Hi Hawkmoon; The targeting of civilian populations in wartime is a constant of history since the Old Testament. What only changes is the magnitude of that targeting.
With respect to the WTC, our enemy has done nothing that isn't normal for wartime, nothing that the Germans didn't do to us during WW2 or tried, and nothing that we've not done against every enemy we've ever had, or tried. If you think otherwise, get out a Ouija board and ask some of the passengers on the Lusitania, or the civilians who lived in Dresden.
War is an extreme situation. This is the central fact of war.
I think it's a waste of time to talk about moralizing and who's targeting civilians and who's sticking to military targets. That's civilian BS. Ever notice how civilians always refer to themselves as "innocent"? The implication is that people in the military must be "guilty". The actual fact is war is carried on between societies, and everyone's involved.
It's a waste of time to talk about who's right and who's wrong. Every war is fought by peoples who believe themselves to be in the right. Of course we think that, and of course they think so too. How could either of us expect our young men (and civilians) to die if we believed ourselves to be in the wrong?
The time to discuss morality and who's right is over, now it's time to get ready to fight. We should be talking about converting automobile factories to tank production, and bringing back the draft, airliner production to combat aircraft. We need to be lining up our allies. It's time to call up the reserves. I don't think this will be a long war, but no one ever does at the beginning.
It's not yet certain that we will have to fight. All the terrorist associated countries are making sounds like they don't want to see our guns. Perhaps Afghanistan will give the culprits up without a fight, but I doubt it, and the best way to minimize our deaths is to prepare for a tough fight.
-- Carl
P.S. And don't worry about people in the streets of Egypt (or wherever) being happy to see the U.S. humbled. They have nothing to lose, but they aren't the ones that make the decisions, their leaders are, and their leaders understand that they will be the ones who have to suffer the inevitable loss. |
