True, but sometimes tactics are so heinous so as to make the other factors moot. There are more civilized ways to put down communists in times of insurgencies.
Come on... I think you are struggling to distinguish the two. Are you honestly of the belief that the wholesale incineration of tens and tens and tens of thousands of innocent men, women, and children -not to mention the abhorrent effects of the residual radiation after the fact- is somehow less heinous then the death of 2,000 suspected guerillas without due process?
I dont even think you can argue that with a straight face (one of the benefits of voicing an argument from behind a keyboard I suppose.)
You have to admit there were more "civilized" ways of ending WWII as well, werent there... but it was effective and is acceptable to you because of the context. You believe, and rightly so, that lives were saved.
The same is true of Pinochet and Chile.
yes...grabbing unarmed civilians off the street and beating them in secret prisons is not one of them
Really. That's a good one. Apparently you haven't met any.
I grew up under Communism. If you think 'civilized' ways can in any way 'put down' hard-core ideological belivers (communist or islamist, they are the *same*), you may want to re-think your world outlook. Yes, what you find there is the reality of the world we live in. The sooner one realizes that fact, and applies Machiavellian thought process to it, the better one fares in the reality.