As Andrew Rosenthal noted in yesterday’s New York Times, things seem to be heating up in Congress with respect to whether–and to what extent–the September 2001 Authorization for Use of Military Force (AUMF) needs to be updated, repealed, and/or … Read more »
Earlier today, former State Department Legal Adviser Harold Koh gave a talk at the Oxford Union, entitled “How to End the Forever War?” His remarks begin as follows:
Thank you, Mr. President and Members of the Union, for inviting me
Courtesy of The Onion, America’s Finest News Source:
Ayman Al-Zawahiri Delivers TEDTalk On Changing Face Of Terrorism
ATLANTA—Addressing attendees gathered for this week’s TEDxEvolution Conference, al-Qaeda head Ayman al-Zawahiri delivered an informative and engrossing TEDTalk on the state
Ibrahim Suleiman Adnan Adam Harun (aka Spin Ghul) is in custody in Brooklyn, facing an array of federal court charges stemming from alleged al Qaeda activities in Afghanistan, Pakistan, and Nigeria between 2001 and 2003 (including joining and training with … Read more »
We appreciate Jack’s quick and comprehensive clarification of his views—and of what the CGWW proposal we critiqued last night seeks to achieve. Like Jack, we want to start by emphasizing the many areas of agreement between us and CGWW … Read more »
In the very first days after the horrific attacks of September 11, 2001, the Bush Administration asked Congress for broad statutory authorization to use military force to “deter and pre-empt any future acts of terrorism or aggression against the United … Read more »
Further to my last post on the capture and prosecution of Sulaiman Abu Ghaith, I now want to share a few thoughts on the prosecution side of things.
The indictment has been unsealed, and is now available here. It … Read more »
Several years ago, in a prescient op-ed in the Washington Post, our colleague John Bellinger argued that the September 2001 AUMF was an increasingly poor fit for the evolving threats facing the United States. It is a theme to which … Read more »
Yesterday, the AP released an English translation of what appears to be a 2011 Al Qaeda tip sheet. (AP journalists evidently found the document in Timbuktu.) Its author, AQAP senior commander Abdullah bin Mohammed, catalogs twenty-two handy methods by … Read more »
In the President’s State of the Union Address, President Obama spent a fair amount of time on foreign policy and Lawfare-related matters. In addition to announcing his cybersecurity executive order, he discussed draw-down plans for Afghanistan, how to deal … Read more »
Amid the flurry of writing about the White Paper’s approach to “imminence” – an important conversation, to be sure – little attention has been paid to a paragraph in the White Paper that seems to establish new parameters for the … Read more »
There’s certainly a lot to say about the DOJ white paper on targeted killings, much of which has been said already (and well) by others (see Raff’s “Headlines and Commentary” post for links). At the risk of being unintentionally … Read more »
As is now familiar to everyone, rather difficult questions arise when we discuss the scope of the AUMF, the current scope of “al Qaeda,” the meaning of “associated forces,” and the circumstances under which the president may have inherent authority … Read more »
What is the United States actually doing so far, and what else reportedly is on the table?
1. So far we have agreed to provide airlift support to the French, on their dime. That is, France is going to pay … Read more »
Former UK Foreign and Commonwealth Office Legal Adviser Daniel Bethlehem has just published an important piece in the latest issue of the American Journal of International Law. The article, entitled “Self-Defense Against an Imminent or Actual Armed Attack by Nonstate … Read more »
The other day, my Brookings colleague Daniel Byman held an event entitled “Yemen and the Future of a Resurgent Al Qaeda.” One of the two panelists was Gregory Johnsen, the author of the recently-released book, The Last Refuge: … Read more »
John McLaughlin, who was Deputy Director of the CIA from 2000-2004, has a nice essay in FP on how the patterns of terrorism we face today differ from the ones that prevailed in the years after 9/11. Many of his … Read more »
The President had this to say about issues of interest to readers of the blog:
Obama: There are some things that we haven’t gotten done. I still want to close Guantanamo. We haven’t been able to get that through Congress.
I’m happy to report that I’ve recently completed drafting an article that has been much on my mind for the past few years. Beyond the Battlefield, Beyond al Qaeda: The Destabilizing Legal Architecture of Counterterrorism (Michigan Law Review, forthcoming 2013) … Read more »
The current commander of ISAF has written this op-ed in the Washington Post on the progress that is being made in Afghanistan, the collaboration between NATO and Afghan security forces, and the uptick in “green on blue” attacks. He concludes:… Read more »
U.S. Policy Toward Yemen
Speaker: John O. Brennan, Assistant to the President for Homeland Security and Counterterrorism
Presider: Margaret Warner, Senior Correspondent, “PBS NewsHour”
August 8, 2012
Council on Foreign Relations
MARGARET WARNER: So welcome, everybody. Welcome to
If you don’t already follow Gregory Johnsen’s Yemen-focused blog, you should. His most recent post, which talks about the complexities associated with attributing AQAP membership to particular persons in Yemen, is typically informative. I have long been interested in … Read more »
This morning, Paul flagged a Washington Post op-ed by Senators Coats, Rubio and Burr. The trio’s piece concerns the improper revelation of national security secrets. As one example, the authors cite the recent disruption, by the CIA and a foreign … Read more »
The Associated Press is reporting that,
Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton says U.S. cyber experts hacked al-Qaeda propaganda online in Yemen, changing ads that bragged about killing Americans into ads that showed the death toll of al-Qaeda attacks against
As Bobby noted previously, Rep. Adam Smith and others are proposing amendments to this year’s NDAA that would make certain changes to the detention-related provisions implemented by last year’s NDAA. Among other things, the Smith Amendment would effectively prohibit the … Read more »
Yesterday I posted a lengthy response to Gabor Rona’s critique of the Brennan speech, and Gabor has now replied to my comments. Alas, we seem to be speaking past one another in various ways (for example, I critiqued what I … Read more »
Very glad to have joined the Lawfare team. I look forward to more sustained blogging once the spring grading season is over. For now, I’ll offer just a quick thought on the speech John Brennan delivered yesterday, and on the … Read more »
John Brennan’s speech yesterday was important for at least three reasons: (1) it marked the first official White House acknowledgment that “the United States Government conducts targeted strikes against specific al-Qa’ida terrorists, sometimes using remotely piloted aircraft, often referred to … Read more »
THE WHITE HOUSE
Office of the Press Secretary
______________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________
EMBARGOED UNTIL DELIVERY
April 30, 2012
Remarks of John O. Brennan – As Prepared for Delivery
Assistant to the President for Homeland Security and Counterterrorism
Woodrow Wilson International Center for … Read more »
Last October, I wrote an op-ed in the Washington Post entitled “Will Drone Strikes Become Obama’s Guantanamo?” in which I said that “the administration needs to work harder to explain and defend its use of drones as lawful … Read more »
Is al Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula (AQAP) so distinct from the original al Qaeda network (“core al Qaeda”) that the use of force against AQAP cannot be justified, as a matter of U.S. domestic law, under the 9/18/01 AUMF? … Read more »
Ken and Ben have recently commented on the national security speeches of Obama Administration officials, including most recently the remarks of CIA General Counsel Stephen Preston. As a former Bush Administration official who would like to encourage more bipartisanship on … Read more »
Robin Simcox, a research fellow at the Henry Jackson Society in London, writes in about the continued need for control orders in the UK and why the criminal justice system will never be entirely satisfactory in dealing with international terrorism. … Read more »
Amanda Jacobsen, a lawyer for Abu Zubaydah, has this oped in the Washington Post complaining that her client–and the government officials responsible for his detention and interrogation–have never faced charges: “We must ask why no charges have been brought against … Read more »
I had no idea when I wrote this post last night about ConText that I would awaken this morning to this incredible story by my former colleague David Ignatius about a cache of soon-to-be-released communications from Osama Bin Laden. Ignatius … Read more »
Last month, Charlie Savage of the New York Times ran this story about an Afghan detainee at Guantanamo Bay by the name of Obaydullah–whose lawyers have made up this handy fact sheet. As Ben earlier wrote, Obaydullah lost … Read more »
Counterstrike: The Untold Story of America’s Secret Campaign Against Al Qaeda explores the emergence of new strategic thinking in American counter-terrorism. Eric Schmitt and Thom Shanker are two consummate national security reporters at the New York Times and their … Read more »
Opinion here. Commentary later, hopefully.
With Anwar al-Awlaki dead, one hears relatively little these days regarding the progress of events in Yemen in relation to AQAP and U.S. involvement there. Which is remarkable, because some very interesting and important things have been happening against the … Read more »
What an interesting day for the question of how to address cases involving participation in the insurgency in Iraq.
Earlier today we learned that Ali Musa Daqduq, the last American military detainee in Iraq (who is believed to have orchestrated … Read more »
Section 1022 of the Conference version of the NDAA carries forward section 1032 of the Senate version, which has been widely described as a mandatory military detention provision for a subset of detainable persons who are non-citizens linked to specific … Read more »
Greg Miller of the Washington Post has an important story this morning addressing the possibility that the original al Qaeda network is but a drone strike or two away from eradication:
The leadership ranks of the main al-Qaeda terrorist network,
Yesterday, the New York Times reported that Samir Khan, a 25-year old U.S. citizen from North Carolina, was killed in the same drone strike that targeted Anwar al-Aulaqi. According to Foreign Policy, Khan “helped create the media architecture of … Read more »
Here is the prepared text, released by the White House, of John Brennan’s speech at the Harvard Law School-Brookings conference now under way in Cambridge. I will post video, including of the very interesting Q&A, as soon as I can:… Read more »
With a few moments to go before the HLS-Brookings Program on Law & Security’s inaugural event begins, I wanted to briefly introduce myself to the Lawfare community. As Ben mentioned in an earlier post, I’m Keith Gerver, a recent graduate … Read more »
Stepping out of his persona as a Guantanamo habeas lawyer, David Remes writes in with the following comments in response to my recent post on fears that Al Qaeda of the Arabian Peninsula is working on refining ricin:
Last Saturday,
Al Qaeda of the Arabian Peninsula is working on a ricin attack:
WASHINGTON — American counterterrorism officials are increasingly concerned that the most dangerous regional arm of Al Qaeda is trying to produce the lethal poison ricin, to be
CNN has posted the English text of the Al Qaeda statement on Osama Bin Laden’s death. It’s worth a read. The Arabic original is available here. The statement reads:
Al-Qaeda statement calls the day “a historic day of the
The Washington Post today reports today on a new investigation by Georgetown faculty and students and the Center for Public Integrity about the murder of Daniel Pearl. The investigation produced a lengthy report concluding, among other things, that Khalid Sheikh … Read more »
Monday, May 20, 2013
As Jack posted yesterday—and as everyone is buzzing about—President Obama will give a major counterterrorism speech on Thursday at the National Defense University. The Wall Street Journal, CNN, and Politico all report on the talk, and subjects that the President will likely address.
Speaking of Jack, he noted another of today’s big stories: the Washington Post’s piece on the FBI’s search, a few years… Read more »
