Forget the zombie apocalypse, here's the real danger coming: DRONES!

[Skybird]

Originally Posted by Catfish

@Skybird:
Well you completely misunderstood me, but it is fine you like that kind of total "war"fare so much.

Thanks for the misled irony. But I do not like war and "total warfare" at all. I just have no illusions about what war is. That'S why you would see much fewer wars with me, and those fewer wars that still are there, would be fought differently, and with much more uncompromised determination.

With having no permission i certainly mean the head or parliament of a state or nation to allow other nations to kill terrorists in their country, not asking the warlord or a criminal.

The government in Pakistan that openly hosts and supports and protzects the Taliban and triues to destabilise Afghanistan, and that has harboured Osama Bin Laden and called it treachery that somebody has betrayed Bin Laden, so that afterwards they caught that doctor and sentenced him to prison in an act of revenge? Or is it the government in Gaza that declares time and again that it is at war with Israel and that is formed by murderers who are criminal, as you would call it, themselves, who act in betrayal of their people'S interest and bring bloodshed and misery and Shria-oriented tyranny above them while plannign the next missile attack against Israeli residential areas where there are no military targets, but they do not want these anyway? Or is it the regime in Iraq that continues with the ethnic hostility and has fielded assassination groups again and of which many observers and insiders say that they torture and discriminate ehtnicities at least as intense as Saddam did?

You have plenty of respect for these, do you?

Does the US ask the countries it kills people in ?

Should it?

And is it really the criminal you are looking for, judged by some hushhush camera pictures, and grainy films ? So he's at a wedding ? Kill them all.

It is not about criminals. This is no law enforcement operation.

The "West" has itself driven, financed and built up the very terrorism it now encounters, warlords, Islam and all, against "communism", and Muenzler has not mentioned it once. There was no responsability back then, and there is none now.

Ah, yes it is all ourt own fault that Saudi regime is corrupt, that Islam claims world supremsacy and wants a caliphate in Spain, it is our mistake that Bin Laden decided to kill 3000 civilians while you do not mention that but worry about the Americans shooting in a war. I assume those 3000 killed just got what they deserved, they really have asked for, didn'T they? Oh wir ruchlosen Westler, oh die armen edlen Wilden, die keine Schuld trifft? Quran and Shariah - it is all our own fault!?

No clue who Muenzler is. Some historic politician, since you link him to some old times? Google did not help me.

And killing without trial is exactly that - you suspect something, and this is enough for you to kill him, via a pushed button, from your room. And then you go downstairs and have breakfast with your family.

Well, in war battle, oyu do not hold trials over enemioes about to get targetted, yes. It proved to be inpracticle.

This is not only cowardly, this is atrocious, against all treaties that ever were.

Aaginst all treaties, yes. The taliban and others disregard the Geneva convention. They disregard the Hague Land Warfare convention. The disregard all those precious humanitarian ROEs that we allow our armies to get bounded by. It is cowardly to fight them with the smallest risk to our own troops? You favour allied soldiers dead instead of enemy terrorists and murderers dead, eh? This is no Basketball, you false philantropist. In spüorts, there may be sportsmanship and fairness, in war it is not. Yoiu do not be satisfied by winning 82 to 76, becasue you then have a lot od funerals in your own army. You want to win 100 to 0, if you can manage that. If that means to stab the enemy in his back while he is sleepiong, very well. If it means to shpoot him from a distance where he cannot return fire, very well. If that means to kill him without him even realsiing you are around, very well. If that means to kill him by drone instead of putting a nfioghter and pilot at risk, very well.

There are no words for this kind of "asymmetric warfare" indeed.

Well, the Amerinas certainly would love if the enemy would not fgall back to asymmetrical warfare, but would just face them in an open field battle like any ordinary army of the past, so that they could kick the hell out of him. Unfortunately, the enemy does not cooperate.

If you do it that way you are not much better than the others you fight against - which certainly seems to suit you, it is total war, Sun-Tzu in "Reinkultur", winning is all and to hell with democracy, jurisdiction and human rights. I would love to see you in a war that is being led by the very methods you so seem to love, out of your comfy chair.

Tell that Bin Laden, he started it when he committed intended mass murder against civilians. Tell that Islam, it has turned these oriental countries and places into stagnating barbaric hellholes all by itself. Without this inhumane ideology, Europe of the past centuries probably would have been culturally, economically and scientifically inferior to the Arab world.

And none of the places you are about, not Iraq not Pkistan, not the Palestinian territories, are democracies. They are theocratic and militant oligarchies.

You are much more dangerous than you imply I am, because you have dangeorus illusions about how these things can be settled, and what war is. You mistake romantic idealism with reality, so that you necessarily fail to adress it on realistic terms. Needless to say that you also are heavily biased, anti-Western, anti-American anyway. You allow barbaric cruelty of our enemies - Islamic terror, that is - while thinking not to challenge them over that shows your own moral and civilizational superiority. You think leading your own army the path to defeat makes you a kind and sensible being that will be liked, and that war can be fought nice and clean and sterile and fair.

You will not be liked. You will get eaten. Happens to prey all the time.

[TLAM Strike]

Originally Posted by Tribesman

If the brits had killed 2000 provos it would mean they had killed about 1500 of their own employees

Man if that was the case I wish I could do someone of the things the PIRA did to my employer...

Originally Posted by Catfish

The US have declared war to several nations in the last decades, some were called interventions (the middle and south Americas), some war, for all kinds of reasons. Now they have declared war not only to terrorists, but to a religion.

Oh if only that was the case....

Things would be soooo much simpler if it was a declared war on a specific religion.

We could arrest every member of that religion and make them an EPW. They would get a nice camp with the Geneva required Red Cross Packages until such time as they surrendered too us, signing an official document to that effect on the deck of the USS Cole. At which time we could dictate whatever terms we wanted; like say they all had to attend mandatory Deislamification Programs, they would have to surrender all their arms and disband their military and their leadership (the latter who would face War Crimes charges). We could even make it part of their laws that it would be illegal to display a crescent moon or distribute Korans then they would also have to pay reparations and have their boarders redrawn to compensate for their aggression.

Ohhh if only it was a proper war. Those wars have rules...

But then its normally the attacker who chooses the method of combat...

[HollywoodBob]

few month ago Iran hacked and capture the most sofisticate drone
read this http://www.rt.com/news/iran-us-drone-toy-965/

what make me laugh so much it when the iran president said wen we finish to study the super stealth american drone we will sell it on ebay < LoL
first time i heard about military technology stolen and sold on ebay

[Catfish]

Hi Skybird,
i can understand this and i cannot even propose anything better, i just say it is still wrong. I have not much respect for the iranian or pakistani leadership, but for the people who have to live under those regimes. They cannot choose.

"It is not about criminals. This is no law enforcement operation"
Says who - you ? It is exactly about criminals. Terrorists are criminals per definitionem. Otherwise they would be soldiers - and they are not.
So this is not a war, other than described by Cheney, Wolfowitz et al.
Also the law of the US is thus enforced in countries obviously not underlying their jurisdiction.

I prefer US law to the Shariah anytime lol, however if you want US jurisdiction worldwide what do you propose ? A big war to end all wars ? Islam against western values ? The problem is that you fuel terrorism with that kind of "warfare", and it will once more fall back on us sooner or later.
No, i do not have a better idea of what to do, however the current course of action looks like an elephant in a porcelain store.

The problem also is that drones are useless without having spies and intelligence, about where the terrorists and their leaders are. You cannot do all by satellite and drones.

Greetings,
Catfish

P.S. it was Muenkler (sry for the typo) and i read some of his texts. Imho he is wrong in more than "a few" aspects.

[MH]

The targeted killing policy has its weakness and merits.
It should be one of policies but not the only one.
It does not prevent terrorism but may keep the flames on manageable levels.

[krashkart]

Originally Posted by MH

The targeted killing policy has its weakness and merits.
It should be one of policies but not the only one.
It does not prevent terrorism but may keep the flames on manageable levels.

And at least it's a bit more clean than a Linebacker style bombing campaign. Not hard to imagine how big of a mess that would be.

[Skybird]

Originally Posted by Catfish

Hi Skybird,
i can understand this and i cannot even propose anything better, i just say it is still wrong.

And you arev right, war always is "wrong" in that it is against our moral rules and values we live by in peacetimes. We may make it a desirable goal, we may excel in niot seeking for war actively, and not causing a war carelessly. Still, war can find us, because there is no consensus amongst those 7 billion people living on this planet that war always is unacceptable and should be avopided. There people who find war desirable to achcieve their goals, perfectly honourable, or perfectly legal and okay. And these people are the problem.

You might be surprised, but I see myself as a pacifist. But that does not mean for me that I always and under all circumstances rule out war, no matter what. It means that I prefer peaceful solutions to important conflicts where we have stakes to lose, and that I do not like war at all. But that is where my pacifism ends - I do not allow to let pacifism being turned into weakness. Nor does pacifism mean that I porefer choosing the wrong, over war. Sometimes, war is inevitable. That'S whow life is. This world is not perfect, so isn'T man. I do not invite war, but I am prepared for it in case it finds me. I don'T call it a welcome guest, but when it appears on my doorstep, I am willing to deal with it. Weakness - is no option. Ignoring reality just because one feels emotionally sensible about peace and war, is no option.

I have not much respect for the iranian or pakistani leadership, but for the people who have to live under those regimes. They cannot choose.

That is not true, many had made their choice in elections, also, as long as you accept the consequences, nothing can stop you to decide for this or for that. Whether you are successful, is somethign different, but the choice you always have. Even in most extreme circumstances - I think of Sophie Scholl. Extreme, I know, but I refuse people beign seen as the total victims of their rulers or cultures only. A Chinese saying says: "people have the government that they deserve".

"It is not about criminals. This is no law enforcement operation"
Says who - you ? It is exactly about criminals. Terrorists are criminals per definitionem. Otherwise they would be soldiers - and they are not.
So this is not a war, other than described by Cheney, Wolfowitz et al.
Also the law of the US is thus enforced in countries obviously not underlying their jurisdiction.

[
There was an old debate ten years ago about this so-called "illegal fighters", the temr goes back to the Napoleonic era and tries to categorize this type of "soldiers" that fight wars, but do not wear uniforms. Inm WWII, such people, if beign caught, would be put against the wall immediately. The taliban is an army of asymmetrical war, but they are not just criminals. Criminals do engage ina cts of war, attack with weapons of war, fire mortars and artillery and HMGs and ATGMs against tanks and SAMs against aircraft. When you call these "criminal", you need to send the Bundespolizei and the BKA facing them. I doubt they would hold out long. Also, acts of war and ideologic crusade done in war fashion, are no categories of crime, but of - war.

I prefer US law to the Shariah anytime lol, however if you want US jurisdiction worldwide what do you propose ?

Neiother did I say I want US global jurisdiction, noir is this the issue here. The iossue is asymmetrical wars beign fought in Afghanistan, Iraq, Pakistan, plus drione strikes taking place occasionally in african coutnries like Somalia, Sudan, and some more. These countries do not represent the global order. They represent war zones, some represent zones run by anarchy and without strong legitimate and potent national governments

A big war to end all wars ? Islam against western values ?

No, Islam against al non-Muslim world. Just today Die welt again qupotes a speaker of the TTB, one of the major organsiations of the Tlaiban, saying that indeed they are fighting for bringing the rule of Islam back to Afghanistan - and the whole world. The problem with Wetserners is that they find this claim so surreal that they simply cannot imagine that other, fporeign people may be serious when they say that.

The problem is that you fuel terrorism with that kind of "warfare", and it will once more fall back on us sooner or later.

No, the problem is Islamic ideology motivating people to waste their lives by turning the world into a bigger hellhole. If we resist to this, you say we fuel terrorism. Should we surrender? What this do, then? Isd the victim of rape fueling the aggression of her attacker when she tries tio fight him/her back? Is the victim of a robber or of an assault fueling the gangster'S aggression when not giving up and surrender, but fights back?

No, i do not have a better idea of what to do, however the current course of action looks like an elephant in a porcelain store.

I have never said anything else but that I consider both wars in Iraq and Afghanistan as strategic defeats for the West, and that the war against Iraq was stupid and misled and that I would not have started it. Afghanistan was a reaction to 9/11, but later turned into a totally mismanaged- selfmade mess.

But aslong as the troops are kept thewre, for whatever stupid poltiicans sthink about the reasons, they are in a warzone, so let them fight the war as a war. Since ten years this is not beign done, and that'S why we are where we are.

The problem also is that drones are useless without having spies and intelligence, about where the terrorists and their leaders are. You cannot do all by satellite and drones.

That is correct, and it is my understanding that right this is being done: intel of various sources, amongst that ELINT, HUMINT and drones life footage, get combined for the bigger picture.

[em2nought]

Mark my words, Merica will use these things to bust hookers - the most dangerous threat to our puritanical way of life.

[Onkel Neal]

Originally Posted by Skybird

Ask again the next time I say something unpopular, or something critical of technology.

I think you misunderstood what I meant

Originally Posted by Skybird

Imagine you would have listened to me when in a angry dispute with Subman back then I said that as an emergency treasure for hard times, solid gold beats stocks, paper and coins hands down, always, and since always. The value you would have invested in buying real gold back then (some years pre 2008), by now would have almost increased five-fold, the price since then went from 450 or so, to 2000. You would possibly be a rich man today.

Way ahead of you, buddy.

Originally Posted by Catfish

That this is a "war", has been declared by characters like Bush, Wolfowitz and Cheney. I will leave Powell out of there, for now. But it is interesting to see how this media propaganda bull**** still works, in the minds of some. This climate of fear is ridiculous.
Can you really wage "war" against people not wearing a uniform, not belonging to a nation, and committing assassinations ? This is police and intelligence work, imho, and not war.

The US have declared war to several nations in the last decades, some were called interventions (the middle and south Americas), some war, for all kinds of reasons. Now they have declared war not only to terrorists, but to a religion.

Wait, you seem to have forgotten, the war has been processed by Obama and his administration for the last 4 years, and very briskly I might add. Why omit them? Come on, Catfish, you can do it. Say characters like Bush and Obama.

Declared war on a religon? I think if you use the word "declared", there has to be a declaration somewhere. I haven't seen it.

[krashkart]

Originally Posted by Neal Stevens

Declared war on a religon? I think if you use the word "declared", there has to be a declaration somewhere. I haven't seen it.

But but but... the Americans never stated anything to the opposite!!! Shame on you, Neal! America declared war upon a religion and that is a verifiable fact.


Gawd! !

[Codz]

If we declared war on the religion of Islam itself I doubt we'd currently have well over a million actively Muslim citizens. To call it a "War on Terror" is erroneous too though. It's more along the lines of "declaring war" on a specific type of Islam-motivated violent extremism in response to 9/11.

[Skybird]

Islam is a fundamentalist and aggressive ideology by core. The mainstream Islam is not the often so perceived "moderate" "peaceful" Islam - this is only a minority worldwide. The hardcore Islam, based on sharia and enforcing it'S law in all world - that is the mainstrema Islam if you ask people and poipulations in Muslim countries: they form the majority, and right so (in the menaing of that this is what Quran and Sharia are about). The abberation from Islam are not the so-called fundamenmtalists or "Islamists" (that is diölomats word invention based on an attempt by Saudi Arabia to gloiss over its own barbaric extremism), the abberation is that minority of Muslims that may indeed (or not) talk on behalf of moderation, tolerance and peace. And a huge part of them her ein the West still dop nto openly take a stance against those in their middle that are "radical", but silenty tolerate them and thus help them by indirectly supporting their cause).

The war in afghanistan and Iraq took place without a formal declaration of war, their governments did not recieve such a docuem,nt, or am I wrong? But by what is being done, they are/were wars - undeclared wars, if you want to be picky, but still: wars. The war on terror is a stupid phrase, since it seem to express that one wages war against a tool (terror). But you don'T. Yiou wage war against those using the tool. Which are those people being motivated by the message of Quran and the demand for Shariah law everywhere. Thus the ideology that motivates them to do so, is the enemy. And that's why I said the war on terror better should be understood as a war on Islam.

Whether you agree to that or not, is not important anymore, since facts already have been created by Islam itself: it is waging war against all non-Muslim mankind since the days of Muhammad. There is no peace where there is no Islamic rule, that's the logic by which it operates. Both peace and freedom, civil rights anyway, are subordinate to Shariah law, and Quran. What freedom and what peace is, gets defined by Shariah and Quran. That'S why Islam does not accept and is incompatible with Western law coders and constitutions plus the values expressed in them.

If you do not believe me that the understanding of terms is totally different in Islam and non-Islam, compare, paragraph by paragraph, the Universal Declaration of Human Rights , and the Cairo Declaration of Human Rights in Islam. An abyss will open before your eyes. They are LIGHTYEARS apart, and totally incompatible. The Islamic Human Rights Declaration can only be had at the price of totally destroying the Universal Declaration of Human Rights.

[Codz]

Originally Posted by Skybird

There is no peace where there is no Islamic rule, that's the logic by which it operates.

The same could be said about any religion. Christian theocracies have also been brutal and unjust. Just look at the Crusades. Any nation ruled by religion will not end well for its people.

[Skybird]

Originally Posted by Codz

The same could be said about any religion. Christian theocracies have also been brutal and unjust. Just look at the Crusades. Any nation ruled by religion will not end well for its people.

Yes, but since a logner time now the West has moved beyond that relgious dictatorship. Islam still is deeply stuck in it. That' why you see more violence of Muslim religious nutheads committed against Jews andChristians, than the other way around. Terror bombs, street attacks, prograoms, legal discrkination, assualt, rape - the number goes into the thousands or even tens of thoussands every year, the size of Jewish and Christian communities in Muslim countries still decreases dramatically, they get sysytemtically discriminated and cleansed out. In the West: mosques pop up everywhere like mushrooms in autumn. The numbers of Isamic crimes of violence reach into the high tens of thousands and hundreds of thousands if you add local milita action and wars like Sudan or Nigeria to it. The record fills books.

Now consider the misery of the uncountable number of case of home-grown violence practiced in the name of Islam.
Globally, I think it is safe to say you here talk about millions.

Consider the status of females in Islam.

Now compare to how many Muslims get assassinated and become victims of progroms in Western coutnries, or get legally discriminated and denied human rights, or get betrayed at courts? Congrats if you fill even one leaf of paper. When somebody eats a pork sandwich in the presence of a Muslim who take soffence from the sight, it probbaly makes it into the headline sof next day'S papers. But if Christains get thrown urine and bood bags at, or get massacred inside a church and get slauhgtered by the hundreds and thousands by "Islamists" - then there is a revealing silence in the media. Mind you, in the EU, criticising Islam and religion now is a crime of discrimination which can bring you to court. We even have started to turn churches into mosques. Propose that the other way around - and you will have immediate hysteric outcry by the ummah world-wide. Show a cartoon, and good ol ummah explodes and threatens terror and violence.

Lovely.

So save me about the sins our ancestors did many centuries ago. Start to care for the same bloody sins Islam still commits on this very present day. It does so without feeling any remorse and without haviung a bad conscience or a feeling of guilt, instead it celebrates that it acts accpordsing to its holy scvriptures. While we feel endlessly sorry and have still a bad conscience for bad things of the distant past.

We now know where our history shows mistakes, and where things went bad. Islam does not, and continues to oush such things.

And just for the record: in the bgeining,m the crusades were a miliztary defencise repsonse in an attempt to take back own land that before was taken ab an aggressive invader who wages wars of attack agaiunst Byzantine (amongst man other places), and later Jerusalem and the masochistically so-called "Holy Land". Mind you, these lands were not Islamic at all, and were coinqwuered by Islamic armies. The early crusades tried to take them back. Not before later, they degenerated into greedy adventures of noble men trying to win welath and land and power for their own well-being, bypassing the original cause that launched the first crusades. - Islam was the original attacker, the agressor. Not the crusaders. It had conquered the North of Africa in maretial cionquest. It took Persia and destroyed it in maretial cionquest. It invaded India in martial conquest.

And later, it initiated trade slaving as well, which again is no North-American invention. North America only made use of the offer, later banned slavery. But certain Islamic countries practice slave trading and slavery until today.

I say again: compare the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, with the Cairo Declaration of Human Rights in Islam. And then read a bit about Shariah law, so to be able to see what barbarism that Cairo declaration indeed wants to declare as obligatory for all mankind, Muslim and dhimmis, harbis and mustamins alike.

[Codz]

I know that religion can be used to commit the most brutal of crimes against humanity. It has been used to suppress science, technology, and basic human rights. Believe me, I know how horrendous religion can be when it's in a position of power. In particular Christianity and Islam. However, I am not going to hate an entire group of millions of people because of it. I will fight for their right to believe what they want, just like I'd fight to protect my right to atheism or a Christian's right to his beliefs. I draw the line when their beliefs try to trample other people's rights and impede social and scientific progress though. Secularism is the way to go in all politics.