[h=3]By ADAM ENTOUS, JULIAN E. BARNES and COLLEEN MCCAIN NELSON[/h]WASHINGTON—President Barack Obama outlined the next phase of his administration's counterterrorism efforts Thursday, detailing tighter standards for drone strikes and making the case for closing the military-run prison at Guantanamo Bay.
In a wide-ranging speech at the National Defense University, the president laid out narrower restrictions for the use of unmanned air strikes. And he said he would lift the ban on transferring prisoners from Guantanamo to Yemen, restarting the process of shrinking the detainee population.
In providing what he called a comprehensive counterterrorism strategy, the president described a weakened al Qaeda on the path to defeat, as he argued against fighting a war on terror in perpetuity.
"Beyond Afghanistan, we must define our effort not as a boundless 'global war on terror'—but rather as a series of persistent, targeted efforts to dismantle specific networks of violent extremists that threaten America," Mr. Obama said.
The new drone guidelines appeared to raise the bar for strikes in some cases by stating that the U.S. will only target suspected terrorists who pose a "continuing and imminent threat to the American people," rather than against suspected terrorists who pose a "significant threat to U.S. interests," based on descriptions by administration officials.
New policy guidance signed this week by Mr. Obama designates the U.S. military as the government agency of "preference" to run U.S. drone campaigns overseas, indicating his intention to gradually phase out the Central Intelligence Agency's control of drone campaigns in Yemen and eventually Pakistan, according to senior administration officials.
Mr. Obama's new policy guidance also sets out standards for launching strikes with drones. Some of the guidelines have been in place; others have been strengthened, administration officials said.
The guidelines signed this week say that there "must be a near certainty" that no civilians will be killed or injured in a drone strike. The standards, officials said, would apply both to American citizens overseas, as well as non-American terrorist targets.
The standard that calls for only targeting suspected terrorists deemed to be a "continuing and imminent threat" goes beyond the standard set out in an April 2012 speech by John Brennan, who at the time was the White House counterterrorism chief and now serves as CIA director.
In that 2012 speech, Mr. Brennan said the administration, in deciding whether to using lethal force, focuses on whether the target "poses a significant threat to U.S. interests."
According to his prepared to remarks, the president planned to say that the use of drones would be heavily constrained and carefully considered.
"America does not take strikes when we have the ability to capture individual terrorists—our preference is always to detain, interrogate, and prosecute them," Mr. Obama planned to say. "America cannot take strikes wherever we choose—our actions are bound by consultations with partners, and respect for state sovereignty."
The guidance signed by Mr. Obama doesn't set out a clear-cut timeline for phasing out the CIA's control of drone programs in Pakistan and Yemen, but officials said the CIA program in Yemen is likely to be shifted first because the U.S. military's Joint Special Operations Command already operates a parallel program in Yemen.
Along with his overhaul of the administration's guidelines for the drone program, Mr. Obama signaled an openness to additional review, including perhaps creating a new secret drone court, to oversee targeting. The administration for the first time on Wednesday acknowledged that four Americans have been killed in drone strikes, one intentionally targeted.
The president said the current internal system of reviews by the Justice Department and other administration agencies is very careful. But administration officials say the White House is open to working with Congress on some additional process to oversee how targets are made.
Some lawmakers have suggested a court modeled on the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court, which does secret oversight of government snooping. Such a court likely wouldn't address the criticism of the secrecy that shrouds much of the drone program.
The new guidelines for drone strikes were announced as lawmakers sought to add new checks to the administration's targeted killing program. Sens. Angus King, a Maine independent, and Marco Rubio (R., Fla.) on Thursday proposed a bill to require an independent review when American terrorist suspects are considered for targeted killings. That team would be led by an individual outside of the spy agency marking the terrorist suspect for death and would have 15 days to complete an alternative analysis.
"It is vital that our government have the tools and the authority to prevent terrorists from killing Americans," Mr. King said. "I also firmly believe that the executive branch being the prosecutor, the judge, the jury, and the executioner is very contrary to the traditions and laws upon which this nation was founded."
Mr. Rubio said the measure would add accountability to this sensitive decision. "This legislation provides a new layer of accountability and ensures the American people are informed through prompt notification to the congressional intelligence committees," he said, without tying the president's hands.
In his speech, Mr. Obama also intended to explain his decision to lift the administration's self-imposed ban on transferring detainees from Guantanamo to Yemen. There are 56 Yemen nationals who have been cleared for transfer but remain detained in Guantanamo, by far the largest single nationality that remains in the prison.
The administration imposed the ban on transferring Yemeni detainees after the attempted 2009 Christmas Day bombing, a plot that originated in Yemen.
Human Rights groups say reducing the population of detainees is a critical first step to closing the prison. There are currently 166 prisoners, 86 of whom are cleared for transfer.
Senior administration officials said the president would take all the steps that he could on his own to move toward closing the detention center, including asking the Defense Department to pick a site in the U.S. to hold military commissions.
But Mr. Obama faces a tough obstacles. A bipartisan majority of lawmakers in Congress have opposed efforts to transfer detainees to the U.S. And Congress has made it difficult to transfer detainees to other countries.
In addition, many Republicans not only don't want to close the prison, they want to use it to interrogate newly captured terrorism suspects outside the U.S.
Rep. Howard "Buck" McKeon (R., Calif.), the chairman of the House Armed Services Committee, said if Mr. Obama wants to close Guantanamo he must offer a clear plan of how future suspected terrorists will be interrogated as well as what he intends to do with detainees who cannot be tried but are too dangerous to release.
—Evan Perez and Siobhan Gorman contributed to this article.
In a wide-ranging speech at the National Defense University, the president laid out narrower restrictions for the use of unmanned air strikes. And he said he would lift the ban on transferring prisoners from Guantanamo to Yemen, restarting the process of shrinking the detainee population.
In providing what he called a comprehensive counterterrorism strategy, the president described a weakened al Qaeda on the path to defeat, as he argued against fighting a war on terror in perpetuity.
"Beyond Afghanistan, we must define our effort not as a boundless 'global war on terror'—but rather as a series of persistent, targeted efforts to dismantle specific networks of violent extremists that threaten America," Mr. Obama said.
The new drone guidelines appeared to raise the bar for strikes in some cases by stating that the U.S. will only target suspected terrorists who pose a "continuing and imminent threat to the American people," rather than against suspected terrorists who pose a "significant threat to U.S. interests," based on descriptions by administration officials.
New policy guidance signed this week by Mr. Obama designates the U.S. military as the government agency of "preference" to run U.S. drone campaigns overseas, indicating his intention to gradually phase out the Central Intelligence Agency's control of drone campaigns in Yemen and eventually Pakistan, according to senior administration officials.
Mr. Obama's new policy guidance also sets out standards for launching strikes with drones. Some of the guidelines have been in place; others have been strengthened, administration officials said.
The guidelines signed this week say that there "must be a near certainty" that no civilians will be killed or injured in a drone strike. The standards, officials said, would apply both to American citizens overseas, as well as non-American terrorist targets.
The standard that calls for only targeting suspected terrorists deemed to be a "continuing and imminent threat" goes beyond the standard set out in an April 2012 speech by John Brennan, who at the time was the White House counterterrorism chief and now serves as CIA director.
In that 2012 speech, Mr. Brennan said the administration, in deciding whether to using lethal force, focuses on whether the target "poses a significant threat to U.S. interests."
According to his prepared to remarks, the president planned to say that the use of drones would be heavily constrained and carefully considered.
"America does not take strikes when we have the ability to capture individual terrorists—our preference is always to detain, interrogate, and prosecute them," Mr. Obama planned to say. "America cannot take strikes wherever we choose—our actions are bound by consultations with partners, and respect for state sovereignty."
The guidance signed by Mr. Obama doesn't set out a clear-cut timeline for phasing out the CIA's control of drone programs in Pakistan and Yemen, but officials said the CIA program in Yemen is likely to be shifted first because the U.S. military's Joint Special Operations Command already operates a parallel program in Yemen.
Along with his overhaul of the administration's guidelines for the drone program, Mr. Obama signaled an openness to additional review, including perhaps creating a new secret drone court, to oversee targeting. The administration for the first time on Wednesday acknowledged that four Americans have been killed in drone strikes, one intentionally targeted.
The president said the current internal system of reviews by the Justice Department and other administration agencies is very careful. But administration officials say the White House is open to working with Congress on some additional process to oversee how targets are made.
Some lawmakers have suggested a court modeled on the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court, which does secret oversight of government snooping. Such a court likely wouldn't address the criticism of the secrecy that shrouds much of the drone program.
The new guidelines for drone strikes were announced as lawmakers sought to add new checks to the administration's targeted killing program. Sens. Angus King, a Maine independent, and Marco Rubio (R., Fla.) on Thursday proposed a bill to require an independent review when American terrorist suspects are considered for targeted killings. That team would be led by an individual outside of the spy agency marking the terrorist suspect for death and would have 15 days to complete an alternative analysis.
"It is vital that our government have the tools and the authority to prevent terrorists from killing Americans," Mr. King said. "I also firmly believe that the executive branch being the prosecutor, the judge, the jury, and the executioner is very contrary to the traditions and laws upon which this nation was founded."
Mr. Rubio said the measure would add accountability to this sensitive decision. "This legislation provides a new layer of accountability and ensures the American people are informed through prompt notification to the congressional intelligence committees," he said, without tying the president's hands.
In his speech, Mr. Obama also intended to explain his decision to lift the administration's self-imposed ban on transferring detainees from Guantanamo to Yemen. There are 56 Yemen nationals who have been cleared for transfer but remain detained in Guantanamo, by far the largest single nationality that remains in the prison.
The administration imposed the ban on transferring Yemeni detainees after the attempted 2009 Christmas Day bombing, a plot that originated in Yemen.
Human Rights groups say reducing the population of detainees is a critical first step to closing the prison. There are currently 166 prisoners, 86 of whom are cleared for transfer.
Senior administration officials said the president would take all the steps that he could on his own to move toward closing the detention center, including asking the Defense Department to pick a site in the U.S. to hold military commissions.
But Mr. Obama faces a tough obstacles. A bipartisan majority of lawmakers in Congress have opposed efforts to transfer detainees to the U.S. And Congress has made it difficult to transfer detainees to other countries.
In addition, many Republicans not only don't want to close the prison, they want to use it to interrogate newly captured terrorism suspects outside the U.S.
Rep. Howard "Buck" McKeon (R., Calif.), the chairman of the House Armed Services Committee, said if Mr. Obama wants to close Guantanamo he must offer a clear plan of how future suspected terrorists will be interrogated as well as what he intends to do with detainees who cannot be tried but are too dangerous to release.
—Evan Perez and Siobhan Gorman contributed to this article.