{"id":65812,"date":"2015-11-02T12:00:25","date_gmt":"2015-11-02T12:00:25","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/?p=65812"},"modified":"2015-10-31T19:25:55","modified_gmt":"2015-10-31T19:25:55","slug":"they-dont-care-who-gets-killed-ex-us-drone-pilot-turned-whistleblower","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/2015\/11\/they-dont-care-who-gets-killed-ex-us-drone-pilot-turned-whistleblower\/","title":{"rendered":"‘They Don’t Care Who Gets Killed’: Ex-US Drone Pilot Turned Whistleblower"},"content":{"rendered":"

17 Oct 2015 – <\/em>Guilt-ridden American drone pilots continue to quit in unprecedented numbers. One former secret mission operator, Brandon Bryant, who\u2019s received a whistleblower award, spoke to RT of the horrors of indiscriminate killing from a safe distance.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe people that are giving the order to kill \u2013 they don\u2019t care who gets killed as long as their target gets attacked\u2026 they\u2019ll take out however many people they can in order to get their results,\u201d<\/em> Bryant says.<\/p>\n

The former pilot received the German Whistleblower Award for revealing details of operations taking place at the Ramstein base, specifically, its role in transferring information between the US and its CIA missions in North Africa, Afghanistan and the Middle East. He was among the first to bring into question the role the base was playing.<\/p>\n

https:\/\/twitter.com\/RT_com\/status\/655351676988182528\/photo\/1?ref_src=twsrc^tfw<\/p>\n

Earlier this year, Bryant spoke to RT and discussed the details of his former job. He explained that it is not about the idea of drones, but about who controls them, to what ends, and how transparent the operation is. He also mentioned about the physiological aspect of being in a virtual cockpit.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe killed people who we really didn\u2019t know who they were, and there was no oversight. And I just know that the inside of the entire program was diseased,\u201d<\/em> he said.<\/p>\n

\u201cI actually talked to a lady whose husband and brother were killed in a drone strike. I talked to her face to face, and she asked me why her husband and brother had to die\u2026 they weren\u2019t bad guys. And I just looked at her and said \u2013 \u2018I don\u2019t know\u2019\u201d<\/em>, he confessed. \u201cAnd that\u2019s not really the best thing that I can tell someone who\u2019s asking questions about why someone that they cared about was killed, and they need to know the answers.<\/em><\/p>\n

\u201cThe really true, hard answer is to say that I\u2019m sorry \u2013 a mistake happened, and I\u2019m doing everything that I can to prevent further mistakes from happening,\u201d<\/em> he added.<\/p>\n

Bryant\u2019s revelations about Ramstein ended up highlighting the existing debate and criticism in Germany and elsewhere about the human collateral damage and legality of US drone warfare. There are also questions if it is legal under the German constitution to host drones at the air base in the south west of Germany, given Bryant\u2019s revelations.<\/p>\n

The prestigious Whistleblower Award is given out biannually. Former NSA contractor Edward Snowden, who is now hiding in Russia from prosecution by the US, was a recipient of the award. Another is Chelsea Manning, who was commended for leaking documents relating to the American campaign in Iraq \u2013 something that earned her a 35-year prison sentence.<\/p>\n

\"MQ-9<\/a>

MQ-9 Reaper \u00a9 Patrick T. Fallon \/ Reuters<\/p><\/div>\n

Prosecutions of people brave enough to answer for such defiant acts have drastically increased during the Obama presidency. The current US President has pardoned fewer prisoners than any other head of state since the 19th century.<\/p>\n

As Bryant is set to receive the award, another unknown person has recently leaked information concerning the US drone program \u2013 the so-called \u2018drone papers.\u2019 The person who leaked the documents is now being hailed as \u2018the new Snowden.\u2019 Details are on The Intercept website.<\/p>\n

https:\/\/twitter.com\/RT_com\/status\/655277634893586432\/photo\/1?ref_src=twsrc^tfw<\/p>\n

One shocking fact to emerge was that a staggering 90 percent of all drone killings are not planned. Also if no evidence is found, the dead are labelled \u2018enemy killed in action.\u2019<\/p>\n

The Former MI5 agent Annie Machon expressed her disbelief at the aggressive crackdown. The drone strikes, she says, \u201care killing thousands of people. It always takes a few brave souls to speak out and take a huge risk of years of imprisonment to actually confirm what has already been known for many years and has concerned certain people, but has not caused outrage across the West. This new whistleblower knows what the risks are and still thinks that to follow their conscience is much more important.\u201d<\/em><\/p>\n

Go to Original \u2013 rt.com<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

17 Oct 2015 – Guilt-ridden American drone pilots continue to quit in unprecedented numbers. One former secret mission operator, Brandon Bryant, who\u2019s received a whistleblower award, spoke of the horrors of indiscriminate killing from a safe distance. <\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":4,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[57],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-65812","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-militarism"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/65812","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/4"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=65812"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/65812\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=65812"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=65812"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=65812"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}