It seems to me that this is the most dangerous attitude towards war - that there is any difference between us and them. Sure, there were those in Afgahnistan who happily crashed planes into a building full of civilians, but this does not reflect the feeelings of an entire country. Just as we were shocked by the civilian killings in Afgahnistan, so I’m sure some of them were horrified at the WTC attacks.
Even though we are a world away from them, it is important to see that the Afgan people are every bit as capable of sorrow and pain, of divided loyalties, of rightous anger, as any North American. If we see them as uncaring faceless statistics, then we must accept that some of them could see us as souless capitolist drones.
Every war involves bloodshed of the most pointless kind - the loss of innocent life. Apparently we have learned absolutely nothing from history. Every war has two sides, and they both steadfastly believe that they are right.
All I have to say is: I hope the Afgans love their children too.
meyer I think you misunderstand. No one said that the average Afghani is any way lacking in humanity, much less the entire nation. Clearly those in power right now in Afghanistan at the very least condone the terrorist acts, if not actively support them. Not only that, there are numerous and varied reports that they deny their own people basic human rights. I believe this is the ‘them’ being referred to, and there is a difference.
Monday morning quarterbacking from a nice safe computer without knowing ANY of the details, yet you still hope some guy risking his ass for you gets punished.
“Ok, here’s the deal. We want you to sign up for the US Armed Forces. You will get paid shit, you will not see your families for long periods of time and you will have to put your life on the line for people who have nothing better to do but criticize your every move. Oh yeah… and if you make a mistake, even while putting your life on the line in a combat zone, we will throw your ass in jail.”
Actually, it’s right on the mark. You are more than willing to throw this guy to the wolves just to soothe your conscience. You are not willing to stand united, you are not willing to back up those who are doing this job for the entire country.
Your comment was selfish. Who the hell cares what you think? If you have a problem with what’s going on, direct it at our leaders, not the men and women who act as litteral extensions of this country’s will.
Irrelevant.
Please keep your unsubstantiated real life hero stories to your self. Your past actions (real or imagined) do not give you carte blanche to shoot off at the mouth.
My point, which you seem to have missed is that we are willing to accept American civilian causulties(killed by us) in this war. What kind of idiot would accept American civilian causulties, but fail to understand that there will be Afghan civilians killed as well?
All innocent people in this world are at risk because of these terrorists. If we choose to sit tight and refuse to hit back because of civilians, then we will never win and ultimately we will have to face even more civilian casulties when the next plane goes into a building.
BTW…
That was an excellent display of poor reading comprehension when you turned “collateral” into “carte blanche.”
Doesn’t vast majority = effective execution?
???
Quick, shoot the one bastard who isn’t perfect.
Keep that up and we won’t have any pilots left to fight back with.
Sure, forget the fact that this particular pilot has also accepted the fact that he (she?) will be heading out to take a second shot at some target somebody else missed. I also missed the part where anybody wanted to reward the pilot for his error.
In my world another combat mission doesn’t qualify as a reward. However, I have no problem seeing where you called for punishment.
From the first day of bombing the Pentagon has never claimed 100% kill ratio for the air sorties. This means that everyday since then, there have been pilots out there taking second and third shots at targets that were previously missed.
We don’t have the technology to fly over a combat zone at 600 mph and hit every moving target we see, every time, without ever hitting something else.
Of course, you are just clever enough to blame the pilots for this.
Incorrect yet again. I hope that someone who did not perform his assigned task correctly is disciplined correctly for that.
You obviously missed the details above (also posted by someone else) that, due to his FAILURE IN COMBAT, someone else is going to have to go in and risk his ass to perform the ASSIGNED TASK the first pilot FAILED TO PERFORM CORRECTLY IN COMBAT.
Man, you certainly do read a lot of bullshit into what people posted, don’t you?
Please bone up on the Uniform Code of Military Justice and then get back to us.
Jesus Christ Almighty! Did you just fucking call me a traitor? Did you just say that I do not support my country? You know, the country I spent 20 years of my life defending so fools like you can call me a traitor when I dare to suggest that a combat pilot be expected to PEFORM HIS ASSIGNED TASKS IN COMBAT CORRECTLY?!
Incorrect. As someone evidently a heck of a lot more familiar with the United States Navy (that’s me, Monty, retired Petty Officer First Class, US Navy) than you, someone who also served in a fighter squadron, I am aware of what the pilot is expected to do in combat: PERFORM HIS ASSIGNED TASKS IN COMBAT CORRECTLY.
The Constitution of the United States of America. You may recall that those of us who have served, and those of us who currently serve, this land have sworn or affirmed “to support and defend the Constitution of the United States against all enemies, foreign and domestic.” As that self-same Constitution guarantees me the right to speak my peace, I’ll go with it over your insulting comments about my patriotism.
Actually, the men and women of the Armed Forces do not act as literal extensions of the country’s will. What they do act as is the military arm of the Executive Department of our form of government. Evidently you are not aware (or have conveniently forgotten) that the United States of America is a republic, not a rule by mob. Our leaders are expected to follow our laws when they carry out their duties. Kind of like the pilot in question is expected to follow our laws, one of which is the Uniform Code of Military Conduct, when he carries out his duties.
It is not irrelevant. I brought up that fact so you just might understand that I know what the Navy, in a combat zone, is like.
So real-life experiences have nothing to do with evaluating a real-life event but your extremist ideas, lacking any qualifications as to knowledge of what the military, in a combat zone, is like do? Fascinating.
My point, which you seem to have missed is that we are willing to accept American civilian causulties(killed by us) in this war.
[/quote]
You may be willing to, but the vast majority of people I know (most of whom are still in the military because I retired last year) are not “willing to accept Amercian civilian casualties.” Where the heck did you glean that from anyway? The American civilian casualties so far in this particular conflict were inflicted by the terrorists. Last I checked, the members of the United States Armed Forces making the combat sorties are uniformed military.
What kind of moron even assigns that attitude to me with exactly zero evidence? Oh, the answer to that is: the poster, Freedom.
I understand completely that there very well may be Afghani civilian casualties here. But if that is from pilot error, then that error needs to be addressed. And sometimes, errors in combat get the person who made that error disciplined. Thus the UCMJ.
That does not negate the intrinsic worth of each of those human beings.
Where the heck did I even suggest refusing to hit back? I suggested that I hope the pilot WHO FAILED TO PERFORM HIS ASSIGNED TASK CORRECTLY IN COMBAT is discplined for FAILING TO PERFORM HIS ASSIGNED TASK IN COMBAT CORRECTLY.
Unlike you, I expect those who are in uniform, just like I was expected to do, to perform their combat tasks correctly to (a) provide for the safety of their fellow combat team members, and (b) carry out their mission as assigned with a minimum of civilian casualties.
Now one way to ensure that minimum is exactly that, minimum, is to appropriately discipline the pilot who made the pilot error.
Or are you unfamiliar with the term “error”?
For those missions correctly executed. The point is that each and every combat sortie is evaluated after the fact to ensure that the person executing it did so as assigned. Failing to carry out one’s assigned mission correctly, due to one’s own error, is what’s known as punishable in our military. That you don’t like that FACT actually is what’s irrelevant here.
Bullshit. What we will have is someone who understands that he is expected to not further endanger his fellow combat team members by fucking up in combat.
Why that part is your entire response. You freaked out when I suggested disciplining the pilot for pilot error. The other pilot you stipulated just now (apparently for your own convenience in this particular thread) should also be disciplined if his missing that target was due to pilot error.
No, but continuing to perform one’s duties with no discipline for failing to perfrom those duties is dangerous to the rest of the combat team.
So why the heck are you freaking out about it if you see no problem with me calling for punishment for someone who freaking screwed up?!
And how many of those were sorties which killed innocent civilians due to pilot error? Nobody is calling for crucifying someone for performing his assigned task correctly.
Of course we don’t. Especially when you have someone making errors as a pilot. The idea, I hope you realize, is to have the pilot do his job correctly in combat and from there hope for the best. Pilot error ain’t right, in civilian or military missions.
Then I am in damn fine company. The United States Armed Forces assigned the blame for this particular event on pilot error. Quick query for you: if it’s pilot error, who, if not the pilot, made the error?
Thanks for the morning laugh, Freedom, but you may want to tone it down a wee bit my brothuh, as you and Monty appear to be heading for a Pit encounter. Just my dos centavos…
Please fill us in on what exactly the pilot did wrong.
I’m expecting information on the plane used, the type of weapon used, the targeting system and the way targetsa are aquired.
Please quote me the relevant sections of the UCMJ.
I’m dying to see how you think it applies in this case.
Actually, they are literal extensions of our country’s will. When our leaders decide to erase something from the map, they are the means.
Once again, would you mind showing us where the UCMC has anything to do with this?
I would like an actual cite, not some gibberish off the top of your head.
Actually, on a message board, your real life qualifications mean jack squat. Who the hell knows who you are, and conversely, what the hell do you know about me?
Nothing.
If it can’t be cited, I’m not impressed.
ummm…
From the fact that we have been sending up F-16’s everytime we think another plane has been hijacked. What the hell do think it is there for?
To shoot the damned thing down if it becomes threatening.
To reiterate, a plane full of innocent civilians controlled by a couple of terrorists will be shot down. If we have accepted that as neccesary, then I’m ok with some stray foreign nationals getting killed every so often while we fight the terrorists.
I’ll be waiting for the part that addresses collateral damage in a combat zone.
Once again, please detail his task, and identify the exact place he failed.
Mind giving a couple of cites of our military disciplining a pilot for missing a target while in a combat zone?
The point was that ALL pilots miss targets occasionally, and all pilots participate in hitting missed targets the second time around.
This is what I’m talking about when I say you have poor reading comprehension.
Can you really not understand the difference between me having no problem with you calling out for punishment and me not having a problem FINDING the place where you called out for punishment?
I was doing so in contrast to you finding the place where I suggested rewarding the pilot.
…and your damn fine company is punishing this pilot how?
Well, I don’t know if I can get you all that, but, at least according to the Yahoo news reports, it was an F/A-18 (Hornet) Navy fighter, equipped with what Yahoo calls a “2000 lb smart bomb”. Unfortunately, that doesn’t help very much in identifying the ordinance, but, from the news reports and what I know of “smart bombs”, they’re satelite guided. The operator arms the bomb, then enters in a sattelite provided location code. The bomb’s computer then uses the provided code to hit its target. Apparently, according to information the DoD has provided, the pilot made a mistake entering in the code, so the bomb missed its target.
**
**
IANAL, but hypothetically, the pilot could be charged under
The plane won’t be automaticaly shot down because it is hijacked by terrorists but if it is aiming to go down on a city centre or otherwise be used as a weapon it likely will. The poor passengers will die anyway. Tough call though.
And you are comparing a plane hijacking to bombing in a combat situation? Innocent civilian casualties somehow make it ok “some stray foreign nationals [civilians] getting killed every so often”… why? It either is or isn’t. I don’t see why it should be dependant on the defense of US airspace for acceptance.
So, Freedom, is it your theory that Monty has spent the past two years on this board pretending to be in the Armed Forces just so he could try to win points in this argument?
Not particularly for this arguement, but stranger things have happened than a person lying about their real life persona on an internet message board.
I’m not familiar with monty’s posting history, nor do I care to research the history of every person I happen to post with.
It’s my theory that unless something is independently verifiable, then it is irrelevant.
There have been several cases on this board in recent memory where a person faked entire sob stories and suckered some of the board. I have no idea whether or not Monty is a fake. My point is that it is impossible to argue anything with someone who is allowed to create reality at will.
JohnnyIsGood
Yes I am comparing the two. The basic premise is the same.
We must stop the terrorists. We can not sit around motionless for fear of hurting a civilian.
It’s not that I see American life as a more valuable, it’s that I don’t see it as LESS valuable. There are people in this world who must be killed in order to make the world safer for all of us. On the way to killing those people there will be innocent casualties. Every single death can be attributed to those causing these attacks. Captain Amazing
IANALeither…
…but it seems to me that hypothetically doesn’t quite cut it.
We are not on new ground here. We have been regularly committing our troops to combat situations for as long as I can remember.
IMHO not one of those Articles seems at all relevant. Luckily for us we don’t have to depend on our opinions. Please show two cases where any of those Articles were applied to a pilot who accidentally missed his target in a combat zone, and the issue is settled.
Feel free to pull from Bosnia, Somalia, The Gulf War, Panama, etc…etc…
Exactly. The “them” I mean is the terrorists, Al Queda, the Taliban, Osama Bin Laden. THAT is where we are different.
While Osama wages “war” against us, he will kill anyone he can. But WE will not. WE will not allow that.
I’m not saying we’re different from the people of Afghanistan-we’re all humans. But we will not become like the terrorists. Freedom: Perhaps it IS inevitable. BUT, does that say we do not have the right to wish otherwise? What is wrong with someone if they grieve for people being hurt in something that wasn’t their fault? Personally, I think we LOSE our own humanity when we say, “Oh well, another person dead-they were innocent, but so what? It happens.” THAT is when we become desensitised to the horrors around us.
BTW-what’s the name of Freedom’s fallacy-he’s using the either we allow civilian casualties, or we sit around doing nothing argument?
Where YOU ever in the military?
:rolleyes:
(We need a rolling eyes smiley with his eyes rolling so far back into his head we see the muscles attached at the back)
Freedom, what’s the beef here? Of course a pilot who bombs the wrong target, if he/she acted wilfully or with culpable negligence, may be criminally liable under the Uniformed Code of Military Justice. That is so obvious it doesn’t bear debate - it is at the heart of military discipline and good order.
In this case, we are far from any court martial proceedings. Yet to be determined is who exactly put in the wrong coordinates, whether it was an honest error or whether it should have been caught, mitigating factors, etc.
And, of course, to expect that the Uniformed Code of Military Justice and the requirements of discipline and good order still apply in combat situations is by no means traitorous.
Well, like I said, I’m not a military lawyer, so I don’t have any citations at hand. Here’s how they could apply, though, if the proscutor decided to prosecute.
ART. 92-The pilot was derelict in his duty. By failing to follow correct proceedures, he caused his mission to fail.
ART. 108-Because of neglect, he caused to be destroyed a 2000 lb bomb belonging to the armed forces.
ART. 109-Because of neglect, he caused to be destroyed buildings not belonging to the armed forces
ART. 119-He unlawfully killed human beings through culpable negligence.
ART. 134-By failing to properly carry out his orders, he brought discredit on the armed forces.
I’m still trying to find case law, so I’ll just ask you to be patient with me.
Fascinating. Freedom has accused me of making up my entire adult life’s work. And it’s even more amusing in that it really is verifiable. Check with this board’s administrators or moderators.
Freedom: I hereby give you my explicit permission to query them and the Admins/Mods of this board now have my explicit permission to verify for you that I actually did serve and actually did retire from the US Armed Forces on February 29, 2001, in the rate (that’s the Navy version of rank for Enlisted) I stated earlier in this thread.
What’s fascinating is that he is attacking my person with that assertion because he is unhappy with (read: “unable to refute”) my argument in this thread.
I’m sorry Guinastasia, I did misunderstand what you were saying. I just wanted to express my feelings on the pointlessness of war, especially when we all know that innocent civilians will be killed. On the other hand, i realize that we cannot just do nothing. That’s what makes it all so upsetting.
Even though its hard, I am trying to remember that the Afgans are people just like us, and even the hijackers were motivated by basic human emotions and thought that they were right. The Afgan people are scared for thier lives, and worried for thier children, just like us.
This helps me try to understand what could otherwise be seen as just the hand of fate, and I think it is very important.
Please accept my apologies for jumping all over you.
Heh, looks like Freedom is up to his tricks again.
Guinastasia, I believe you are referring to the either-or fallacy, also called false dilemma or sometimes black and white fallacy. You become guilty of this logical fallacy when you state that only two alternatives exist, when in fact there are more than two.
I think we’ve seen an increase in such fallacies on these boards since the 9/11 attacks, as people lose perspective of the real issues and focus instead on issues of ethnic or national opposition or hostility, much like Freedom’s ranting.
**
I disagree. Military actions and terrorist actions do not share a basic premise, except for their violent nature.
Agreed, I don’t question that.
Yeah but that is different. No one is saying american lives are less valuable but you put up a silly argument to suport your position. It does not make it ok that a few innocent afghanis die due to pilot mistake because we are willing to accept that it might become necessary to shoot down planes with innocent american civilians, which is exactly what you said.
And I also disagree with pretty much everything else you said. The pilot is responsible for failing his mission. Civilians were killed, fuel and ordnance wasted, target remains a threat, the image of the Air Force damaged, etc etc etc. Of course he is liable to be punished for that. Soldiers catch flak for a lot less in the armed forces than aiming for the wrong target. I’m not saying he should be court-martialed without knowing more details. It’s a difficult position for him.
And the whole how-dare-you-criticize-behind-a-computer-doing-nothing-while-the-brave-soldiers-risk-their-lives-defending-our-nation thing is getting old. It is their job ok? I can’t say he was incompetent because I’m not doing it? Give me a break. Maybe he didn’t want to do it in the first place.
Like Abe said you are ranting without any perspective, IMO.
I was saying that the basic premise of shooting down a hijacked plane and a combat situation were the same, with the premise being that we must stop the terrorists.
I’m still waiting for a clear cut explanation of what he did wrong. Then I want examples of someone being court martialed for it.
Hell, we don’t even have to dick around with the past, we can wait right here and see what happens. If they court martial this guy, then obviously I don’t have a grasp of how pilots get judged.
If nothing happens to this pilot, then I stand by my statement that Monty seems more than willing eat his own in this situation.
My entire beef in this thread comes from how quickly Monty was calling for the pilot to be punished. Nobody on this thread has any real idea what happened in that cockpit. In a situation where a man is putting his life on the line for me, I absolutely give him the benefit of the doubt until hard facts come out the other way.
Agreed. It is not a tit for tat situation where one justifies the other. I never meant to come off that way.
What I was trying to say was that if we have reached the extraordinary point of shooting down our own airliners, then we have to accept the fact that removing this threat from the world is more important than not killing any innocent people along the way.
It sucks. I’m not cheerleading when random Afghanis get killed, but I lay the responsibility for their deaths on the Taliban.
Abe
My beef is about pre-judging a Navy pilot without any real information about what really happened.
Please show me where I blurred over into the “issues of ethnic or national opposition or hostility.” SuaSponte
If the news article stated that they had film from this guy’s flight where he intentionally started strafing a residential area and then bombed schools, all on his own, I would agree with you.
I guess this entire thing hinges on whether or not accidentaly punching in a wrong number counts as culpable negligence.
IF that is even what happened. As far as I can tell, no one in here knows what happened.
Exactly.
That is why I am pissed that someone would be calling for his punishment already.
Dead civilians do not automatically equal punishment for a Navy pilot, which is what Monty seems to be implying. Guinastasia
I agree. I have never said that the loss of innocent life over there doesn’t matter. I have been a big fan of the scaled down strikes and would never support just randomly attacking Afghanistan in order get revenge.
This country is not perfect and has done many things to piss people off, but we have also done a ton to help other people. We did not ask for this fight, and there is no one I know that enjoys this fight. Unfortunately we are in this fight, whether we like it or not.
Getting overly focused on civilian casualties in the middle of the fight seems like a deadly mistake to me.
Monty
Monty,
You have misread so much in this post that it does not surprise me that you messed up again. I have not accused you of making up anything.
The bottom line is, everyone’s real life is pretty irrelevant in Great Debates. That was my point. That is the way I deal with all posters in here, and that is the way I will continue to deal with all posters.
Any title or experience that anyone has in real life does not automatically make them the authority on a given subject. Even if it did, the very nature of the net cheapens that by giving everybody the ability to be whatever they want just by typing it.
Take the lawyers on the board for example. They don’t come in waving their law degrees around and claim victory, they offer cites and usually a couple of cases to back up their point. It’s the evidence they put in the thread that matters, not who they are in real life.
I am not interseted in your real life Monty. It may come as a shock to you, but it doesn’t matter one bit to me one way or the other. I like this board because it is an INTERNET board.
As far as I can tell, your only assertion is that this pilot should be punished, I haven’t seen you put out an arguement to back it up yet. Captain Amazing seems to be doing all the work trying to show that a pilot who misses his target can be charged with a crime.
The best part is, we can just wait around and see if this guy gets court martialed. If he does, then I will be first in line to apoligize to you. If he doesn’t, then I stand by my statement that you were more than ready to throw this guy to the wolves without knowing any facts in order to soothe your own conscience.