Belial,

I disagree with you. Killing children in order to get an adult to do something against her/his will is an act of cowardice, in my opinion. Just because the terrorist dies in the act does not make the act – or the actor – any less cowardly.

What then, is your definition of courage?

Blowing yourself up has absolutely nothing to do with courage. Those men and women are so misguided by their belief system that they cannot think for themselves. Remember, they think they are going to......"Paradise" It's the leaders of these misguided fools who hide behind their politics/religion who are the real cowards. I don't see any of the leaders of the terrorist faction blowing themselves up......they aren't that stupid. Cowards always send someone else to fight for them when they can.

Getting caught and imprisoned, possibly executed, represents danger.
Getting killed by someone trying to stop you represents danger.
Flying a plane which you are aboard into a building represents danger.
Confronting these dangers with the confidence - however misguided - that you are not acting in vain represents - according to the dictionary - courage.

No, terrorist leaders are not blowing themselves up. They might be, indeed, cowards.

Belial,

It does not take courage to do what they did. It took a mindset and a belief system that promised them "Paradise" once dead. They are told they will be martyrs in the name of Allah and what better way to die if you are one of "the chosen". They truly believe that they go to a better place. They are cowards who do as they are told....a person with true courage would say NO.

Belial,

The passengers aboard the aircraft which crashed in Pennsylvania faced their adversaries, the hijackers, bravely – and died in their attempt to gain control of the aircraft. The terrorist who intentionally kills a child kills someone who is not their adversary, for what has the child done? Is there any redeeming quality if then the terrorist kills him or her self? I may be wrong, but it seems to me that you are inappropriately associating suicide, where the actor has control of the time and place of death, with bravery, where the actor does not.

Whether or not they believed they would be rewarded in paradise I doubt that that belief could be so deeply ingrained that they did not perceive at some level their deaths, particularly deaths of that violent nature, to be dangerous. Of course, I don't know that. I could be wrong. But no-one knows. As I said, I don't see courage as connected with virtue so to me any act in which the protagonist suppresses significant fear for themselves and presses on to their objective is courageous. I tend to see the "evil therefore cowardly" theory a lot and I don't agree with it, so I threw out my own theory. The only thing I ask of anyone is that they read and think carefully about what I say. Pixies is usually good in this regard, which is a big reason I still post here.

Hey look, I went off track. Go me :)

I am not calling courage a redeeming quality.



Why does bravery require the actor to not have control of the time and place of their death?

Belial,

As this no longer relates to the War on Terrorism, how about we take it off-line? I am happy to discuss these issues, but they seem at best tangential to the focus of this thread.

Sure. PM me.

This sucks, do we realy have to pick sides between terrorists and fascists?

No sir, you don't. You never have had to do so.

"War on Terror" is a ridiculously grandinose title for a narrowly-focussed war on certain nations who have been selected for their respective political significance and complete abscence of prospects for victory.

Belial,

The War on Terror is a world war, fought by in England by the English, in Indonesia by the Indonesians, in France by the French, in the Philippines by Filipinos, in the United States by Americans, etc. On occasion, terrorists are interdicted outside the boarders of the target nations. Commonly, these are covert operations, but on occasion large scale offenses are employed.

No one should confuse the downfall of the Taliban as anything other than a particular theater of operation in a global conflict. The government of Afghanistan gave succor and sanctuary to a particular terrorist organization, Al-Qaeda, and was overthrown by those who preferred a different government. The reason that they were overthrown was that THERE WAS NO PEACFUL MEANS to select an alternative. The fact that the Taliban did not stand a snowball’s chance in Hell against the might that their misbegotten foolishness brought down upon them in no way excuses their reprehensible policies which, among other savageries, included the destruction of the Binyamin Buddahs as well as a substantial faction of Afghanistan’s cultural heritage.

The War on Terror will take a long time, and success is not guarantied.

This "War on Terror" you speak of in your first paragraph is merely the enforcement of the laws of these nations. It is not a holistic initiative to eliminate terror.

The downfall of the Taliban had nothing to do with their activities inside Afghanistan and everything to do with the ability to blame them for al-Qaeda. And did they give succour and sanctuary to al-Qaeda? Remember that this is hardly the same situation as al-Qaeda existing in their territory.

If the war on terror had anything to do with, as Belial put it, giving succour and sanctuary to al-Qaeda then the next target for invasion would have been Saudi Arabia. Hell, Saudi possibly should have been the first. But by that metric of justification, Iraq shouldn't have ever been on the radar. If the answer is to invade countries which contain people who support the terrorists, would you agree that England would've been justified to invade Ireland? If so, you must extend your support to an English invasion of the US itself, the IRA got loads of money from our fellow citizens.

I can't tell you how much I disliked the Taliban, and the destruction of the Buddahs had me downright appopleptic and screaming at the news program. But you can't use those as mitigating factors and pretend you're doing anything but sugar coating a pill. If invading another country is a pill that NEEDS sugar coating, it strikes me the case hasn't been made convincingly.

G

Belial,

The War on Terrorism is, indeed, not a holistic initiative to eliminate terror. It is rather, a holistic initiative to reduce terrorism to an acceptable minimum. Any fanatic with access to explosives may become a terrorist. With a population in excess of 6 billion, it would be unreasonable to set 0 as the upper bound. Terror is an internal experience. Terrorism is the behavior which has been targeted.

The proximate tools are conventional police work to interdict terrorists within national borders, and the armed forces (both conventional and unconventional) to combat those outside national borders. These tools function first to incarcerate or kill terrorists. Their second function is to reduce the opportunities for terrorist funding, recruiting, training, and the practice of their trade.

Two other tools are long term: political liberation and economic advancement. Take a moment to look at the countries of origin of the world’s terrorists over the last 50 years. I believe that you will see a correlation between the ratio of terrorists by nationality and lack of political freedom/autocratic rulers etc. I think you will also see a correlation between the ratio of terrorists by nationality and their poverty/absence of wealth.

The ratio of Palestinian to Dutch suicide bombers is, I think, striking.

To illustrate the point, as the PRC has become increasingly integrated into the world’s economy, and as the per capita income of its population has grown, so too has it reduced its support for international terrorism. The same cannot be said of pariah nations which have few or no economic incentives to moderate their idealisms. Permit me to point to Afghanistan as an extreme example of this.

As for the Taliban giving sanctuary to al-Qaeda: Either the Taliban was or was not the legitimate government of Afghanistan. If it was, and it provided a safe haven to an organization, al-Qaeda, which was demonstrably a clear and present danger to the United States, then that support constituted the casus belli for action under international norms. If, on the other hand the Taliban was not, in fact, the legitimate government of Afghanistan, then any arguments in support of them by their apologists are irrelevant.

jseal,

The "War on Terror" is not a holistic anything. If it was, it would encompass retribution, recompense and/or prosecution for atrocities carried out in countries that have no current political value. Remember Panama, Guatemala, Laos, Chile? US compliance with the World Court's decision on the Contra atrocities in Nicaragua would be a good start to a holistic "War on Terror".

What would you define as the provision of sanctuary, since there are al-Qaeda operatives and sympathetic fundraisers worldwide?

Training and operating bases come to mind.

Which brings the CIA to mind ;)

Belial,

Keep the CIA in mind if you wish. Doing so does not change the relationship that the Taliban had with the terrrorist organization Al-Qaeda. It provided provided santuary.

And the CIA provided training. Since the issue of training seems to be a relevant one to justification for bombing Afghanistan, can it be used to justify bombing the US?

Belial,

Why yes. Of course it can! A government which does so need only accept the consequences. The Taliban can, in this way, serve as a good example of a bad example! I never thought about it that way. Thank you.

What do you mean? :confused:

me thinks u guys have been suckleing too much from King Bush's bosum

Am I the only person this statemant gives a head ache.

I think the point Belial was trying to make was that the CIA trained Binladen and many of the other al-Qaeda leaders. Just because they called it gorilla warfare if you get down to it, it just a diferent side of the same coin.

Not only that the CIA has supported and they have been knowen to use terrrorist when they deem it's for their best intrest.

GingerV~ I read your post and once again you gave me an opportunity to look at something in a different way. Thanks!

This thread makes my head hurt...


Like many other topics, war is not one that people who are on polar opposite sides of the argument will ever be able to convince the other that he/she is right. Rant on and prove that you are a better thinker/debater than the other, that you can recite all the doctrines that support your beliefs, that you can belittle someone with a differing point of view. My opinion of world politics will not change from this thread.

Now if you'll excuse me, I'm going back to look at the beautiful, naked women of Pixies...

Booger

It is general knowledge that the CIA provided training and funding for the Afghan resistance to the Soviet backed government during the Cold War.

I’m sure your not suggesting that it was therefore acceptable for the Afghan government to provide Al-Qaeda support for its assault on the United States, are you?

Keep it on topic and/or courteous or take it to PM.

jseal

If you train a dog to be viscous and to bite then you kick it and it bites you do you blame the dog or the person who trained it?

The US *trained (this was part of the suport) Binladen and many of the other al-Qaeda leaders when they were fighting the Soviet backed government during the Cold War. So if we are going to start to lay the blame maybe we should look at some of the US policies that helped lead to the events on 9/11. Not only did the US train the people who masterminded this do to our policies they deemed us a big enough threat that they dared risk such a thing. If you truely beleave the attacked us over some holly war as we have been told. Then you seem to be looking at a very small part of the big picture and with this I can not help you.


* the training we gave them was to fight a much bigger and better armed force using what ever means possible.

skyler you don't debate someone to change their mind. Becasue if they have taken the opposite side of debat most likely you won't. The debate is for others who are watching who maybe haven't made up thier minds or to maybe give them a new way of looking at the same old thing.

I am enjoying Jseal's gold medal performance (I'm not sure I always understand him though).

The man you quote Booger, Mr. Bertrand Russell was also a master on the paradoxical subject of the ethics of war.

Sometimes you have to make decisions that you know are only 55% right and unfortunately the 45% wrong can hang around to kick you in the ass later. Sometimes you can be wrong in the first place, but I wouldn't question the overall position that the CIA acts in the US's best interests or that those interests may be unpalatable to many of your own citizens let alone others around the world.

Booger,

I may be wrong, but I believe that the purpose of the War on Terrorism is not to lay the blame for the situation, but rather to curtail the activity.

And how's that working jseal? I'll admit, my interpretation is that we haven't seen a decrease in terror attacks recently. But I haven't yet seen a scholarly accounting of pre- and post- gulf war numbers. If you've got one, I'd like to see it.

I'm not going to repeat myself, you don't win a War on Terror by invading the wrong damned country. I'm not convinced you win it by invading any country.

GingerV,

The statistics about terrorism, and by implication the results of the war upon it, are subjects of active debate. The link I have provided below provides three charts, and the supporting numbers, for three significant measurements: frequency (how many occurred during a year), and how many were killed and how many were injured. The red plot shows the statistics provided by the US State Department, the blue plot is that of numbers provided by the RAND organization, an organization independent of the US government. I hope that the source of the data will not be used to derail the discussion.

http://www.johnstonsarchive.net/ter...intlterror.html

I call upon any Pixie who is adept in statistical analysis to assist here. My familiarity with the discipline is more than 20 years old.

While this data set is modest, I believe that a positive trend line may be plotted on all three charts from the start of the recording in the late 60s through the late 80s. This would indicate that terrorism as an institution was growing.

All three charts show a dip in the 1989 – 1990 period.

The Frequency and Fatality charts also show a negative trend line for the period from the late 80s through the late 90s, a period of global economic growth. This would indicate that terrorism as an institution was decreasing. The Injury chart differs sharply beginning in 1993. I’m unsure of the cause, perhaps a change in weaponry, or perhaps tactics.

Following the decline of global economic growth at the end of the 1990s, the frequency and magnitude of terrorism incidents increase. The 2001 Fatality plot is anomalous, skewed by the 9/11 incident.

Focusing on the period 1998 – 2003 (the last year for which both data sets are complete), the numbers show a decrease in both injuries as well as fatalities. The RAND & DOS numbers for terrorism incidents during 2003 are at variance. We’d need to find out if there was a change in reporting criteria for either organization.

These numbers fail to support the suggestion made by some that the War on Terrorism is a failure. I think that now it is your opportunity to provide data sets from other reputable organizations, with a similar analysis. Perhaps the EU provides statistics on this subject. That, coupled with a RAND-like apples-to-apples comparison from some other respectable European institution unaffiliated with the official line would help dispel, or at least mitigate any American spin on the numbers.

Actually, my statistical analysis is pretty good. Has to be, both to do what I do for a living, and to keep up in conversations with my physicist bf. And I'd be glad to help with that side of things...but the first thing (and I'm sure you know this) is that lines are meaningless if you don't know what into them. What constitutes a terrorist incident here? Are they source specific, or are they collapsing across various terrorist organizations? Something as simple as whether Sept 11 (to use one that we're all too familiar with) count as 1, 3 or 4 attacks makes a difference.

Also, line graphs like this aren't terribly meaningful in this sort of complex system. Verbal analysis of what is and isn't relevant would be a big help in interpreting what are, effectively, raw numbers. More than that, though...IF you put any faith in these for purposes of prediction (and I'm not sure if they're useful for that), there are a couple of things that throw up some problems for the assertion that the Gulf War Redux has had any impact on the war on terror.

The US Dos number seem more relevant (don't fold domestic terror in...although if Palestinian attacks on Israel are counted as domestic I may be 100% off about that), and according to them...while the number of fatalities dropped (although given the range even in non-spike years I'm not sure it's statistically significant), the number of attacks stays the same between 2002 and 2003 (the closest we can come to before and after measures, I disagree that the 1998-2003 bin is telling...both cause I don't see the dip you talk about around the spike...and the Bush pre-emptive defense doctrine wasn't applied until 2002). Arguably, that means we're not making anything better. Data from 2004 would be particularly interesting, but isn't available until the end of the year apparently. So if you come back with "this doesn't show a long range effective decrease" I can't argue on the numbers. But I would want at least a logical argument to show why it should be expected apriori that the effect would be long range. Most folks seemed to think the effect would be instantaneous. Then again, most folks think Iraq was responsible for 9/11....so there you go.

You might say that we aren't making anything worse, to defend the invasion. But I think that's problematic...as the positive effect on the War on Terror is used to justify the damage we've done. So we have on ballance made something worse, without making Terror better.

Anyway....could you throw me a rope on the folks who put these numbers together in the first place so I can get a better idea about where the numbers come from? Thanks.

G

GingerV,

Bless you!

I was concerned that I was about to be castigated for another interminable dissertation. It has also been many moons since I was last tasked with statistical analysis. Your response has comforted me on both points.

Lies, damned lies, and statistics, yes’m. I’m sure we can tend to this. I shall try to secure the measuring criteria used by each organization. I do believe that terrorist incidents are here recorded independently, thus 9/11 = 4. Let us not let the Palestinian attacks on Israel slip between the cracks of the debate. Terrorism is not an American problem, it is a World problem.

I’d like to review what may prove to be a point of contention between us

Reading your posts has left me with the impression that you believe the “Old Guard’s” (of which I would be assumed to be a member) position is that the justification for the overthrow of the Hussein regime was a natural consequence of the War on Terrorism.

That line goes, I believe, roughly that “there was some covert association between Hussein and bin Laden, and so by removing Hussein, bin Laden would be damaged, and anyway we should have taken Hussein out in 1991, so getting rid of the sonofabitch does the world a power of good anyway”. No?

Actually, my recollection of the events leading up to the Iraq regime change of March-April last year is that the armed conflict was justified by Iraq’s non-compliance with several UN resolutions. These related to the inability of UN verification of Iraq pledges to eliminate its programs to develop NBC munitions. Subsequent, very, very thorough searches failed to find any WMDs, and indeed it turned out that the programs which Mr. Hussein thought were in place, actually were being manipulated for the financial gain of various senior Iraqis. A bit embarrassing to Messrs Bush and Blair.

The argument for the invasion of Iraq was not based on the previously announced WOT by Bush, but on of the “clear and present danger” that Iraq presented to the world. I’m sure you recall the famous “15 minute” comment, and Secretary Powell’s satellite photographs? There was also a bit of a bother with allegations of HM government “sexing up” the Iraq dossier to “enhance” the case for war.

Where I am going with this line of argument is that there is no useful purpose served in arguing that “the invasion of Iraq did no good in the WOT”, as that was not the basis for the invasion. The reason that I have spent the time reviewing this is because I hope to avoid a debate about the invasion of Iraq last year defining or limiting the discussion of the WOT.

War on Terror--continued
 

Sorry to have been away these few days to have missed the post "war on Terror" posted by Vigil--a great thread in that this is an important topic.

I see that Jseal had taken some issue with my posting to the previous thread--sorry you have and misunderstand my position. But as for Poland and Denmarks assistance in our involvement in Irqac amounts to next to nothing--barely enough troops contributed to guard a shopping mall and they are more dependant on US forces to keep them safe from terrorest--been there and seen it first hand.

Any person who is killed in war is one too many--loosing flower of our youth though shameless borrowed by me is a fact. It doesn't refer to just a body count--it also refers to the lost innocents, and bitter memories that will haunt the lives of many a serving soldier. Personally I would have perfered to exist ignorant of the ugly face of war and been happier for it. Sadly that is my lot and not the lot of others.

And yes the invasion of Afganistan was to end a terrorest safe havean--and as much as I hate to admit it--it was and should be to kill "verman". I would dearly wish with all my heart that these verman can be reasoned with to end the hate and violence. Yet they will not listen to reason and ignore the parts of their own beliefs that don't suit their views. Thus what else is there but to destroy them? Its reality as hard as it seems.