Richard Lowry

About the author: Richard Lowry is editor of the National Review, a conservative weekly magazine.

U.S. leaders are uncomfortable discussing it, but assassination is a morally justifiable means of dealing with enemy heads of state during wartime. Under international law, the targeted killing of specific individuals is legal during wartime, and in moral terms, killing a single leader through assassination is preferable to killing thousands of soldiers on the battlefield. America's hesitancy to openly condone assassination is due to executive order 12333, issued by former President Gerald Ford, which prohibits assassination by agents of the U.S. government. In the war on terrorism, however, assassination is an effective and justifiable means of dealing with foreign leaders who support terrorism.

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