Mike,
Actually the original and fairly limited question was do we accept the surrender of these pitiful soldiers when the time comes (assuming the throwing down of arms, the underwear, the whole desert storm thing), which was and is my view, or do we mow them down, which appears to be Diana's and Bum's view?
First of all, those guys weeping in their underwear won't be your real extremists. Those guys will already be in mufti trying to cross over into Pakistan or Iran or somewhere else. When we process them (assuming we get to process them and not the Northern Alliance), we should muster out the low level conscripts, and try to figure out what to charge the commanders with. Remember that many of these guys will be wanted for domestic crimes committed under the Taliban (beatings and executions come to mind, roll the videotape), and may be liable for international crimes as well. Recall, too, that for our own selfish purposes we WANT these people to surrender and not continue to fight, since it saves lives.
My guess is the native English speakers won't get a vote in this matter, anyway; this will be a policy matter taken care of at the local level.
The idea that we will get Usama and his gang in a reach for the sky surrender is ludicrous. We'll be looking down the gun barrels at the mice. The rats will be harder to chase down, imho.
Btw, pretty sharp turn on oil. That was a short rally, wasn't it?
Kb |
