John Brennan—Obama’s Eminently Qualified Cold-blooded Imperialist Assassin

February 17, 2013 | Revolution Newspaper | revcom.us

 

John BrennanJohn Brennan is Barack Obama’s pick to run the department of Cold-blooded Imperialist Assassins—the CIA. He is eminently qualified—he joined the CIA in 1980 and has been neck-deep in U.S. “counter-terrorism” ever since. Here are some highlights from his recent career.

  • During the hated George W. Bush regime, Brennan was deputy executive director of the CIA and part of the team that oversaw renditions and extraordinary renditions. (Rendition is the U.S. practice of sending captives to “black sites” in foreign countries to be tortured.) In a 2005 interview on PBS Newshour, Brennan said, “I think it’s an absolutely vital tool. I have been intimately familiar now over the past decade with the cases of rendition that the U.S. government has been involved in. And I can say without a doubt that it has been very successful as far as producing intelligence that has saved lives.”

  • As one of the top CIA officials under Bush, Brennan was, as commentator Glenn Greenwald put it, “an ardent supporter of torture.”

  • In 2006, Brennan told the PBS program Frontline, “The point is the war or the campaign against terrorism can be a long one, and that the opposition, whether it be Al Qaeda, or whether it be Iraq, doesn’t play by the Marquis de Queensbury rules. Therefore, the U.S. in some areas has to take off the gloves. And I think that’s entirely appropriate.”

  • Since 2009, as Obama’s Deputy National Security Advisor for Homeland Security and Counterterrorism, Brennan has overseen Obama’s massive escalation of drone strikes in Afghanistan, Pakistan, Yemen, Somalia, and elsewhere. In an April 2012 speech, Brennan said, “First, these targeted strikes are legal ... Second, targeted strikes are ethical ... [and] Targeted strikes are wise.”

  • He brings Obama the “kill list” every week on “Terror Tuesday”—when Obama goes over the list and decides who lives and who dies.

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