Civilized warfare

Please tell me what your idea of civilized warfare is.

History has shown repeatedly great empires and civilizations that have been laid low or snuffed out by other tribes/nations/Empires that did not follow what they thought was civilized warfare. By the time they had figured out that the enemy will not fight to their civilized ideas, it was too late to save themselves.

The idea of simplely arresting them using tazzers does not work. When a guy comes after you with a AK-47 (United airline flight) you can not just let him repeatedly shoot you (crash into your buildings). This is not some bully on the playground, there is no teacher to hide behind and these people will not stop until you are either converted or what they prefer DEAD.

I am a soldier and the idea of causing any bodily pain to another person makes my skin crawl. If a person goes down from a hail of my squad's bullets, I just do not wish it was my bullets.

I just found out two weeks ago that one of my wife's friend’s 5 years old relative named Olga, died in the elementary school attack in Russia. I will not just sit idly by and let my children get massacred at their school's summer festival, just because someone else don't like my culture or religion (or lack of religion).

That's My Two Cents

No one least of all this individual can find the attack on the elementary school at Baslan anything less than a crime. Yet(do not mistake what I write as an apology for terrorism) the children perished in a botched attempt at recuse. This does not mitigate the gravity of the crime.

We are living in a complex world in which simple minded nationalism will not serve any purpose. USA is not a nation, she is an EMPIRE and hence we are all interested in what goes on.

Terrorism can only be readicated when the injustices, real or imagined, are substantially reduced.

"civilised warfare".....is that when you play chess? Or maybe when you pull ot the trusty old...Risk board? War is war....ppl DIE....especially when they fake that they are dead....he just chose the wrong marine to fake to, i guess....good for the marine. I stand by him 100%....too bad a few more weren't faking dead either

"How many people will have to die to awake the conscience of the World"

So you are shocked that a few bad apples in the US military isn't causing the uproar you want? Don't look at how they deal with the US's few excesses, look at how the world deals with wholesale slaughter on the scale of hundreds of thousands or millions.

• Apparently 1,000,000 wasn't enough in Rwanda.
• So far about 60,000 isn't enough yet in Sudan.
• 400,000 wasn't enough to prevent Hussein from killing his own people.
• Stalin caused the deaths of tens of millions of Russians.
• Mao Tse-tung killed even more Chinese than that, and is considered the most prolific mass murderer in history.
• How many people died in Idi Amin's slaughter? 500,000 or so. Mass murder, mind you, that he was never, ever brought to justice for. After living a while in Iraq, he moved to Saudi Arabia and lived happily on a $1400 a month stipend with cooks, maids, housing, all provided by the Saudi royal family.

You want to make a list of what the world should have been outraged about but never got around to it? Don't even start about the "outrage" or the Arab world; cultures that rely on oppression, wholesale slaughter, torture, and hate for their everyday existance and entertainment.

Nah, you just want to bitch and whine some more abou the US in Iraq.

I think that people letting their patriotism cloud their ability to read Bahu's article properly.

Yes his opening line makes assumptions on what happened (just as many other peoples blogs have assumed all was rosey) but that is not what the focus of his article is about. it's about the bigger picture and the questions of whether the US war itself is to blame for this incident as oppossed to the soldier. If you throw enough soldiers into a tough situation some of them will make mistakes or bad decisions because of stress. Likewise though, we label these terrorists as such, but 2 years ago most of them were probably innoncent Iraqi civilians going about their daily business under a dictatorship regime. Yes they are now abhorant terrorists, but who made them so? If there any responsibility on those who invaded their country? While we can condemn the terrorism we cannot just ignore the questions that Bahu raises.

Issues such as the situation the marine actually found himself in, and issues such as the damage such incidents do to the US image, cannot just be ignored in a fit of US patriotism. How many new terrorists will be spawned when they perceive that the US itself doesn't care about Iraqi human rights? Is this a self fulfilling circle?

Paul.

Paul and Bahu

it's about the bigger picture and the questions of whether the US war itself is to blame for this incident as oppossed to the soldier

I have stated my point:

This is not some bully on the playground, there is no teacher to hide behind and these people will not stop until you are either converted or what they prefer DEAD.

I will not just sit idly by and let my children get massacred at their school's summer festival, just because someone else don't like my culture or religion (or lack of religion).

This is a culture war that has started. It started years ago, but it started small and has slowly built up. The First Bush and Clinton Administration decided to ignore it. This in the end resulted in death of 3,000 of our citizens.

If you cave into their demands like the Philippine kidnappings in the 1990s and the early 1970s Middle East highjackings/kidnappings, they will only escalate. Both situations have ended because we stopped paying the ransom or ignoring the events.

People wonder why we didn't stop 9/11. But these are the same people who ignored the earlier events that lead up to 9/11.

You two may want to ignore the African Embassy bombing, 9/11 and the Russian attack if you want by blaming the US. We were not the one who packed the explosives. But remember in the Koran it says “if your enemy wish to talk that is because they are weak and that is were you may destroy him”. So your peace and giving them flowers in your mind will solve everything, to them that just shows them where to attack.

Yes they are now abhorant terrorists, but who made them so?

Every bodies a victim now (can anybody take responsibility for themselves?). I think the person pointing the AK-47 at me made himself a terrorist.

If there any responsibility on those who invaded their country?

Maybe it is the responsibility of Sadam to have lived up to his First Gulf War peaces treaty or his people to remove him from power first.

How many new terrorists will be spawned when they perceive that the US itself doesn't care about Iraqi human rights?

Interesting for you to say this about a country that was regularly placed on the top to the human rights watch list. I don't see where this incident is a human right violation yet. As I said before, let see if it was one, before you scream at the top of your lungs that it was.

Is this a self fulfilling circle?

As I noted above, it will be if we show weakness.

USA is not a nation, she is an EMPIRE

Empire: 1. an aggregate of nations, tribes, clans, or peoples ruled over by one supreme sovereign: usually a territory of greater extent then a kingdom. 2. a government under an emperor. 3. imperial power; sovereignty. 4. supreme control: absolute sway.

While you may think that the US is an EMPIRE, we are not. While we may have alliances, defense treaties, trade treaties, and protectorates, we are not an Empire. You may want to continue using the word in order to belittle the country, but please use the proper name of protectorate. Or please make your case at to why we are an Empire instead to using the wrong word because it makes the nation look evil.

Terrorism can only be readicated when the injustices, real or imagined, are substantially reduced.

OK, then show me an example of when this tacit has worked. The examples that I have given above showing forceful dealing and wiping out the problem at the source has repeatedly worked. I can even provide more examples if you want.

That's My Two Cents

I feel confident there is not a person commenting here who condones the wanton murder of innocent people. So we got that going for us.

THE FOLLOWING IS A RANT FOR WHICH I MAKE NO APOLOGIES.

However, I, for one, DO NOT condone articles like this which are uninformed emotional condemnations ("War Crimes in Iraq...") of the volunteer soldiers we have sent in harm's way, especially when they are unaccompanied by any moral outrage over the subhuman behavior of terrorists who are regularly conducting grisly public executions of innocents. There is NO MORAL EQUIVALENCE WHATSOEVER between this incident and what the terrorists are doing, so the "higher standard" crap is just that, crap. Anyone who tries to assert otherwise is just wrong, which is the nicest thing I can think of to say about them. Bahu can protest all he wants about what a pacifist he is, he's reserved his outrage for our soldiers exercising their split-second judgment in a war where any body under a blanket, dead or alive, could be the weapon du jour of his enemy.

I repeat:

This was not a war crime; it was war.

That Marine was fully justified in using lethal force to protect himself, his fellow soldiers and accompanying civilians (the reporter) from potential harm.

The military investigation should determine the Marine conducted himself not just appropriately, but bravely, in the circumstances.

NO lawyers. NO court-martial.

Next terrorist, please.

Cheers,
Daiwa

Where are the pictures at?
Please "embed" some pictures into here so we can see them!!

- Grim

I think that some of the bloggers have got the picture horribly wrong. ivilized Warfare is a term that is used to gloss warfare between armed combatants: indiscriminata cluster bombing of houses, hospitals and civic infracture is not civilized and if the citizens of America are aware of what their military is doing in Iraq, many of those who critisizzed me will be more vehement than me in putting the record straight. When 5 to 10 people gather together to pray or talk helicopter gunships are sent to mow them down. You decide what to call this.

Empire is a concept that can be used to designate a political system that has interests "economic or strategic" well beyond its borders. There is nothing Evil about the word, just straight fact.