Obama’s drone campaign targeted five Muslim-majority countries and violated international law.

Evidence

As the jurist Mary Ellen O’Connell, who describes the present-day drone strikes in Pakistan, Somalia, and Yemen as illegal, reminds us: “Drones launch missiles or drop bombs, the kind of weapons that may only be used lawfully in armed conflict hostilities.” The fact is that “there was no armed conflict on the territory of Pakistan because there was no intense armed fighting between organized armed groups. International law does not recognize the right to kill with battlefield weapons outside an actual armed conflict. The so-called ‘global war on terror’ is not an armed conflict.” These strikes therefore constitute grave violations of the laws of war. — Grégoire Chamayou, A Theory of the Drone, 251 (#corroborates, via linked claim)

Categorization

• corroborated: 2 independent passages support this claim
• XREF: connects to: Obama’s rhetoric masked drone strikes and mosque surveillance.; Drone strikes outside declared battlefields violate international law — Grégoire Chamayou, A Theory of the Drone, 251

Related

• Obama’s drone campaign killed civilians in five Muslim-majority countries (similarity 0.87)
• Obama’s drone strikes killed Muslims across five nations (similarity 0.87)
• Drone strikes outside declared battlefields violate international law (similarity 0.84)
• Neither law-enforcement nor laws-of-war frameworks can legally justify drone strikes (similarity 0.83)
• Drone strikes occur in countries officially at peace, not just war zones. (similarity 0.81)
• Barack Obama authorized killing US citizens abroad via drone without trial (similarity 0.80)
• Drone strikes constitute weapons of state terrorism (similarity 0.80)
• Obama’s oratory concealed continued drone strikes and mosque surveillance (similarity 0.78)

Broader Connections

• Drone strikes outside declared battlefields violate international law #corroborates (0.70) — Grégoire Chamayou, A Theory of the Drone, 251