Are we discussing America's policy to use drone strikes or whether or not they are specifically targeting women and children?Originally Posted by Katman
The Majestic Metal Wizard
Are we discussing America's policy to use drone strikes or whether or not they are specifically targeting women and children?
Physics; Thou art a cruel, heartless Bitch-of-a-Mistress
The Majestic Metal Wizard
Specifically targeting does not equal collateral deaths.So once it is established and a decision is made to forfeit the lives of the innocent in order to chop the head off of the snake (coz we know there isn't another waiting to take their place), they do specifically target the women and children.
Yes the outcome is the same, but they are not the same.
Physics; Thou art a cruel, heartless Bitch-of-a-Mistress
Aio ki te Aorangi
They're not collateral, because they are known to be there where they once weren't. There is nothing accidental about their death. They become targets.
I didn't think!!! I experimented!!!
Forum whore
Did you read the figures of 1147 killed for the sake of removing 41 men?
You'd think that America would have figured out by now that a huge number of innocent people are being killed by their 'precise' targeting method.
The reason that they don't seem to have figured it out is that they actually couldn't give the slightest fuck about collateral damage.
In my eyes that is every bit as morally corrupt as specifically targeting women and children.
Anarchic Wild Child
It asn't covered up - William Calley was tried and found guilty ..
Yes - but what do YOU think the difference is?
Not for the dead women and children there isn't ..There is also a difference between attacking women and children in the first instance and launching a retaliatory strike based solely on the actions of your opponents.
That'as plainly stupid .. not your usual ...but that doesn't matter right - Everything America has ever done is the work of Beezelbub and all his hellish minions and Terrorists are just poor misunderstood goat herds who would never hurt a fly and just want a hug.
Am I doing it right?
Do you seriously think that the US will ADMIT to deliberately targeting women and children ?? The moment they do they will face massive international condemnation ...
There are other terrorists and terrorist groups - those two certainly target women and children ... but they don't do it to create terror in the citizenery and change Government's minds - they do it for their own ends - genocide, sexual gratification or recruitment ... that doesn't make it right either ...
But I thought we were talking about bigger players in th arena ..
"So if you meet me, have some sympathy, have some courtesy, have some taste ..."
Anarchic Wild Child
Gawd - that's well below your usually well-reasoned responses ...
"So if you meet me, have some sympathy, have some courtesy, have some taste ..."
Forum whore
Really?
http://nypost.com/2014/03/15/richard...sacre-coverup/
The Majestic Metal Wizard
Yes they are (from http://www.thefreedictionary.com/collateral):
"4. Of a secondary nature; subordinate: collateral target damage from a bombing run."
They are not the primary target, known or otherwise - they are still secondary and therefore still Collateral.
Physics; Thou art a cruel, heartless Bitch-of-a-Mistress
Aio ki te Aorangi
You said that a decision is made as to whether to kill people or not. If you decide to do so, they are no longer collateral. Strangely enough, if the same commander decides that he doesn't want them to die but carries on with the drone strike, then yeah, that is collateral damage. One is accidental, one is a intentional action. The accident is collateral, the intention is murder.
Wiki:
"Collateral damage is damage to things that are incidental to the intended target. It is frequently used as a military term where non-combatants are accidentally or unintentionally killed or wounded and/or non-combatant property damaged as result of the attack on legitimate military targets.[1][2]"
The Majestic Metal Wizard
Okay
If we are going to discuss America's use of Drones, I would tend to suggest that the failure is not with the accuracy of the technology, but with the accuracy of the intelligence - but given the numbers presented - it would be correct to condemn America's use of drones while such a high incidence of Collateral deaths is occuring.
BUT
That is not what we were discussing - we were discussing whether they were targeted or not
Physics; Thou art a cruel, heartless Bitch-of-a-Mistress
Anorak
America is a country, your stories as always rely on hearsay, innuendo and dubiously motivated alternative media. As well as discredited self confessed liars.
You need to sort out fact from fiction. Strapping bombs to kids and sending missles and bombs purposefully at innocent targets is different from collateral damage.
In both world wars however, both sides did evil deeds, but don't forget who targeted civilians first. Also don't forget who set out to exterminate a civilian population ethic minorities.
Kinky is using a feather. Perverted is using the whole chicken
The Majestic Metal Wizard
Point of order - I said continue the mission
I suspect that if you were to ask any Commander - they would all say that they don't want innocents to die. Which would kinda prove my point.
Physics; Thou art a cruel, heartless Bitch-of-a-Mistress
Forum whore
As has already been said, if intelligence suggests that there are innocent civilians in the vicinity of the intended target and the attack is carried out regardless, then yes, they were targeted.
Anarchic Wild Child
From Wikipedia (admittedly the suppository of all knowledge)
Calley was charged on September 5, 1969, with six specifications of premeditated murder for the deaths of 109 South Vietnamese civilians near the village of My Lai, at a hamlet called Son My, more commonly called My Lai in the U.S. press.
After deliberating for 79 hours, the six-officer jury (five of whom had served in Vietnam) convicted him on March 29, 1971, of the premeditated murder of 22 Vietnamese civilians. On March 31, 1971, Calley was sentenced to life imprisonment and hard labor at Fort Leavenworth,[11] which includes the United States Disciplinary Barracks, the Department of Defense's only maximum security prison.
So - definitely convicted
However ...
On April 1, 1971, only a day after Calley was sentenced, President Richard Nixon ordered him transferred from Leavenworth prison to house arrest at Fort Benning, pending appeal. This leniency was protested by Melvin Laird, the secretary of defense. On August 20, 1971, the convening authority—the commanding general of Fort Benning—reduced Calley's sentence to 20 years. The Court of Military Review affirmed both the conviction and sentence (46 C.M.R. 1131 (1973)). The Secretary of the Army reviewed the sentence and findings and approved both, but in a separate clemency action commuted confinement to 10 years. On May 3, 1974, President Nixon notified the secretary that he had reviewed the case and determined he would take no further action in the matter.
Ultimately, Calley served only three and a half years of house arrest in his quarters at Fort Benning. He petitioned the federal district court for habeas corpus on February 11, 1974, which was granted on September 25, 1974, along with his immediate release, by federal judge J. Robert Elliott. Judge Elliott found that Calley's trial had been prejudiced by pre-trial publicity, denial of subpoenas of certain defense witnesses, refusal of the United States House of Representatives to release testimony taken in executive session of its My Lai investigation, and inadequate notice of the charges. (The judge had released Calley on bail on February 27, 1974, but an appeals court reversed it and returned Calley to U.S. Army custody on June 13, 1974.) Later in 1974, President Nixon tacitly issued Calley a limited presidential pardon. Consequently, his general court-martial conviction and dismissal from the U.S. Army were upheld; however, the prison sentence and subsequent parole obligations were commuted to time served, leaving Calley a free man.[8]
"So if you meet me, have some sympathy, have some courtesy, have some taste ..."
Forum whore
This isn't Call of Duty we're talking about here.
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