So were the guys who flew bomber missions over Germany (and Britain) heroes or cowards? They were there to drop bombs on cities. The bombs couldn’t be aimed, they just released thousands of them and hoped a few landed on factories and bridges. But of course, plenty of bombs landed on schools and hospitals and churches and houses and orphanages.
If the British pilots bombing Germany were heroes, then the German pilots bombing Britain had to be heroes too.
You’ve lost me; don’t you think Hasan figured he’d eventually get cut down by gunfire once he started shooting at the military base? Instead of planting explosives or recruiting dupes or whatever, he picked a method of killing people that apparently involved a willingness to get shot.
Perhaps some heads of government are being selfish but they are elected to represent the people, Some heads of government were eveil and some may use it for their own intentions…Like Hitler for instance. He seemed to be the poster boy for evil but he didn’t hide, he went out among the people and was targeted,but he wasn’t a hero He was a despot. When has bin Laden been seen in public talking to his people?
Bin Laden and McVeigh may have given up some worldly comforts, but they had ideas of grandeur as their goal. Neither had a legitiment reason for killing or getting people to kill for them. Osama is worse that McVeigh because he does nothing but get pople riled up to do his dirty work.
There are better ways to get one’s point across with out killing innocent people to reach your goal.
Our soldiers do not hide their faces, they wear proudly the uniforms of our country. They know they have a chance to be killed but do not want to die, but take the chance for the lives of their buddies and their country. The same goes for our allied soldiers. bin Laden’s flunkys hide their faces so they won’t be known.
No head of government in my opinion should go to war except in defense of the country and should not strike first. If that country is proven to be really in danger then of course it has the right to defend it self. Or in the defense of another if asked by the other country for help,as was in the war in Europe.
He may have been suicidal, but now I notice he has hired a lawyer to defend himself, and he apparently thought he could kill a lot of unarmed people before he was caught. Looks like he changed his mind now that he is still alive. It seems it was his intent to kill even more as so many were injured. He will have to wait a while to get his virgins if that was his intent! Notice he went into a room full of people he knew was unarmed and expected to escape.
The pilots intent was not to kill innocent people, and that is why war is so terrible a way to settle any dispute, as innocent people also pay the price. The pilots were also risking getting shot down, not hiding in caves etc… There is no way to wage a war and not have innnocent people suffer or die. Hitler’s intent was to kill innocent people, Jews,Gays, and Gypsies. They were not bombed but dragged to death camps. If we were like them and bin Laden we could just have killed randomly like they do with their bombs tied to their bodies go into areas where their own people are and slaughter anyone in the way.
What was in the pilots’ minds during this then? Or this? (Or on the other side, this or this?) What about the guys who dropped the bombs? What about the generals who gave the orders?
Strictly speaking, it sounds like his family hired the lawyer.
Does the intent of the pilots matter? They were still dropping the bombs. And some raids were definitely intended to cause high levels of destruction and civilian damage for morale purposes. You’re talking about total warfare here.
Of course.
What do you think about the use of remote controlled Predator drones?
I’m not sure conventional definitions of bravery apply to someone who’s gone nuts. You could say the guy was brave enough to do something that was likely to get him killed, or a coward for shooting innocent people - and not only that, but for doing it to avoid deployment. If you’re that crazy, it probably doesn’t count.
Conversations like this thread always remind me of this line from the novel 1632:
And when possible, they do that from inside tanks, or in airplanes out the reach of the enemy, or in foxholes. That’s because they are brave, not stupid. Just as Osama would be stupid to go out and personally play soldier, especially since he’s a sick old guy.
His rifle clip keeps catching on the dialysis machine.
Quite, it seems to me that monavis wants to create increasingly tortured, ad hoc definitions with the major goal - sentimental and emotional - of denying to bad people any touch on a “good” or “admirable” trait. Courage, bravery, whatever. Bad guys must be all bad and can’t have and positive trait…
If that’s what he wants to do, well… his choice, but it strikes me as largely emotional and irrational.
People who want to commit suicide display a willingness to get shot. That doesn’t make them any more or less cowardly.
I don’t want to particularly associate myself with monavis here, but I’d be a lot more willing to call one of these shooters “brave” if he (or she) didn’t willingly commit suicide. That’s essentially what happens to these people, either directly, or by putting themselves in a situation that results in certain death. Very few end up facing the music afterward.
ETA: I take it back, at least in this case. In all of the reading I’ve done (obviously not enough), I thought Hasan was dead. Christ, I feel dumb.
The reports immediately after the shooting said he was dead. I think that didn’t get corrected for about a day. But he’s in the hospital, repotedly paralyzed from the waist down.
Hitler had the country at large, the army, and the SS to protect him. It’s not particularly impressive to not hide in such circumstances - he didn’t need to. I mean, there was an assassination attempt from the* inside*, and that failed. If bin Laden had what Hitler had, I’d pretty much guarantee you he’d be out and about among the masses. Not having popular support doesn’t make you a coward to act accordingly.
I don’t think it’s reasonable to claim that an overall idea of grandeur means that current, voluntary hardships aren’t unselfish. Beyond that, i’m not entirely sure McVeigh had an idea of grandeur - you’ll have to sell me on that point.
I agree that neither had legimitate reasons for killing people, or getting people to kill for them. But that doesn’t make someone cowardly or heroic, it makes them wrong.
And that makes them inefficient, or foolish, or cruel, but not particularly cowardly in and of itself.
And? We’re not debating the forces, we’re debating the people. Note, however, that our soldiers wear camoflage, armour, have protective vehicles and support. Some level of hiding oneself and protecting oneself is clearly acceptable. And in the grand scheme of hiding, I would tend to say that hiding one’s face is a much lesser degree of cowardice than not even being in the countries of major conflict.
But this is projecting, not reality. What you’d like heads of government to do, not what they do. And it still doesn’t have anything to do with cowardice or heroism.
What RNATB said. Bin Laden is a monster and if I had the chance I’d put a bullet in his head myself. But he’s not a coward in the way that you probably think.
Their intent was to defeat the enemy they did not try to delibertly kill innocent people. Yes, it is known ahead of time that some innocent people willl die in a war,but they did not set out with the intent of killing innocent people. They didn’t go into market places where there were no one trying to kill them, but tried to avoid the innocent at all costs. That is the difference. Driving planes into buildings that contain no enemies in a non declared war is a big difference. Our pilots saved the lives of many Jews, Gypsies, and non Nazi’s, and stopped Hitler and his allies from killing and taking over more countries.
You can think as you wish…I can disagree as I wish.
You call it as you like,I will call it as it seems to me. I agree to dis-agree.
Even with their protecive vechicles they are in danger and risk getting killed…bin Laden doesn’t, he has some one else do it for him.
When you drop bombs on cities, you don’t have to try to kill innocent people. It’s going to happen.
Again - and this is in no way a defense of terrorism - this is demonstrably untrue. What’s the purpose of setting a city on fire from the air if not killing innocent people and breaking the will of their leadership?
???
Mate, the guy is at risk of being killed daily, and it appears held his ground at the Tora Bora caves. He’s a bloody monster, but that doesn’t mean he lacks personal guts - your sentimental desire to strip the term away notwithstanding.
In many ways, Bin Laden - again a monster and a murderer - in sending teams out to commit acts of war/terror on his enemy is not particularly different in a personal sense from a head of state (or a head of an army faction) ordering troops. ‘Someone else do it for him’ is how large organisations work.
Frankly, he’d be a complete idiot to personally run out and attack an American, if his value to his cause and organisation is great in a Command & Control role.