Jodi et al, I am merely speculating - ruminating - pondering possibilities here. Forgive me if nothing I say makes any sense or is workable, I am merely reaching for alternatives to nuking Afghanistan, ground invasion, or hand waving and whining for the Afghans to turn him over (pretty please).
Nobody in this thread (or most of the ones I’ve read) has given any consideration to embargoes. I suppose the reason is looking at the history of recent affairs with Iraq, and just how well embargoes hold up. Besides, given how poor off that country is anyway, it doesn’t look like it would have much effect other than preventing food and medicine from getting to the people. More suffering innocents.
What would it take to get a fatwa from all “real” Muslim states against Bin Laden for violating the true Islam and murdering innocents? Would that not give a legitimate Islamic religious backing to pressure Afghanistan to do something? If the rest of the Islamic world is unified against them on their own religious turf, it surely becomes less of a case of American anti-Islam oppression. Notice my call is not just for political support from the Islamic nations, but specific religious condemnation from within. Is there anyone that the Taliban would consider a legitimate Islamic source whose condemnation would matter (as opposed to the Egyptians and Saudis and other obvious U.S. puppets ;))?
Another thought that just popped into my head - what if we ask all the other Muslim states their recommendation for how to get Bin Laden? Tell them we want justice but don’t want to be anti-Muslim in the process, so we need their help - what would they do? This puts some of the onus on the Muslims to provide us with a course of action that brings Bin Laden to justice without becoming a crusade. I suppose the first criticism is this seems like asking the fox to guard the henhouse, but if we’re truthful that we don’t equate the actions of one group as all of Islam, then we should act like it and give them a chance to prove it by helping us find an acceptable answer.
Does anyone else have any creative alternatives that don’t involve “make it all glass” or “boo hoo pleeease”?
IRISHMAN – Thanks for posting. Your thoughts were exactly what I was looking for – alternate suggestions for courses of action that do not amount to doing nothing. Here are my thoughts on them:
Embargoes. Almost certainly totally ineffective. You cannot take something from the man who has nothing. And it’s not like we send a lot of stuff over to Afghanistan anyway. The only thing we could embargo, even internationally, that might be effective are things like food and medical supplies. It’s hard to imagine how we could justify doing that, in light of the fact that, guilty as the Taliban may be of harboring bin Laden, the country as a whole is undoubtedly suffering greatly.
An attack upon Afghanistan by other Muslim nations. I simply don’t see it happening and I don’t think there is any serious argument to be made that it ever would.
Religious condemnation. I think this is already occurring, but it is of very limited use. Like other types of extremists, fundamentalist Muslims apparently don’t really care what moderate Muslims think, because moderate Muslims are not true to to the faith. Just as fundamentalist Christians would probably not be persuaded by moderate Christians, nor Ultra-Orthodox Jews persuaded by moderate Jews, neither are the extremist fundamentalist Muslims likely to be swayed by their moderate counterparts.
Recommendations on how to get bin Laden. I think they should certainly be solicited, but for how long? What are they going to tell us that we don’t know? – he’s in a cave in Afghanistan and it will be extremely difficult, maybe impossible, to get him out. And what if we ask them for their input on a potential invasion, only to find they are strongly against it? If we then go ahead, what message does that send? There is a very fine line between asking for advice and asking for permission and, in any event, people whose advice is solicited tend to become testy if it is then not taken. (Which is only human nature.)
That said, I think there is a lot of merit to saying “Yes, we have disagreed in the past and we will disagree in the future. But this attack is so horrific and beyond the bounds of humanity that we know you join us in condemning it in the strongest possible terms. And we know that your faith, like Christianity, recognizes the need for and the right to, justice. So how would you suggest we obtain it?”
I’m not sure that’s an “instead of” as opposed to a “in addition to” military action, though. But it’s the best suggestion I’ve heard anyone make thus far.
I am offended by a lot of the rah rah flag-waving war talk, but Jodi, I am certainly in no position to advise specifically what action should be taken. Are you? Are any of us? Everybody’s a military expert all of a sudden. And we’re all free to have our opinions. I just know that the people of Afghanistan have suffered terribly for the last number of years, and bombing the hell out of them againto make Bush look good or appease the anger and horror of the citizenry… I hope the leaders are more mature and effective than this.
I know the feeling, though. Once I was held up and terrorized by a gunman who robbed the store I worked in and threatened to kill me. He had shot others in such robberies and I was convinced he was gonna kill me. I’ve moderated my stance by now, but if you’d asked me for advice anytime in the next couple of months after this had happened, I would have said feed him (and every other crazed, desperate heroin addict) to the tigers in the zoo, one body part at a time.
[[And I want to reemphasize how critical I believe it is that we pursue cooperative relationships with those moderate elements straddling the fence on US relations.]]
Congress has given Bush support for whatever military action (no matter how whimsical) he decides to take. Many other countries have informally given support as well. But from what I’ve heard, the UN Security Council has NOT voted to support this yet.
[[And if he’d killed more than 5,000 people, would you still have moderated your stance?]]
I certainly wouldn’t advocate killing many innocent people to get it out of my system. That seems like a dangerously emotional response that can only set much of the rest of the world against us, besides being a terribly immoral move. No doubt this is a complicated situation. No doubt we have to respond somehow. I don’t know what we should do. I’m no expert. I’m going on gut feelings just like the rest of you are. Let’s hope there are other effective options average folks like us haven’t thought of.
Okey doke, Jill. My gut feelings are that (a) the perpetrators of this act and those who provided support for their act need to be destroyed, and (b) everyone else should be left alone. The nasty bit, of course, is balancing (a) and (b). As always, that means both principles will likely have to give way to some extent. Bombing Kabul on the off chance that we’ll kill some bad guys is clearly indefensible. But doing nothing unless we can avoid all harm to innocents is also a bad idea, since we can be damn sure that these SOB’s are going to do everything in their power to ensure that other innocents will be killed.
Put another way, let’s say your armed robber has killed 5,000 people, and has sworn to keep on killing. Should we do nothing until we can guarantee that we won’t harm anybody who isn’t guilty? When does it become rational to bomb the crap out of the bad guy to prevent further slaughter, even though it will likely cause the deaths of other innocents? I don’t know myself, other than that the number darned sure isn’t zero.
I suppose it’s possible that the Taliban would give him up to us(and his organization). Damned unlikely though.
I suppose it’s possible that the Taliban would allow us to go in and execute arrest warrants and continue our investigation. Pretty unlikey also.
IMO, we are gonna have to go in and take him by force. Bombing is not going to do the trick. The big news outfits have already reported that Bin Laden’s boys have dispersed and will probably be hiding amongst the villagers in rural areas. One news source said that some Taliban officials
have already sent their families into the rural areas.
The terrorists will use innocent civillians as sheilds, hoping that will prevent us from striking. And if the Taliban helped Bin Laden, and continue to hide him, then that makes Afganistan an enemy that we will have to deal with. Yeah, I’m sure that many in that country do not agree with their government, and can be considered innocent. But the fact is they do not control that country. The soldiers will not answer to them. And when any countries go to war, there are civillian casualties. It’s unavoidable.
In any event, the President will make the call. I’m certain that he will be advised by experts and that all possible options will be discussed and weighed. He’s not gonna go off half-cocked.
My prediction is that we will go in and kick the stuffing out of Afganistan. I’d be happy if something happened to make that unnecessary. But I won’t hold my breath.
I just wanted to point out that if Bin Laden is allowed off scott-free, he’s likely to strike again. And again. His goal is the utter destruction of America. Why do you think he’ll stop after taking out a mere .002% of it?
We get in there, fight if necessary, and get out again. Pakistan has agreed to fully support America if there is a strike against Afghanistan. Will there be civilian casualities? I can almost guarantee it. War is not pretty… but it is often necessary.
Jodi, minty, you make some very good points here. :applause:
I would also like to state that, from all appearances, those of us who expect strong military force do not find that arbitrary bombing of Afghanistan is how we want this force used. But, in the course of at least three threads, no matter how many times we say it our opponents keep hearing the opposite anyway. Can we try getting back to GD mode, people?
Frankly, I expect us to act similarly to how we did in Vietnam. Bomb, push borders, bomb, push borders. In Vietnam that was all we really did, however, and we expected the government of South Vietnam to do its own policing behind us. I don’t think we’ll make that mistake again, but I have detailed what I feel we should do in at least three different threads so I won’t do so here unless asked to.
The Taliban has already made it clear that justice cannot be had without conflict, and they are only speaking for themselves. The trouble is, they control almost the entire country (90-95% gets cited often). Because their military is nowhere near the level of sophistication as previous enemies have been, it will be difficult to attack military installations alone without the killing of innocents.
So do we move our troops in to a human minefield? That’s just silly. Do we buy them out? With what?-- we already gave Afghanistan $43 million worth of wheat and other supplies this year. Did that stop or help anything? Do we just do nothing? Silly again, many have made their goals clear: doing nothing won’t stop the deaths. Ask everyone to hold hands, because you can’t make a fist if you’re holding hands?-- thankfully I haven’t seen anyone suggest just that here. Yet.
Justice cannot be had, in this case, without the use of explicit force. Quit thinking that explicit force necessitates non-descriminatory bombing and you’ll find many people’s arguments take a much more debatable form.
