Trisk: That was a beautiful post. Amen, brother.
We are the bully? Please tell me that you are not suggesting that the WTC bombings were justified. These are inherently evil acts. Worse than a nuke. If the eventuality came where a tactical nuke was deployed their would be collateral damage to innocent people.
With a terrorist, the collateral damage is the goal.
I doesn’t matter to me whether we puposely kill civilians or accidentally kill civilians, both are wrong. I know I’m not making any friends here, and maybe I souund naive and stupid, but the moment we kill one innocent civilian in response to the WTC bombings, we become as bad as bin Laden or whomever else planned it.
think peace,
JB
If you think I thought differently, you did not read my OP.
Scylla: I wasn’t replying to any one poster, but just the general attitude that I am getting from this thread. I’m sorry if I sounded defensive, that was not my intent.
think world peace,
JB
Scylla, I don’t want to rule out nukes either… I, for one, wish we had more testing and yet am also glad to see a general disarmament policy.
In fact, I still agree with your general opinion here even given all the dissent… while I am not keen wih an analogy based in comparing these people to children or animals I feel the sentiment you are trying to express and hopefully understand it fully.
We should not, I repeat, should not frown upon nuclear response. We should simply not answer it if asked, and not mention it if it isn’t asked. The whole world knows we have nukes. Let them be, as ever, our silent partner. Anything we say about nukes cannot be positive… if we say we won’t use them and then it turns out they need to be used, we’re diplomatically fucked. If we say they aren’t ruled out that seems largely reactionary… just say something superbly non-commital: “This should be possible to resolve without such force.”
That said, I don’t believe this will escalate to the level where a nuclear strike is necessary. If bin Laden is responsible or not, its time for him to take one for the team anyway and the Taliban should turn him over for crimes he’s implicated in in other affairs. Similarly, other nations with terrorist groups should hunt them down and hold some public trials.
Because I think this very well could escalate to a nuke-level event very easily. Most of the world is fucking fed up with terrorism, and perhaps this is really the last straw. If they could do this to us and our allies (and they have) then there is little reason anymore to think that conventional diplomatic means will work.
Whether or not there is a government to declare war on, the time for diplomatic resolution is frankly long gone. With the possible exception of the aloof French government (a report I heard which said the French of course expressed their grief but were not resigned to follow the US in any particular crusade) I think the rest of Europe is surely with us, and any country which has also received acts of terrorism against it will probably jump on the bandwagon… and for good cause too.
We aren’t going to be thinking of other political ties right now. Much like WWII, we weren’t quite so worried about the USSR while there were more emminent battles to fight… and so this may be once the conflict begins (if it begins… it can still be avoided). IF the conlfict begins, people are going to pick sides QUICK and if enough jump against America and its anti-terrorist allies then we’ve got a real situation.
So no, I wouldn’t rule out a nuke. As much as I hate and fear them, I would never even consider getting rid of nukes in the forseeable future (ie- within my lifetime). And we shouldn’t rule them out.
If the reports I hear are true on the news this evening, it seems that the white house was indeed a target. It cannot semantically be an act of war, but you can’t get much closer to an act of war than that.
In peacetime: walk softly, and carry a big stick. In these times?-- all the more reason to keep your stick ready.
But really, guys: diplomacy works with people who want to use diplomats. After the guns are drawn the diplomats hit the bunkers. The terrorists’ guns are drawn, and some have openly declared that they themselves are at war with America and American interests… semantics or not, they fucking meant it, and so should we.
But it’s not really sad, is it Kalt? In fact, you kind of like the idea, don’t you? I bet it goes to a good place in your gut, the idea of turning the whole middle east in a field of radioactive glass. C’mon, say it. Now is one of the few times when you can let this sort of thing out, and you need to take advantage of it, because within a few weeks, all of us pansy liberals will be enforcing political correctness again, and then you won’t be able to use phrases like “sand niggers” in public anymore.
You don’t really want to see any other alternative, do you?
Triskademus:
I would like to think your ideas are true, but I don’t think it’s so.
If the people die starving from lack of medicine and food, because of your economic sanctions, aren’t they just as dead as if it was from a bullet?
What kind of sanctions do you need to impoversh a people to such a degree that a country can no longer afford to buy a couple of plane tickets and some cardboard knives?
The problem with terrorism is that can be waged by the impovershed. Poverty is most likely one of its root causes. How does creating more poverty solve the problem?
But will this cycle of “I shoot you, you shoot me, I shoot you…” ever end unless a super power like the United States makes some effort to resolve things peacefuly? i dont want to live out the rest of my life in constant war, which is what I fear if we ever use a nuclear type weapon against any target.
peace,
JB
Is killing 1 or 10 or 1000 innocent civilians worth escalating the terrorism to untold heights? That would be a better question because I think it should be obvious by now that attacks focused on civilians do not deter the military from retaliating. Indeed, attacks on their civilians will make them feel exactly like you and Scylla do right now. They will naturally retaliate, probably with nuclear weapons due to a sudden much greater support for their side throughout the world.
Scylla, As ever, an intriguing thread.
I completely agree with the OP. The people with whom we are dealing don’t understand compassion, love, restraint, killing only at need, or reason. They speak only one language: Violence.
With a small child or an animal, who is not capable of understanding reason, you need to communicate on their level, and the only things they can understand are Pain. Fear. Cause and effect.
The only proper response to this event is an overwhelming, brutal act of force. We need finally to send out a message, saying “We’ve sat still for too long. We will no longer tolerate anything of this sort. If you attack us, your nation will cease to exist,” and follow through on it.
The cost of attacking the U.S. needs to be FAR greater than any possible benefit. Israel has linked Iraq to the attack, in a funding and supply role. We seem to know that Bin Laden is headquartered in Afghanistan. So we take president Bush at his word, and leave both of those countries in the same state as the World Trade Center was left in, and teach potential suicide bombers that if they attack us to get attention for their cause then that cause, and anyone who aids them, will be annihilated.
I don’t think we should jump straight into lobbing nukes, tempting though it is, but we are in a position where we have NO ALTERNATIVE but to respond with massive force.
I totally agree with this scenario. They must believe that we will not rule out total extermination. I will adjust my viewpoint accordingly.
The difference is, and this is an important distinction, we will not kill innocents purposely. Innocents may die, but we will not target them, nor will we continue to harass and terrorize them once our mission is completed. If it’s too much for you, I understand, but it will happen.
And again, no thanks.
Scylla, Milossarian, erislover: The purpose of war is not to annilihate your fucking enemy; it is to persuade him TO DO WHAT YOU WANT.
Remember von Clauswitz’s dictum: War is an extension of politics by force. The ultimate policital costs of using nukes are not justified in this case.
Kalt:
Are you aware how unhelpful your attitude is?
This is a time when force may need to be used, and possibly it may escalate to extreme force.
Only a fool relishes this.
Such reactions as yours only provide credence to those on the other extreme who advocate allowing these things to happen unchecked.
This is a time for sorrow, prudence, and regret over the necessity of a very hard but necessary path ahead of us.
Sure, taking out anyone who supports the terrorists cause might be inevitable, but it is statements like “your nation will cease to exist” that I am worring about. How does not caring about civilian deaths make up better than terrorists ourselves? This is the point that I am stuck on. I dont think there is any rational answer for that. If we kill civilians, even if they live in the same country as a terrorist, we are terrorists. Some people dont have the ‘privilidge’ of being born in such a peacefull and loving and tolerant country as the United States.
Lets not let someones location be the deciding factor in whether they live or die.
think peace,
JB
I was only speaking that from their mindset we are the bully and they are the ones retaliating. In school yard psychology reality doesen’t matter, only the mindsets of the people involved.
I don’t think your ideas are justified so why would I think that theirs are? I just don’t see much difference in between the two. With the terrorists they used collateral damage as a tool to get what they want. With you you want to use collateral damage as a tool to get what you want.
Zenster:
This is the tough part, my friend. They have to believe it becasue it’s true. This is not the kind of thing we can afford to bluff about.
If our bluff gets called, and we back down, it’s open season on us as far as the terrorists are concerned. We lose all credibility, and respect. We go back on a promise of dire consequences and we’re completely screwed.
So, if we say it, and goes that far we have to be willing to do it.
Much better that we don’t bluff if we don’t mean it. It has to be true.
Who said anything about total annihilation? We’ve got plenty of nuclear wepaons which will not result in such an event.
But nuclear force, even given WWII, is unprecidented and will be a hard choice to make.
It is not a choice to rule out, as the enemy has obviously demonstrated it will take any means necessary as well. If there is cause to drop a nuke-- and there is some support for it-- I dont think we should let hippie rhetoric stop us (and I’m a hippie!). There are a few things you can do to defeat an enemy. One is to consume him: re, the Romans. The second is to dissolve him: re, coup d’etat. The third is to overpower him: re, conventional warfare.
Convenional warfare, if necessary in the first place, is very unlikely to dissuade religious conviction. As such, there is no method of attack that we should rule out right now. It is simply too soon, and we don’t know the ramifications of any actions that are going to be taken.
A nuclear weapon is a tool of war. Any engagement of conventional warfare has, as a possibility, the result of nuclear assault. Any attempt to pretend otherwise is simply avoiding the fact. If we use conventional warfare but fear to use nukes we lack the strength of our conviction, and should not be in a conflict in the first place. This doesn’t mean nukes don’t have their own considerations, just simply that they shouldn’t be ruled out.
I don’t agree with the use of nukes either. They will send a powerful short-term message, but an even more powerful long term message that is counter-productive to the U.S.