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Politics : Sharks in the Septic Tank -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: cosmicforce who wrote (33261)	10/16/2001 2:47:58 PM
From: Lazarus_Long	Read Replies (2) \| Respond to of 82486

Percentage? This isn't a high school algebra lesson. Abstract? There was nothing abstract about those 6,000 dead in NYC. We really don't want to be fighting a conventional war against an unconventional enemy Why not? Conventional forces have defeated unconventional more than once. Remember Che Guevera? How about the British in Malaya after WWI? The idea that the unconventional forces always win is a myth. And who said we're going to fight a conventional war? Are those Special Ops troops going into Afghanistan conventional forces? because it will just make us look worse Pesonally I don't give a d*n what they think we look like. We're past that now. Way past it. and reinforce that notion that we are at war with Islam (bin Laden's message).* We seem to be doing OK on that front too. But see below. There are some points I believe you are missing. One of the purposes of this should be to convince other governments that it is a VERY bad idea to shelter terrorist organizations. At least if those organizations have the US on their target list. Another is to make an example of the Afghanistan. So that the people in other countries throw out those organizations or those governments so they will not have to endure the consequences. Deterrence. It worked during the Cold War.

To: cosmicforce who wrote (33261)	10/16/2001 4:45:29 PM
From: TimF	Respond to of 82486

Okay, what percentage of collateral killing are you willing to accept to make this abstract point? What is the verified perpetrator body count these days (beyond those who died in the act of terrorism)? I wouldn't say it was the percentage of collateral killing that matters as much as the overall level of it. If one terrorist planned and commited the attacks all by himself, and didn't die but rather got away and was planning to continue with similar attacks, and we had a chance to drop a bomb into his bunker I would so so, even if there is a chance that it might kill one innocent person and if it does it would mean the deaths of the innocents where as great in number as the deaths among the guilty. If on the other hand 1,000,000 people where guilty of the act and we had to kill 1,000,000 innocents in order to get the 1,000,000 who where guilty it would cause me to hesitate more then the risk to the one innocent even though the % figures are the same. Another consideration I find important is the level of effort in avoiding casualties among the innocent. If all we had to use against Al-Qaida and the Taliban was "dumb iron" bombs pushed out of cargo planes with no bomb sights or positioning equipment or laser guidance or anything that would make them more accurate, but we tried as much as possible to limit damage to civilians we would probably kill a lot more civilians then we would if we took our modern equipment and made a half-hearted effort to avoid civilian casualties, but the casual attitude about killing innocents expressed in the second case is morally repugnant. Of course in reality we are using the best modern equipment combined with a strong attempt to prevent such casualties. So the deaths of innocents should be minimal. It is possible that more innocent people may be killed in riots against our attacks then by the blast and shrapnel from our bombs. Tim