Military leaders being convicted of crimes....
 

This story, http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/19394865/, made me thing about another story I read this week:
http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/19318805/

Now, I'm no pacifist guy who thinks there aren't civilian deaths in war, but how in the world can we expect the rest of the world to take us serious when I see things like this? I know it's a Baghdad court, but it's really an American appointed court. And I know 180,000 deaths is a whole lot different than what happened in the Afghanistan story, but it's the same principle is it not? Innocent deaths. This is coming from a white, Anglo Saxon, registered Republican, who voted for Bush in 2000, but not in '04. I can't imagine what the rest of the world thinks.

Um, how can one even take the step of comparing one story with the other? That's beyond a bit of a reach.

One is a mass attack to exterminate thousands and the other is a precise attack in which there are innocents within the kill zone (there is never going to be a time when there are no innocents near a target like this).

Regardless of whether ones says it is an acceptable loss, there is no doubt that these are the kinds of things that Al-Q seize upon in their recruiting efforts. When added altogether, one could argue that while the attack MAY end up killing one member of Al-Q, it also may have recruited 10 people who otherwise would not have joined Al-Q, or maybe not. I would like to see the U.S. be a little more cautious in deciding things like this (i.e. did they exhaust all other approaches, is he important enough), which it sounds like they may have done.

What I don't like seeing is the double talk. One military guys says we never would have done the airstrike if they knew children were present, then another guys says, yes they knew, but went ahead anyway. When I hear that it makes me wonder how else I am being lied to in similar situations -- although sadly I think the answer is 'all the time.'

I would agree that the 2 are definitely not comparable.

I'd like to point out that pretty much every pacifist guy out there both thinks and knows that there are civilian deaths in war. That's usually the #1 reason they're pacifists.

The military and the US government in particular go to GREAT financial lengths to ensure we minimize civilian deaths as much as war and technology will allow. As least relative to any other nation that goes to war. So I hope the commander's on the ground are doing their best as well. I certainly believe so, but we pride ourselves in teaching and preaching honorable tactics in combat (Geneva Conventions are followed pretty strict for instance) but that never rules out "cowboys" or leaders making bad decisions. It's always possible there could have been a better time to take this terror leader out. But who really knows?


Let's keep in mind just how vast this beauracracy is (US Military). We are told to not talk to the press...because you don't want to end up being a "military spokesman" when you don't know what the fuck your talking about. This is a perfect example of that.

Some guy on the ground is saying, "Hell no we don't target civilians, we wouldn't do that!" and the other guy...the "public relations" guy (think Tony Snow but for a military commander) is saying, "Yeah, we had a shot and we took it. Sorry."

The next thing you know there's "double talk" and everybody is thinking somebody's lying when in reality one is probably closer to the truth and the other is based on perception/ideal/rumor. Everybody tries to avoid it, but as large as the military is, that's sometimes impossible. As for lying, most people in Iraq or Afghanistan fighting could give a rats ass what some hippie at Berkley thinks, so they are usually pretty honest if not accurate.

From the article:

Possibly my new favorite name ever...

Mr. Poopypants is mine.

While I tend to agree, what does the rest of the world thing when they read the article and it says "Military leaders knew there were children present, but considered risk worth it", what do they think? Wouldn't that alone convict the military leaders of almost any other country in our minds? Wouldn't we consider that "terrorism"?

While I tend to agree with you, this gives me a scary thought on not going forward with it: the terrorists will have found a way to stop us. They will just keep kids around them all the time. Does anyone really think they wouldn't use children as "sympathetic" shields? These same terrorists use kids as suicide bombers.

There is no winning a PR battle where kids are involved in war. But I don't see an easy answer to this one considering the type of combatant we're up against.

"Any other nation"? Are you suggesting that Great Britain and Canada, to name just two who have deployed with us recently, don't go to these lengths?

How would we consider that terrorism? We're dealing with terrorists, not a military force. There aren't military compounds to attack, there are homes and villages that are used as the strongholds. The children are not the target but the unfortunate side affect of the situation.

How does the world view us? It depends upon the people we are speaking of. Sane and logical people will understand the situation. Lunatic fanatics will hate us no matter what we did or do. It changes nothing.

Now if the statement was "We had a great chance to get the targets while they were all alone in one place which was far from anyone innocent but chose to wait until they were around the children because we figured that would be more fun.", that may cause a problem.

Nah they just use our tools to accomplish those same goals.:)