Trump doubles down on striking cultural sites in Iran

AP via Yahoo News ^ | 01/06/2020

[SeekAndFind]

President Donald Trump insisted Sunday that Iranian cultural sites were fair game for the U.S. military, dismissing concerns within his own administration that doing so could constitute a war crime under international law. He also warned Iraq that he would levy punishing sanctions if it expelled American troops in retaliation for a U.S. airstrike in Baghdad that killed a top Iranian official.

Trump’s comments came amid escalating tensions in the Middle East following the killing of Gen. Qassem Soleimani, the head of Iran’s elite Quds force. Iran has vowed to retaliate and Iraq’s parliament responded by voting Sunday to oust U.S. troops based in the country.

Trump first raised the prospect of targeting Iranian cultural sites Saturday in a tweet. Speaking with reporters Sunday as he returned to Washington from his holiday stay in Florida, he doubled down, despite international prohibitions.

“They’re allowed to kill our people. They’re allowed to torture and maim our people. They’re allowed to use roadside bombs and blow up our people. And we’re not allowed to touch their cultural sites? It doesn’t work that way,” Trump said.

The targeted killing of Soleimani sparked outrage in the Middle East, including in Iraq, where more than 5,000 American troops are still on the ground 17 years after the U.S. invasion. Iraq’s parliament voted Sunday in favor of a nonbinding resolution calling for the expulsion of the American forces.

Trump said the U.S. wouldn’t leave without being paid for its military investments in Iraq over the years — then said if the troops do have to withdraw, he would hit Baghdad with economic penalties.

[JBW1949]

Do you believe that these Muslims, who use women and children as shields would NOT use museums, hospitals and such as cover for nuclear research sites, ammo dumps, missile sites, combat aircraft, naval assets, et al.

[JBW1949]

When are people going to get it through their heads that these radical Muslims do NOT think the same way that we do???

When are people going to realize that they do NOT put the same value on people, places, artifacts that we do????

[JBW1949]

Did you look at my post #119???? That should explain what I am talking about...

[SecondAmendment]

Saracens have a history of using “weddings”, “hospitals”, “mosques”, etc to hide and shield their asymmetrical warfare activities ...

[Zhang Fei]

[Do you believe that these Muslims, who use women and children as shields would NOT use museums, hospitals and such as cover for nuclear research sites, ammo dumps, missile sites, combat aircraft, naval assets, et al.]

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They certainly would, and we should hit those cultural sites if they are being used to shelter military assets. But why even mention cultural sites? A cultural site that houses military assets is a military site.

[JBW1949]

Why not say you would hit everything anywhere??? It doesn’t mean you will, but it puts the thought in their heads...

President Trump knows exactly what he’s doing...

[Zhang Fei]

[Why not say you would hit everything anywhere??? It doesn’t mean you will, but it puts the thought in their heads...

President Trump knows exactly what he’s doing...]

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I think it’s an unforced error. Then again, he did win the presidency on his first try at politics, so you gotta give him the benefit of the doubt re how this looks to the voting public. I am enjoying the ruckus, though.

[Zhang Fei]

[If there is no “just war” and it simply comes down to “might is right” that would be a strong argument for pacifism. Again, it’s not a position I accept.]

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Sometimes it just boils down to “if you and yours have to die so me and mine may live, so be it”. War is basically amoral. When we set out rules of engagement, what we’re doing is calibrating how many friendly deaths we’re willing to take in order to satisfy our urge for moral preening. The guys who set the rules don’t generally have blood kin out on the front lines*. The people who drafted the most recent Geneva Conventions not only did not - they wrote the rules expressly to poke Uncle Sam in the eye. Here’s something I saw on the web about how war is essentially an amoral sorter of outcomes:

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[For the classical age Greeks, in Homer’s Iliad, what is often missed is that for them the Trojans would have been the side of civilization, not the Greeks. They are the polis they’d recognize in their own time. Inside the city, the social ties of husbands and wives, parents and children, they fully function. There is mercy to the weak, understanding to the governed, a desire for normality to return, an understanding that war shouldn’t be the main purpose of human life. As Fagles commented, those were sentiments that had no place in the armed camp off shore.

But the Trojans had the defects of their virtues: they were not as at home in the ugly business of war as the Acheans. The main champion of the Trojans is a guy who might have been a great warrior, but was truly meant for peacetime: as a husband, as a father, as an heir to the throne. It was him saying goodbye to his wife and infant remains one of the classic scenes of Western literature, not him slaying somebody. But he was doomed to die in battle to the man who has no family, no ties, whose main purpose in life is simply to kill people, and has just let several of his comrades die over a petty quarrel over a slave girl: the man who was utterly, totally made for war, who finds his purpose in there.

This all made one of the biggest points (another one was the sheer futility of it all in the beginning of Book 12) of the Iliad much clearer: no matter how great your civilization is, it will be doomed to destruction if met by an outside force of superior might. Armed force can only be warded off by a superior armed force. So, if people over 2500 years ago clearly understood this, why do we not today? Why do we have people who do think that war can be anything other than the unambiguous, amoral-for better or worse-expression of the extremes in human nature? ]

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* Would Dubya and McCain have gotten so worked up about torture if they had children who were combat infantrymen in Afghanistan or Iraq? The way I look at it, rules of engagement should be decided only by people who have children in ground combat roles.

[Mr. Mojo]

So-called “cultural sites” won’t be targeted unless the enemy uses them as human shields. And if they do, I hope we blast them down to Hades.

[Verginius Rufus]

There are some genuine cultural sites in Iran like Persepolis. I'm sure Trump realizes that if he were to destroy something of that caliber he would be reviled for generations. He's trolling them. If any strikes need to be taken they will presumably be designed to weaken Iran militarily or economically.

Meanwhile the Archaeological Institute of America issued a condemnation of bombing cultural sites (no mention of Trump but obviously with him in mind).

[gandalftb]

You can bet we have eyes on them.

[frank ballenger]

what would be a ‘cultural site’?

I wonder, too.

In the US it's Graceland, James Brown's birthplace and Area 51. Throw in the bar where AOC served drinks and stole tips.

Culture? America's got it.

[Fightin Whitey]

Well, git on over there with a big pile of proper uniforms (hats and t-shirts at least) to separate the murderers, bombers and terrorists from the gravy!

[NRx]

“So, if people over 2500 years ago clearly understood this, why do we not today?”

These people were pagans. I am Christian. Their world view and moral ethos was radically different from that of the Christian world.

“Sometimes it just boils down to “if you and yours have to die so me and mine may live, so be it”. War is basically amoral.”

No. War is immoral, because at least one side is always wrong. If someone has to die then either they, or I am doing something we should not be. Placing the state above God is a modern specie of paganism. Whether we call it Communism, or Fascism or anything else is not really material. Killing Soleimani was an act of righteous justice and moral self defense. If the government of Iran causes any more violence then more action may be justified against that government and its agents. Targeted attacks against their government and military leadership as well as bases ships and etc. fall under that heading. Deliberately bombing civilians and “cultural” sites does not. If Trump crosses that line he will be abusing the authority given to him by God and will lose my support. (Romans 13)

[Mrs. Don-o]

Syria.

[Bishop_Malachi]

President Donald Trump insisted Sunday that Iranian cultural sites were fair game for the U.S. military, dismissing concerns within his own administration that doing so could constitute a war crime under international law. He also warned Iraq that he would levy punishing sanctions if it expelled American troops in retaliation for a U.S. airstrike in Baghdad that killed a top Iranian official.

__________________________________________________

Trump...I love you man, but get rid of these Neo-Con influences or your gonna endanger all the gains we’ve gotten so far.

[Mrs. Don-o]

Just to be clear: it was inflicted on them by ISIS.

[Colorado Doug]

We can be assured that he will not be as open in his travels as his former mentor. Most of his planning will be in some nondescript building or bunker somewhere.

I hope that John Kerry, Michael Moore, et al, can spend some time with Soleimani’s replacement. I'm sure that they can offer him lots of good advise. Maybe the new General can return the favor by showing them some of Iran's cultural sites.

[JBW1949]

That’s what I posted in my #119...

You said President Trump made a mistake by saying something about “cultural sites” and this could cause world wide disaster...

I said the Muslims could care less about “cultural sites”...They destroy them themselves....

[Oatka]

Persians have a rich and long culture. There are 23 UNESCO World Heritage sites in Iran.

There's a line from "Raiders of the Lost Ark that has always stuck with me.

IIRC, Indiana is aiming an RPG at the bad guy who has the Ark of the Covenant. "Indiana, we are just passing through history. THIS is history."

No one will remember the vast majority of us, but those historic sites that have been around for a thousand years or more will still command admiration.

It really sickened me to see (ISIS), who won't even be a footnote in history, destroying all those thousand plus years old monuments. The U.S. doesn't have to add to that obscenity.