I'm not saying Al Qaeda is not scum, but saying the US military or our military are not killing civilians is just nonsense.
Lockerbie bomber goes missing .....
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That recent scandal about our government/military handing over Afghan civilians to the Afghans while knowing full well that they were being tortured made me hold my head down in shame. It was not a good day for Canada.
Where I to say what I really think of you, particularly after such an insensitive remark, you stupid insufferably rude little twit, Fred would ban me.
Virtually all the civilians were killed in the war between the Sunnis and Shites.
You are speaking of an element of the Law of Armed Conflict (LOAC) called "Proportionality". The gist of it is....an actor's action or his response to an enemy action must be proportional to the threat or the target. This element of the LOAC seeks to prevent situations such as killing a planeload of people to kill two agents. Western commanders actually consult lawyers during the targetting process - if there is a gun emplacement on top of an apartment building, or a hospital etc, it is unlawful to destroy the whole building just to kill the gun emplacement; the collateral damage would be too great. Another way must be found.
Your (undoubtedly ridiculous) assertion that the plane may have been brought down to kill two CIA agents allegedly onboard, is not proportional and is not lawful.
That is why bin Laden and Mullah Omar always surround themselves with civilians.
It's a matter of intent. I don't believe that the CIA agents were the target, or that the attackers were even aware that they were there. I believe the Libyans *intent* was very specifically to target and kill civilians.
I think you know that's true. You could dispute it, but that would seem to be pure obstinance in the face of the obvious.
Reagan did not order the bombing of Tripoli. He ordered the bombing of specific military targets in Tripoli.
No doubt the relatives of "collateral damage" feel pretty goddamn awful about their loss, but at the end of the day you have to work through the following questions:
Q1. Is it possible to have a world without any armed conflict?
A. No, not so long as the enemy is willing to use violence, eventually you too will be drawn into armed conflict
Q2. Is it possible to have a war with no civilian casualties?
A. That would be great, but it is simply not possible with current military technology
Q3. Does that mean you can freely kill as many civilians as you possibly can, without regard?
A. No it does not, you must try your best to limit the civilian casualties to as few as possible.
That means that very unfortunately there are going to be armed conflicts that are just and necessary, and in those conflicts there are going to be completely innocent people who get killed.
Their relatives are going to feel goddamn awful when they get killed, and rightly so, but that does not justify going out to specifically target civilians in a counter attack.
???
AQ had almost no connection to Iraq, did not really exist in Iraq until after the invasion, is no longer present, and was responsible for very little of the violence there.
My view on Iraq is this:
1. In *most* cases the US has in fact tried to minimize the civilian casualties in Iraq
2. In a few pretty critical cases gross incompetence on the part of the US lead to a large number of civilian casualties, I do not think it was intentional, I think it was ridiculous incompetence and stpuidity
3. There is an open question as to whether the war was actually necessary. We will not settle this question in any satisfactory way, but it is clear that at least some key reasons that the US gave for starting the war were wrong.
That does not excuse what the US has done in Iraq.
You can't come in, wipe out the security apparatus in a country, and then blame the resulting breakdown in security on the local population. That's absurd.
As an invader and an occupation force the US had a duty, and has a duty to this day, to ensure order and peace in Iraq.
Yes the US has set up a sovereign government now, and that is a reasonable step towards the goal of peace and security, but the US is not off the hook until that new government is up and running and the security situation restored.
US responsibility will decline in phases, and has declined to some extent, as that government gets up and running, but in the long run, and the big picture, the US is to blame for the breakdown in security in Iraq and the resulting sectarian warfare.
Clearly.
Another reason to stay out of Iran, Somalia, Sudan, Zimbabwe, Burma, North Korea, Bosnia, etc.
You deserve to be treated with such insensitivity. Firstly you brought it up, and secondly, you are the one that has the arrogance to think your personal grief is more important then the grief of others. Finally, you attempted to justify the attack that caused the retaliatory attack in Lockerbie. So while I do regret any loss of life, don't expect me to not press my arguments against the hypocrisy of your point of view.
How do you know what Reagan ordered. Why was Gaddafi's palace a so called "military target". As I said before if we all agree that Libyan intelligence bombed 103... there were 2 CIA operatives on board. How do you know they were not targeted by Libyan intelligence? If this was the case, doesn't that make the rest of the casualties "collateral damage". Also, why was the 911 attack on the Pentagon considered an act of terror, isn't it a military target? If you want to go down that road, almost every Israeli is a member of the IDF, ergo every attack against any Israeli is an attack against a military target no? So why do we call it terror?.....
Merry Christmas nottyboi. I hope you, your ignorance, and your anger, find happiness together in 2010. God bless.
What makes you think I angry?, funny how you call me ignorant without answering one of my questions. Please enlighten me oh! great one. People like you can only see things from your perspective or by what if fed to you by the media. Try and at least see things from the other perspective. Maybe if you got out of the Capital once in a while you might realize the world does not revolve around it. I hope you find a way to stop behaving like a sheep in 2010.
??
Your assumptions about me are grossly incorrect. But it doesn't matter. Anyhow, your anger is evident in your posts. You simply may not be aware of it, but it is obvious to the rest of us.
As a Christmas present to you, you are welcome to bash me anyway you wish. Perhaps that will be a good release for your rage. Merry Christmas.
You must live in a very sheltered world. I do get somewhat annoyed when people try to minimize the deaths of others as "collateral damage" funny how collateral damage seems to be people in non-western countries pretty much all the time. When western people die they are "victims of terror". Funny how that works. I also find it annoying when people make snide comments about me being ignorent without offering any new information or correcting my assertions. THAT is the height of ignorance combined with arrogance. Please spare me insincere greetings I have no need for empty sentiment.
Don't give me this nonsense. The US ordered 2 B1 bombers to level several blocks of Baghdad in an attempt to kill Saddam early in the war. Hundreds died. Please don't give me rubbish about lawyers defining morality. I think it is pretty clear by the redefinition of torture by the Bush Justice Dept John Yoo, that some 2 bit lawyer can be found to deliver an opinion that anything is legal for a buck. What was the target in the Libyan bombing? It had no strategic objective. It was merely a tit for tat escalation. Who defines legality? Perhaps it was legal under Libyan law?
I guess I'm making the seemingly reasonable assumption that the targets that were hit were what he ordered hit:
Military barracks, military camps, militay airfields, and the air defense network.
First, so far as I know, it wasn't a target.
Second, Gaddafi is essentially the head of state no?
First let's agree to the principle that if the Libyans did not target the CIA agents then the bombing was a crime.
Second, in analyzing whether that's likely, I find it somewhat incredulous given that Libya had also bombed a string of other civilian targets, for example a discotheque. Are you saying that amazingly all of these targets had CIA operatives?
I find that to be beyond belief.
Third, two CIA agents seem like minimal value targets.
In any case a reasonable way to handle this would be to bring the Libyans up on war crime charges and let a judge sift through the evidence. If the Libyans can produce evidence that they were actually targetting military targets that were actually high value targets then they can explain that to the judge.
You have a reasonable point there, although it misses the requirement that you MINIMIZE civilian casualties. The attackers appeared to have acted to maximize civilian casualties which in and of itself is a crime.
You cannot use military targets as an excuse to attack civilians.
Only when they are in uniform and armed. You cannot attack unarmed soldiers who are not in active service.
