Summations Only

I read this morning about the latest drone attack in Pakistan that killed 5 'suspected militants'.How is it possible that the world allows this? How did it become acceptable to go around executing people who we suspect to be 'militants'? If I had a drone could I send it over Washington and start executing 'suspected militants'? I am sure there would be lots of good potential targets. This site lists at least some of the known drone attacks by the US military. These are the #'s for Pakistan.

quote:

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Total Obama strikes: 282
Total US strikes since 2004: 334
Total reported killed: 2,496 — 3,202
Civilians reported killed: 482 — 832
Children reported killed: 175
Total reported injured: 1,196 — 1,318

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Whatever happened to innocent until proven guilty? How is this not murder?

What is it about being a nation state that absolves it from the crime of murder. The definition of which is"The unlawful premeditated killing of one human being by another."So if you are a nation you just pass a law that says that it is ok? Is that all the justification that is required?

Vociferous condemnation would be a good start followed by sanctions. Canada alone could seriously mess with their energy supply not to mention their grass and maple syrup. Put the squeeze on em. Something other than silent complicity.

This is the slippery slope that the US has embraced. Scary as fuck. I think the key point is that the US is not at war with Pakistan, Yemen or Somalia. Which I would say makes the killings illegal. I guess it is all under the mantle of the CIA which probably has a host of legal protections of which I know nothing.Still I think that it is morally reprehensible and a huge loss to the integrity of the rule of law.

I won't dispute for a minute that if I had to fight a war then I would want all the best tools available. I would be ruthless and unrelenting.This is altogether different from targeted assassinations outside of any recognizable theatre of war. Killing innocents on the battlefield is not the same as killing innocents in a controlled, zero danger situation.

The law is born of morality. No doubt there is a big separation between them but they are seriously linked.

Fairly common for gov'ts to kill people with impunity I guess. After all, like Ringo says, what are you gonna do about it?Here is a Canadian soldier charged with 2nd degree murder for dispatching a wounded enemy in a war zone. He is charged because it is deemed that the wounded man no longer presented an immediate danger. So even in a hot battle zone our soldiers are only allowed to employ as much force as is necessary to neutralize the immediate threat.How can we hold our soldiers, who are being personally shot at right now, to a higher standard of responsibility than we do a soldier killing people from an office 4000 miles away from any danger?It just feels like some kind of snow job out of a movie about a dystopian future.

Scenario 1 — A soldier executes a dying man in the battlefield in a country that is in a state of occupation and near civil war. The man was absolutely going to dye and the defendant characterizes it as an act of mercy. He is accused of murder because he was not in immediate danger.Scenario 2 — A soldier executes a suspected militant and his family in a country not at war with anyone from 4000 miles away. The danger that is used to justify the killing is of a theoretical nature. He bears no responsibility for killing the 'militant' or the accidentally dispatched.They are connected mostly because I am comparing them to each other so as to point out what seems like an inconsistency in the application of our sense of right and wrong.Comprende?

So what he should have said was that he thought the guy was going to get better and start shooting at him again at some future date. This then would be equal to the danger presented by a 'suspected militant'. Say you have an armed robber who has killed a couple of people and taken refuge in his house with his wife and children. By your line of reasoning it would be acceptable for the police to just blow up the whole house killing all the occupants because the criminal presented a danger.It is not legal at all, it is just expedient. Would it be legal to do it in the US? If Iran were to carry out an operation like these in the US it would be classified as terrorism. We would have no qualms about calling it murder. Herein lies the hypocrisy and the dishonest application of 'our' own laws.

While I have been encouraged to be polemic when framing the debate topics I don't think it's hyperbole. I think the hyperbole comes when they describe the killings as 'legal'. I think if more people were to decide that it was a lot like murder then the US would not be able to act with such impunity.

So we have militants from Afghanistan who are taking refuge in Pakistan and the US (coalition) is engaging them there. Seems fair enough. I mean we do want to actually win right?The problem is that the US is not at war with any particular state. They claim to be at war with Afghanistan to gain the legal protection of being at war and then use those protections to go after individuals no matter where they are located. It's bullshit.

Yes the judge or jury for the soldier on the battlefield but not for the soldier in the office. That is not my intention jar. I am trying to better illuminate the subject by coming at it from different angles. Where is the material difference?

It is absolutely relevant.

The behaviour is the same. It is the classification that is different. Eh? Pakistan have some laws don't they? If anybody is at war it is the US.But the important point is that even if it is ok to kill that one guy it is not ok to kill those other people. The soldier in the office is much closer to the police scenario than the battlefield scenario.

Yeah not really a state are they? This is not WWIII, we are not in imminent peril, these are not soldiers in uniform preparing to invade another country. This is claiming the protection of the rules of war under distinctly unwarlike conditions.