It’s been quite awhile since I’ve seen someone portray Frontpage as a reliable source.
Now, since you seem to disagree with my statement about Middle Easterners being able to tell the difference between Germans and Americans, perhaps you can enlighten us on your qualifications to make such a dumb and borderline racist assertion.
How many Middle Eastern countries have you visited?
How many Middle Easterners have you ever spoken with?
Also, I assume you can talk at length about Sudan and why it’s hardly representative of the Arab World?
If not, what would cause you to make a judgement about the Middle East based upon what happened in the Sudan?
Wouldn’t you agree that making decisions about how Moroccans and Jordanians would react based on some occurrences is like judging Canadians and citizens of the United States based on events that occurred in Guatamala since “they’re all Americans”?
Same here. Fuck that guy. Glad he’s gone. (Though, ironically, not because of a drone strike. No one outside of bin Laden’s compound was harmed during the raid.)
Well, they may or may not fight back, being perhaps neither inclined to nor able to do so. I think it’s fairly uncontroversial to say that it certainly isn’t helping to influence their opinion of the US favorably.
I am reasonably confident that one day in the not-too-distant future, historical consensus will see these unfettered drone attacks as a shameful chapter of American history, on par with the Trail of Tears or the Philippine-American War.
Most Americans don’t want to admit they are an empire; they certainly don’t want to admit that they are behaving amorally or worse. Americans generally have a near compulsive need to believe America is the heroic savior of the world. Bastion of Freedom and Democracy, crusader for Justice, etc.
Which is kind of interesting. It shows that when we actually want to get a specific guy instead of just blowing up some man who may or may not be a valid target and justifying it after the fact, we don’t send drones.
I hope those are of somewhat reliable source for you, there is a google-thinga-ma-chig where you are, right? You are obviously ignoring the fact, that those emabssies where attacked - no matter the facts.
Based on an event in Sudan you’ve decided that Middle Easternors see no difference between Americans and Germans.
That strikes me as remarkably stupid.
Presumably you also have no problem making assumptions about how “New Yorkers” react based on something that happens in El Salvador since Salvadorans and New Yorkers are both “Americans.”
Is it also safe to assume you’re very familiar with the relationship between Germans and the Middle East and can talk in detail about how it differs from the experiences of Americans.
Also you failed to answer my questions as to how you can be so certain about the feeling of Middle Easterners.
So please, how many Middle Eastern countries have you visited and how long have you spent there?
Also, how many Middle Easterners have you spoken with about the situation?
Yes, in the case of the highest-profile target imaginable, Obama went against the advice of his staff and ordered a dangerous Navy SEAL raid instead of sending a drone because he felt it was worth the gamble to prove Bin Laden was there. It was a difficult decision that nearly got people killed and provoked an international incident, so… drone strikes debunked, I guess.
You seem shocked that in order to be effective, our precious military might to actually need to take personal risks, instead of talking about how brave they are while killing people who can’t fight back and who we don’t actually know are even our targets.
Still a good example. Out of five people killed during the Bin Laden raid, three were “civilians” (or, of you prefer, “bystanders”) - brother of the courier, brother’s wife and Bin Laden’s son.
That’s 60% “collateral damage”. During a surgical strike. So - should the SEALS have refrained from this mission to minimize civilian casualties?
We wanted proof, and we wanted everything else we pulled out of the compound. Papers and computers were, no doubt, seen as an excellent secondary goal of the mission.
Not sure where you’re getting shock out of that post. I was pointing out that, yes, the government did not use a drone to get Bin Laden (and it was a great decision). That choice involved large risks and fallout that might be seen as making it impractical to use that method over and over. Pakistan withdrew its (covert) support for the drone strikes after that raid because they were offended- and of course embarrassed that bin Laden was caught and killed in a military town.
Ok, so you think people in the military are cowardly bullies. Can I ask why I’m supposed to give a damn? I’m not in the military and I’m not invested in the notion that they’re brave, nor am I offended if they don’t live up to whatever level of braggadocio you feel they project, and I’m not offended by the idea that drone strikes are unfair or chicken or not quite cricket. I’m bothered by civilian deaths and fishy accounting and questions about evidence and due process, but not by the idea that the U.S. military is, on some level, cheating. War sucks, and so does terrorism.
Right, good deflection - I fail to understand what your questions have to do with a moral justification with the USA sending in drones and killing people.
Hint: when mentioning America, generally the USA is meant (unless otherwise stated), not understanding this in this context is very stupid and since you are the only one that questioned that, I assume you are just deflecting - Since I never said, that the people in the Middle East don’t know that there are different nations, but we are all considered Westerners.
Hint: with Westerners most nations in Western Europe (continent), Israle, North America (USA, Canda) etc is ment.
Both special forces missions and drone strikes represent violations of national territorial sovereignty (unlike espionage missions), less egregiously in the case of special forces missions, which have a much better track record of excluding injury to civilian life and property than drone strikes. However, they both violate territorial sovereignty, and as such should not be practiced by signatories to both the U.N. Charter (Article 2, Section 4 states “All Members shall refrain in their international relations from the threat or use of force against the territorial integrity or political independence of any state, or in any other manner inconsistent with the Purposes of the United Nations.”) as well as the Chicago Convention on International Civil Aviation, which states “The contracting States recognize that every State has complete and exclusive sovereignty over the airspace above its territory.” in Article 1 and “No aircraft capable of being flown without a pilot shall be flown without a pilot over the territory of a contracting State without special authorization by that State and in accordance with the terms of such authorization.” in Article 8.
The United States, Afghanistan, Pakistan, and Yemen are all members of the United Nations as well as signatories to the Chicago Convention. As such, drone strikes by the US inside the territory of the other three nations are in violation of treaty agreements unless those other governments acquiesce to these strikes. However, there are recent indications in allthreenations that this period of acquiescence may be drawing to an end.
If that comes to pass, then the US would have to formally declare war on these nations if it wished to continue its policy of drone strikes. There is a roughlyanalogous precedent in American history. Of course, this would be an extremely unlikely course of events. Far more likely is that the US will simply have to get by without the ability to carry out these drone strikes. I eagerly anticipate that day.
From the quoted article above about Afghan resistance to the policy of drone strikes:
This seems to indicate that the US military can be more averse to collateral damage and still take out “high-value targets” if it chooses to do so; the fact that it has largely not, to date, done so seems to imply a callousness to foreign loss of life. Like I said, I find this brutality shameful.
First off, the courier opened fire on the SEAL team, and can thus hardly be classified as a “bystander”.
Secondly, the others killed (besides bin Laden himself) were all adults.
Thirdly, there were many children present who escaped the raid without serious injury.
I cannot believe that you are arguing in good faith that the aftermath of this raid is in any way comparable to that from the Wech Baghtu or Deh Bala drone strikes.