we don’t know the exact domestic legal argument that the Trump administration is relying on, the decision to kill Soleimani pushes against certain aspects of how the president’s authority to use military force—both constitutional and statutory—have been construed in the past. This does not mean that these arguments were legally unavailable to the Trump administration or that its actions were unlawful. But it does mean that these actions’ legitimacy may be more vulnerable to criticism, which may in turn encourage new efforts to check his authority through the legislative and political processes.
Did the President Have the Domestic Legal Authority to Kill Qassem Soleimani?

Should the president have the power to assassinate?

I keep thinking about the Saudi assassination of Khashoggi and Trump's response.

btw, I don't even believe in capital punishment.

Khashoggi was never a classic dissident: In fact, he’d served as the editor of government-backed newspapers and as a media adviser to members of the royal family. But when he criticized Trump shortly after the 2016 US presidential election, the Saudi government banned Khashoggi from writing and speaking publicly.
Jamal Khashoggi’s Murder Shook Everyone—Except Trump

Huh?

define assassinate

Nakosis said:

Should the president have the power to assassinate?

I keep thinking about the Saudi assassination of Khashoggi and Trump's response.

btw, I don't even believe in capital punishment.

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No. I do not believe a president can do whatever he thinks when it comes to assassinating top officials of another government. If it affects the national interest on the level of starting a war, then the people need to have a voice on the matter through their elected officials in a system of checks and balances.

What I fear with Trump, is now he has tasted blood. "I ordered him killed", to add to his list of insatiable power-ego cravings. He can use his office with impunity to blackmail foreign leaders to malign his political opponents publicly for him, now he can kill his way through as way of exerting power in dealing with governments of other countries. Killing his political rivals, may not be too many years in the making, given the lack of balls of anyone in the Republican party to reign him in with the law. It's all green-lights for him now. Goodbye America, as you know it.

Mestemia said:

define assassinate

Click to expand...

as·sas·si·nate
/əˈsasnˌāt/
verb
murder (an important person) in a surprise attack for political or religious reasons.
"the organization's leader had been assassinated four months before the coup"

mur·der
/ˈmərdər/
noun
the unlawful premeditated killing of one human being by another.
"the stabbing murder of an off-Broadway producer"
verb
kill (someone) unlawfully and with premeditation.
"somebody tried to murder Joe"

I suppose if it is done by the president, it's not unlawful? Again, back to the legal standing...

Nakosis said:

Should the president have the power to assassinate?

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Legally, no idea.

But in practical terms, assassination is not an effective tool for regime change. If you assassinate one person, even if they are an important figure, there is an entire bureaucracy of people ready to take their place. This idea that a state, party or organisation, lives and dies based on it's leading figures assumes they are inherently weak to begin with, which is not always the case. Killing Bin Laden hasn't got rid of Al Qaeda for example.

Assassination may only be effective as a tool for disruption in the chain-of-command. It can cause a certain level of chaos. In the Cold War, I believe there was an assumption that neither the USA nor the Soviet Union would target the leadership because if something happened, these would be the only people who could de-escalate the situation and actually control events and bring them to a halt. In the interests of maintaining stability and keeping events within certain predictable boundaries, states have an interest in not screwing up their enemies command structure (unless they are absolutely desperate).

I'm not so much arguing against whether a President can assassinate an individual, but that assassination even as a weapon of terrorist organisations is generally ineffective. It is one small incident affecting a handful of individuals in a much wider historical context and set of organisation and power structures. It will not generally have a decisive effect on a military engagement or an arms race between nations.

It's a really, really bad idea to assassinate someone because you can't control the consequences of the event itself. It is sheer adventurism based on a wildly in-deterministic view of history that over-estimates the significance of individuals in changing the historical process by their decision-making. Assassination could act as a tipping point but only if the forces for a change already exist and are already in motion.

Nakosis said:

Should the president have the power to assassinate?

I keep thinking about the Saudi assassination of Khashoggi and Trump's response.

Click to expand...

Should Putin have the power to assassinate (as he's done)? Should XI have the power to assassinate?

"What goes around, comes around".

Nakosis said:

as·sas·si·nate
/əˈsasnˌāt/
verb
murder (an important person) in a surprise attack for political or religious reasons.
"the organization's leader had been assassinated four months before the coup"

mur·der
/ˈmərdər/
noun
the unlawful premeditated killing of one human being by another.
"the stabbing murder of an off-Broadway producer"
verb
kill (someone) unlawfully and with premeditation.
"somebody tried to murder Joe"

I suppose if it is done by the president, it's not unlawful? Again, back to the legal standing...

Click to expand...

Now that we a basis for comparison...
It has not been shown yet whether Trump has "assassinated" any one.
Unless you are wanting to ignore that "illegally" part of the definition YOU provided.

As to the OP, if the President is allowed to illegally kill, then by the very definition of the word it is NOT an assassination.

If semantics is not what you were looking to debate, you should reword your OP to reflect that.

sun rise said:

"What goes around, comes around".

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That's what I was going to say.

according to an article from the BBC:

What does the law say?
The relevant law in the UN Charter allows for a state to act in self-defence "if an armed attack occurs".

But this definition tends to be interpreted by governments, say legal experts.

"In the Soleimani case, the US is claiming it acted in self-defence to prevent imminent attacks, a category of action which, if in fact true, is generally seen as being permissible under the UN Charter," says Dapo Akande, professor of public international law at Oxford University and co-director of the Oxford Institute for Ethics, Law and Armed Conflict (ELAC).

But Agnes Callamard, UN special rapporteur on extra-judicial killings. has tweeted about the strike saying "this test is unlikely to be met".

A 2010 UN report on "targeted killings" said there was a weighty body of scholarship that viewed the self-defence argument as having the right to use force "against a real and imminent threat when the necessity of that self-defence is instant, overwhelming, and leaving no choice of means, and no moment of deliberation."

Source: What does the law say about Soleimani's assassination?

Reading your article, it seems like he could just bypass the article II stuff by going with the AUMF policy, which I suppose were the bush war powers for which he secured a more broad and free kind of authorization? And then, although there was the bit about the gerald ford stance on assassination, what use is that if it since the new executive can just rescind it , I don't get the point of it

Killing a t

Nakosis said:

Even by this deferential metric, however, the Soleimani strike raises serious questions. While we don’t know the exact domestic legal argument that the Trump administration is relying on, the decision to kill Soleimani pushes against certain aspects of how the president’s authority to use military force—both constitutional and statutory—have been construed in the past. This does not mean that these arguments were legally unavailable to the Trump administration or that its actions were unlawful. But it does mean that these actions’ legitimacy may be more vulnerable to criticism, which may in turn encourage new efforts to check his authority through the legislative and political processes.
Did the President Have the Domestic Legal Authority to Kill Qassem Soleimani?

Should the president have the power to assassinate?

I keep thinking about the Saudi assassination of Khashoggi and Trump's response.

btw, I don't even believe in capital punishment.

Click to expand...

The target was a declared terrorist who was on the soil of a foreign nation where he planned and orchestrated an attack on the US embassy.

Yes, the President has the legal authority to order the killing of a terrorist.

What do you mean by the power to assassinate ? Anyone he chooses ? His mother in law, who ?

Khashoggi was a saudi citizen on saudi soil ( their embassy) under the rule of the saudi royal family.

The Saudis kill their own citizens all the time. It is part of the fabric of their religion. What would you have Trump do ?

By law, the President may order the death of someone who meets certain thresholds prescribed by law.

shmogie said:

By law, the President may order the death of someone who meets certain thresholds prescribed by law.

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Where is that written? Doesn't seem to be part of the Constitution.

Nakosis said:

Even by this deferential metric, however, the Soleimani strike raises serious questions. While we don’t know the exact domestic legal argument that the Trump administration is relying on, the decision to kill Soleimani pushes against certain aspects of how the president’s authority to use military force—both constitutional and statutory—have been construed in the past. This does not mean that these arguments were legally unavailable to the Trump administration or that its actions were unlawful. But it does mean that these actions’ legitimacy may be more vulnerable to criticism, which may in turn encourage new efforts to check his authority through the legislative and political processes.
Did the President Have the Domestic Legal Authority to Kill Qassem Soleimani?

Should the president have the power to assassinate?

I keep thinking about the Saudi assassination of Khashoggi and Trump's response.

btw, I don't even believe in capital punishment.

Click to expand...

The word assassinate has such negative connotations; I'd prefer using the term "take down of a terrorist" instead of using the word "assassinate."

Nakosis said:

Where is that written? Doesn't seem to be part of the Constitution.

Click to expand...

What has law and democracy to do with it. We're dealing with a regime that thinks laws and restrictions are meant to be ignored with followers who cheer him on. His attitude: L'état, c'est moi

I can't say when assassination is legal.
But I notice that it's always OK when we do it.
But it's always wrong when they do it.
So it's purely a matter of perspective.

Nakosis said:

Where is that written? Doesn't seem to be part of the Constitution.

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It's in the emanations of penumbras right alongside all of the other nonsense we've acceded to for the sake of convenience.

Revoltingest said:

I can't say when assassination is legal.

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Assassination is never legal as per the definition of the word.

Mestemia said:

Assassination is never legal as per the definition of the word.

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Legality is determined in the jurisdiction where the case is heard.
Thus it's a matter which depends upon perspective.

Caution:
Let no poster read this post as justifying assassination.
I addressed the general morality & legality.
I still say that Trump was wrong to do it for the reason that
it risked escalation of violence. That is the overwhelming
issue if one thinks strategically about seeking peace.

Salvador said:

The word assassinate has such negative connotations; I'd prefer using the term "take down of a terrorist" instead of using the word "assassinate."

Click to expand...

Your alternative has too many syllables.
I see your side. You just need the right word.