A Penny for Your Thoughts
Damian Penny, that is. He quotes a print article from a Canadian anti-American:
I've never pretended to be an objective journalist, or really a journalist at all, for that matter. Maybe someday - but hardly now. My honesty is my redemption. I scowl when I read words like 'murderous' used to describe the actions of the 9/11 hijackers - not because they weren't - they certainly were, but because in the bloody core of my sweaty angry heart, I know those same adjectives would never escape onto a front page article describing George W. Bush, with the same supposed objectivity and accuracy boasted in reports on the 9/11 'terrorists.'
Sheesh, yeah, where's the balance in not comparing President Bush to Mohammed Atta. (/sarcasm)
posted by Pat @ 5:15 PM
17 comments
17 Comments:
It seems people still don't understand differences in intent.
LOL! Bush has FAR more blood on his hands than Atta ever did (if he really did the deed which I doubt). Bush's war has killed more people than on 911, that is a fact no one can deny.
It seems people still don't understand differences in intent.
Bush's intent was clear the day he utter the infamous word, "Nookular" in describing Saddam's capability.
Iraq 3,000 dead
Hey, so I guess the 43,154 Iraqis killed to date don't matter huh? BTW, Bush could care less about the US dead either. Basically, as long as those pipelines are running to Israel the war party is happier than a pig in shit.
More evidence Mel Gibson was right all along..
President George W Bush is coming under enormous pressure from Israel - and from Israel's neoconservative friends inside and outside the US administration
And ..
Fears that Bush might succumb to this Israeli and neoconservative pressure is beginning to cause serious alarm in Moscow, Beijing, Berlin, Paris, Rome and other world capitals where, as if to urge caution on Washington, political leaders are increasingly speaking out in favor of dialogue with Tehran and against the use of military force.
Pressures mount on Bush to bomb Iran
BTW this situation is a perfect time for Israel to attack America in a 911 like 'event' and then blame Iran. Look out for that. All the lies are but used up and a lot of people aren't falling for this crap anymore. The only thing that can rally the goyim is to hit them and hit them hard.
"Nookular"
Oddly enough, that actually is a legitimate pronunciation of the word.
If you go to the Merriam-Webster website, that's how the audio version goes.
One had a warped ideological agenda and the other wanted to make a shitload of war profits for his establishment cronies?
I was talking more the direct intent to kill civilians. It's a distinction you folks don't make often.
Bush's war has killed more people than on 911, that is a fact no one can deny.
And America killed more civilians than the Japanese did.
Didn't change the fact that the Japanese were imperialistic, murderous thugs.
Again, it's not numbers but intent.
If you recall the war began over tensions regarding who would control the Southeast Asian colonies and their resources.
We cut off their steel and oil and they wanted to knock us out so they could conquer the area. The Brits had the most invested in the area, anyway, not us.
I don't think the US had squeeky clean hands going into the war now did they?
Nope, we'd been arming our buddies for a while. Though I don't consider that bad.
Also it was Americas intent to kill civilians in Japan
Still not getting it. The INTENT was to cause the Japanese to surrender, thus ending the war. It wasn't the same as, y'know, conquering China and just executing everyone for the hell of it. Kinda like destroying German cities to stop an aggressive force is the same as throwing people in death camps because they're undesirables.
only about 40,000 civilians killed by US actions.
Wrong again, at most a third of the deaths were caused by US action.
Well if you mean all the deaths caused by the overthrow of Saddam you'd technically by right, but a vast majority of the deaths are caused by the various insurgent factions vying for control of the country.
The issue of "intent" is another classical liberal cop-out when making comparisons.
It's perfectly valid. If you don't make comparisons in intent than the Holocaust = Dresden, Nanking = Hiroshima, and My Lai = London blitz.
Iraq is losing 2-3,000 a month, mostly green on green. That number is in the hundreds of thousands.
Not yet it isn't. The 40,000+ includes the ones killed by other Iraqis.
Not yet it isn't. The 40,000+ includes the ones killed by other Iraqis.
Let me finish that..
"ones killed by other Iraqis because of the US led war and resulting occupation."
"ones killed by other Iraqis because of the US led war and resulting occupation."
I bet you cried when Saddam killed over a million of his own.
First, once the number is high enough intent to specifically kill civilians doesn't matter.
Eh? So it's ok to intentionally kill civilians, as long as you kill a lot of them? I don't get your argument.
Second, when you use the types of munitions the US uses in urban areas, people get killed by them.
I'm sorry, I think what you meant to say "when you use ANY types of weapons in an urban area, people get killed by them".
One would have to be an idiot to actually think that "precision guided" bombs don't kill plenty of bystanders EVEN when and IF they hit their intended target.
Oh, I see. So we should go the Russia-in-Afghanistan (or Russia-in-Chechnya)route and just artillery the living fuck out of anything we don't like? I like your logic: "Precision munitions are ineffective, so let's just blow shit up the old way".
The responsibility for civilian deaths from such incidents doesn't rest with those dropping the bombs. It rests with those using civilians as human shields. The Russians understand that, the US people seem not to. When Chechen terrorists took over a movie theater with several hundred hostages, SPESZNAZ teams carried out a raid which resulted in the deaths of 40 civilians. The US would have probably taken a different approach because those deaths would have been considered unacceptable. Yet I like the Russian approach better, and firmly believe in it's effectiveness.
Think about it: if you restrain yourself and limit your effectiveness when your enemy hide behind civilians, you're simply encouraging them to do it more often. Our enemies learn from us all the time - they're not stupid. They can see what works and what doesn't. And what works best against western nations is hiding amongst civilians, killing civilians and blaming it on us, and calling as much media attention as possible to every civilian death which occurs. As an extreme example, Hezbollah now has a PR department, and they've been shown several times manipulating the news. They don't even have to rely on western press interpretations any more, and as a result don't even need scenes of real massacres; they simply move some bodies around, manufacture a story, and feed it to the local Reuters correspondent.
That approach by them leads us to put ourselves at more risk. It leads us to avoid shooting at them for fear of hitting civilians. It results in them inflicting more casualties on us while taking less casualties themselves. And finally, it leads to a loss of support for us because many people really do buy the moral equivalency bullshit.
On the other hand, if we had the Russian mentality the current terrorist approach would be totally ineffective. Promise to bomb the living fuck out of their positions regardless of civilian presence, and you've suddenly brought our kill/loss ratio to a much better level. That's one incentive gone for them to hide in civilian areas. At the same time, you're giving the civilians some incentive to report these fuckers, or at least kick them out. Make no mistake about it, most terrorists/insurgents in the middle east operate with the knowledge if not consent of their neighbours. Would those neighbours be so cooperative if they saw Pres. Bush on TV saying "we will drop a 2000lb bomb on ANY terrorist house we find, so those of you living within a hundred meters of one should probably think of relocating"?
Even better, if we made a promise to not only hit terrorists regardless of civilian death, but also torture to death any terrorist who hides behind civilians, how much longer do you think they'd keep doing it? Now you've not only taken away the incentive for them to hide behind civilians, but you've given them a VERY good incentive NOT to do it.
To Alex: Guess what, the US DOES use the "Russian method" far more frequently than you think .... were waiting for an AIR STRIKE to take out the house.
That's not exactly the Russian method. The Russian method would have enveloped leveling most of the neighborhood.
They could have easily taken that house themselves seeing as how they had an Abrams on the scene.
What qualifications exactly do you have to be second guessing the tactical decision of the commander on the ground?
Given the location, in that case civilian casulties wasn't so much an issue as the fact that the fighters in that house could have EASILY escaped half an hour before the air strike ever came.
Ah, you just answered my previous question - no qualifications whatsoever. You've obviously never heard of a cordon, nor have you studied doctrine for urban combat.
A better example is Fallujah.
A better example of what?
As for human shields, this bullshit liberal rationalization doesn't hold water.
I've been accused of many things, but this is the first time anyone's called me a liberal.
Would you let Saddam claim the same thing about Kurds and Shia's killed in the uprisings against the government?
He was intentionally targeting civilians. Plus he was using chemical weapons. Those circumstances are a wee bit different. If he had limited himself to bombing the houses of his enemies, I would have had no problem with that. On the other hand, when he sends a truck full of soldiers to round up and execute an entire village, that's a bit different.
Could the insurgents claim that if their suicide bombing is aimed at military targets but kills more people in the street- the US Army is using "human shields"?
No they certainly couldn't. The US army works inside cities because that's where the insurgents are - however, they mark themselves clearly in order to be easy to distinguish from civilians, and they construct their bases away from civilian residences. This creates plenty of opportunity to engage them away from civilians. Are you truly so blind that you cannot see the difference?
As always, liberalism entails applying its standards selectively. The US, Britain, Israel, etc. are allowed to blame "collatoral damage" on enemies using "human shields". Milosevic, Saddam, Ante Gotovina, Stalin, and virtually anyone opposed to liberalism for better or for worse can't use that luxury.
They can't use that luxury when they intentionally target civilians. They COULD use it if they operated the way we do. But they don't and they never have. To use the SPETSNAZ hostage rescue I mentioned earlier as an example - what Milosevic, Saddam, Stalin, etc did would be equivalent to ordering the SPETSNAZ team to not only go in and kill the terrorists without worrying about casualties, but to go in and execute 4 out of every 5 hostages, and imprison and torture the remainder. That's a wee bit different than saying "ok, go waste those terrorist assholes, but do your best not to kill any civs".
Thank you Alex, for providing evidence that you don't have a clue what you are talking about, whether it is regarding the US military or the Russian military now or then.
Right. I've been serving in the military now for 9 years, and you've had...well, right, you've never worn a uniform in your life. And no, those two months in girl guides do not count. And I'm the one who doesn't know anything about the military?
Go on, pull the other one.
You are a "liberal" by classical definition whether you like it or not. You constantly play this game of who is allegedly "intentionally" targetting civilians.
If that's the criteria you use, then 99% of western militaries are by your definition classically liberal.
I think a better explanation is that you're right the fuck out of 'er.
It is common knowledge in military history that when you fight guerilla insurgencies, especially in urban areas- people will get killed.
It's common knowledge that when you fight ANYWHERE people will get killed. Do you derive pleasure from stating the obvious?
Who do you think Saddam would want to kill- unconnected civilians who were previously if not at that time supportive of his regime, or the insurgents who were plotting to kill him?
Insurgents mostly, but Saddam had a very loose definition of "insurgent" (we saw you near the palace looking like you might be doing something wrong. or you stopped Saddams son from raping your wife. you hereby get the death penalty.), and he would also take great pleasure in executing the families of insurgents in order to "teach others a lesson". I understand that civilian casualties are unavoidable, but it's a different matter altogether to be executing the wives and children of the men who fight you. That's just not on. And neither is gassing entire villages of Kurds, or sending truckloads of soldiers to round up and execute entire tribes.
Of course there were excesses, as there was for the US in Korea and Vietnam.
The difference once again, you amoral clown, is that Saddams "excesses" were government policy, whereas US "excesses" are against policy, and are punished whenever possible. We spend millions training our soldiers NOT to do what Saddam ORDERS his to do. I don't know where you get the nerve to try and compare us. I'd love to kick your ass right about now, so I suggest you pull your head out of it before I cause you some serious cranial trauma.
The point is that it is simply idiocy to pretend that when there is "collatoral" damage in other armies it must be intentional but collatoral damage for the US and its allies is accidental as normal.
Except that 99% of the time it's the truth, and it's well documented.
The issue here is that the US could avoid all that collatoral damage by NOT GOING TO WAR. Saddam could not avoid fighting a counter-insurgency because it was in his country. Ditto Saddam and ditto Milosevic(only in Kosovo that is).
Yes, well, when you start off with an idiotic premise like that one it's no wonder you'll grab on to any logical fallacy you can find in order to back up your argument. In this respect you're little better than the truthers. You come up with your conclusion first:
THE US SHOULD NEVER GO TO WAR!
you then find any insane theory you can to show that the US going to war is wrong. Meanwhile you ignore the dozens of good reasons for going to war, AND you ignore the actions of other countries when they use naked force to commit atrocities not approaching anything the US has done since Nagasaki. Much like the truthers start off with their premise:
THE US GOVERNMENT DID IT!
and then find any insane theory they can to show that the US government was behind 9/11, while ignoring all the evidence which shows otherwise, and ignoring the actions of a certain muslim terrorist organization who have attacked the US in the past and have even admitted to being behind 9/11.
See the similarity?
Post a Comment
<< Home