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To: EternalVigilance; Scholastic; DoughtyOne
Do you also comdemn the bombing of Japenese and German cities with conventional bombs?

Absolutely, the firebombing of German and Japanese cities by the Brits and the US respectively were equally immoral.

Should we have foresworn any military action which might have endangered civilians?

No, but we should take reasonable precautions to ensure that civilian lives are not lost.

But the questions raised are as current as today's news headlines. Should the Israelis restrain themselves from bombing the terrorist masterminds in such a way that innocent civilians can't possibly be killed? Wouldn't such a policy simply give an insurmountable edge to the Islamo-fascists?

It is one thing when a nation launches a strike against a military target and civilians die by mistake and wholly unintentionally. It is wholly another for a country to purposely have as the objective of his attack the mass obliteration of innocent civilians or in this case of entire cities. That is always immoral as a matter of course whatever the justification or pretext. The ability to discern the difference is what discerns enlightened and civilized Christian man from the barbarians of the Dark Ages.

Smart bombs are good...I think America should always work to minimize civilian casualties whenever and wherever possible...but to restrain ourselves from going after our mortal enemies because the cowards hide themselves amongst the innocent would assure our defeat.

You and Sean Hannity get this one wrong. If a terrorist hides in an apartment building of 200 plus innocent people and the only way you have a 50% chance or better to kill him in the building is to kill everyone else in the building, do you kill 200 innocents just to kill one guilty. Sean Hannity says kill the innocent women and children to get to the terrorist, which is by definition committing a terrorist act or fighting terrorism with terrorism. So would Hitler, Stalin, Mao or Timothy McVeigh. What say you?
67 posted on 08/06/2002 11:53:15 AM PDT by rightwing2
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To: rightwing2
"If a terrorist hides in an apartment building of 200 plus innocent people and the only way you have a 50% chance or better to kill him in the building is to kill everyone else in the building, do you kill 200 innocents just to kill one guilty"

You are missing a lot of the equation here. Will the terrorist stop if you don't get him, or are you risking 1000's additional lives by not getting him now. That is an unknown but an important unknown. If he kills 1000's more because YOU decided not to make a tough decision, then what? Praise and honors for those who can stand up and make tough decisions and be responsible for those decisions.
117 posted on 08/06/2002 2:30:04 PM PDT by PeterPrinciple
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To: rightwing2
You and Sean Hannity get this one wrong. If a terrorist hides in an apartment building of 200 plus innocent people and the only way you have a 50% chance or better to kill him in the building is to kill everyone else in the building, do you kill 200 innocents just to kill one guilty. Sean Hannity says kill the innocent women and children to get to the terrorist, which is by definition committing a terrorist act or fighting terrorism with terrorism. So would Hitler, Stalin, Mao or Timothy McVeigh. What say you?

  I say it depends on who it is we're targeting, and how much military value his death will gain us. If we have bin Laden, or Saddam Hussein, hiding in an apartment building with 200 people, then those 200 people are toast. If it's some Hamas stooge, perhaps not, but it really does depend on what value we get out of killing him.

  It also depends on what our relations are with the country. If we're formally at war, then blowing up that apartment building to get some one of military significance becomes much easier. In a wartime situation, the leaders of the country are committing perfidy if they place (or even allow) military targets in a civilian environment, and the blame - legal and, I believe, moral, for the civilian deaths is on their shoulders.

  In the more likely case where it's a terrorist hiding in an apartment building in an otherwise neutral country, it becomes more difficult, and we're much less likely to blow up the whole building. However, as I'm sure you're aware, our sensitivity to civilian deaths encourages unfriendly nations to place military targets in civilian environments. If we wish to spare future civilian deaths, we may have to get over this, and start targeting military targets even if numerous civilian deaths are inevitable.

  In the specific case of the article - Hiroshima - we were at war with Japan. Hiroshima was a valid target, but we killed a lot more civilians than was necessary. It is certainly questionable as far as the morality of that strike is concerned. In retrospect, I think it actually improves. The bombing of Hiroshima and Nagasaki ended the war before the Soviets got involved. For all the horror those two cities endured, it is truly minor compared to what would have happened in a North and South Japan. Just look at North Korea for a shining example.

Drew Garrett

168 posted on 08/09/2002 10:39:15 AM PDT by agarrett
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