Yesterday, American drones killed Al-Qaeda's latest second-in-command, Abu Yahya al-Libi, in a village in Pakistan. Over Pakistan's protests, there have been at least seven drone strikes in Pakistani territory in the last two weeks.
Going back even further, al-Libi is the second number-two man we've killed in Pakistan in the last year, on top of a number of other high-value targets.
Say what you will about Obama's ramping-up of drone strikes since taking office, but it's my feeling that expecting the president to have absolutely zero blood on his hands is, while admirable, laughably impractical. Until such time as we achieve absolute world peace, there are going to be people the president needs to kill, and if you look at the wide variety of ways leaders have chosen to do so throughout time, drones are far and away the cleanest (and most cost-effective) we've come up with so far.
Imagine if Bush had just sent a drone after Saddam Hussein?
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