Pjen: acquiesced in what?
He is an Aussie.
Every military action pursued by the United States has triggered the appearance on American street corners of savagely nationalistic mouth-breathers who enthusiastically wave placards encouraging the free use of our nuclear arsenal against the enemy du jour. They are rightly regarded by most as the bloodthirsty fringe and for the most part are ignored. They certainly don’t influence official policy to any measurable degree.
Don’t judge an entire people by the beliefs and actions of its worst members, unless you yourself want to be judged by the backward knuckledraggers in your neighborhood.
Point of order. Are broad brush slams against entire populations forbidden in other fora as well, or just GD? Thanks.
Diplomacy? Something like this, then?
“the policy of settling international quarrels by admitting and satisfying grievances through rational negotiation and compromise, thereby avoiding the resort to an armed conflict which would be, expensive, bloody and possibly dangerous.”
Now, tagos, there you go again. I’m no freer with anyone else’s life than I would be with my own. I was pointing out that, when you talk about hundreds of people dying, fifteen people could also die.
That said, I didn’t say that the SAS is going to walk in and walk out. I’m saying, irrespective of if they are called to move or not, the SAS are training to haul these people out as well as they can. I know you don’t think much of them, but they really are quite capable. If they’re tasked to go, they will go and do as well as humanly possible.
Acquiesced in the continuation of the Gitmo Gulag- Blair having no balls at all to stand up for human rights- ‘An Anomaly’ indeed.
Agreed; I wouldn’t want to be judged by the antics of chowder, that’s for sure.
Ex Python’s take on this matter:
I think he meatly sums up my position onthe matter.
Obviously the Iranians are not as civilized as we, eh Chowder.
Really? Please explain why trained (I assume they were trained like I was when I was in the Canadian army) military people would willing say things against their will without coercion? Even if I knew I was in Iranian waters I wouldn’t be saying such a thing on TV. Frankly, you get name, rank and serial number. PERIOD. Now that sounds good on paper, but in actuality you are not expected to throw yourself on a bayonet. But some guy looking at you cross-eyed shouldn’t be enough to make you do things you don’t want to.
If these soldiers are under no coercion then when they are released they should be court martialed and either sent to jail or given a dishonourable discharge. But, I bet they are and you just don’t see what type of coercion it is. Not all coercion is physical or visible.
In my opinion, no they are not.
Incidentally, are you stalking me?
Because they expect to be treated the way we treat prisoners ? I know that if I was captured by our enemies I’d be afraid they would apply our own standards to me. Honestly, I’m surprised that anyone in Iraq surrenders; I’d shoot myself before surrendering to the Coalition.
For that matter, the Guardian article doesn’t say they weren’t coerced; just that they weren’t treated as badly as they would be if they were ME people in Coalition hands.
I’m interested in how they know this is the case? I’m not saying it isn’t the case, I just want to know how they know it is? Or has the military turned into a bunch of pussies since I was in 20-some years ago?
I don’t know; as I just said, that was the point of the article. Do you have any reason to believe they were treated as badly ? Especially since they are still alive ?
And as an aside, not only is using the term “pussy” to mean “weak” obnoxious and sexist, it’s even more so when one of the people involved is a woman.
What has Iran got to achieve by treating people badly ?
There’s an an enormous amount to be gained from treating the well, and being seen to treat them well i.e. contrasting how they treat ‘detainees’ with how ‘the west’ treats Muslim detainees.
Don’t apply our leaders and standards. Really, the Iranians aren’t that stupid.
:dubious:
:dubious: right back at you. Elsie’s statement is perfectly reasonable, and a smiley isn’t much of a rebuttal.
Personally I think a rescue mission would be an act of madness and impossible to pull off.
The trouble is that once they’ve pulled a stunt like that, they’ll pull another, and another.
It is difficult dealing with people who enter someone else’s territory, kidnap a bunch of uniformed people then accuse them of spying. The mentality is at the level of a small boy telling a lie and expecting to be believed. The fact that they think it will drum up local support indicates that they think their own population is pretty gullible note: they are making broad brush generalizations - not me
One needs to respond, preferably in a way that will make them hold off from pulling another trick, like a ‘spontaneous’ storming of the British Embassy - something I consider very likely.
At present, the best I can think of is withdrawing our diplomatic staff, advizing UK nationals to get out and packing their diplomatic staff off to Tehran.
I would also look carefully into ways of inflicting economically crippling damage and make it clear that we are considering it.
Trained military personnel should not willingly go on camera when it is obvious it will be used by their captors for propaganda purposes. Either they did it willingly with little coercion, or they were forced to. I assume that they would have been trained like I was so I figure they were forced to.
But it is the Iranians who are forcing her to wear a head scarf because she has a vagina. Proof alone that they are more civilized than us. Yet, it is me you are upset at for using a term that I’d heard used many a time in the military over 20 years ago. A term that came to me while I was trying to remember what it was like when I wore a uniform. Well, I’m sorry if I offended anyone by my comment. Please replace ‘pussies’ with ‘weaklings’ if anyone chooses to read my post above…
Long ago I lost any respect that I may have had for you. You do not like anything about the west from what I can gather, this being so just sod off to whatever country you find appealing.
I have nothing else to say in this thread but I’ll just remind you and Elsie that it was not the West who was responsible for.
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The WTC atrocity
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The London tube and bus bombings
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The Madrid bombings
Plus a host of others directed at innocents with NO means of defence
…and don’t throw the WTC conspiracy theories at me because they are bullcrap
Read Uzis closing paragraph, digest it and ponder on what is said there.
I’m out of here, save your breath
The UK papers have brought up this subject a few times, I doubt it is a coincidence. The idea is that they are told to cooperate as nobody would believe that they really meant what they were saying.
From memory, they are told to keep quiet about anything important for 48 hours, as after then it will not matter much.
It makes sense as reeling out a whole load of nonsense is quite a good way of avoiding physical torture.