Innocence Riots

For those who think that the entire Middle East hates us and supports the terrorist attack on 11 September 2012 that killed Ambassador Stevens. Just as American's, people in the Middle East have widely varying opinions and beliefs. Decrying attack, protesters overtake Islamist group's HQ in BenghaziMy travels and work in the Middle East have met with many people friendly and sympathetic to Americans and some not so. Many have been fustrated with US policy and dominating presence in the Middle East, of course. Are there people there who wish the removal of the US and other western influences, yes. Are there people there who wish ill-will of the US and other western influences, yes. This varies from region to region, country to country and person to person. However, to paint with a broad brush that everyone in the Middle East hate everyone in the 'west' and supports militant Islamic extremists and terrorists is at best, unsubstantiated prejudice and bigotry. Edited by DevilsAdvocate, : No reason given.Edited by DevilsAdvocate, : No reason given.Edited by DevilsAdvocate, : No reason given.

No, using our military and political power to reduce the effectiveness of terrorism HAS given better security. We HAVE dramatically reduced the amount of terrorism to the United States and the west from Al Qaeda and other related terrorist groups. We HAVE effectively cut the head off of Al Qaeda and drove them underground in Afghanistan, Iraq, Pakistan, the Arabian Peninsula and Africa. Of course this has resulted in backlash and other unfortunate consequences. The benefits outweigh the risks. It is not a zero sum game.People see this one reaction insuing from the 'insults against Mohammed' and judge the entire Middle East on it. Should we judge the US solely on the 1992 Rodney King riots in LA or the 'Battle in Seatle' riot in 1999. Of course not. The acts of a group of people do not speak for all. And terrorists in one degree or another will always exist. One cannot eliminate terrorism in the same degree one cannot eliminate an ideology or religion. However, we can attempt to make it as painful as possible for them to carry out their reign of terror. That is not true. In some regions yes. In some regions the opposite. What a broad brush you generalize with. Would you have rather let terrorist groups such as Al Qaeda and the like flourish and continue their reign of terror?Do I agree with our entire course of action, no. Do I like killing innocent men, women and children in efforts to take down Al Qaeda, of course not. Do I think there could have been a better way to do this? Probably, but we are human and have only some many recourses to do this. What is the most effective with the least amount of 'collatoral damage' both to human life and our image of being a humane force. It is a fine line we walk for the best interest of not just ourselves but the regions we are fighting terrorism in and doing more harm than good. How do we fight terror without being drawn into it and unintionally provoking it ourselves is the question that needs to be answered. And there may be no answer to this questions.To tie this back to the topic, our very presence in the Middle East encites resent and hatred (who else would like to be occupied by foreigners) by some but not all. However, do not use the broad brush of generality to think that what we are doing there is not effective. 9-11 was our own making? I am pretty sure that was unprovoked. So you have to go through metal detectors and take off your shoes. What the heck. Is it that much of an inconvenience for you?

In some parts of the world we have not felt safe for quite some time (if ever) aka Syria, Iran, North Korea, etc. Whether we have a presence in the Middle East or not, does not really make a difference, as the regimes and the ideologies these countries espouse are already diametrically opposed to ours as evidence in the propoganda they spread about us.Past examples of clinging to the tennets of the Monroe Doctrine (sticking our heads in the sand and pretending that if we do not get involved in foreign affairs outside the western hemiphere that other countries would respect us and do us no harm) has proved disasterous and wrong-headed i.e. WWI, WWII, etc.That does not mean that I think we should antagonize or invade any country out there that does not agree with American policies. Of course not. Again, their exists a fine line in how we weed out terrorist organizations to the point that they are ineffective without destroying the vary ideals we are protecting. And there has not been a terrorist attack on home soil for over 11 years. That is an accomplishment.Again, not a zero sum game. We have to weigh pros and cons, risks vs benefits. Should we have waited for Al Qaeda to strike us again? Nobody said taking the fight to Al Qaeda on their home turf would have been easy or quick. We have dealt a substantial blow to Al Qaeda and other terrorist organizations in the Middle East but not without consequences. Now it is time to start turning over this responsibility to the governments of the Middle East and reduce our presence. This will help in reducing the blowback and resentment of our presence there. However, this is not something that can be done overnight, it requires time and patience. Let the military do what it does best, reconstruction and helping governments reinstitute law and order. This was done in post-WWII Europe. It can be done in the Middle East as well. Will it be perfect of course not. Will there still be needless death and terrorism. Yes. I believe that education, tolerance and patience however, are the best tools to defeat terrorism. And we have terrorists in America as well, we just don't label them as such. The difference is that Al Qaeda was a well-organized terrorist group that killed over 2000+ innocent Americans on our home turf in one day. This not something that would have just "gone away" by igoring it, we had to take action. Do I agree with exactly how we did that, no. I don't think that our actions in Iraq had anything to do with defeating Al Qaeda in Afghanistan. If we concentrated our actions in Afghanistan to start with we probably could have wrapped this up sooner but hind site is 20/20 and we cannot change the past. It has been. We have not had any domestic terrorist attacks since 9/11 due to our and our allies military actions. We increased security during WWI, WWII, the Korean War, the Cuban Missile Crisis, and times throughout history that are not tied to terrorism (but are tied to times of crisis and war). Increased security is not necessarily a bad thing if done out of neccessity and are temporary in nature. I wish the world was the world of John Lennon's "Imagine" but it is not. And until it is we have to make sacrifices to ensure as many innocent lives as possible are spared. The good of the many outweighs the good of the few unfortunately. I never said the world is becoming 'safer' for Americans. I think as you say it is nuanced. Making general statements such as this ignore the complexity of human behavior. It is safer driving than say 30 years ago, it is safer to fly than ever, should I say that it is safer to be a human now than ever? Humans live longer lives because it is safer now than say 100 years ago due. It is just a ridiculous statement to make. When were Americans or anyone else 'safe'. We are safe until something happens to us. If I travelled to the Middle East in the 70s, 80s or 90s, there was as much a likelihood that I could possibly be kidnapped then, as there is now; depending on the region I travelled to and how much I stood out as an American. Safety has not dramatically increased or decreased.Edited by DevilsAdvocate, : No reason given.Edited by DevilsAdvocate, : No reason given.Edited by DevilsAdvocate, : No reason given.

At the risk of repeated threats to attacks on commercial aircraft you are complaining about waiting in line or taking off your shoes. Really? After 9-11, the shoe bomber, the underware bomber, UK to US airline terror plots, etc, etc. What do you expect us to do. Sit back and wait for a terrorist to take down another airliner? If taking off my shoes and pushing my carry ons through an x-ray machine is what I have to do to prevent innocent people from dying than that is the least I can do. Seriously stop wanking. You cannot attack terrorist camps in an land-bound country without setting up military facilities in that country, especially when at the time the country is hostile to any foreign presence or operations aka the Taliban. Military aircraft have to refuel, soldiers and marines have to set up forward bases to conduct operations, etc. Your view of taking out terrorists in a foreign country is simplistic and unrealistic. It is a complex, long and pain staking process which you gloss over and generalize. Are you saying you know better than generals and admirals how to wage a war against terrorists in a foreign country? Our goal originally was not to take out the Taliban. However, when the Taliban is openly supporting terrorist groups such as Al Qaeda in their attack agains the United States and when they effectively run the country in which these terrorists reside, we have to effectively neutralize them to get to Al Qaeda. This is what we basically did, we decapitated Al Qaeda's leadership and drove the rest into hiding after we pushed back the Taliban.Yes, the Taliban has taken back part of Afghanistan. It is now up to the Afghanistan government to figure out what to do with the Taliban. Our purpose in Afghanistan was not to free the Afghan people from the Taliban, it was to prevent another attack to innocent civilians on our and our allies collective home turf. If we could help the Afghan people throw off the tyranny of the Taliban in the process, that is all well and good but that was not the end goal. We accomplished taking out the Al Qaeda leadership and set a precedence for future actions against acts of terrorism. I totally agree with you on this Percy. There are two sides of Islam, just as there are with any other human ideology and religion out there. Christianisty, Mormanism, Hinduism, and just about every other religion out there have its extremists and those who believe they are justified to use violence and morally reprehensible behavior in promoting their beliefs. The bloody history of Christianity is just as tainted as that of Islam. I don't know if there is such a thing as a 'religion of peace'. Peace can exist with or without religion.Edited by DevilsAdvocate, : No reason given.

I am all for withdrawing our forces in Afghanistan, as long as it does not endanger the troops who are currently there. It takes time to train the Afghan military to take care of their own domestic problems and to conduct a systematic, safe withdrawel out of the country with the least amount of casualitiess as possible. I believe we are doing that right now by our withdrawel out of Iraq and soon to be withdrawel out of Afghanistan. It takes time. We have seen in Vietnam what happens when we yank our military out of a military hotspot overnight.

I didn't say I necessarily agree with how the TSA conducts their security searches or who has to be searched. There are always better ways of doing things.Of course I wouldn't put it past terrorists to smuggle explosives in the dipers of their own children. Ridiculous I know but we have already seen the shoe and underwear bombers, and we have found literature about terrorists training would be suicide bombers hiding explosives in their orifices.How far we should go with this, I don't know. I think there is a human limit and line to be drawn between personal freedom and comfort and security. When it results in a police state situation like your video shows, it is definately is an issue that needs to be resolved. The question is how?I try not to fly if possible.

Good point. It was the intelligence community that foiled these would be terrorists more than anything. The security at the airport is supposed to be the last step in security to try to prevent terrorism in the air. What the success rate of TSA and other airport security task forces are around the world, I am not sure. True, it only takes one though. If we had not ramped up security at the airports after 9-11 and a terrorist took down an airlines, all fingers would point back at airport security I would think. True. The difference is the number of people you can take out in one whack with an attack on an airliner and the publicity involved vice a fatal traffic accident involving a few people. The issue there is that an explosive carried by a terrorist would have to be pretty large to take out a large number of people on the ground. However in the air it only takes a small explosion to take down an airliner.I agree though that a person probably has a greater likihood of being struck by lightning than dying in an airline terrorist attack. Of course, the victims of 9-11 would have wished they were not part of this small minority of people. Edited by DevilsAdvocate, : No reason given.

So we shouldn't go after a terrorist group who attacked innocent people on our home soil? Not sure what your point is here.We had to take action to prevent further attacks to innocent civilians from taking place. However, by doing so we put our military at risk. But that is what our military is for. To protect the American populous from foreign threats. Those in the military understand this risk to themselves.Your mentality seems to be that if we had just waited the terrorists would leave us alone. Correct me if I am wrong.

Where are you getting 60 trillion dollars from, just curious. That seems a bit exaggerated. But yes, airport security has gone to the extreme. In my humble opinion there has to be some sort of compromise between personal liberty and freedom and security. Where that is exactly I am not sure. In the eye in the sky downlook on humanity that is true. It is also true that it is safer to walk or ride a bicycle than drive a car. Does that mean we should not drive cars or spend money on increasing safety in vehicles?Again we have to come to a solution. How do we provide enough security in the air without causing more harm than good. I think an increase in science and technology in the area of security may help provide the solution in the same way that advances in cybersecurity is protecting against computer attacks. True. However, since there have not been any attacks to people in security lines, this has not been focused on by the media and thus is not deemed as much a threat as the threat against travelers in the aircraft. Whether this is true or not. Not sure where you are getting 60 trillions dollars. Our total public debt to debt for the United States is 16 trillion. The total global debt is about 48 trillion. You are out to lunch on the 60 trillion. But I accept that we need to reasobly balance security and personal freedom.Edited by DevilsAdvocate, : No reason given.

That seams reasonable but in the light of 9-11, it would have been difficult to argue that we should do absolutely nothing to prevent another terrorist attack on airlines from happening. Sometimes emotions and fear outweigh logical reasoning.

I like you Percy, but I think your speaking out of ignorance and naivety here.Humans are humans. Just because you are nice to people does not mean they will reciprocate. If people do not stand up for the innocent and helpless than they are as much to blame as those who instigate violence. If some one tries to take or do harm to your children or your wife are you just going to let them? Are you just going to walk away? I hope not. The same thing is true on the larger scale. Would you not through political and military means, fight to protect the innocent (i.e. the Holocaust, Rwanda, etc)?As Ringo so eloquently quotes Ecclesiastes 3:1-8 (one of the few passages of the Bible I like, along with some of Jesus parables and moral lessons), "to every thing there is a season, and a time to every purpose under the heaven". There is a time for war (i.e. WWII) and there is a time for peace.Of course the preference is for peace but peace does not mean allowing the needless slaughter and genocide that occurs. Sometimes I feel we (collective 'we', not just the US) have not done enough to stand up for the defenseless (i.e. Khmer Rouge, Rwanda, Darfur, etc). However, it is easy to say this in hindsight. Sometimes we do not get the full story of what is going on until after it happens. For example, the US was wrapping up the Vietnam War when Khmer Rouge occurred and was politically, culturally and military unable to stop it from happening.Sometimes I feel like countries (including the US) are not putting enough pressure on these despot regimes to prevent atrocities from occurring. The US, Great Britain (and sometimes France) cannot and should not be the only countries to pressure on the despotic regimes. It must, must be a multilateral, international effort.I do believe that we had to take action after 9-11 even though I disagree with how we did this. This should have been a multilateral, international action. If America had worked with other countries to take action instead of impetuously going in guns blazing without carefully considering the best course of action, we would not be in the mess we are in now. However, we are in this mess, and we do have to work through it.Just my two cents and my 19 year experience as a member of the US armed services. I will get off my soapbox now.

Is it always? I do not conur. If we (collective we, not just the US) did not stop Hitler and Japan, how many more humans would have died, been enslaved, and have their freedoms taken away. Diplomacy did not get anywhere with either Japan or Germany. When a county or regime is hell bent on genocide the only recourse sometimes is meeting force with brute force. Edited by DevilsAdvocate, : No reason given.Edited by DevilsAdvocate, : No reason given.

Pacifism is good as long as it is tempered with a healthy dose of reality and understanding of human behavior. I would rather be a pacifist than a war monger, but not at the expense of the defense of myself and my fellow human beings against those who wish to harm us.There is a time to stand up and defend those who cannot. We just have to be careful not to adopt the vary behaviors we are defending against.

But there was a Hitler. Playing the "what ifs" does not negate the fact that Hitler as we know him existed and the Holocaust occured. It is a balance I grant you that. However, the military is not always meant for action, it is also there for deterrence of violence. That is in fact one of the main tenents of the US military. So you are saying that we should have just stood by and let Germany needlessly slaughter millions of innocent human beings?It is inevitable that Hitler would have killed more Jews, Poles, Gypsies, Jehovah's Witnesses, mentally & physically handicapped, homosexuals, communists, socialists, political opponents, etc if we (collective allied 'we') had done nothing.Hitler targeted these people before Germany declared war on the US and even before he began his invasions into Poland and France. How noble. A unified Europe created by the euthenasia of tens of millions of human beings. Of course the US government and other european powers did the same thing in North America with the Native Americans. It does not make it right though, and I do not justify Manifest Destiny in the least. It would have sputtered out when he had no one left but blue eyed little Nazis left. Ever here of Action T4 and the euthanasia of the mentaly and physically handicapped by the Nazis? One of many schemes of terror the Nazis created well before he began his invasions into other countries. Or do you think its 'better' for the human race that we weed out the unwanteds? (this is satirical, I imagine you do not espouse that, but am trying to make a point).There is a time in place for the military. Again, the main tenant is deterrence. However there is a time to stand up and fight for the innocent.One of my favorite statements as well: However, if we had not stood up to Hitler and other despotic regimes, we would have 'done nothing' thus enabling them to continue their reigns of terror.As long as their are Osama bin Ladens, Adolph Hitlers, Heinrich Himmlers, Adolf Eichmanns, Pol Pots, Idi Amins, Mao Zedongs, Joseph Stalins, and others who are bent on murdering innocent people to promote their plans of domination there is a need for a military force to deter them. Will we be successful all the time, of course not. However, without the deterrence of force, they will run unchecked.How do you feel about the police? Do you think the police should not use any weapons? What about SWAT teams? etc. Should we just try to be 'nice' to mass murderers, armed robbers, etc and let them continue killing? Should we not enforce law and order?Have Americans and other proponents of freedom and democracy always done the right thing? Of course not. However, I do believe inaction can be just as bad or worse. In all cases we should try diplomacy first, but if innocent men, women and children are dying needless deaths at the hands of cruel dictators and despots, action is not only needed but required to put their actions to an end when all other means have failed.I am as much a proponent of peace as any peacenik out there. But I believe there is a time and place for the military and police action as long as there are humans who wish to harm other humans, but only as a last resort. As a military veteran and Naval Officer, I can account to the fact that 95% of the time, the military is in a state of non-hostility and non-violent action (the general public is usually unaware of the vast amounts of time, energy and money the military spends on benevolent causes such as giving out food and other humanitarian aid). It is the 5% of time that we as the military are routing out terrorists, or other violent actions, that we get criticized for.I will leave off with a quote from my favorite scientist. I am not using this to promote my position, but just as a perspective of our potential if evey human understood our 'place' in the universe. Edited by DevilsAdvocate, : No reason given.Edited by DevilsAdvocate, : No reason given.Edited by DevilsAdvocate, : No reason given.Edited by DevilsAdvocate, : No reason given.Edited by DevilsAdvocate, : No reason given.Edited by DevilsAdvocate, : No reason given.