Officially U.S. government does not admit that Anwar al-Awlaki was killed in a drone attack!

The New York Times and the ACLU (American Civil Liberties Union) have been seeking to have the U.S. government release information about the (alleged!) program of targeted killings using drones. The suit has been ongoing since June 2011 and the U.S. government has repeatedly taken the position that to even affirm or deny the existence of the program would endanger national security.

This is the official position even though U.S. officials and the president have repeatedly spoken about the program indicating how successful it has been and how few civilian casualties there are.Obama even boasted about killing the Anwar al-Awlaki a U.S. citizne in Yemen. There was even a long article in the New York Times based no doubt on information deliberately leaked to paint a mostly positive portrait of the president and his kill list.

Al-Awlaki was killed by a drone attack in Yemen on Sept. 30 2011. Of the killing Obama boasted:: "The death of Awlaki marks another significant milestone in the broader effort to defeat al-Qaeda and its affiliates. Furthermore this success is a tribute to our intelligence community …"" Even though Obama said this apparently it does not imply that there even is a drone program or that Al-Awlaki was killed by a drone.. Apparently the government cannot even acknowledge what the president clearly said.

This idiocy has a rational purpose. The U.S. government can release classified information that they believe will help them politically while denying critics any information that might be disadvantageous politically. However the U.S. government does admit that it was responsible for the killing of Osama bin Laden! For more see this article.. The entire Motion For Summary Judgment presented by the U.S. government can be found here.