1.  Situations in which there is an “imminent threat” to our national security and safety.  Our response to kill the people posing the threat is based on the laws of self defense.

I agree with Mr. Krauthammer.  The idea of self defense is so ingrained in all people that this situation provides an obvious use for drones.  Still, there should be some criteria established—before the drones are used—defining what actions constitute an “imminent threat.”

2.  He also justifies the use of drones in situations of a “mutual state of war.”  We are in such a state of war now with Al-Qaeda, since they vowed years ago to kill Americans.  We can use drones to kill these terrorists who are at war with out country.

I have some questions about this:

a.  What is defined as a “mutual state of war?”  Just because some representatives of Al Qaeda make statements about “destroying the west,” can we still call this a “state of war?”  How do we know they speak for anyone but themselves?  Exactly which members of Al Qaeda are “at war” with us?  All of them?

b.  How can we identify the enemy?  Mr. Krauthammer references WWII enemies and our unrestricted bombing of military and civilian targets.  But in WWII, the enemy and it’s real estate were clearly identifiable—today individual Al Qaeda members aren’t always clealy identified and they often live in a variety of places.  No longer do we find them massed in one country, like Germany in WWII.  This leads to the problem of collateral damage . . .

c.  Collateral Damage.  The Dept. of Defense has never released data about the collateral damage inflicted on, perhaps, innocent people who have been in the vicinity of drone explosions.  Although this has become an acceptable by-product of all-out war, (Such as WWII) in the past, those civilians were members of the enemy.  Today, individual terrorists often live in civilian areas of countries—whose citizens are often allies of ours.  Although drones are some of the most accurate bombers ever used, they still make mistakes in targeting and the explosions can kill many innocent people.

d.  How would we react?  Just like the U.S. use of torture during the Iraq war—which violates the Geneva Convention on War to which we subscribe—I often wonder how we would react in the U.S. if other countries started bombing Minneapolis or Cleveland, claiming that they had a right to do so because they were targeting their enemies who were hiding in our country.  What do you think we’d do?

If we practice activities like torture or drone killings, aren’t we inviting the same kind of behavior against ourselves?  And if our cities are bombed, what moral ground do we have to stand on in opposition to such bombing?

The post Droning on about Drones appeared first on Colin T. Nelson.

In federal court in Minneapolis a jury found Mahamud Said Omar guilty of recruiting as many as 20 young Somali men to fight in Somalia.  See the good article by Allie Shah in the StarTribune: http://www.startribune.com/local/minneapolis/174834731.html  The conviction is the result of months of investigation by the FBI and the extradition of Mr. Omar from the Netherlands to stand trial here.  His conviction seems to solve the mystery of why and where over 20 young men went when they disappeared from the Twin Cities several years ago.

One by one, these young men disappeared from their schools, jobs, and homes.  When a few were able to make contact with their families here, they told a chilling story of recruitment to fight in a militia called El Shabab, in Somalia.  What happened?

When the FBI started investigating, they discovered the existence of the militia in Somalia which was fighting against the incursions of Christian forces from surrounding countries.  Apparently, the young  men were recruited to supply soldiers for El Shabab.  The trial of Mr. Omar centered on his efforts to recruit these men and send them through a secret pipeline overseas.

After working for over 30 years in the criminal justice system, here are three points that strike me as interesting:

1.  Although Mr. Omar worked for years as a janitor in a mosque, how was he able to hire not one, but three, very expensive defense lawyers?

2.  In many criminal cases, the accused is so arrogant that they become their own worst enemy.  Mr. Omar had been held in custody in the Netherlands for several months, fighting his extradition to the U.S.  In spite of the fact he knew what awaited him in the U.S. courts and the accusations against him, he still talked extensively to the FBI while in jail.  Those conversations were taped and provided some of the most damaging evidence against him during his trial.

3.  Thanks to the perseverance of several people and agents on the prosecution team, they were able to collect and assemble the evidence in an extremely complex case.  One of the toughest problems they faced was how to organize it all in order for the jury to understand the arcane and twisted trail of money and clues.  The team was successful and convinced the jury of Mr. Omar’s guilt.

I’ve followed the story of the missing young men because my first novel, Reprisal, deals with this mystery and tells the story of international terrorists who have grabbed the young men in order to start a devastating plague.  Although my novel is fiction, real events raise a troubling question that makes my book interesting

Although the conviction of Mr. Omar solves the mystery of what happened to some of the missing boys, many of them are still unaccounted for…what really happened to them and where are they now?

The post Terrorist Guilty in Minneapolis appeared first on Colin T. Nelson.

The defendant has been accused of killing a member of a strange church that might have ties to a national, violent militia group.

When Zehra’s case starts to fall apart inexplicably, she digs deeper only to find she’s caught up in the middle of an international plot to bring about a nuclear disaster.

If you live in the Twin City area, you’re welcome to come to the release party:

Thursday, May 31 from 4:30-7:00 at Magers & Quinn Booksellers located at 3038 Hennepin Ave. So. in Minneapolis.  There will be live music, free wine and food, and, of course, books for sale!  Or, check out my website for a free introduction to the new book.

Thanks to so many people who have helped and supported me in the writing of this book.  I appreciate all your efforts.

The post Fallout is Published!! appeared first on Colin T. Nelson.

Found in the remains of Egyptian mummies and all over ancient Asia and China, the virus has probably killed more people than wars, famine, and drought have done.  Epidemics in Europe during the Middle Ages affected the course of western history.  Outbreaks of small pox started the decline of the Roman Empire and, once transported to the New World, succeeded in wiping-out most of the native population.  During the early 1700’s in Europe as many as 400,000 people died annually—about the population of Minneapolis.

The war on small pox started with the practice of inoculation against the disease.  Medical practitioners brought the practice from Istanbul to Western Europe and then to the United States by the mid-1700’s.

The process involved pricking the skin of a person and infecting them with a small amount of pox.  It caused them to become slightly ill but also made them immune to the more serious disease when it struck.

During the American Revolution the Continental army attacked the British city of Quebec.  They came close to succeeding until an outbreak of small pox stopped them. The British army had been inoculated, avoided the plague, and repulsed the American’s attack for good.

Edward Jenner didn’t actually discover the vaccine used against small pox, but he was the first scientist to attempt to control an infectious disease—and he was successful.

By the 1950’s small pox had been effectively eradicated from Europe and North America, thanks to public sanitation efforts and the widespread use of the vaccine.  By 1980, after a world-wide campaign, the World Health Organization announced the official end of the disease in the world and recommended that countries cease vaccination—which meant that today no one has immunity to the disease.  (Even for those of us who received vaccine years ago, the protection has decayed.)

Everyone in the world is vulnerable.

With that scary thought in mind, I’ve written a suspense novel about terrorists who steal samples of small pox from a repository in Russia and intend to infect American school children with it—creating hundreds of “weapons of mass destruction.”  It’s called Reprisal.  It takes place in Minneapolis where several Somali boys have disappeared in the past few years.  In my book, they’ve been kidnapped to be used by the terrorists to carry small pox back into the schools and start a pandemic.

Could it happen?  What do you think our most vulnerable spot is for bio-terrorists to attack?  What should we do?

The post The Smallest Terrorist appeared first on Colin T. Nelson.

Found in the remains of Egyptian mummies and all over ancient Asia and China, the virus has probably killed more people than wars, famine, and terrorists have done.  Epidemics in Europe during the Middle Ages affected the course of western history.  Outbreaks of small pox started the decline of the Roman Empire and, once transported to the New World, succeeded in wiping-out most of the native population.  During the early 1700’s in Europe as many as 400,000 people died annually—about the population of Minneapolis.

The war on small pox started with the practice of inoculation against the disease.  Medical practitioners took the practice from Istanbul to Western Europe and then to the United States by the mid-1700’s.

The process involved pricking the skin of a person and infecting them with a small amount of pox.  It caused them to become slightly ill but also made them immune to the more serious disease when it struck.

During the American Revolution the Continental army attacked the British city of Quebec.  They came close to succeeding until an outbreak of small pox stopped them. The British army had been inoculated, avoided the plague, and repulsed the American’s attack for good.

Edward Jenner didn’t actually discover the vaccine used against small pox, but he was the first scientist to attempt to control an infectious disease—and he was successful.

By the 1950’s small pox had been effectively eradicated from Europe and North America, thanks to public sanitation efforts and the widespread use of the vaccine.  In 1980, after a world-wide campaign, the World Health Organization announced the official end of the disease in the world and recommended that countries cease vaccination—which meant that today no one has immunity to the disease.  (Even for those of us who received vaccine years ago, the protection has decayed.)

Everyone in the world is vulnerable.

With that scary thought in mind, I’ve written a suspense novel about terrorists who steal samples of small pox from a repository in Russia and intend to infect American school children with it—creating hundreds of “weapons of mass destruction.”  It’s called Reprisal.  It takes place in Minneapolis where several Somali boys have disappeared in the past few years.  In my book, they’ve been kidnapped to be used by the terrorists to carry small pox back into the schools and start a pandemic.

What really scares me—and readers also—is that the “enemy” here is something you can’t see, touch, feel, or smell…how do you defend against it?  Also, once the population learns about the spread of small pox, I think the panic will be worse than the disease itself.

Luckily, I can tell you the heroine in my book succeeds in stopping the terrorists and preventing an outbreak—at the last-minute, of course.

Check-out the book at my web site and tell me what you think.

The post Something Worse Than bin Laden appeared first on Colin T. Nelson.