> In a time of war, the first victim is the truth. A slight, but important perversion of the case. Truth is destroyed first in order that war may be conducted. An observation that is amply demonstrated in the present situation in Iraq. One should really stay away from such bromides for their presence is usually indicative of a shallow intellectual approach to the topic. The entire nature of truth is, in most, ultimately determined by ones emotional attachment to the object under scrutiny. This attachment is often so great that believers will frequently kill dissenters and sometimes even die themselves before they will yield to evidence. However, intensity of belief is no substitute for evidence, no matter how passionately the believer's case is made. ----------------------- Such a wordy approach to discussion reminds me of the phrase "Can't see the forest for the trees." There are several interpretations of this convoluted response. 1) Just because the suicide bombers are willing to die to destroy their enemy does not make them right. 2) Saddam Hussien used propaganda to justify starting this war by invading Kuwait. 3) Emotional attachments determien truth. (Which is not so). 4) Only evidence, no matter how long it takes to accumulate, can be used to justify killing an enemy during wartime. ----------------------- > So, when the US military bombs a house in which terrorists where > seen entering, This assertion is the revealing about the intellectual rigour of the argument that follows upon its utterance, for the case was never established as to whether the persons under observation: a.) were in fact terrorists; and b.) actually entered the house. The assumptions that directly led to the deaths of the inhabitants of that structure, none of whom were identified as adult males, is the heart of the problem and represents a difficulty that "true believers" wish to wave away as inconsequential. But, it is this mindless use of lethal force which is the question. No matter how "smart" one makes a bomb, it matters little if it is directed by intellects blind to the self-injury that indiscriminate killing does to their cause. Wrapping oneself up in a flag in order to justify killing people in far-off lands just because they happen to be in the way of or near something that you suspect, might, possibly, under certain circumstances, at some future time, threaten to cause some injury or other to your interests, is hardly a convincing justification of murdering women and children in their beds. On the one hand we have as justification a suspicion that people labelled, but not identified, as terrorists entered a home. On the other we have ten or so dead women and children. Are we to believe that suspicion is reasonable cause for their murder? Or is the standard of behaviour for representatives the "advanced" "civilized" states less rigorous than that set for the rest of the world? Is it really ethically permissible to kill red people, brown people, black people, yellow people, any people; using means and under circumstances that would not be approved with respect to ones own people? ---------------------- The above three paragraphs are contingent upon the validity of item 4). ---------------------- I realize that the Geneva Conventions are not held in high esteem by those who evidence their firm belief in their own capability to establish universal rights and wrongs, to accurately identify at night the exact nature of people about their households, and their remarkable formidability in resisting forced entry. But for the rest of humanity the law seems to serve better. And the law says that military force may only be directed against armed individuals who are actively resisting or against infrastructure whose primary purpose is to prolong an enemy's capacity to resist. A civilian residence, unless KNOWN to be occupied by enemy forces, is NEVER a legitimate target. An unarmed person, no matter how suspicious their circumstance, is not a legitimate military target. If a military force attacks a home, mosque, a church or a monastery then the onus is on the attacker to prove that there was clear and unmistakable cause. ---------------------- The Geneva Conventions are only useful against an opponent who observes them. In other words, Geneva is a useful device by terrorists to constrain the enemies of terrorism. The history of the legitimacy of Geneva is uncertian, as is the history of the UN. ---------------------- However, United States forces in Iraq frequently seem unwilling or unable to establish the actual presence of those that they seek when they use their "smart" weapons to kill. It is this evasion of responsibility that renders the act criminal. If the U.S. army had ground troops in contact with these suspects and there was armed resistance, then one has a case that any consequential civilian deaths were regrettable, but were only the unintended side effect of a hostile encounter. --------------------- Translation: We have to risk getting our guys shot to peices before we can respond. Then we can hear about 'sending other peoples children to die' --------------------- But, that is not what happened in this case at all. What happened is that a RPV operator, working from grainy images provided from a low-light camera, operated from a moving aircraft that never descended below 200m, observed shadowy figures that appeared to be engaged in some form of "suspicious" activity and who then "seemed" to enter a house and decided upon that basis that everyone therein should die. --------------------- http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fog_of_war --------------------- War can be distilled into two words, deceit and surprise. Usually the deceit begins sometime before overt hostilities, and frequently hostilities contain many surprises for aggressors. I believe Croesus encountered such a surprise. No doubt he too believed what he was told and was certain in that belief, he just did not understand what it meant. --------------------- Deciet and Surprise are the primary tools of the terrorist. --------------------- * To join/leave the list, search archives, change list settings, * * etc., please visit http://raven.utc.edu/archives/hp3000-l.html *