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Politics : Foreign Affairs Discussion Group -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: Brumar89 who wrote (99831)	6/2/2003 12:49:51 AM
From: Jacob Snyder	Read Replies (2) \| Respond to of 281500

<Wouldn't you say the suicide bombers know that ALL of the dead will be non-combantants?> The last major war, in which the violence was targetted at mostly combatants, was WW1. Since then, everyone understands that the easiest way of winning wars is destroying the will and/or ability of the opposition civilian population, to support their combatants. And, further, that it's a lot easier to find and kill civilians, than combatants. This applies especially to guerrilla wars, like the Intifada, and Vietnam. Everyone knows this, and acts accordingly. Frequently, all too frequently, the easiest way, maybe the only way, to win a war, is to target civilians. There are exceptions to this (like both our wars on Iraq), but the above is the general way wars have been fought, and the way all guerrilla wars have been fought, for at least the last 100 years. Although everyone knows this, everyone also wants to think of themselves as civilized and moral. Good People. We get around this dilemma, be defining our own methods and weapons as good, moral, civilized, acceptable. And defining the methods and weapons used by our opponents, as the opposite. And by ignoring all contrary evidence. This way, we can feel good about ourselves, while doing the same horrible things to Them, that they are doing to Us. The Israelis constantly use massive firepower in areas with lots of Palestinian civilians. They habitually use the principle of "collective punishment", which means punishing the civilian populations who support the enemy combatants. Of the 1000+ they killed last year, how many were non-combatants? Who knows? A 12-year-old throwing stones at tanks, is he a combatant? A cleric who preaches jihad? A woman who sews the vest worn by suicide bombers? The relatives of that bomber, who encouraged him? All these, the Israelis target.