9/11 conspiracy theoriesThere are various conspiracy theories that attribute the preparation and execution of the September 11 attacks against the United States to parties other than, or in addition to, al-Qaeda. These include the theory that high-level government officials had advance knowledge of the attacks. Government investigations and independent reviews have rejected these theories. Proponents of these theories assert that there are inconsistencies in the commonly accepted version, or that there exists evidence that was ignored, concealed, or overlooked.
Presidency of Barack ObamaBarack Obama's tenure as the 44th president of the United States began with his first inauguration on January 20, 2009, and ended on January 20, 2017. A Democrat from Illinois, Obama took office following a decisive victory over Republican nominee John McCain in the 2008 presidential election. Four years later, in the 2012 presidential election, he defeated Republican nominee Mitt Romney to win re-election. Obama is the first African American president, the first multiracial president, the first non-white president, and the first president born in Hawaii.
War on terrorThe war on terror, officially the Global War on Terrorism (GWOT), is a global counterterrorism military campaign initiated by the United States following the September 11 attacks and is also the most recent global conflict spanning multiple wars. The main targets of the campaign were militant Islamist and Salafi jihadist armed organisations such as al-Qaeda, the Islamic State, and their international affiliates, which were waging military insurgencies to overthrow governments of various Muslim-majority countries.
John KerryJohn Forbes Kerry (born December 11, 1943) is an American attorney, politician and diplomat who currently serves as the first U.S. Special Presidential Envoy for Climate. A member of the Forbes family and the Democratic Party, he previously served as the 68th United States secretary of state from 2013 to 2017 in the administration of Barack Obama and represented Massachusetts in the United States Senate from 1985 to 2013. Kerry was the Democratic nominee for president of the United States in the 2004 election, losing to incumbent President George W.
Enhanced interrogation techniques"Enhanced interrogation techniques" or "enhanced interrogation" was a program of systematic torture of detainees by the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA), the Defense Intelligence Agency (DIA) and various components of the U.S. Armed Forces at remote sites around the world—including Bagram, Guantanamo Bay, Abu Ghraib, and Bucharest—authorized by officials of the George W. Bush administration.
WaterboardingWaterboarding is a form of torture in which water is poured over a cloth covering the face and breathing passages of an immobilized captive, causing the person to experience the sensation of drowning. In the most common method of waterboarding, the captive's face is covered with cloth or some other thin material and immobilized on their back at an incline of 10 to 20 degrees. Torturers pour water onto the face over the breathing passages, causing an almost immediate gag reflex and creating a drowning sensation for the captive.
Extrajudicial killingAn extrajudicial killing (also known as an extrajudicial execution or an extralegal killing) is the deliberate killing of a person without the lawful authority granted by a judicial proceeding. It typically refers to government authorities, whether lawfully or unlawfully, targeting specific people for death, which in authoritarian regimes often involves political, trade union, dissident, religious and social figures.
Black siteIn military terminology, a black site is a location at which an unacknowledged black operation or black project is conducted. A 2021 Associated Press news story defined black sites as "clandestine jails where prisoners generally are not charged with a crime and have no legal recourse, with no bail or court order." Black jails Black sites are widespread within China and a Chinese black site has been alleged to exist in Dubai by a former detainee. Black sites in China are also known as "black jails.
Targeted killingTargeted killing is a form of assassination carried out by governments outside a judicial procedure or a battlefield. Since the late 20th century, the legal status of targeted killing has become a subject of contention within and between various nations. Historically, at least since the mid-eighteenth century, Western thinking has generally considered the use of assassination as a tool of statecraft to be illegal.
Anwar al-AwlakiAnwar Nasser Abdulla al-Awlaki (Anwar al-'Awlaqī; 21 or 22 April 1971 - 30 September 2011) was an American imam who was killed in 2011 in Yemen by a U.S. government drone strike ordered by President Barack Obama. Al-Awlaki became the first U.S. citizen to be targeted and killed by a drone strike from the U.S. government. U.S. government officials argued that Awlaki was a key organizer for the Islamist terrorist group al-Qaeda, and in June 2014, a previously classified memorandum issued by the U.S.
