I am not looking for a big take-down of myself here, but maybe just highlight some sentences or something to let me see your point. Sometimes I really think that yourself and I missread each others statements constantly, or simply fail to say what we mean cleary enough. 'Course, maybe its just me.
I will say right off that I was being a pretty snarky and you're taking this remarkably well. Kudos, and I apologize. But yes, let me explain myself.
"
Never in the entire history of armed conflict has a military gone so far out of its way to avoid civilian casualties. Thats the entire reason we have smart weapons." - In other words, exactly what was being done in northern Pakistan. On the hand, it's a bit myopic, since most of the outcry over the use of drone-bombs is that they're targeting individuals and taking out whole households. But the point of that sentence, as I understand it, is that smart-weapons are a scalpel to the hammer of conventional strikes, such as helicopters or whatever other manned missions into Pakistan as might be proposed. Ergo, you were then lauding the exact same tactic that the Obama-authorized military is leaning on now, precisely because it's such a cleaner alternative to a heavier conflict. Which was kinda lost with-
"
Its the entire reason why the Allied troops have such a problem in Iraq, because they wont just broadsword the enemy. You could even make a case that MORE civilians area dead in Iraq because we didnt use much stronger measures and therefore the war occupation dragged on longer than it needed to." - Wherein you proposed that taking what you considered the exceptionally humane route of smart-weapon strikes was ultimately detrimental to the war effort, and would have been better served by less concern for precision and collateral damage. This was in the context of a different war, but the strategic principle of morality-vs-effectiveness is the same. In other words, you were then advocating for harsher military actions, and are now criticizing the continued use of what you then called a too-cautious strategy.
But then and now, it's wasn't and isn't a question of military efficacy, but the morality to the warmaking effort itself, as relative to the different ways of fighting an enemy. A very particular enemy, namely, al-Qaeda. The argument revolved around your insistence that al-Qaeda was such a dangerous and reprehensible enemy that effort should be spared in exacting vengeance on them, including ignoring the authority of other governments, the protests of other nations' peoples, or treaties that the United States had signed. To wit: "
Fuck what any one else might say about it. Our morality is our concern, not anyone elses."
That's exactly what you're getting with Obama, who has consistently chosen to pursue an enemy which you declared beyond the normal rules of engagement or law, using a tactic you specifically praised for its precision (when you weren't calling for something stronger), over the objections of another government and its people, just as you said America should. Again, the quoted lines are about Iraq, but the conversation wandered back and forth between conflicts, and frequently conflated them as one issue, since the argument was over whether the US Government should give any credence to foreign (or legal) objections to how it conducted a global, multinational multi-front war. That in mind, the only significant difference I can see between then and now, aside from any personal changes over the last two years which I wouldn't be privy to, is that we were then discussing the actions taken by the Bush administration, and we're now talking about Obama's.
Author
Topic: Pakistan to CIA: Hit the road, Jack (Read 13565 times)