It’s a crime, murder. In either this thread or the GD tangent, someone asserted that there are times when it’s okay to kill a prisoner of war. I’m still flabbergasted that someone thinks that it’s okay to summarily kill a noncombatant for whom they have the responsibility to protect.
I see. Yes, you’re stupid and you’re dishonest. At the very least, disingenuous.
What crimes do you think most of the military’s doing? “Oh, gee, Your Honor, I was feeding the troops at my base in California but ‘I was only following orders!’” And from that you would accuse the company cook of being scum-of-the-earth.
You know, I’d find it a whole bundle easier to believe members of the US military were dispassionately carrying out orders, if we hadn’t had 90 dozen posts here, circulating emails and blogs, all of which went “rah rah,” “go war gonna kill me some ragheads and bring that Saddam down.”
If we hadn’t had no military posts whatsoever, saying, pre-war and early-war “Yeah you know the Liberals have it bang-to-rights, it’s all been a pack of lies.” “I’m an honorable man and I gotta call it like it is.”
Because, the voices coming out of the US military all appear to be overwhelmingly pro-war and pro-GOP. Even to this day, whenever an argument on an aspect of the war comes up, the military voices appear to offer either:
- support for the war, or
- silence.
So much so, that we can assume the truth of a criticism when the response is silence. But what we never see is e.g. "“Yeah you know the Liberals have it bang-to-rights, we do have a policy of rendition and torture.”
So it’s not too hard to see where Der Trihs is coming from.
Interesting. I never find myself wishing that our own land got invaded, bombs dropped in a shock and awe campaign on our cities, with tens of thousands of our own civilians killed, so that some people could be compelled to walk in someone else’s shoes for a year before they talk about how defensible it is for soldiers to follow orders that risk the lives of civilians. I’m not an asshole like that.
Daniel
I’m not focused on deniability. Those who knowingly and specifically target civilians should be prosecuted to the fullest extent of the UCMJ. Those who do not knowingly and specifically target civilians, but through the fog of war mistakenly kill some live with those consequences for the rest of their life. While I have not personally served in the military, many of my friends and family do. Have you ever taken the time to ask a soldier about their conscious? Being a paramedic I have had this conversation with a few veterans. Believe me, they feel accountable.
Since you so skillfully evaded my example, I’ll straight ask you, is the ordinance technician who loads bombs also morally responsible? How about the cook? Maybe the sergeant who filed the paperwork for the mission? Hey, someone had to make the choice to deploy that pilot who dropped those bombs, is that person responsible too?
The weapons used today are a lot better at not killing civilians. The incendiary bombings of Germany and Japan produced hundreds of thousands of dead civilians. Thankfully we’re not doing that anymore. If any military commander tried to pull that off I’d like to believe he’d be immediately removed from command, and I can’t imagine any pilot who would agree to do it.
See, here is where you’re logic is off:
Wrong answer. Moral agency is exercised every time a soldier picks up a rifle. Every time a marine chooses to fire his rifle is has made a moral choice. If he fires it into the chest of another man with a rifle, it’s okay. If he fires it into the back of a fleeing woman carrying her child, it’s not.
I think it is horrible that any civilians have to die in a war. I would gladly trade the life of a serviceman to allow a civilian to live. As soon as you can find a way for war to not kill any civilians, please share it with the rest of us. The only way for there to never be any civilian deaths is to not wage war in the first place, which will lead into the GD forum. In the meantime I believe that our military is trying to carry out its mission with as few civilian deaths as possible. It’s a mission that our elected civilian leadership has chosen to send the military to do, with full knowledge that the armed forces make one piss poor police force.
When I see Der Trihs moniker…I see automatically see “Red Shirt” in backward lettering (but same order of words), and therefore, your pointing out of this left/right circular reasoning is dead-on.
What the hell are you talking about? There are plenty of military voices on this board who have spoken out against this war. I am one of them. I proudly served for six years, and have never supported this war and I know quite a few people in the same boat and I’ve seen other veterans post the same damn thing here many times.
So the each individual soldier in every branch of the armed forces, active duty or reserve, bears personal responsibility for this war? How about the fucking VOTER? Are you under the impression that the military voted Bush into office? Was it the soldier who bent over backwards to appease Bush, or was it our damned elected representatives?
Stop blaming the soldiers for this unconscionable war. The American voter is to blame for this war, and the American non-voter is probably even more to blame.
You don’t like the war? I can suggest that rather than wish death on our soldiers, some of whom are my best friends in the world, why don’t you fucking agitate for Bush’s impeachment, or Congressional oversight, or Bush to be tried in International Criminal Court? Why don’t you take some of that (admittedly negligible) energy you’re using to post drivel on this message board, and write to your congressman?!! Why don’t you bundle up and march for peace each and every weekend until you get some results, you fucking fuck!
And, you dumbshits, if people stopped volunteering for the military, fucks like you would get drafted.
Let them try.
Daniel
At OUR hands? Cite?
You’re not confusing them with the two million or so slaughtered by the North Vietnamese and the Khmer Rhouge after we left, are you?
Sevastopol
Wow all the military is pro war and Pro GOP.
Well I want the war to end, I am one the loudest anti-Bush/Cheney people on the board and I am very Proud of my Military service.
I thought it was an unjust war that had nothing to do with Terrorism, planned by a **bunch of draft dodgers ** that ignored the advise of their only military man.
I have never ***hated * ** a group of politicians as much as **Cheney, Rumsfeld & Ashcroft ** with good level of ***loathing ** * towards their moron puppet Bush.
Jim
In my earlier post I should probably have emphasised this part:
I’m always pleased to be corrected where I have it wrong. But to generalise that the serving military are overwhelmingly pro-war and pro-GOP seems fair enough.
But exactly. So why are we rationalizing with all this business about “accidental” civilian deaths? Is our presence in Iraq accidental? Did people join the military accidentally? Everybody prosecuting the war – whether President or company cook – shares a burden of the guilt. The basic question here is, is this war right or wrong? If we say it’s wrong, then how can the people prosecuting it not be wrong? Because we accord them the blanket absolution that they’re just following orders?
If we think about the dismal history of soldiers “just following orders,” I really do wish that more soldiers would exercise their moral agency and decline to participate. I can guarantee you, if the brass were worried that the rank and file were thinking about the morality of the orders given to them, that there’d be fewer stupid wars like the present one.
Yes. You are your own special type of asshole. On that point, we agree.
Hear, hear!!
But don’t forget that Nuremberg was largely a show trial. The “just following orders” defense was not accepted, for a lot of lower echelon folk, because the victors wanted blood. This is about the only episode that this defense was totally rejected.
I do however think that one of the more heroic acts, sometimes displayed in war, is when a soldiers stops his own comrades from comitting a war crime. That takes quite some courage. Although hard, it should be the duty of every soldier to be on guard and keep the horrors of war within waht limits possible.
The stupidity of this is mind-numbing. Do you have any powers of foresight at all? You would be putting an end to the military. They need to be prepared and ready to act, not ready to debate. How much time should we give each soldier to gather and access facts? How much time to bounce his feelings and ideas around in debate groups to check his opinions and hone them?
Let me ask you this one question: should we have a standing military that is well-trained in combat?
And to answer a question you asked (and to not see the answer is mind-boggling): even IF you say the war is wrong, the people prosecuting it are judged on how well they prosecute it. Both from a soldiering perspective and a moral one. And the morality is dictated by the rules of war and the US military code of conduct. If they do not run afoul of those things, then their service is honorable.
Do you really think any army can function if everyone in it feels they can question the “justice” of every cause, of every order? Well, it can’t.
Is that your goal?
Yes.
I should add the caveat that emergency medical treatment, IMHO, gets a pass. But cooking the food, servicing the engines, filling out the payslips, etc. don’t
Tell me you’re joking. I find it odd that anyone could actually believe such an assertion as yours, MrDibble, makes sense.
Oh, why not just come right out and call me “disingenous” or accuse me of using words wrong, you stupid one-trick pony. This passive aggression doesn’t suit you. Did I in any way indicate that I was joking?
What doesn’t make sense? Anyone who supports an unjust war is in the wrong. That’s my belief.