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No Comment Is Necessary II
The BBC reports:
An American air strike in the northern Iraqi city of Mosul has hit the wrong target, the US military has admitted.
The bomb demolished a house in Aaytha, killing 14 people, according to local officials. The US put the toll at five.
The military said it "deeply regrets the loss of possibly innocent lives", and promised an investigation.
Who came up with the phrase "possibly innocent lives"?
|1.9.05 @ 1:24PM|#
"Who came up with the phrase "possibly innocent
lives"?"
I'd guess it was a lawyer.
You know: "Anything you say can and will be used against you in a
court of law."
|1.9.05 @ 1:32PM|#
Well, since they were likely Muslims, they are presumed guilty until proven innocent--provided, of course, we felt like giving them a chance to prove themselves innocent. Who knows--if we hadn't bombed them, perhaps we would have just detained them for life. You can't be too careful with these people you know.
Jesse Walker|1.9.05 @ 1:42PM|#
Hey Jesse, if no comment was necessary, why did you add
one?
It's not a comment, it's a question.
OK, so it's a comment disguised as a question.
|1.9.05 @ 2:24PM|#
The comment is rather trying to be subjective rather than objective. Who knows, the airstrike "possibly killed innocent lives, each with an estimated height of 5'4 and above. With a slim chance that they were trying to hide WMD's"
|1.9.05 @ 2:47PM|#
Well, since we killed them first at least there's no chance that any of them will be able to kill us.
|1.9.05 @ 3:53PM|#
... until we find the secret Iraqi zombie
facility...
Is that why John Kerry looks like Herman Munster?
|1.9.05 @ 4:22PM|#
"... until we find the secret Iraqi zombie facility...
Then you'll see."
Looks like somebody's been reading Charles Stross
|1.9.05 @ 5:31PM|#
Even if they *were* innocent, they probably wouldn't have been in a few years time. Thanks to our pre-emptive strike, they got to go to heaven before doing anything stupid.
|1.9.05 @ 5:46PM|#
Every "possibly innocent" Arab who dies is one more who won't be
able to have a change of heart and join the terrorists.
Every American who dies is one more who won't be able to turn into
a traitor later on.
The more people who die, the fewer are left to kill the rest of
us!
|1.9.05 @ 6:07PM|#
Unfortunately, things happen and innocent people get killed all the time in war. I wish that was not the case. Unlike the clowns who post on this site and Monday morning quarterback everything done in Iraq, I have actually been in a targeting cell and know what lengths our military goes to to prevent this kind of thing from happening. The terrorists of course, kill innocent people everyday in Iraq and no one on here seems to care beyond the concern that if the U.S. was able to capture them, they might not be treated with all the precautions we give American criminals. I just wish people like Jesse Walker and the folks who post on this forum would get out in the world a little bit more. Leave this nice tolerent country we live in and go out to places like Iraq and Afghanistan and the Sudan and meet some of the people out there whom you really don't want to meet. Perhaps then you might find out that its a lot easier to be a freedom loving, government hating libertarian living in the most powerful nation in history then it is to deal with the messy realities facing the rest of the world and those people defending it.
|1.9.05 @ 6:11PM|#
John-
My posts weren't actually mocking the people in the military, they
were mocking some of the posters who concoct theories about how
every supposed problem we face is actually an advantage or proof of
victory.
When you say, as somebody who has been there, that civilian
casualties are awful but inevitable and at least we try take great
care to minimize it, well, I can accept that. But when people here
(some of whom have no military experience, just like me) point to
everything happening in Iraq and say "It's not a bug, it's a
feature!", well, I have to mock them.
|1.9.05 @ 6:20PM|#
"possibly innocent lives"
"it's not really torture"
What in the Hell has happened to us? It seems that this war is
being prosecuted at the cost of our national character. But, if we
can get control of our government and pull them back from this
barbarous insanity, it will be a reaffirmation of the good
character of the American people and a demonstration of fealty to
the founding principles of our republic.
Jesse Walker|1.9.05 @ 7:06PM|#
Thanks for the smug little lecture, John. Care to tell us what
you think about the phrase "possibly innocent civilians"?
Feel free to answer the query I posed to you in the
torture thread as well. In case you've forgotten, you had
written something even more estranged from reality than your
comment here. If you need a reminder, here it is again:
I find it interesting that so many people who are so appalled
at what is happening at GUTMO [sic] didn't seem too concerned when
Bill Clinton and Janet Reno burned our own citizens to death at
Waco. Libitarians [sic] and liberals love and will die to protect
facist [sic] muslims [sic] but don't seem to give two shits about
the strange if generally harmless Christian kooks down the
road.
I pointed out that I, this magazine, and libertarians in general
had actually said and done quite a bit in opposition to the Waco
disaster. Then I asked, "What were you doing then?" I'm still
waiting for a reply.
|1.9.05 @ 7:27PM|#
John,
The Iraq war was and is unnecessary for our defense. Don't forget
the WMD and "connections" lies that were used to fabricate
compliance among American people. The chief motivators behind the
war believed that it would be a good thing for the agenda of the
Israeli government. There is a long and well documented history in
this regard and remember that right after 9/11, Wolfowitz actually
pounded the table for going directly after Iraq instead of
Afghanistan!
|1.9.05 @ 7:58PM|#
John,
If you really believe that libertarians were unconcerned about Waco
and Clinton's and Reno's responsibility for that slaughter, you're
just ignorant of the history. Also, the criticism coming from
libertarian quarters was, on the whole, far more severe than that
emanating from the liberals. Some liberal comment even took the
form of shameful and ridiculous apologetics. Just google it up and
compare the comments on the tragedy from Reason and
Liberty to the liberal, The New Republic.
|1.9.05 @ 8:00PM|#
I know it must hurt your feelings, John, when in our attempt to
Win Hearts and Minds we actually call upon our side to treat the
opposing side humanely.
And as flagrantly unfair as it is that our half a trillion dollar a
year military be treated in accordance with standards asymmetric to
those of an insurgent underground, you still managed to contain
your impotent rage and make a relevant contribution to the topic at
hand.
|1.9.05 @ 8:01PM|#
Mr. Barton,
The Irag war was never about oil or WMD or 'flypaper' or democracy
or Hussein (that was for public consumption) but was conceived as
the beginning of the solution to the problem of Arab terrorism. The
Iraq war is a utopian project to remake the Arab states of the
Middle East so that the inhabitants won't want to blow themselves
and us up. In a way, it's Clintonian foreign policy do-goodism writ
very large. Utopian projects are difficult to achieve, to say the
least.
That's just my take.
As for the question at hand, I think perhaps some boneheaded
officer really meant to say "possible loss of innocent lives".
Weasely, but not as sinister.
John,
The problem is not with the targeting that identifies the possible
presence of the enemy but the idiotic tactic of dropping bombs on
houses. I'm a tanker not a groundpounder but if it was my decision
I'd send a platoon of infantry to seize and search the house. When
we do that we don't create as many enemies and we demonstrate to
the enemy that we're coming to get them, mano a mano. It's nice
that we try not to blow up the wrong buildings but if we're not
under fire, and the story indicates no one was under fire, I don't
see any reason to drop a bomb on a house. We didn't get our man and
we made new enemies. Not good.
Dragoon!
|1.9.05 @ 8:10PM|#
We don't know. Maybe they did hit the right house and we don't know it yet. Possibly innocent is as good of a term as any. The point is that these are hard decision. Torture is another good example. What is torture? Is keeping someone awake torture? Is not releasing them torture? As a result of Abu Gahrib we now turn everyone loose after three days and have no coercive interrogation techniques. The insurgents know that, shut up for three days and get released. I don't support torture, but I don't support a catch and release program for terrorists either. These are tough question with no easy answers. How to target, who to target, what to do with people you think are bad guys. The people at Reason and on this site never offer any answers to these questions. They just bitch and moan. I have no doubt that if the FBI had foiled 9-11, Jesse Walker and the folks at reason would be screaming at the roof tops about how the FBI is holding a bunch on innocent muslims named Mahaumad Atta and gang and how horrible it is. Well, fortuenately for you guys they didn't get them and 3,000 people are dead. You can never win on these things. Had Bush done nothing and Saddam gassed a city, he would have been responsible for not acting. That doesn't justify every action, but it makes it a hell of a lot harder to in a position of responsibilty, which thank G-d in heaven no one on the site is in.
|1.9.05 @ 8:18PM|#
John, we clearly won't agree on the issues, but why do you write "G-d" instead of "God"?
|1.9.05 @ 8:23PM|#
In the long run you are right, its up to the Iraqis to save their country Thoreau. We can't do it for them. Its not as simple as get the Americans out. The mistake America made in Iraq was to assume that only a few people at the top were responsible for Saddam. Hundreds of thousands of people in Iraq were part of the regime and profited from it. The Iraqi people are no less to blame for Saddam than the Germans were for Hitler. The people who lived well under the regime and profited from it, certainly don't have the same future in a democratic Iraq. Some of them are willing to fight and die to get back into power. Ultimately, we and the Iraqis who don't suppor them either have to kill enough of them to show the others its hopeless, or let them take back over. That really is more the Iraqis choice than ours.
|1.9.05 @ 8:28PM|#
John,
...Monday morning quarterback...
Because we know that everything should be left to the experts.
Criticism of the state, that's just not something we should do.
:)
...have actually been in a targeting cell and know what lengths
our military goes to to prevent this kind of thing from
happening.
Care to be more specific?
...no one on here seems to care beyond the concern that if the
U.S. was able to capture them, they might not be treated with all
the precautions we give American criminals.
No, we are concerned about their efforts and about what happens to
them post-capture. Unlike you, other people can keep more than one
thought in their head at a time.
Leave this nice tolerent country we live in and go out to
places like Iraq and Afghanistan and the Sudan and meet some of the
people out there whom you really don't want to meet.
I've been to places like these. And?
As a result of Abu Gahrib we now turn everyone loose after
three days and have no coercive interrogation
techniques.
That's simply not true; for example, the CIA has quite a few
long-term prisoners in special facilities and they use coercion and
torture as information gathering tools.
The people at Reason and on this site never offer any answers
to these questions.
No, we offer answers that you don't like; there's a
difference.
Your comments regarding 9/11 border on the absurd and are
hyperbolic in the extreme.
BTW, we're stilling waiting for you to asnwer Jesse's question.
Grow a pair.
|1.9.05 @ 8:30PM|#
Ultimately, we and the Iraqis who don't suppor them either
have to kill enough of them to show the others its hopeless, or let
them take back over.
Already, the utopian project takes on an even bloodier
aspect.
All I know is that if liberalization is to come about it will have
to be an Iraqi project.
|1.9.05 @ 8:30PM|#
John,
Here you are castigating the bloggers here as unrealistic,
cowardly, etc., and you won't even answer Walker's question. You
are the very definition of a paper tiger.
|1.9.05 @ 8:31PM|#
John,
Dude, if you're a targeter and you don't know if you hit the right
house ... You can't throw 500 pound bombs around hoping to hit the
target. And you certainly can't do that in a residential
neighborhood. Maybe we hit the right house but the wrong people
were in it?
The only analogy I can think of is tank gunnery where not hitting
the target or hitting the wrong target is a great big no-no. But
then the only people who get pissed off are your superiors.
Don't give me that "we're at war" line. I refuse to admit I am at
war. When did Congress declare war? I've got no problem shooting at
people who are trying to kill me but that doesn't apply to avoidle
killing like dropping a bomb on a house when I could use some
infantry.
I also refuse to treat Arabs worse than we treated Nazis. Shit, we
gave Nazis trials and everything before we hanged them.
Dragoon!
|1.9.05 @ 9:07PM|#
John:
"Had Bush done nothing and Saddam gassed a city, he would have been
responsible for not acting. "
Actually, Bush did nothing when Saddam gassed a city back in 1988
(back when he was a friend of the US). So spare me the bull shit.
This war was never about saving the Iraqis or democracy. These were
execuses that the Bush administration came up with when other
justifications for the war fell flat.
|1.9.05 @ 9:17PM|#
John:
Torture is another good example. What is torture?
Look at this!
http://www.antiwar.com/news/?articleid=2444
Scroll down to the May 19 photo. The guy was beaten to death!
That's torture and it's murder. And if you care for the founding
principles behind our country, you must demand that all those
responsible, however high up the chain of command, be prosecuted
and punished if found guilty of these crimes. A decent people
should not let their government behave like this.
Also John, in your 08:23 post, you seem to trying to make it as
though most of the opposition to our government in Iraq is from
Saddam loyalists. This seems like an attempt to justify the
occupation, which it doesn't anyway. But also, doesn't it seem
reasonable that there would be a lot of folks there who don't like
our government or Saddam?
|1.9.05 @ 9:18PM|#
For all the beating up John is taking, I say he's still raising
some valid points that too many people -- and not just libertarians
-- are avoiding. Slamming perspectives like John brings is at least
partly a cop out, because there ARE hard questions in there.
Trooper Jones, if we're not at war then what the hell is it? Sure
congress made no declaration, and I'm all on your side about how
those formalities *should* work. But they don't work that way any
more (to my great consternation). Still, saying we're not at war in
Iraq today is a cop out.
And we can all say "we never should have gone into Iraq". I'll
second that with everybody else. I've long believed that Iraq was a
Utopian project. But -- we are in Iraq fighting a war. Now a) we
fight or b) we get out. We're there, so by now the rest of it is
all hot air and fog.
I'll try and drive to the center of the hard questions that nobody
(I've seen, anywhere) has really answered.
Suppose, just for a moment, that Iraq was a fully justifiable war,
with US security genuinely at stake. And suppose, under those
conditions, we came up against the kind of monsters we're facing in
Iraq today. The "insurgents" don't see civilians as we do (people),
they see them more like bushes to hide behind, which one may pull
up, cut, or burn, as convenient.
I say (again) that attitude in our enemy is *the* significant
similarity between Iraq and Vietnam. The hard question is, how do
you fight that kind of enemy?
We haven't figured out how. The Isrealis (forget whether *they're*
justified for the moment) haven't figured out how. The south
Vietnamese never figured it out. We can all say "it's up to the
Iraqi people", just like we said before "it's up to the
Vietnamese". But I don't think the Iraqis are going to figure it
out either.
Consider this fact: in Vietnam, both north and south, popular
support for the communists never exceeded 10% of the people. Yet
these tactics I've described above have to date been invincible,
against all popular opposition. I bet, if you could get on the
ground and get the info, that the same is true in Iraq -- the
insurgents lack popular support.
So the question stands: how do we fight an enemy that uses
civilians for camaflouge????!!!!!
"National character" is a great concept, and sure, I'd rather not
be out there burning innocents and children myself. But if you're
in a fight to the death with a wild animal, what constraints will
you place on yourself while you fight?
And if you *don't* constrain yourself, then what will you be when
it's over, if you win?
A battle tactic is now out there, that we have yet to find a way of
defeating. I don't see answers. Anybody got suggestions?
|1.9.05 @ 9:38PM|#
Trooper Jones:
The Iraq war is a utopian project to remake the Arab states of
the Middle East so that the inhabitants won't want to blow
themselves and us up.
I think that terror and democratization are among the
rationalizations. But the evidence is that the main concerns for
the chief propagators behind the Iraq war are: First, Israel-
second, Israel- last, Israel. For years, the neocons have been
pushing regime change in Iraq for the sake of the Israeli
government. Also, it was interventions by our government in the
Mideast that made us the targets of terrorists in the first
place.
|1.9.05 @ 9:47PM|#
pragmatist:
The "insurgents" don't see civilians as we do (people), they
see them more like bushes to hide behind, which one may pull up,
cut, or burn, as convenient.
It's not "we". It's the US government. Now how many more Iraqi
civilians has our government killed than the insurgents have? I'm
thinking tens of thousands.
|1.9.05 @ 9:53PM|#
The hard question is, how do you fight that kind of
enemy?
There are alternatives to fighting. Our government's fighting
needlessly makes enemies for us.
|1.9.05 @ 10:04PM|#
Rick,
Maybe right now we (US gov't) is killing more than the insurgents.
But when the US is gone? The tide will probably turn. But that
misses my point.
If you want to say "get the hell out" I can respect that. But
slamming the people who are doing the fighting, when they're up
against that kind of enemy -- and nobody can tell us how we're
supposed to beat that enemy in a "civilized" manner -- is
lame.
The fact stands that there will be innocent casualties in any war,
try though we may to minimize them. The two central questions are
1) should we be fighting this war and 2) if yes, then how are we
supposed to win against the enemy's tactics?
Jesse Walker|1.9.05 @ 10:25PM|#
I have no doubt that if the FBI had foiled 9-11, Jesse
Walker and the folks at reason would be screaming at the roof tops
about how the FBI is holding a bunch on innocent muslims named
Mahaumad Atta and gang and how horrible it is.
I'm sure you "have no doubt" about all sorts of things, John.
Unfortunately, many of them aren't so.
|1.9.05 @ 10:26PM|#
Ok Rick, fair enough. "Get out of Iraq" is a position I can
grasp (and largely agree with). "Get Out of Iraq" even fits on a
bumper sticker.
Nonetheless, the fact that we don't have a good way of defeating
this kind of enemy bothers me.
|1.9.05 @ 10:31PM|#
The two central questions are 1) should we be fighting this
war and 2) if yes, then how are we supposed to win against the
enemy's tactics?
These are important issues, but I think it's a mistake to separate
them out so neatly. But for the sake of argument.
1) A big reason many (including myself) are against this war is
precisely because we believe it to be unwinnable on its own terms.
That is to say, it makes use of pure military tactics to address a
series of broad non-military developmental socio-cultural
goals.
2) To beat an insurgent movement to have to win over its populace
(rather than, say, obliterate it). "A guerilla moves among the
people as a fish swims in the sea," Mao said. If that sea becomes
an enemy to it purposes, the fish drowns.
That is why incidents like the one that started this thread do more
damage than a thousand successful military operations do good.
|1.9.05 @ 10:40PM|#
Pavel,
I agree with you on 1) but not 2). How familiar are you with Viet
Cong tactics? If anything, they've perfected those tactics in Iraq.
It's really, really hard to drown that fish because, it uses a sort
of ju-jitsu (sp?). It uses our own sense of civility against us.
That's our vulnerability, I say. Iraq may be wrong, but what if we
come up against this tactic in a justified war?
|1.9.05 @ 11:04PM|#
Pavel, btw, why do you think it's wrong to separate out the questions as I have?
|1.9.05 @ 11:17PM|#
One more btw. I agree we shouldn't have gone into Iraq. But now
that we're there, does anybody really think we should run off now
and leave the Iraqis to their own devices? That impresses me a bit
like getting a woman pregnant, then saying "gee I shouldn't have
done that, see ya". Running off right now says little more for our
"national character" than bombing innocents.
Our grand gov't has us in a bind, methinks, and the hard questions
aren't to be waved aside.
Jim Henley|1.9.05 @ 11:20PM|#
Just google it up and compare the comments on the tragedy
from Reason and Liberty to the liberal, The New
Republic.
The New Republic was actually pretty good on Waco. They were never
part of the Janet Reno Hype Machine.
|1.9.05 @ 11:23PM|#
pragmatist,
It doesn't seem to me that the defining traits of asymetric warfare
have to do with one side being more "civil" rather than just
larger. Like judo, it's about using the lumbering momentum of the
attacker against them. Russia has had much the same problem in
Chechnya and previously in Afghanistan. It'd be a stretch to say
that being too civil was their weakness. You hardly need a sense of
civility to decide against wiping out an entire nation on account
of the fuzzy line between combatant and non-combatant.
|1.9.05 @ 11:29PM|#
pragmatist,
Slamming perspectives like John brings is at least partly a cop
out, because there ARE hard questions in there.
Care to detail these "valid points?" To be frank John has accused a
lot of people of things that he can't establish (just see silly his
comments about Waco, etc.). So if you could detail these "valid
points," I am all ears.
Consider this fact: in Vietnam, both north and south, popular
support for the communists never exceeded 10% of the
people.
If that's the case one wonders why the U.S. resisted having an
election there as the peace accords between France and the
Vietnamese Communists called for? I'm not going to say that the
communists would have been better for Viet Nam, but it seems that
the U.S. government was not as confident in non-communist electoral
success as you are.
|1.9.05 @ 11:34PM|#
why do you think it's wrong to separate out the questions as
I have?
What I meant was that the kind of tactics you think are successful
against guerilla "terrorists" (2) will inform your answer about
whether you think we should have entered this war or should
continue fighting it (1).
Running off right now says little more for our "national
character" than bombing innocents.
Of course one could have adopted this same stance towards Vietnam
until the last helicopter left Saigon. If defeat is inevitable, one
should hope for defeat sooner than later. Of course that would
damaging to our precious American pride. But considering our
grotesquely inflated pride:sense ratio, I don't think that's such a
bad thing.
|1.9.05 @ 11:56PM|#
Pragmatist, this is off-topic, but do you have any sources for that Vietnamese support figure? It just seems sort of low.
|1.10.05 @ 12:04AM|#
I'd send a platoon of infantry to seize and search the
house. When we do that we don't create as many enemies and we
demonstrate to the enemy that we're coming to get them, mano a
mano.
And in doing that, if you had taken a casualty it would've been
viewed in certain quarters, such as by a great many here, of the
continuance or deepening of the "quagmire". Of course, if you
didn't take any casualties, but one of your men backhands, or God
forbid puts one into, while wrestling with Grandpa during the entry
(who everyone in the house swears was just going for his glasses,
although he did ignore instructions to stay still, and you found
your targets upstairs) it would be seen as evidence of how the US
is no longer the "good guy", how we weren't prepared because
undoubtedly there weren't any native Arabic speakers on the team,
and after all
he's-just-defending-his-home-against-foreign-invaders-wouldn't-you-do-the-same?
And if everything had gone perfectly, the entry gone off w/o a
hitch, the people in the neighborhood made you lunch, and your men
had built a school, a daycare center, a market and a mosque before
you left the town, it would have passed without note, and been
viewed as evidence of nothing. And that's assuming that you got the
right house. From the viewpoint of meeting impossible standards of
performance dropping a bomb is a no brainer. Almost no risk of
friendly casualties, no potential detainees to torture, and frankly
roughly the same collateral damage is gonna be reported by the Beeb
hit or miss so you can preprint the settlement checks.
...'Course you still get screwed if you hit the wrong house.
...when in our attempt to Win Hearts and Minds we actually call
upon our side to treat the opposing side humanely.
Yeah, like when we humanely bombed the shit out of Dresden. Like we
humanely atom bombed a couple of Japanese cities. To paraphrase
Grant, war is cruelty and you can't refine it. All you can do is
win it as efficiently as possible. Pussyfooting around terms like
the "rules of war" ignores the fact that those rules, while
ostensibly created to limit suffering, can, like most hard and fast
rules be manipulated to increase suffering. The most logical rule
is don't fight, but if you fight, win fast and completely. All
rules and tactics should flow from that.
Nonetheless, the fact that we don't have a good way of
defeating this kind of enemy bothers me.
What bothers me is no one was complaining when the Air Force was
dropping shaped concrete blocks rather than bombs to limit the
damage done in neighborhoods, using s'loads of precision munitions
when simple cheaper area effect weapons would've worked better, and
started patrolling on foot rather than sitting at intersections in
tanks. Again, we're making the mistake of conducting this war as a
PR exercise rather than a military operation, and that does nothing
but makes both sides bleed longer. We could've attrited a lot of
these fighters in the field by actively trying to destroy their
units, we chose to tiptoe instead rather than 'give Saddam the PR
victory' of tons of civilian casualties. Guess what? Despite all
that we got blamed for tons of civilian casualties, have that blame
ongoing, and allowed who knows how many fighters to get away, that
we're now having to kill singly, while avoiding the aforementioned
civilians. We would've killed the same number of people, with
considerably less hassle, had we gone about the task in earnest
from the start.
We have a tactic that'll work; give the civilians a greater
incentive to distinguish themselves from the targets, by
demonstrating that come hell or high water the targets (and
anything in their general vicinity) will die. Once a critical mass
of the population fears the consequences of allowing the insurgents
to hide among them more than they fear the consequences of refusing
the insurgents santuary, then the chief tactical advantage of the
insurgent goes away.
Of course that would damaging to our precious American pride.
But considering our grotesquely inflated pride:sense ratio, I don't
think that's such a bad thing.
It damages more than pride, it validates the essential strategic
assumption of terrorism in general; that they can inflict
asymetrical damage on an opponent and thereby impose their will.
Validating that point proves the tactic effective and therefore
makes it more likely to be used in the future. What's fundamentally
dangerous about that is that underneath it's completely wrong; the
US could, if sufficiently provoked, instantly and completely
eliminate virtually any threat posed by any nation or group on the
planet. It's only because of the viewpoint that our conventional
forces should be enough of a credible threat to deter aggression
against us and our interests that it's not our primary option.
Maintain the wealth, influence and status of a superpower,concede
the point that the conventional forces alone cannot defend that
superpower, and encourage aggression, and you move closer, not
further from a point where the unthinkable could happen.
|1.10.05 @ 12:13AM|#
shem, see _Vietnam: A Political History_ by Joseph
Buttinger.
I'm married to someone who grew up in Vietnam, their family was
there in '75. I've never been to Vietnam but talked to many who
were there. I think Buttinger is largely on target. By and large,
the Vietnamese people did not want communism.
|1.10.05 @ 12:25AM|#
I was one of the ones interested in John's response to Walker's
observations about libertarians and Waco. Considering John's
comment about Waco in the other thread, it seemed to me that he
doesn't know much about libertarians in general.
...If he did, I think I would join the chorus here, but he doesn't
seem to, so I won't. Not knowing much about libertarians doesn't
seem to stop him from criticizing us though, but that's neither
strange nor new. There are a lot of people out there who only know
what they know because someone else told them about it.
|1.10.05 @ 12:26AM|#
This is certainly a complicated issue. Here are some things we
need to consider.
It has been said many times on hit and run that many Iraqis resent
the US occupation just as most of us wouldn't like foriegn
occupation. This is certainly a valid point. However suppose we did
witdraw next week and the country collapsed into civil war. How
many people who are now in Iraq saying "Those damn Americans they
should leave already" would say "Those damn Americans why did they
leave already?" ? I'd like to see a poll of Iraqis with the
question "If you knew American troops leaving tomorrow would result
in civil war would you want them to leave tomorrow?"
Obviously we have a moral obligation to do everything possible to
avoid innocent casualties during millitary operations. To my
knowledge the millitary is doing that but our targeting methods
aren't perfect. Should we, as some have suggested on this thread,
go into battle only with infantry and refrain from bombing until
actually under fire? Would this tactic reduce innocent casualties?
If so that is a strong argument for it. But we might also ask if it
will put our troops in greater danger. If the answer to both
questions is "yes" then what?
As far as I can see the best thing to do is to train an Iraqi
millitary under the control of the constitutional government to be
able to fight the insurgents on their own as quickly as possible.
Then we should witdraw.
I have not seen the Iraqi constitution and I would imagine it isn't
exactly "utopian" (much less the blueprint for a libertarian
paridise); but as long as it secures the basics (freedom of speech,
freedom of expression, freedom of religion, due process, rule of
law, equal legal protection and rights, accountable government,
etc.) its good enough. The Iraqis should be left to argue amongst
themselves to about the details.
|1.10.05 @ 12:29AM|#
Junyo wrote: "We have a tactic that'll work; give the civilians
a greater incentive to distinguish themselves from the targets, by
demonstrating that come hell or high water the targets (and
anything in their general vicinity) will die. Once a critical mass
of the population fears the consequences of allowing the insurgents
to hide among them more than they fear the consequences of refusing
the insurgents santuary, then the chief tactical advantage of the
insurgent goes away."
Yep there's a good tactic, because slaughtering over two million
Vietnamese worked *so* well, and a million or more Afghans for the
Soviets, and 500,000 or so Algerians for the French, etc. That's a
perfect model for winning a war, that's for sure.
|1.10.05 @ 12:37AM|#
Gary,
True the US wasn't sure the communists wouldn't win. Problem in
Vietnam was the fact that there was no realistic alternative to the
communists. Communists won be default. But my whole point is that
the communist tactics in Nam were quite similar to what the
insurgents in Iraq are using. See also my response to shem. Beyond
that, the similarities break down fast.
I'm not defending everything John says, and am not aware of what he
said outside this thread. But the frustration I hear him express
has, I believe, some validity. We ARE at war, right or wrong. The
question is now what? How do we fight this enemy, or else, how do
we gracefully (and humanely) exit? It's real easy to gripe and moan
about everything that happens over there. It's much harder to
answer the question of what to do now that we're there.
So, the validity (my opinion) in what I perceive as John's
frustration, is the fact that so many people aren't asking "now
what?", they're just griping about what's happening -- which by
itself solves nothing. Tell me how to humanely exit Iraq now.
I think Junyo is right, we're holding US forces in Iraq to an
absolutely impossible standard. That, more than anything else,
could be our undoing.
Pavel, you've got a point -- if we don't see a way to win, we
should get out sooner than later. But I still think the questions
"should we be there?" and "how do we win?" are distinct.
I consider our pride irrelevant in Iraq. I'm more concerned with
being humane, given all the conditions that now exist, mistakes and
all.
I'm also very concerned with a question nobody here has really
addressed: now that we're in Iraq, are we going to try and win or
are we going to cut and run? If run, are you really, really sure
that's a) humane and b) strategically intelligent -- all things
given, as they actually exist today. I mean cut the crap about "oh
we shouldn't have done this".
And Junyo may be right, if we bomb and fight hard enough, in Iraq
we just may win it. But we're going to have to have the stomach for
it. And that means there WILL be innocent casualties. The
insurgents will make very sure of that, and count on our sense of
"national character" to prevent us from pulling it off.
|1.10.05 @ 12:41AM|#
Bruce, I second that. I have limited confidence in the survival
of whatever gov't we set up over there, but what you say may be the
only humane way for us to exit.
Now, can we actually get a gov't set up and a militia trained?
|1.10.05 @ 12:43AM|#
"I just wish people like Jesse Walker and the folks who post
on this forum would get out in the world a little bit more. Leave
this nice tolerent country we live in and go out to places like
Iraq and Afghanistan and the Sudan and meet some of the people out
there whom you really don't want to meet. Perhaps then you might
find out that its a lot easier to be a freedom loving, government
hating libertarian living in the most powerful nation in history
then it is to deal with the messy realities facing the rest of the
world and those people defending it."
I don't know why, but it seems to surprise a certain kind of person
to learn that some, who thought the Iraq War was a good idea it was
about defending America from WMD and al-Qaeda, are against the War
now that it's about creating a nominal democracy for the people of
Iraq.
There are those who think that the lives of American troops are too
precious to be squandered on Iraq's democratic pipe dreams, and
they have a valid argument to make. However, the people who seem
most likely to make that argument often, for some reason, don't,
and the people most likely to respond to that argument often seem
to think that whoever is making that argument is more concerned
about Iraqi civilians or not torturing insurgents than anything
else.
raymond|1.10.05 @ 12:45AM|#
Who came up with the phrase "possibly innocent
lives"?
"Innocent lives" is a "pro-life" catchword.
Its use allows "pro-life" people simultaneously to defend the
unalienable right to life of "unborn children" and to support
capital punishment and war.
The person who came up with the expression "possibly innocent
lives" is undoubtedly a strict-constructionist pro-lifer.
--0--
(a theological aside - Since from about 7 (the age of reason) we
all begin sinning, and since anyway we are born in original sin and
carry it in us until baptism. we can determine the period of
innocence of the post-born with some - but not with total -
accuracy. Ie, from baptism to about 6 or 7.
(So. Among the dead were some kids. Maybe baptised, maybe not. Six,
seven years old - we can't be sure. Only God - or B-sh -
knows.)
|1.10.05 @ 1:11AM|#
Russia has had much the same problem in Chechnya and
previously in Afghanistan. It'd be a stretch to say that being too
civil was their weakness.
That is an excellent observation that deserves to be
reiterated!
|1.10.05 @ 1:42AM|#
Being overly civil has never, historically, been a Russian
character trait. And Mongolian tactics (take no prisoners, and
leave no men of fighting age alive behind you) is not only
barbaric, it doesn't always work.
Still, if we had a ready way of defeating the enemy in Iraq, this
whole problem would be sooo much simpler. Then we could set them up
with their own gov't, and get out.
My whole drive on this thread has been to get right here. I think
cutting and running today is not exactly moral of us. So how do we
beat this enemy? The Iraqis use tactics similar to the Viet Cong,
but their motives are different. We need some counter-ju-jitsu,
which is what (I think) we should put a lot of effort into coming
up with.
I'm convinced there's a lot of brain power among us libertarians,
if we can focus it on the right questions. Finding counter-tactics
in Iraq is, I think, one of the right questions -- basically, how
do we win over there, now that we're stuck with the mess?
|1.10.05 @ 2:08AM|#
"So, the validity (my opinion) in what I perceive as John's
frustration, is the fact that so many people aren't asking "now
what?", they're just griping about what's happening -- which by
itself solves nothing. Tell me how to humanely exit Iraq
now."
There is no humane way to exit now. If the Bush Administration
hadn't stupidly alienated the UN, there might have been; but it
purposely alienated our most pragmatic option, so there isn't a
humane way out.
Am I to put my faith in the Bush Administration's magic beans then?
This is the problem--there may not be a humane way to stay
either.
Believe me, John's frustration is matched by my own. Would he feel
better if I pretended that a non-existent, humane exit strategy
existed? Given that none exists, should I pretend that staying is
likely to work as advertised?
I can hope I'm wrong--real hard--but that's not much of a plan of
action. I think the most pragmatic thing I can do is keep pointing
out that the emperor has no clothes on in preparation for the day
that a) we have to decide between slouching into the middle of a
civil war or coming home, and the day that b) we have to decide
whether or not to follow the emperor into some fresh
adventure.
...That's the most pragmatic action I can think of, do you have any
new ideas?
|1.10.05 @ 8:25AM|#
Yep there's a good tactic, because slaughtering over two million
Vietnamese worked *so* well, and a million or more Afghans for the
Soviets, and 500,000 or so Algerians for the French, etc. That's a
perfect model for winning a war, that's for sure.
Slaughter is your word and interpetation of the tactic. I'm talking
about redefining acceptable risks and collateral losses if it will
generate lower total losses. The Vietnam analogy is apt; for
political considerations, a desire to win with "a relatively low
level of violence" we dropped thousands of tons of ordnance on
Shock and Awe type targets, while failing to ever implement the
coherent, effective strategies the military wanted, like a
sustained strategic bombing campaign against the North like the Air
Force wanted. We actully did destroy the insurgents; by the end of
the war the the Vietcong were no longer a viable a fighting force
and NVA regulars were doing most of the fighting. Vietnam was a
failure, not of tactics, but of strategy and will. And the French
won in Algiers, and again public opinion forced a political loss of
the military victory. Politics are for before wars start, once
engaged they are a secondary consideration at best.
And Junyo may be right, if we bomb and fight hard enough, in
Iraq we just may win it. But we're going to have to have the
stomach for it.
Which is the point. We invite them to hide among the populace by
demonstrating daily that we don't have the stones to stop it. The
once it were made clear that that tactic won't work, it becomes a
bad deal both for the insurgents and the normal citizens, and the
tactic becomes depreferred. The unseriousness of the debate is that
some of the most pragmatic people on the planet seem to believe
that combat can be conducted like a church social. and everyday
that we demonstrate that unseriousness, that lack of stomach, by
conceding the tactical and strategic initiative, we prolong the
situation.
|1.10.05 @ 9:24AM|#
I think that I am with Junyo on this.
I think that if we leave Iraq now and concede victory to the
jihadists, the jihad will follow us home, ever strengthened in
their belief that we are indeed a paper tiger that they can defeat
even in our own home(with Gods help).
I really don't think that playing that much harder or more
ruthlessly will help. I think that you have to balance the harm it
will do.
I hate to sound like a champion for the government. But I think
that the war is being won the way it is being fought now. And with
minimal casualties on both sides. I think that one way of doing it
better would be to get Shiites and Kurds special units to do more
dirty work in the Sunni triangle. That of course is much easier
said than done. Specially on a large scale.
I have seen the iraqis learn to march, I have seen them learn to
shoot, I have seen them learn a bunch of shit. But to teach someone
to always be alert and to be disciplined when no one is grading in
order to save their own lives. That is hard to teach. It is much
easier to be a terrorist than to fight terrorism.
|1.10.05 @ 9:31AM|#
But my whole point is that the communist tactics in Nam were
quite similar to what the insurgents in Iraq are using.
At various times and places, certain groups in Vietnam certainly
engaged in the kinds of hit and run raiding that certain groups in
Iraq are using, but anyone with much of a grasp on what happened in
Vietnam will realize that these tactics were not sufficient to win
the day.
The force that prevailed in Vietnam was not the proto-asymmetrical
warriors, swimming in black pajamas through the ocean of Vietnamese
civilians. Indeed, the Viet Cong guerrillas were pretty much of a
non-factor by the latter stages of the war.
The force that prevailed was a conventional army of North
Vietnamese Communists, driving tanks, flattening towns with heavy
artillery, organized into divisions that any European general would
recognize, and wearing uniforms (dark olive trimmed with red, if
memory serves). That is who drove the ARVN troops from the field,
occupied Saigon, and imposed Communist rule and the deaths of tens
of thousands of civilians on the South.
In short, it was not asymmetrical or guerrilla warfare that won in
Vietnam, but a very conventional surrogate Soviet army. There is no
such force on the horizon in Iraq.
|1.10.05 @ 10:02AM|#
Looks like they can take out our tanks:
http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/6727646/
R.C. Dean,
Indeed, the Viet Cong guerrillas were pretty much of a
non-factor by the latter stages of the war.
They were harmed immensely by the Tet counter-stroke. Some think
that the Tet Offensive was indeed planned by the North Vietnamese
as a means to destroy the Viet Cong.
In short, it was not asymmetrical or guerrilla warfare that won
in Vietnam, but a very conventional surrogate Soviet
army.
That ignores all the years that the Viet Cong was a relatively
effective fighting force though. After all, when the U.S. was the
backbone of the fighting force there, they were engaged by the Viet
Cong and PAVN, but traditional fighting was rare.
|1.10.05 @ 10:19AM|#
For those who are pushing the "Let's kill civilians to dry up
support for the insurgents" strategy, this is morally different
from the reprisals at Tulle, Oradour, and the Ardeatine Caves
how?
http://www.dasreich.ca/oradour.html
http://www.zchor.org/italy/caves.htm
|1.10.05 @ 11:34AM|#
For those who are pushing the "Let's kill civilians to dry
up support for the insurgents" strategy, this is morally different
from the reprisals at Tulle, Oradour, and the Ardeatine Caves
how?
I don't see anyone pushing for arbitrarily "killing civilians"; I'm
certainly not. But the fact remains that there are a finite number
of ways to win a war; primarily they all focus on removing your
enemy's ability and/or will to fight. Our enemies are driven by
ideaology, removing their will is a very involved task. And
removing their ability to fight is problematic if we're going to
voluntarily allow them respite to train, rest and rearm, simply
because they shield themselves with civilians, especially if those
civilian have a choice in the matter. You simply can't allow the
enemy to dictate the ground and terms of the conflict and expect to
win. Traditionally we've considered infrastructural targets,
factories, transportation centers, barracks and their support
facilities, as legitimate targets, and destroyed them with the full
knowledge that we'd be killing non-military personnel. Now we're
supposed to give the enablers a free pass because they support the
targets on a micro rather than macro scale? A guy who loans an
insurgent his car is the equivalent of a troop train engineer, a
person that feeds them the mirror of a worker in a mess hall,
legitimate civilian targets all (our enemy certainly has those
rules, and kills accordingly). That isn't the same as punitive
raids directed entirely at the general populace and intended to
broadly terrorize. But the standard that we're being held to is
that in an instance where insurgents are operating in a small
neighborhood, so small that they can't operate and maintain cover
without the active assistance of some portion of the civilian
population, and the tacit approval of the rest, humping a volley
into what is in effect a enemy staging area makes us the equivalent
of Nazis.
|1.10.05 @ 12:35PM|#
"Now we're supposed to give the enablers a free pass because
they support the targets on a micro rather than macro scale? A guy
who loans an insurgent his car is the equivalent of a troop train
engineer, a person that feeds them the mirror of a worker in a mess
hall, legitimate civilian targets all (our enemy certainly has
those rules, and kills accordingly)."
And under the Civil Reserve Air Fleet (CRAF) program, American air
carriers lend their commercial passenger and cargo jets (with
crews) to the U.S. military. And through taxes, American businesses
and citizens finance the U.S. military. Now, applying your logic
above, finish this completely factually parallel line of
reasoning...
|1.10.05 @ 12:52PM|#
SR, not really sure what your point is. The enemy we're fighting has already demonstrated a willingness to attack targets far softer than those you mention, and fairly regularly kills completely neutral targets, like aid workers. It's already been stated that all Americans, at home or abroad, were considered legitmate targets. If you're arguing that their target selection would loosen in response, I'm not sure how that would even be possible.
|1.10.05 @ 1:37PM|#
Junyo, are you actually that dense? To spell it out, the point is this: morally distinguish a hypothetical new 9/11-style attack on U.S. soil by supporters of the Iraqi insurgency from what you've described.
gaius marius|1.10.05 @ 1:54PM|#
1) A big reason many (including myself) are against this war
is precisely because we believe it to be unwinnable on its own
terms. That is to say, it makes use of pure military tactics to
address a series of broad non-military developmental socio-cultural
goals.
2) To beat an insurgent movement to have to win over its populace
(rather than, say, obliterate it). "A guerilla moves among the
people as a fish swims in the sea," Mao said. If that sea becomes
an enemy to it purposes, the fish drowns.
That is why incidents like the one that started this thread do more
damage than a thousand successful military operations do
good.
absolutely.
mr pragmatist, the methodology of the insurgents are
not new -- they are in fact very very old. and the
book on defeating it is exactly as mr pavel notes.
it should be said that an insurgency doesn't need majority support
-- it needs only a significant minority to thrive. it had that in
vietnam for most of the war (i have no context for your 10% number)
and it has it now (and more) in iraq.
and for that reason
From the viewpoint of meeting impossible standards of performance
dropping a bomb is a no brainer. Almost no risk of friendly
casualties, no potential detainees to torture, and frankly roughly
the same collateral damage is gonna be reported by the Beeb hit or
miss so you can preprint the settlement checks.
And Junyo may be right, if we bomb and fight hard enough, in Iraq
we just may win it. But we're going to have to have the stomach for
it. And that means there WILL be innocent casualties. The
insurgents will make very sure of that, and count on our sense of
"national character" to prevent us from pulling it off.
this shit is to be reviled everywhere it is seen. not only is it
the sure course to loss, but it is utterly unnecessary and inhumane
in every respect. it is sheer romantic militarist fantasy --
completely counterproductive. fighting harder will get you nowhere.
taking more risks -- the true risks attendant to war -- will.
you cannot win an insurgency by blowing everything up. what would
win you the insurgency is putting our men out there to get shot --
but in doing so preserve innocent lives.
the fantasy of rumsfeld was that this was not so -- that bombs and
fewer troops would win wars faster with fewer casualties, making
the whole job easier. that has been proven wrong; it plainly
prolongs wars and turns the people against you because they see you
trading their lives for yours.
mr junyo -- you're wrong. this war needs to be fought with far
greater risk to american men precisely because it cannot be fought
in the papers. american men must die -- they must die because
500-pound bombs act as a cowardly shield for our guys as it kills
innocents -- and every iraqi knows it and holds us in comtempt for
it. it is precisely because we have abandoned our "national
character" -- or rather, that which we would aspire to -- that we
are losing.
gaius marius|1.10.05 @ 1:57PM|#
I don't see anyone pushing for arbitrarily "killing
civilians"; I'm certainly not.
indeed, mr junyo, you may not mean to -- but the advocacy of
bombing where we should be policing is exactly that.
gaius marius|1.10.05 @ 2:03PM|#
A guy who loans an insurgent his car is the equivalent of a
troop train engineer, a person that feeds them the mirror of a
worker in a mess hall, legitimate civilian targets all (our enemy
certainly has those rules, and kills accordingly). That isn't the
same as punitive raids directed entirely at the general populace
and intended to broadly terrorize. But the standard that we're
being held to is that in an instance where insurgents are operating
in a small neighborhood, so small that they can't operate and
maintain cover without the active assistance of some portion of the
civilian population, and the tacit approval of the rest, humping a
volley into what is in effect a enemy staging area makes us the
equivalent of Nazis.
so you advocate the slaughter of the general population, mr junyo,
to meet the goal expediently? amazing. you ARE pushing for
arbitrary slaughter, you know, because that's how such directives
will be carried out.
how about instead we actually pretend to be human for a moment,
understand that they assist the insurgency because of how we've
conducted the occupation -- that is, by JDAM -- and change out
tactics to try to bring them over to our side?
i agree, it's much harder -- but it has the advantage of actually
being a strategy that CAN be won.
|1.10.05 @ 2:46PM|#
To spell it out, the point is this: morally distinguish a
hypothetical new 9/11-style attack on U.S. soil by supporters of
the Iraqi insurgency from what you've described.
You mean a moral distinction other than the basic validity of the
underlying grievance itself, the ultimat ends that the contrasting
sides are attempting to achieve, or the fact that the 9/11 attacks
were directed indiscriminately at a target that verifibly contained
neutral and friendly targets (and one would assume that a
"9/11-style" attack would follow the same pattern)? I couldn't care
less about abstract moral posturing. The fact that such an attack
has already been conducted indicates means that regardless of our
moral stance, our opponents use such tactics as they see fit. If it
helps with your sense of outrage to cling to a moral superiority
over insurgents go for it, but I don't see where it actually
accomplishes anything other than makes us bigger targets and
hampers our ability to defend ourselves. Personally I'll settle for
the simple deterent effect of the credible threat of a wildly
disproportionate response.
|1.10.05 @ 3:13PM|#
so you advocate the slaughter of the general population, mr
junyo, to meet the goal expediently? amazing. you ARE pushing for
arbitrary slaughter, you know, because that's how such directives
will be carried out.
Since I gave specific instances of people offering direct aid to
combatants I'm advocating nothing against the general population,
unless you're alleging that the general population gives direct aid
to the insurgency. As for how such directives would be implemented,
you have your opinion and a pout, but precious little by way of
actual argument, which seems to be a running theme which most of
your replies.
how about instead we actually pretend to be human for a moment,
understand that they assist the insurgency because of how we've
conducted the occupation...
I love the smug underlying assumption, that these people are
incapable of reason, and driven by animal instinct, lash out
wildly. They've reacted as they have because we've created a false
risk economy; when faced with the choice of whether or not to aid
an insurgent, the citizen is faced with the explicit threat to life
and limb if they refuse, accompanied by an at best an abstract
promise of a long term payoff. When faced with the choice of
whether or not to aid the occupiers, the citizen realizes that
essentially no threat is faced from the occupiers for refusal,
versus a significantly higher risk of reprisal from insurgents if
they agree. In such an environment, the smart thing to do is to aid
the insurgents, and wil remain so as long as we represent a greater
real threat to wrong addresses than we do to the ground level
infrastructure of the insurgents.
...change out tactics to try to bring them over to our
side.
Outside of rebuilding their country, and making them the first self
determining Arab state in history what do you suggest? Sing alongs
around a campfire and s'mores?
|1.10.05 @ 3:25PM|#
dammit I'll try to post it again;
Gaius,
I don't think a bigger army would solve the problem. I think it
would in fact be worse than the 500lb bomb thing. More Americans
would not only mean more targets, it also means more Americans
having sex with Iraqis and doing other similar stuff that upsets
their fragile egos.
I think Rumsfeld was right about the small footprint thing. I don't
know if he was right about not destroying their army totally on the
way in.
|1.10.05 @ 3:28PM|#
I didn't see anything particularly Orwellian in the use of
"possible innocents" -- it seems an appropriate term prior to
investigation, especially in a situation where every casualty can
be claimed innocent for whatever press organ is present.
Mr. Marius seems awfully enamored of hand-to-hand combat. Maybe we
should be calling out the insurgents for some mano-a-mano trident
and net action to establish some good old-fashioned moral
authority. Scimtars at 12 paces? What if we sent out our knights
for a joust and they sent a car-bomb for the crowd instead? Since
this is the first time I have ever seen a hint of suggested ACTION
from the joe/rick/gaius-bots, I'll give it a C+ for effort.
|1.10.05 @ 3:31PM|#
This line;
"this shit is to be reviled everywhere it is seen. not only is it
the sure course to loss, but it is utterly unnecessary and inhumane
in every respect. it is sheer romantic militarist fantasy --
completely counterproductive. fighting harder will get you nowhere.
taking more risks -- the true risks attendant to war --
will."
And others made earlier in the thread seem to imply that going
meaner can never work against an insurgency. I don't thing that is
true historically. It worked for the russians in Chechnya, it
worked for them in Easter Europe. And for the Chineese in
Tibet.
My guess is that it almost always works for a stronger power that
has no moral qualms about it.
I don't think it would work for us because we do. That is just not
who we are. But to claim that you cant employ that tactic against
an insurgency is wrong IMO.
gaius marius|1.10.05 @ 3:38PM|#
I'm advocating nothing against the general population,
i agree, mr junyo -- you're not. but you should know that you
*are*. the pragmatic implementation of what you're prescribing will
be arbitrary application. the problem is that we can't tell the
difference; the result is my lai.
precious little by way of actual argument
and, as argument, i'll cite the loosening of the rules of
"interrogation" to get more information which almost immediately
became systemic and arbitrary torture in the hands of typically
irrational people.
that these people are incapable of reason, and driven by animal
instinct, lash out wildly.
an overstatement, but a trait that i would apply in equal measure
to ourselves as well as to them -- and that because we're both
human, and not rational monads. only a few on either side exhibit
much reason under circumstances like these.
In such an environment, the smart thing to do is to aid the
insurgents, and wil remain so as long as we represent a greater
real threat to wrong addresses than we do to the ground level
infrastructure of the insurgents.
beyond pointing out how stupidly reductive your schematic is -- as
though nationalism, religion, patriarchy and tribalism play no part
whatsoever in the iraqi population because (again, ridiculously)
all men are rational monads coldly evaluating their self-interest
-- i would comment that your solution is essentially to make the
united states into a stalinist totalitarian power in iraq and
intimidate and slaughter our way to Achieving The Noble Goal of a
Free and Democratic State.
i'll let you ponder the irony of that. it is precisely such
butcherous rationalization of murder states that leads me to abhor
the stupidity of noble heroism.
gaius marius|1.10.05 @ 3:41PM|#
My guess is that it almost always works for a stronger power
that has no moral qualms about it.
I don't think it would work for us because we do. That is just not
who we are. But to claim that you cant employ that tactic against
an insurgency is wrong IMO.
i agree, mr kwais. the possible other path is to institute the very
terror regime we went there ostensibly to upset.
i don't treat this as a serious plan of attack, as mr junyo does,
and so don't devote much thought to it. but, considering the men in
the white house, maybe i should.
gaius marius|1.10.05 @ 3:50PM|#
Mr. Marius seems awfully enamored of hand-to-hand
combat.
to the contrary, mr mouth, i abhor it. i never wanted this war
precisely because i think the right way of fighting it is
appalling, and the wrong way of fighting it is even more so.
but such a change in tactics would mean an order of magnitude fewer
innocents killed, several orders of magnitude less property and
infrastructure destruction, and do much to shake the popular image
that americans are strategically weak because they are afraid of
dying and morally vapid because they're unafraid to kill innocents
to protect themselves.
it would, in short, be the most ethical of a lot of unethical
choices: if you're going to have your trotskyite utopian war, pay
the *whole* bill.
|1.10.05 @ 4:26PM|#
I thought this was a serious discussion of serious topics, but yet again it is a single-handed fanboy exercise. Are trotskyite utopian views a -3 or -4 on a 500lb JDAM? Do I roll the 12 sided for collateral damage?
|1.10.05 @ 4:47PM|#
I thought this was a serious discussion of serious topics, but yet again it is a single-handed fanboy exercise. Are trotskyite utopian views a -3 or -4 on a 500lb JDAM? Do I roll the 12 sided for collateral damage?
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