Should We Use Bio Weapons On the Taliban?

[Wildest_Bill]

I know there have been only a few cases of anthrax so far and only one death in this country. But what if say they do get a hold of a crop duster, make the modifications and kill thousands of people in one of our populated cities. How should we retailiate then?

I mean we have those wicked weapons don’t we? All except we know how to dispense them and kill everything. Would that be the next course of action if they indeed kill alot of ours? I mean if they use that crap on us, why shouldn’t we use that crap them? It sure would be a detterent to any other goofball nation of terrorist that want to use that crap on us. Knowing full well we are going to use it MASSIVELY on them.

[Mangetout]

Why retaliate in like manner, indiscriminately killing large numbers of innocent civillians; there are much more effective and targetable weapons available.

Retaliating with Anthrax would be a bad move.

They aren’t a nation of ‘goofball terrorists’ Bill, they are a nation of ordinary people.

[Sterra]

What good is bioweapons on the Taliban? That would only be useful if they weren’t already trying to use the Afghani people as meatshields

[Elvis]

First of all, the US is a party to an international convention prohibiting the use of biological weapons. Our using them would be a massive breach of international good faith, even if they were used on us first.

Second, you can’t just use biological weapons on the “taliban”. What we’re doing now is surgically striking military targets (at least that’s what we’re trying to do…) You can’t just go spread anthrax or smallpox on the taliban–you’d have to poison the people of Afghanistan. Not a good idea, under the circumstances.

[Wildest_Bill]

*Originally posted by Elvis *
**First of all, the US is a party to an international convention prohibiting the use of biological weapons. Our using them would be a massive breach of international good faith, even if they were used on us first.

I didn’t know this. Sometimes I don’t understand why we sign treaties like this when there are countries out there that didn’t sign it. I mean I understand we are the big guy and trying to set a good example but man this is starting to suck when these little piss ant countries use them on us.

Second, you can’t just use biological weapons on the “taliban”. What we’re doing now is surgically striking military targets (at least that’s what we’re trying to do…) You can’t just go spread anthrax or smallpox on the taliban–you’d have to poison the people of Afghanistan. Not a good idea, under the circumstances.

I hate that innocent people there are getting poisoned but if they killed thousands of innocent people here with that nasty it would probably bother me less.

[Mangetout]

Bill, It’s time to admit that two wrongs don’t always make a right; if, for example, somebody harmed my children, what good would it do to harm their children (or worse still, the children of some random stranger) ?

[Wildest_Bill]

*Originally posted by Mangetout *
**Bill, It’s time to admit that two wrongs don’t always make a right; if, for example, somebody harmed my children, what good would it do to harm their children (or worse still, the children of some random stranger) ? **

I totally see what you are saying. And let me say that I hate bio weapons heck I hate nukes. I think the people that invented these weapons should be in Hell. They are evil. I am just freak’n out over all this stuff. I mean what kind of weirdos kill strangers for no good reason.

But on the other hand, if it is between the lives Afgans or Americans, I’ll take the Americans. In otherwords if it was my call, I would wipe out all Afganistans totally to save just one American city from bio weapons. Is that wrong?

[Rysdad]

I don’t think using bio/chem/nuke weapons on Afghanistan would be appropriate at all.

Giving the person that mailed the anthrax-laden letters a dose of his own “medicine” (without the subsequent Cipro) would be poetic justice, though.

(Ok, this is GD. Yes, I know that would be “cruel and unusual.”)

[Tejota]

How about a taylored virus that targets religious fundamentalists?

[Mangetout]

*Originally posted by Wildest Bill *
But on the other hand, if it is between the lives Afgans or Americans, I’ll take the Americans. In otherwords if it was my call, I would wipe out all Afganistans totally to save just one American city from bio weapons. Is that wrong? **

Impossible for me to say, as it’s a false dichotomy; nobody is asking you to make the choice between wiping out all innocent Afghans or putting American lives in danger.

[El_Kabong]

But on the other hand, if it is between the lives Afgans or Americans, I’ll take the Americans. In otherwords if it was my call, I would wipe out all Afganistans totally to save just one American city from bio weapons. Is that wrong?

Er, yes.
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Oh, want me to explain? OK.

1. The lives of Afghan civilians are not inherently less valuable than the lives of Americans. If you believe the lives of foriegners are valueless, please explain why.

2. The official US position is that bioweapons are BAD. Bioweapons are EVIL. We have pledged not to use them. If we use them on innocent civilians, that means we in the USA are liars and evil people.

3. There is no reason to believe that killing every living soul in Afghanistan would do anything in particular to prevent the destruction of an American city by bioweapons.

4. Even if we set aside 1) through 3), bioweapons are highly imprecise and there is no reason to think that their effects would necessarily stop at the Afghan border.

Any other questions?

[manhattan]

Gee, Bill, you seem awfully convinced that the anthrax attacks are coming from Osama bin Laden’s guys. Are you privy to some intelligence that we’re not?

And if it turns out to be a copycat or someone piling on? A Planned Parenthood office got a preliminary positive test for anthrax today? If it turns out that the final test is also positive and this turns out to be the work of American right-wing nutjobs, can we use biological weapons against Baptist Churches?

[elucidator]

Damn, Bill, you’re starting to worry me, getting all soft and cuddly. You been spendin’ time down in Austin, you know, they got liberals and humanists all over! You’re just not using your imagination! Think a bit!

1.Nuke ‘em “old-school”. Naw, hell, I don’t mean “H-bombs”, way too quick. I mean good ol’ fashioned A-bombs, dust the whole area with plutonium! Now, that’s something with a real, down-home half-life and a lingering, agonizing death, make anthrax look like a day at the beach!

2. Drop “April-food” packages! You know, like diet pop, and potatoe chips made with that fake fat stuff! See, its got no nutritional value, and on top of that, it causes diahrr……diarrhea….the runs! Just picture it: those gol-durn towel-heads gathering up those packages to feed their kids and they sit and watch the nasty little buggers die anyway! Tell me that wouldn’t be a hoot!

And those are ideas just off the top of my head!

Hell, if we got on this right away, we could get this ball rolling, and still be on time for Church come Sunday!

[Guinastasia]

Hey Bill-how about we send YOU to the Taliban-you can ask them all the questions you like, no?

[Captain_Amazing]

Isn’t it U.S. doctrine that nuclear/chemical/biological weapons (“weapons of mass destruction”) are a reasonable response to the use of weapons of mass destruction against U.S. civilians or the military?

[Lemur866]

OK.

Bill, I’m going to do you the favor of responding to your post. But after I do that, will you do something for me? Will you please stop with these atrocity threads? You know the answers already, and you make yourself look foolish.

First, biological weapons are notoriously impossible to control. How can you start an epidemic in Afghanistan and expect it to remain confined to Afghanistan? We have much more to fear from a global pandemic than the Taliban does.

Second, it would make a lot of people mad at us. I know it doesn’t matter whether you were killed by a US bomb or by a US anthrax spore, you’re just as dead. But people DO care, largely because of the uncontrollable nature of biological warfare. We have plenty of bombs, and we can kill everyone in Afghanistan via conventional means if that becomes neccesary.

Now, third and most important. It doesn’t matter how many atrocities the Taliban inflicts, we should still not inflict atrocities on Afghanistan. Understand? We… Will… Not… Commit… Atrocities. See? America GOOD, Taliban BAD.

We are like Superman, they are like Lex Luthor. When Lex Luthor does something bad to, say, Lois Lane to get back at Superman, does Superman go do something bad to Lex Luthor’s girlfriend? No, he goes and punches Lex Luthor and hauls him off to jail, where the bad people go.

So when the bad people in the Taliban do something bad, America should respond by doing something bad TO THE TALIBAN, like punching them or dropping bombs on them. Not Afghanistan, The Taliban. Because there are a lot of people in Afghanistan that the Taliban are mean to. They don’t like the Taliban, but the Taliban have a bunch of guns so they can do whatever they want to the people in Afghanistan and the people in Afghanistan can’t do anything about it.

So remember kids, be a hero like Superman, not a villain like Lex Luthor. Don’t use biological weapons on the other kids EVEN IF THEY STARTED IT FIRST! Don’t make me turn this car around! I’m warning you!

[BobT]

I believe the U.S would respond strongly to any chemical/bio/nuclear attack that was state-sponsored. If we knew that Saddam Hussein supplied the anthrax, then the people of Iraq would have hell to pay, but the U.S. wouldn’t start using any bio or chem weapons because we aren’t supposed to have any.

And we aren’t going to start lobbing nukes unless we are severely pissed off and that would take quite a bit.

[Larry_Mudd]

*Originally posted by manhattan *
And if it turns out to be a copycat or someone piling on? A Planned Parenthood office got a preliminary positive test for anthrax today? If it turns out that the final test is also positive and this turns out to be the work of American right-wing nutjobs, can we use biological weapons against Baptist Churches?

Forgive me if this is excessive cross-posting, but it seems germane: [sub] (poor choice of words?)[/sub]
It seems more credible to me that the anthrax scare is related to Larry W. Harris, a Christian Identity white supremacist who was charged with mail fraud after procuring bubonic plague bacilli by mail?

In 1995, he was arrested after purchasing three vials of bubonic plague by mail from a Maryland laboratory.

That was not in and of itself a crime, but Harris was convicted on two counts of mail fraud and one count of wire fraud for misrepresenting the purpose of the purchase, a federal offense.

He later was found to have cultivated anthrax, and had talked about releasing plague in NYC and blaming it on Iraq.

According to an affidavit filed with his arrest warrant, Harris told a group last summer of a 1995 plan to “place a ‘globe’ of bubonic plague toxins in a New York City subway station, where it would be broken by a passing subway train, causing hundreds of thousands of deaths.”

He told the group, according to the affidavit, that “the Iraqis would be blamed for that event.”

However, Siller said that there is as of yet no indication as to “what the target might have been or even if there was a target at this point.”

In New York, Mayor Rudy Giuliani called a news conference to discount any connection between the arrests in Nevada and a plan to attack New York.

(The article is from 1998.)

These people have been known to cultivate anthrax, and there have already been indications that they intended to attack New York and blame it on the muslim world. Ideologically, these people want a global armageddon, and the current situation would seem very attractive to them.

[Wildest_Bill]

*Originally posted by manhattan *
And if it turns out to be a copycat or someone piling on? A Planned Parenthood office got a preliminary positive test for anthrax today? If it turns out that the final test is also positive and this turns out to be the work of American right-wing nutjobs, can we use biological weapons against Baptist Churches? **

Well this was a pretty good analogy(almost got me thinking ) all except we are talking about Americans protected by the constitution) here not a foreign country that is considered hostile. Also I wouldn’t care if you gave the nut jobs the anthrax virus as punishment if they indeed are the ones that used that stuff(I don’t think so though).

I am back to taking out terrorist instead of whole countries(this was my original idea btw). But screw the trial and jury bull crap. I say you start using biological laced bullets that kill very painfully and just start sniping all know terrorist no matter where thay may be. Start with the ones in Switzerland and move around the world shooting them and then feeding their bodies to the pigs.

I heard about how the Israelies took out another bomber and I think we should start that course of action. They know how to deal with this scum you kill them. I added the bioligical death part just to show these morons that you don’t **** with the US with bio weapons.

[Mangetout]

WB, would I be right in guessing that your copy of the bible falls open naturally at Deuteronomy?