Right and wrong are similar to truth and falsehood, everything
depends upon the point of view of the judge.
-----------------------
No, right and wrong are moral determinations, truth and falsehood
are factuals ones.
-----------------------
I do not recall
asserting that the tactics of the Iraqi resistance are appropriate
or justifiable and I frankly do not see that methods employed by
someone else ever can be used as a defence for ones own criminal
behaviour. Any such a claim is puerile.
-----------------------
I thought I had made it clear these were my interpretations of your
position, since the volume of words used by you served to obscure,
rather than clarify your position.
-----------------------
Your information is some 15 years out of date. It may therefore
surprise you to learn that since that time the United States has
invaded, conquered, and presently occupies Iran. The "war", such
as it was, is over. It ended with a United States "victory"
proclaimed on April 16, 2003.
-----------------------
No my information is not out of date. And we are not occupying
Iran, neither did we make war on and invade Iran. When you use
lots of words to obscure a position, it helps to add in a few
spelling errors.
-----------------------
The legal position of the United
States as an occupying military power of a conquered state was
ratified by a decision of the UN Security Council on October 16,
2003.
-----------------------
The UN and any of it's decisions are interesting, but lack validity.
-----------------------
Besides your own emotional attachment to this position, what
evidence can you present that proves your assertion is correct?
-----------------------
Real simple. The Earth is approximately 93 million miles from the
Sun, no matter what your emotional position on this subject is.
-----------------------
On
what basis is truth and falsehood determined?
-----------------------
Truth and falsehood are based on facts. Without facts truth and
falsehood cannot be dteremined.
-----------------------
The United States is only rhetorically at war.
-----------------------
I will agree that I would have preferred a declaration of war prior
to this Iraq invasion, but what we have is still within the bounds
of Constitutionality, such as it is.
-----------------------
Ask yourself this: What would be the situation if those people who
were killed by that "smart" bomb dropped on January 3 had instead
been individually killed by a bullet to the back of their necks
administered by special forces personnel acting on intelligence
that the victims were all members of a terrorist cell? Would that
have been considered the same thing or not? If not, then why not?
The outcome is the same is it not? The victims are the same are
they not? The reasons are the same, are they not?
------------------------
As long as we have an enemy willing to put innocents in the line of fire,
this kind of thing will happen. I ask you how you propose to determine
who and where the terrorists are? Do you propose to drag a Judge and
Jury out into the battlefield to review evidence? Or maybe gather evidence
and take 6 months to determine what we are to do? Maybe send in pollsters
with a questionaire to interview the people and determine who are really
terrorists, who are terrorist sympathizers, who are terrorist
collaborators,
who are innocents, who are hostages, sort them all out and just hope no one
decides to get violent before the people in charge give permission to start
shooting? Do you propose to apply a standard to our forces which is not
observed by the enemy? If you do then I suggest you really want us to
lose,
and the method to do this is to apply a standard which guarantees failure.
--------------------------
Your lack of subtlety is evident. What you apparently fail to
appreciate is that war itself is nothing but terror. The
professional soldier does not seek a fair fight, he seeks a
decisive one with the the odds all in his favour. A submarine does
not announce its intentions to the torpedo a ship, nor does it
pause to take on survivors. A bomber does not warn its sleeping
targets any more than a tank camouflaged in defilade hoists a
banner before engaging its targets in their flank.
--------------------------
Wars have been conducted where both sides fight by the same rules, and
the soldier did not use 'unfair' advantages as long as his opponent did
not, at least by and large.
What you are ignoring is, deceit and surprise are only one of many tools
of war and wars have been won without using these as primary tools.
Whereas
these are the primary tools of terrorists, and they would not have a chance
without them.
As far as your submarine/torpedo example is concerned, read about
the 'Laconia
incident' and see how the UN handled that.
---------------------------
Many people desire such a qualitative difference to exist, but I
can see none. It is disingenuous to suggest that your opponent's
methods are uncivilized because your methods are more costly than
they can afford. In conflict, it is not cost but effectiveness that
rules. The US response to indigenous resistance in Iran is
remarkably costly and evidently ineffective. Its opponents in Iran
are employing methods that are cheap out of necessity and happen to
be effective nonetheless.
---------------------------
Iran again? The only reason they are effective is they are not held to the
same standard as you would like to hold our forces.
---------------------------
The point of all this is that, if the United States wishes to
distinguish its behaviour qualitatively from its opponents then it
must adopt methods and procedures with respect to its military
actions that establish and sustain such distinctions. If it does
not wish to establish that distinction, then I fail to see what its
actual objectives in Iraq can amount to.
---------------------------
There is a name for those who play it straight against an enemy who does
not.
I have trouble believing you really do not know what the objectives in Iraq
are. You think we are not trying to establish a stable and humane self
government there?
---------------------------
A rat-catcher is employed to rid a city of rats and the person
engaged destroys three thousand rats in three years. However, they
also kill 30,000 cats, dogs and other family pets in the same
period. What then are we to make of the rat-catcher?
---------------------------
Why, the rat-catcher should have applied UN sanctions against the rats!
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