Why can the government not officially acknowledge CIA drones are carrying out airstrikes? Coz 1984 is their playbook!

stltoday.com

NAVAL AIR STATION SIGONELLA, Italy • The U.S. government does not officially acknowledge that CIA drones are carrying out airstrikes in Pakistan, Yemen and other countries. But Defense Secretary Leon E. Panetta came closer than usual Friday.

Speaking to U.S. and other NATO troops in Italy, first in Naples and later in Sicily, Panetta twice referred to the Predator drones he controlled in his previous job as CIA director. It was a rare on-the-record confirmation of the agency’s use of the unmanned aircraft by a senior U.S. official, even though the program has become an open secret in Washington.

When officials talk about the CIA drones, they usually do so anonymously or refer simply to “counterterrorism operations.”

“Having moved from the CIA to the Pentagon, obviously I have a hell of a lot more weapons available to me in this job than I had at the CIA, although the Predators aren’t bad,” he said while addressing sailors and Marines at the U.S. Navy’s 6th Fleet headquarters in Naples.

Panetta had come to Italy for briefings on the NATO air campaign in Libya, which has made extensive use of U.S. Air Force drones. But those operations, because they are controlled by the Pentagon, are not even nominally secret.

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