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

To: neolib who wrote (187620)	5/28/2006 10:29:34 PM
From: Hawkmoon	Read Replies (3) \| Respond to of 281500

some General had to order American special ops troops to get rid of their beards and casual dress. And had they been captured, they would have been shot, mutilated, and probably strung up in some horrendous manner as a public display. (the same fate that almost any US soldier would face in the hands of Al Qai'da forces). So the "uniform" was not much of a concern. But SpecOps folks are quite familiar with operating in such enviroments and they known the risks. But I'm sure that many of them had some semblance of a uniform with them that could be put on. And most importantly, they generally have some form of identification marking them as a legal armed combatant. (where are the legal documents for Al Qai'da members?) And btw.. beards and moustaches have NO BEARING on what denotes a uniform. I stand by what I said. Bush & Rummy have shown a great willingness to push the envelope of treatment of our adversaries ever since 9/11. Push the envelope, or an attempt to tailor the existing rules for LEGAL COMBATANTS so that they incorporate ILLEGAL COMBATANTS, rather than permitting terrorism and their attacks to be construed as merely "criminal acts". The entire equivocation over "illegal combatants" set the tone. And just what should we define them as? Full-fledged combatants?? Fine.. then they get put into a POW camp, interrogated, and held until the end of hostilities and then turned back over to.. Well.. Hmm.. what country were they representing again? Isn't that how we handled the Germans and the Japanese (those few who surrendered)?? Did we have an early release program for them?? Did they all get lawyers and trials? Folks need to face some facts.. Gitmo is a POW camp for illegal combatants. They are there because the were we to treat them in the same manner illegal combatants in previous conflicts like WWII, they would be hung/shot as spies and saboteurs. Bush has shown a much more casual regard for their civilians, and this attitude has enjoyed broad American public support, as 9/11 targeted our civilians. I bet I could find statements you made to that effect. Start digging.. I believe the closest approximation to that would be if the enemy were caught in the midst of, or traveling with, civilians. I would have to target the enemy and hope that I didn't kill to many of the civilians. But you don't deliberately target civilians on a TACTICAL LEVEL and there should SELDOM be an excuse for doing so, IMO That's for the "strategic" planners to decide (mass bombing, nuclear strikes.. etc). There was a perfect example of this. Ayman Zawahiri, #2 of Al Qai'da, was traveling in a car with some reported unknown "civilians", heading for Pakistan. We had the shot (from what I was told)... perfect opportunity to take him down with a Hellfire launched from a Predator. But someone "upstairs" decided that since we didn't know if they were terrorists, or actual "civilians, we couldn't kill him. Think of that.. We had the chance to take out the operational and planning head of Al Qai'da. In terms of WWII, he would have been the equivalent of "Mussolini"... But we couldn't do it because of "rules" about not targeting civilians. What would you have done in this case?? Hawk