War and Pissed Off

Off Topic Politics & World Issues
41

[quote]Runnyrat wrote:
But vroom is a liberal going to the dark side, rainjack’s an ignorant fucker, and most people can’t distinguish between anti-zionist, anti-colonialism, and anti-semitism [/quote]

Oh, let’s do the best part first. Rattydan, I am still a liberal, however, that doesn’t mean that I am one who will give whatever someone asks in order to stay at peace.

That is akin to a protection racket… where payments are made to keep threats at bay. As long as there are people willing to knuckle under to threats, there will be people to make them pay protection.

[quote]Ratdanny also wrote:
I think the first move against terrorism should be return to greenline borders. Then, in particular the Palestinians will have enough water, and land to grow food.

This will also render any further terrorism ‘wrong’, they won’t have a leg to stand on. I don’t think Israel will disappear, they should know this by now… [/quote]

Terrorism is already wrong. And there are no fucking quotes necessary to describe it as such.

The problem is that you think the current situation is about some tangible fair issue when it isn’t. We’ve progressed beyond that.

The war against the west is not going to go away simply because there is peace with between Israel and some of it’s neighbors.[/quote]

[quote]dannyrunt then wrote:
Future terrorists can be punished accordingly. I don’t see any further reason to hate the west, if the west do the above, and are very much more surgical in their attacks on terrorists. [/quote]

How can they be punished? Are you suggesting a war in that case would then be justified in order to stop the terrorists? Wow. I can’t believe you are arguing for war… though in a sense, arguing for terrorism as you do is also war. We’ve established that previously.

So, basically, you suggest that all the terrorism on the planet, right now, is justified, and that if only Israel was nicer that the whole world would be one happy hand holding place.

[quote]runnydolt then wrote:
If the PA have at least some clout, and are run by cool people, they won’t be going to Iran/wherever for funds, they’ll be self- sufficient. [/quote]

Ahahahaha. What a retard.

[quote]dannycant then wrote:
You made in your question a lot of points i’ve made before. Like limited immigration even for legitimate (non terrorist) workers and academics, etc. Good post man. I don’t hold all the answers. Noone does.
[/quote]

LOL. Yeah, anyone who agrees with you and echos some of your bullshit is obviously a smart and decent fellow. I wish you held even an smattering of an answer.

What the world needs right now is an end to the propaganda that is very successfully fueling hatred and making terrorist recruitment easy. It needs a strong moderate voice to take control in the Middle East.

Until there is a moderate voice in the Middle East it will be a powderkeg. Non of your appeasement ideas or justification of terrorist acts will be of any help at all.

42

K… Well let’s move past the e-row and talk about the issues. I just don’t like anonymous arguments as opposed to debate/conversation and I felt it was rapidly going down that road. All friends again - albeit massively disagreeing ones… :wink:

Re Hiroshima and Nagasaki - They weren’t soldiers were they? That was deliberately targetting civilians. You see… We ALL have skeletons in our closet.

As for retribution… Japan wasn’t allowed to build weapons or have a standing army for however long it was, and I dare say that was an issue. Oh, and everyone was either dead or crippled and the rest had to help rebuild the country didn’t they?

Off to bed now but will answer the rest tomorrow. Have a good’un.

43

I think a good deal of the debate here is based on a prejudice that both sides of an argument must have valid points, or be given equal treatment. There is a creeping moral relativism in a lot of these posts that needs to be addressed.

People seem unwilling to make a judgement that falls along absolute moral lines. Terrorism is wrong. Under all conditions. Imposing the kind of law that Sharia Islam preaches is wrong, in the most profound sense of the word.

Saying so is okay.

44

Caeser- some of what you said was true. I suggest acquiescence would be more likely at greenline borders.

I wasn’t answering 'How do we stop islamic terrorism in the world today, i was proposing how we could chill the parties in the israel/palestine mess only.

I hear you on islam being culturally archaic. I think Yasser Arafat got a bit of an exaggerated bad press.

Yeh, guerilla terrorists are sneaky.

What do you suggest then?

45

“There is no instance of a country having benefited from prolonged warfare.”
-SUN TZU, THE ART OF WAR

Cheney warns of ‘decades of war’
BBC, October 2005
US Vice-President Dick Cheney has said that the US must be prepared to fight the war on terror for decades.

“No nation could preserve its freedom in the midst of continual warfare”
-James Madison

Ability to Wage ‘Long War’ Is Key To Pentagon Plan
Washington Post, February 2006
The Pentagon, readying for what it calls a “long war,” yesterday laid out a new 20-year defense strategy that envisions U.S. troops deployed, often clandestinely, in dozens of countries at once to fight terrorism and other nontraditional threats.

“Over grown military establishments are under any form of government inauspicious to liberty, and are to be regarded as particularly hostile to republican liberty.”
-George Washington

“The Department of Defense is the behemoth… With an annual budget larger than the gross domestic product of Russia, it is an empire.”
-The 9/11 Commission Report

“Military men are just dumb stupid animals to be used as pawns in foreign policy.”
-Henry Kissinger

46

[quote]thunderbolt23 wrote:
dannyrat wrote:

Are we a civilised society? (By we i mean the Western states)

Yes, the most civilized in history.

If we are civilised shouldn’t we apply in a secular way the principle ‘do to others as you would have them do uno you?’

Yes, and we do.

If we see the harm and pain inflicted by violence on our own, how can we claim a right to return greater pain in reply?

Absolutely we can. Weakness invites aggression. Asking someone who is harming you to politely desist will never result in them stopping harming you. To think so is the height of naivete.

If we do the above, how can we claim to be doing what is right?

Because often the only way to end violence is to give the harming party a worthwhile incentive not to harm you anymore. Open mouth kisses and warm, fuzzy hugs are not that incentive.

If we believe in war to impress our own strength, and will, what future do we expect to create? Do we care about the future?

One that ensures that countries are on no uncertain terms with one another - which is about the best we can hope for in a world that will never arrive at utopia.

If we know that we hate our enemy, how can we claim to be suitable to choose action?
Could you perform surgery with adrenaline overpowering you (the answer for me is no).

War is not surgery, and that is a stupid analogy. Moreover, hatred for an enemy does not have to mean wild, erratic responses hopped up on adrenaline. The response can be cold, calculated, considered, and put to great debate among a society.

Would we prefer to neglect anything outside our own best interests, or apply the ‘greatest good for the greatest number’

We can have a world that strikes a balance between self-interest and broader principles, but nations will most often opt for national interest above all else.

Moreover, the ‘greatest good for the greatest number’ - among many of its flaws - fails at the highest level because the world is entirely too diverse to come to any agreement on that notion.

Is nationalism more important than humanism, and human rights?

This is a false choice - it doesn’t have to be an either-or.

Would you die and kill for your native flag, and whatever cause your leaders, inept or astute, chose?

This, of course, is nothing short of retarded - there isn’t one person here who thinks that is plausible.

If people talking about political scenarios on the internet can’t even stay civil and talk, do you think we can do better in international diplomacy?

Because this is the opposite playing field than international diplomacy. Here, there are no consequences. Here, you can say all kinds of things you would never say to someone in person because you won’t get your lip split in cyberspace. Here, you can act ten times tougher than you really are because no one can take you to task over it. Here, you can hide behind your e-personality because you’ll never have to face consequences. Here, when someone trounces you in argument, you can simply respond with “you didn’t trounce me” and expect that that is good enough even when it isn’t true and you know it it isn’t, because there are no consequences to actually winning and losing these debates.

I think international diplomacy actually is more civil in many ways, because there, words matter.

I’ve seen real women crying because their son has been killed at war. I’ve known family and friends to die, suddenly and slowly. My uncle had 3 children die in cot deaths, in sequence.I could never exaggerate the effect of losing family. I don’t want to see any more than neccessary.

Nor does anyone else - don’t be ridiculous. End the melodramatics and be serious.

I only want to know who thinks life is sacred, and who believes in power instead.

Most of us think life is sacred, and values are too - and we also think both are sacred enough to fight for.[/quote]

Well said thunderbolt!

I say “give war a chance!”

47

[quote]ExNole wrote:
I think a good deal of the debate here is based on a prejudice that both sides of an argument must have valid points, or be given equal treatment. There is a creeping moral relativism in a lot of these posts that needs to be addressed.

People seem unwilling to make a judgement that falls along absolute moral lines. Terrorism is wrong. Under all conditions. Imposing the kind of law that Sharia Islam preaches is wrong, in the most profound sense of the word.

Saying so is okay.[/quote]

Hmm… I may disagree with you completely, but still want to understand exactly where you are coming from. Why is it so absurd to want to get past all the heavy-handed western propaganda (‘They want to destroy our way of life!!!’) and get to the bottom of the issue from their point of view? Remember, that with the majority of the western world being far more interested in whether Justin Timberlake is still with Cameron Diaz, a lot happens in that neck of the woods that is never reported in the western press.

If someone kept on trying to kick me in the nuts, in addition to trying to stop him, I’d try to discover the underlying reason why he was so upset and see if I can address the cause too.

I think this is a tricky one. I don’t have all the answers here so please don’t flame relentlessly. I’m just interested in opinion from both sides of the fence about these questions that keep swirling around my head. I am most certainly not a terrorist sympathiser but I truly do not believe that the issue is as cut and dried as ‘we are right, they are wrong’ ‘we are just just, they are evil’.

Rather than wanting to destroy our way of life, I get the feeling that most of the middle-east just wants us to fuck off and leave them alone - wholesale. But we are all so embroiled there now after decades of commerce and sticking our respective noses in that it would be wholly impossible to extricate ourselves fully.

Anyway, mostly the questions keeping me up this week have been…

If a government that you voted in is killing people’s families in a far off country for whatever reason, are you, the voter, innocent? Have you not given them the authority to act in your name?

If that is the case, are the voters not legitimate targets? If not, why not?

Should all other nations immediately bow down before the nation with the strongest army like a class nerd before the school bully, or should they try and fight on their own terms, however that is achieved?

When Bin Laden and the Taliban were fighting the Russians using precisely the same tactics they later became infamous for they were ‘freedom fighters’. Now, they are ‘terrorists’. What changed? A broadening of the definition or a changing political wind in the white house?

Is killing thousands of civilians in a country that did NOT elect their government - as part of the collateral damage - any more justifiable than terrorist attacks on non-military targets? If so, why?

Is oil not a valid enough reason to go to war in this day and age without having to tack on some bullshit comic-book soundbytes about an axis of evil etc?

Is Justin Timberlake still with Cameron Diaz?

I know you’re not supposed to say some of these things these days, but I would love to hear people’s opinions without all the name-calling that so often marrs otherwise interesting debate on this forum.

1-Pack…

48

[quote]1-packlondoner wrote:

Hmm… I may disagree with you completely, but still want to understand exactly where you are coming from. Why is it so absurd to want to get past all the heavy-handed western propaganda (‘They want to destroy our way of life!!!’) and get to the bottom of the issue from their point of view? Remember, that with the majority of the western world being far more interested in whether Justin Timberlake is still with Cameron Diaz, a lot happens in that neck of the woods that is never reported in the western press. [/quote]

The issue is pretty complicated. They don’t hate us for our freedom, and there are concrete reasons that they can point to as to why they are angry with the west.

But, being able to list their disagreements doesn’t justify their
actions or positions. And, in a lot of ways, we can’t stop doing the things that anger them- supporting secular moderate Arab leaders and supporting Israel.

[quote]
If someone kept on trying to kick me in the nuts, in addition to trying to stop him, I’d try to discover the underlying reason why he was so upset and see if I can address the cause too.

I think this is a tricky one. I don’t have all the answers here so please don’t flame relentlessly. I’m just interested in opinion from both sides of the fence about these questions that keep swirling around my head. I am most certainly not a terrorist sympathiser but I truly do not believe that the issue is as cut and dried as ‘we are right, they are wrong’ ‘we are just just, they are evil’. [/quote]
Here, is the problem I was talking about earlier. By calling someone evil, you do not have to posit your own moral perfection. Hitler was evil, and I don’t have to be Mother Theresa to say so. The problems in the middle east are complicated, and there are a lot of non-Islamists who dislike the west, but Islamic fundamentalism is a bad thing. Just because they believe it fervently doesn’t mean its worth a damn. [/quote]

[quote]
Rather than wanting to destroy our way of life, I get the feeling that most of the middle-east just wants us to fuck off and leave them alone - wholesale. But we are all so embroiled there now after decades of commerce and sticking our respective noses in that it would be wholly impossible to extricate ourselves fully. [/quote]
They want us to leave them alone so they can establish Islamic law over the middle east and destroy Israel [quote]
Anyway, mostly the questions keeping me up this week have been…

Should all other nations immediately bow down before the nation with the strongest army like a class nerd before the school bully, or should they try and fight on their own terms, however that is achieved? [/quote]
There is a difference between guerilla warfare and terrorism.

[quote]
When Bin Laden and the Taliban were fighting the Russians using precisely the same tactics they later became infamous for they were ‘freedom fighters’. Now, they are ‘terrorists’. What changed? A broadening of the definition or a changing political wind in the white house? [/quote] They never flew planes into Russian buildings. They shot down Russian helicopters and mined their tanks. [quote]

Is oil not a valid enough reason to go to war in this day and age without having to tack on some bullshit comic-book soundbytes about an axis of evil etc?

1-Pack…[/quote]

It’s important to separate the real threat from Islamic fundamentalism from whatever it is happened in Iraq.

49

[quote]ExNole wrote:

The issue is pretty complicated. They don’t hate us for our freedom, and there are concrete reasons that they can point to as to why they are angry with the west.

But, being able to list their disagreements doesn’t justify their
actions or positions. And, in a lot of ways, we can’t stop doing the things that anger them- supporting secular moderate Arab leaders and supporting Israel.
[/quote]

I was making the point that others on this thread have said they don’t have a genuine grievence. I believe they would disagree. I agree that it is hard to stop doing many of the things we are doing, but that doesn’t mean we shouldn’t acknowledge that we have done them.

To be honest, I think unless you want to be seen as a massive hypocrite, you couldn’t be responsible for murdering several million Jews and then call Hitler evil.

Likewise, surely if you use the media machine to claim this as a just and moral war against an ‘insane’ enemy that has been caricatured to an absurd level… Well you need to be consistant and 'fess up when much of what Europe and the US has done out there in the last century would not win us any humanitarian or fair-play awards.

If we were more open about our past it would still give us the leeway to utterly condemn what is happening and act accordingly, but to show what we HAVE done, marked against how we are now being treated would surely display what an overreaction on their part it has been and that whilst we’ve not been squeaky clean, we maybe don’t deserve this. But it is not in the nature of governments to be honest about anything and what happens is that for people who see the cracks in the thin media-friendly politician veneer, we automatically assume they have behaved even worse.

Re Muslim stereotyping - My sister’s boyfriend for example is a British muslim who was airlifted out of Beiruit on a family visit and brought back to Britain. He’s a lovely sweet guy who treats my sister with nothing but respect. He makes music and also drinks alcohol, like the vast majority of muslims I have met. THAT is the real face of islam to me - not this horrible image that the media and my (and possibly yours?) government is portraying. Just in the same way that the overwhelming majority of Christians around the world do not adhere 100% to the literal interpretation of the bible.

And fundamentalism is a bad thing whether it be muslim, christian or hebrew. Extremists are bad, mmmkay. Mothers getting murdered for having abortions? That’s terrorism to me.

It’s kind of a chicken and egg situation though isn’t it. A long and often bloody conflict where each succsessive generation on each side forgets what deeds their fathers committed and only know the hardship their enemies have wrought.

To be honest I don’t know enough in depth about that era to maintain an argument on it so I’ll totally yield that point.

[quote]
Is oil not a valid enough reason to go to war in this day and age without having to tack on some bullshit comic-book soundbytes about an axis of evil etc?

1-Pack…

It’s important to separate the real threat from Islamic fundamentalism from whatever it is happened in Iraq.[/quote]

(in best parliamentary address voice)

I refer the honourable gentleman to the answer I gave before regarding chickens and eggs.

Also, it is important to seperate Islam from extremism, fundamentalism and terrorism. I’m horrified that these days to say the word Muslim is almost to infer ‘terrorist’.

Black, white or yellow. Christian, Jew or Muslim. Gay, straight or goat-fucker… The world is very simply divided in cs and non-cs. Not sure which I am - I think it changes on a daily basis.

Thanks for replying though. I thought what you said was v interesting.

50

[quote]1-packlondoner wrote:

Re Hiroshima and Nagasaki - They weren’t soldiers were they? That was deliberately targetting civilians. You see… We ALL have skeletons in our closet.

As for retribution… Japan wasn’t allowed to build weapons or have a standing army for however long it was, and I dare say that was an issue. Oh, and everyone was either dead or crippled and the rest had to help rebuild the country didn’t they?

[/quote]

It was a feroucious act for certain. But one that I think had to be taken to save the many lives of American service men.

How many American (and English) service men should we have lost before acting as we did?

War isn’t very pretty is it?

But then who began that particular war to which you are referring?

That the Japanese bombed Peral Harbor cause you any angst?

If they didn’t do that then we surely would not have had to retaliate right?

Okay…

51

1-pack,

What I see is something a bit different than others, I think.

I keep focusing on the inability for moderates to express themselves. When you control the media it is easy to create a public opinion, or foment an enmity and hatred.

I know people like to claim our news organizations are coopted, but it really isn’t the same idea at all. I must point out that every moderate and peacenik is able to publish their opinion any way they wish.

This is simply not so in countries with a controlled media or a culture of hatred and violence that would silence opposition to their own viewpoint.

Again, where we have gotten to is very different than where we came from. The tactics used to create an atmosphere of hatred has the populace believing that all the evils in the world are perpetrated by the west.

Sure, they were unhappy with the formation of Israel, but it certainly is not going to go away. Do they have any other legitimate greviances?

Howabout, if you wish to suggest they do, that you dig some up and present them for consideration. Just be wary of pulling a Danny and suggesting terrorism is justified and should be appeased.

52

[quote]dannyrat wrote:
Are you seriosu marmadogg? If so, i don’t even need to condemn you. You are as good as dead.

Maybe you should go to the mideast and be a terrorist, as you just expressed an ideology far more practically destructive than terrorism- American terror (with nukes)[/quote]

How am I personally as good as dead?

WTF do you know?

ANSWER: Jack sh!t

53

vroom,

Very interesting. Got tons of work on but I will most certainly get back to you on this at some point.

Will do my utmost to avoid wiki-facts!

54

[quote]1-packlondoner wrote:
ExNole wrote:

I was making the point that others on this thread have said they don’t have a genuine grievence. I believe they would disagree. I agree that it is hard to stop doing many of the things we are doing, but that doesn’t mean we shouldn’t acknowledge that we have done them.
[/quote]

I think we may be using ‘genuine grievance’ in different senses. I take it to mean a justified grievance, not the reason that someone is upset.

I’m not supporting a simplistic view of the situation, and I’m not suggesting that the ‘causes’ of unrest shouldn’t be given consideration, either in deciding who to support or how to implement that support.

For instance, in Iraq, there are a lot of people who see us as an occupying force. They may be insurgents or merely implicity support the insurgents. We need to do our best not to alienate the people any more, because our interests are both in a free and stable Iraq.

Hezbollah doens’t want Israel to leave so they can be independent, they want Israel destroyed. There isn’t any common ground there. Now, financing education and trying to force media reforms etc will help, but not for a generation or more. Until then, the options are try and disarm/destroy them, or accept that at any time they can bomb or rocket their towns.

55

[quote]Marmadogg wrote:
WTF do you know?

ANSWER: Jack sh!t[/quote]

I have been saying this for the last week or two. He doesn’t seen to grasp that concept.

Now I just tell him he’s pretty and his hair smells good.

56

Just a quick note to all that I haven’t forgotten what I said I’d do here - Just have had a week of crazy busy-ness in the ‘real’ world so my e-arguments have had to take a back seat for a while. 3.44am and I’m STILL grafting…

Agh!

57

[quote]rainjack wrote:
Marmadogg wrote:
WTF do you know?

ANSWER: Jack sh!t

I have been saying this for the last week or two. He doesn’t seen to grasp that concept.

Now I just tell him he’s pretty and his hair smells good. [/quote]

I would be careful on this one boys… Remember that dannyrunt is dangerous with his blade!

Anyways, why would you waste time with the unemployed self-proclaimed expert on the Middle East whose solution to the problems with Israel is that the Palestinians “Elect someone cool” (instead of say, a terror organization like Hamas)?

It is much more appropriate that we acknowledge danny “the Blade” runt as this year’s politics forum Squat1000.

I have never seen such a collusion of combatants: Harris, JeffR, Marmadogg, Thunderbolt, Rainjack, Zap, Vroom… If all these guys think you’re out there, you’re waaaaay out there!

I hope you take the time to type out fifteen pages of racist “yankee” garbage, throwing in references to “Eretz Israel”, talk about your tough life as a street blademaster and all the street cred you have, telling us all the books you have read, throwing in swear words to sound tough, and justifying flying nailbombs at hospitals because the Jews don’t belong.

I will only skim it to take out more ammunition to amuse the forum at your expense!

58

[quote]ChuckyT wrote:

Anyways, why would you waste time with the unemployed self-proclaimed expert on the Middle East whose solution to the problems with Israel is that the Palestinians “Elect someone cool” (instead of say, a terror organization like Hamas)?

It is much more appropriate that we acknowledge danny “the Blade” runt as this year’s politics forum Squat1000.

I hope you take the time to type out fifteen pages of racist “yankee” garbage, throwing in references to “Eretz Israel”, talk about your tough life as a street blademaster and all the street cred you have, telling us all the books you have read, throwing in swear words to sound tough, and justifying flying nailbombs at hospitals because the Jews don’t belong.

[/quote]

My manifesto. Thanks, man. I really love this ‘Blade’ and ‘rugged’ infatuation you have. I feel it’s really part of this 2d, black-and-white friend or foe mentality.

I don’t, and won’t justify who i am or what i know to be true to you chucky/jeff. I don’t want any mention of me in any post. Is it vain of me, when faced with rejection of solid and reasonable inferences about history, to mention that i have academic training on this, in addition to the regular (news watching)? Because i don’t care what you think! I’ve expressed myself well enough, often enough, on topics i’m sure of.

Yours menacingly, Zorro

[quote] I will only skim it to take out more ammunition to amuse the forum at your expense![/quote] So true

59

[quote]THE BLADE (said with a hushed and awe-inspired whisper)

I don’t, and won’t justify who i am or what i know to be true to you chucky/jeff.[/quote]

“THE BLADE,” what are you on about now?

I often disagree with Chucky. Wait, no I don’t!!! I’m happy to be compared to him.

However, I’ve decided that you and reckless are the same person.

Think about it. You both have massive street cred: belgian/“THE BLADE.”

You both try to get to know the terrorist mindset. You both are on the wrong side of every issue.

THE BLADE=reckless.

DON’T FIGHT YOUR SUPERHERO STATUS, THE BLADE!!!

You do know that you make elementary historical errors as a matter of course.

Therefore, your reasoning must be summarily rejected at all times.

I would like you to check out the latest article by Leroy Thompson. It’s titled, “Chili Temper Tanto.” You’ll love it. Mercworx joins the tanto rush with a hot and spicy mix of Asian fighter and American Camp Knive.

It’s right up your alley. You could enhance your urban hero status. The best of both worlds!!! Asian flash coupled with Yankee Doodle common sense.

That’s the problem. You sure are wrong.

I’VE FOUND IT!!! I’ve found out why THE BLADE (Hushed tones) has decided to call himself dannyrat on this forum:

Read this month’s issue of tactical knives and you will see that THE BLADE believes that Ontario’s Rat-5: Less is more. Jeff Randall and Ontario produce a synergy of size and performance with a new RAT model two inches shorter than it’s brother.

It’s all you!!!

JeffR