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.

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Eudaimonia

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

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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?

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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.

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Eudaimonia

Sure. PM me.

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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.

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Eudaimonia

"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.

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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.

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Eudaimonia

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.

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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.

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Eudaimonia

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?

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Training and operating bases come to mind.

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Eudaimonia

Which brings the CIA to mind

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