Besides,
TEH EEVEL CIA DID IT ALL FOR TEH FREEMASONS!
TEH EEVEL CIA DID IT ALL FOR TEH FREEMASONS!
Terrorism on the rise?
- Thread starter welsh
- Start date
T
TorontoReign
Guest
Well Bradylama .......Attempting is the keyword. I am in the army, so I know what goes on over there , as opposed to all the crap that the news says. It's not very pretty and we should leave it all alone. If we went back to "isolationisim" we would be just fine, instead of digging ourselves deeper and deeper every day. The war isn't going to end for a long, long time. The shit is going to get worse and worse, until something very bad happens. It's coming and we can't do anything about it. We just keep sending our freaKing soldiers to get shot and die. George Bush came to visit us here at Fort Hood not too long back. We woke up at 2 A.m, marched for two hours, stood around for another 7 hours, then he finally showed up. Wanna know what the guy said? Here I'll paraphrase," Good job. Yall are doing GREAT things. Keep up the good work. I'm glad your families understand"............
Edit: Angry army guy rant.
Edit: Angry army guy rant.
Bradylama said:
Surgical strikes don't work if your scalpel is a chainsaw.
Also it's not a semantic problem, it's a marketing problem.
Maybe in the US it's a bit different, but in every country I've been to, war is a Bad Thing (tm).
Not only do you make the threat more present to your own population, but you also create a black and white scheme that might turn the undecided against you.
Since nothing really changed on September 11th 2001, the ones initiating the "war" are, in the eyes of many people, the United States.
September 11th was one attempt of many, although it was probably the largest and worst. Of course the terrorists bombed first, but declaring the war against terrorism and then going and invading Afghanistan and Iraq and installing new governments for both of them doesn't exactly prove those people wrong who're spreading the anti-American anti-imperialist propaganda with which new terrorists are recruited.
I wouldn't call an all-out war surgical. Especially if you don't clean up afterwards and leave the patient with huge holes in the chest because you walked off halfway through the operation.
Bradylama
So Old I'm Losing Radiation Signs
Whether or not America is confirmed as an imperialist, belligerent superpower, is besides the point. It also doesn't matter if the people spreading that message are proven incorrect. You can brainwash people with a lie, after all.
But then, there goes your whole idea about what creates terrorists right out the window.
But then, there goes your whole idea about what creates terrorists right out the window.
You didn't read what I wrote about brainwashing, eh?
Not every terrorist is forced into terrorism, the real problem ARE those who choose it out of personal experience.
You don't even need to manipulate any of the news stories (and I'm talking about mostly uncensored media here) about America these days. If you're anti-American already, you will only be confirmed in your views -- the one or two reports that don't provide any new firewood will be happily ignored.
True, children raised into terrorism are a problem, but they're mostly a problem occuring in countries where free militias are already a daily issue or where few days go by without another carbomb or suicide attack.
You can't really prevent future cases of brainwashing, yes. But that doesn't mean you should just drain everybody else in fire propellant just because "they'll get brainwashed anyway".
If you'd actually try to understand what I say (or write, rather) instead of just trying to prove me wrong because you think every terrorist is a brainwashing victim (which creates the interesting question of who made the brainwashers terrorists), you'd see what I mean.
O noez, Bradylama disagrees. I think I'm going to cut myself now.
Not every terrorist is forced into terrorism, the real problem ARE those who choose it out of personal experience.
You don't even need to manipulate any of the news stories (and I'm talking about mostly uncensored media here) about America these days. If you're anti-American already, you will only be confirmed in your views -- the one or two reports that don't provide any new firewood will be happily ignored.
True, children raised into terrorism are a problem, but they're mostly a problem occuring in countries where free militias are already a daily issue or where few days go by without another carbomb or suicide attack.
You can't really prevent future cases of brainwashing, yes. But that doesn't mean you should just drain everybody else in fire propellant just because "they'll get brainwashed anyway".
If you'd actually try to understand what I say (or write, rather) instead of just trying to prove me wrong because you think every terrorist is a brainwashing victim (which creates the interesting question of who made the brainwashers terrorists), you'd see what I mean.
O noez, Bradylama disagrees. I think I'm going to cut myself now.
Bradylama
So Old I'm Losing Radiation Signs
The amount of terrorists created because of American intervention is negligible to the amount of terrorists that already exist. Namely, because you don't need a whole lot of people to blow shit up as it is. That's what you weren't able to pick up on. A "War on Terrorism" seeks to end terrorism. Whether or not that creates more potential terrorists in the process is a part of the risk.
I also don't see how we could get away with "Surgical Strikes" without seeming imperialistic and belligerent. Your diplomacy schtick also falls short when diplomacy fails. We tried diplomacy with the Taliban, but they effectively brick-walled us. So we tried diplomacy with Pakistan, so we could ruin the aforementioned party's shit.
Or did you mean covert ops? That would be a surgical strike, right? What if those Covert Secretive operations were exposed, or were to fail? Diplomatic crisis. More terrorists.
I also don't see how we could get away with "Surgical Strikes" without seeming imperialistic and belligerent. Your diplomacy schtick also falls short when diplomacy fails. We tried diplomacy with the Taliban, but they effectively brick-walled us. So we tried diplomacy with Pakistan, so we could ruin the aforementioned party's shit.
Or did you mean covert ops? That would be a surgical strike, right? What if those Covert Secretive operations were exposed, or were to fail? Diplomatic crisis. More terrorists.
Bradylama, I believe you have your head up your ass.
Listen to the wise webguru, he speaks the truth.
Listen to the wise webguru, he speaks the truth.
Bradylama
So Old I'm Losing Radiation Signs
I'm listening...
By diplomacy I mean everything that isn't a military intervention. Food, education, foreign investment, etc. a.a.
By surgical strikes I mean anything from CONSIDERATE house raids ("Let's just raid every single building in that district, seize their weapons and shoot anyone who even looks at you funny for treating their customs like dirt" is NOT considerate) to covert ops and assassinations.
The problem is the balance and the timing. Throwing bombs and food at people doesn't exactly make anyone your friend -- maybe except for Saddam and Dubya.
You can't just respond to a faint problem with instant drastic measures -- that's bad PR because it makes you look like a megalomaniac trying to nuke mosquitos out of boredom. You have to consider the gravity of the problem, the public idea of the problem's gravity and what your previous actions were like (as well as how the general public -- ignore Americans there if you want to see something REALLY frightening -- perceived them).
Aggressive propaganda won't lead you anywhere either. By staging a Saddam-statue-getting-torn-down-by-GIs party with cheering crowds of... oh, roughly twenty people, will come back and bite you in the ass the instant someone notices the fact it supposedly happened in a major capital and 90% of the population didn't particularily care about it all happening.
That kind of thing hampers your credibility as much as plastic turkeys on Thanksgiving.
If you can't control your GIs enough to prevent tortures (that then get blamed on the grunts rather than sending some heads rolling in the administration -- woohey) or other violations of the Geneva convention (shooting a dying disarmed enemy lying on the ground in a mosque won't earn you much positive karma) and decide to call your POWs "oh, well, neither prisoners nor POWs, but we'll keep them anyway" only to lock them up in Cuba with no legal status whatsoever while using any psychological torture that doesn't sound serious to Americans that is not good publicity.
The invasion of Iraq was a bad idea. Bad because improperly timed. It's a bullshit argument that Saddam was oppressing his people. So what? If you ask the average guy these days they only go "Well, Saddam was a tyrant, yeah, BUT ..." and that's "BUT the Americans aren't that great either".
The somewhat unharmed populace didn't percieve it as a liberation.
You can't just fast forward a country's political evolution by forcing it into a new system in a blitz.
If you are going to change it, try a slower pace.
Had you wanted to liberate the Iraqi people, you should have waited until the majority became aware of the problem at hand and started actively revolting.
Liberating a country from a dictator you previously ignored or even supported?
Bad politics, no twinky.
It is all about public image and while the US seems to be incredibly good at brainwashing its own people (even WITHOUT the help of the government) into believing that everything American is great and that America is the best country in the world and Americans never make any mistakes, the image of the US towards the foreign world is all but "Land of the Free".
Sure, Mexicans try to get into the US all the time, but that's because they BELIEVE their country is a shitty place to live. If they were as apathic, ignorant or misinformed as the populace of Iraq was under Saddam Hussein, the majority of them would probably not even care.
The Iraq as it was was a working system that posed no outward threat.
The Iraq as it is now is a broken system that is so volatile it does not only prove a threat to its inhabitants (civilians AND soldiers) but also a potential danger to the neighbouring countries and the rest of the world.
Afghanistan isn't much better, other than that it's somewhat stable in comparison because the invasion forces pretty much let the new administration do what it wants.
It doesn't work as well as it did when it was lead by oppressive extremists, but although more of the extremists have probably turned into terrorists by now, it is somewhat stable and more democratic.
I'm not going to discuss how the US government could un-fuck the situation it has created, but I've tried explaining how a government in general could prevent from fucking up that much while trying to decrease terrorism and increase the power of the people of other countries.
I don't like comparing people to Hitler all that much, but the Bush administration sure shares the strategical "talent" with him.
At least Hitler had the better PR.
By surgical strikes I mean anything from CONSIDERATE house raids ("Let's just raid every single building in that district, seize their weapons and shoot anyone who even looks at you funny for treating their customs like dirt" is NOT considerate) to covert ops and assassinations.
The problem is the balance and the timing. Throwing bombs and food at people doesn't exactly make anyone your friend -- maybe except for Saddam and Dubya.
You can't just respond to a faint problem with instant drastic measures -- that's bad PR because it makes you look like a megalomaniac trying to nuke mosquitos out of boredom. You have to consider the gravity of the problem, the public idea of the problem's gravity and what your previous actions were like (as well as how the general public -- ignore Americans there if you want to see something REALLY frightening -- perceived them).
Aggressive propaganda won't lead you anywhere either. By staging a Saddam-statue-getting-torn-down-by-GIs party with cheering crowds of... oh, roughly twenty people, will come back and bite you in the ass the instant someone notices the fact it supposedly happened in a major capital and 90% of the population didn't particularily care about it all happening.
That kind of thing hampers your credibility as much as plastic turkeys on Thanksgiving.
If you can't control your GIs enough to prevent tortures (that then get blamed on the grunts rather than sending some heads rolling in the administration -- woohey) or other violations of the Geneva convention (shooting a dying disarmed enemy lying on the ground in a mosque won't earn you much positive karma) and decide to call your POWs "oh, well, neither prisoners nor POWs, but we'll keep them anyway" only to lock them up in Cuba with no legal status whatsoever while using any psychological torture that doesn't sound serious to Americans that is not good publicity.
The invasion of Iraq was a bad idea. Bad because improperly timed. It's a bullshit argument that Saddam was oppressing his people. So what? If you ask the average guy these days they only go "Well, Saddam was a tyrant, yeah, BUT ..." and that's "BUT the Americans aren't that great either".
The somewhat unharmed populace didn't percieve it as a liberation.
You can't just fast forward a country's political evolution by forcing it into a new system in a blitz.
If you are going to change it, try a slower pace.
Had you wanted to liberate the Iraqi people, you should have waited until the majority became aware of the problem at hand and started actively revolting.
Liberating a country from a dictator you previously ignored or even supported?
Bad politics, no twinky.
It is all about public image and while the US seems to be incredibly good at brainwashing its own people (even WITHOUT the help of the government) into believing that everything American is great and that America is the best country in the world and Americans never make any mistakes, the image of the US towards the foreign world is all but "Land of the Free".
Sure, Mexicans try to get into the US all the time, but that's because they BELIEVE their country is a shitty place to live. If they were as apathic, ignorant or misinformed as the populace of Iraq was under Saddam Hussein, the majority of them would probably not even care.
The Iraq as it was was a working system that posed no outward threat.
The Iraq as it is now is a broken system that is so volatile it does not only prove a threat to its inhabitants (civilians AND soldiers) but also a potential danger to the neighbouring countries and the rest of the world.
Afghanistan isn't much better, other than that it's somewhat stable in comparison because the invasion forces pretty much let the new administration do what it wants.
It doesn't work as well as it did when it was lead by oppressive extremists, but although more of the extremists have probably turned into terrorists by now, it is somewhat stable and more democratic.
I'm not going to discuss how the US government could un-fuck the situation it has created, but I've tried explaining how a government in general could prevent from fucking up that much while trying to decrease terrorism and increase the power of the people of other countries.
I don't like comparing people to Hitler all that much, but the Bush administration sure shares the strategical "talent" with him.
At least Hitler had the better PR.
Bradylama
So Old I'm Losing Radiation Signs
Sure, because those have done wonders for Theocracies and Authoritarian Dictatorships.
Diplomacy only works if they buy what you're selling.
How do you make a culturally sensitive house raid? Do Japanese police take their shoes off before breaking into someone's apartment? Assasinations are also, from what I understand, illegal, but as long as nobody knows it was us, its ok.
But terrorism isn't a faint problem. Wars have been started because some jerk assasinated so-and-so or blew up such and such. The attack on the world trade center caused a recession, and God forbid that Wall Street itself went down, or half the financial institutions in the country would have gone down, taking the World with it.
Terrorism may just go away, but not before it blows a lot of shit up. You're saying that we should walk a fucking tight rope when it comes to dealing with terrorism, and not create more. How can we stop creating more terrorists? Eduction? It just isn't working. No matter how many people you do educate, there's always going to be some ignorant hick waiting to be turned into a soldier of God. Especially in podunk nations like Afghanistan and other Central Asian nations that are poor as shit. The best solution is to develop these countries and put them in a position where they can be educated, but we can't do that if the ruling elite thinks education is an affront to God, or would rather keep their subjects ignorant.
You people keep talking about terrorism as if it were a pure abstract. Its not abstract, terrorism is real, and it'll blow shit up while you wait for it to go away. Important shit.
This isn't some new product line Public Relations bullshit, this is warfare.
How does something like that come back to bite you in the ass? Abu Ghraib is something that comes back to bite you in the ass, half-hearted propaganda nobody cares about.
I'm not saying that everything we're doing is right, but we're doing something. You have to expect mistakes to be made, or unpopular actions to be performed. Its a part of any kind of war. You have to go to war sometime, though, and if you aren't willing to use that card until its too late, then its your loss.
So we should just give Saddam food and money that goes straight to his pockets and personal guard, and not a cent gets to his people? I hate to keep using rhetoric here, but there are a bunch of logic holes in your argument. How can we develop muslim nations if their ruling powers stifle development? Oh sure, we could just help out Saddam and maybe things will get better in Iraq, but a lot of fat good that did us before.
How do you even determine the right time to invade a country that's hostile to foreign dominance?
And how long is that going to take? Ten years? Twenty? One-Hundred? Again shit blows up.
Or maybe we should encourage revolution and arm insurgent groups. woops again.
This is off-topic, but that was a really bad example. Have you been to Mexico? Perhaps the reason the Mexicans aren't migrating to Central America or Europe is because Central America sucks, and Europe is too far to swim.
Bullshit. How long would it take for that "working system" to work against you again? Nevermind either that while Saddam was certainly no friend of Revolutionist Islam, he didn't have any qualms about harboring international terrorists.
Your naivete is astounding. This shit is done.
Bradylama said:
Not to step between you two juggernauts of logic and diplomacy but... I don't think he said anywhere that we should give more money to Saddam or support him in any way. I think the general idea is to leave him alone until he dies and then do something when the country no longer has a head to command the whip. - Colt
Bradylama
So Old I'm Losing Radiation Signs
Only, the country would have had a head to command the whip, unless we assasinated Uday and Qussay. I haven't really checked, but I don't think Kim has a set heir, which could cause a power vacuum in North Korea. Saddam did.
Even then, though, a power vacuum doesn't always produce positive results, as was the case with the Afghan civil war.
Even then, though, a power vacuum doesn't always produce positive results, as was the case with the Afghan civil war.
(sorry, I had to)