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safeguard
Outer Party
Post #54876
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Posted: Tue 2008-04-22 20:23
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| Politics: Libertarian |
Country: Canada |
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| Re: why support the troops? |
Post Rating: 0.0/4 (0 votes cast) |
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Hm, excellent topic Azazel. Sounds simple at first but clearly it's attracting many different points of view creating a lengthy discussion, which I did enjoy reading. Before I add my several cents, I'll go ahead and make it known I agree with JD-sama's arguments, as well as the legitimacy of the question raised by him and Azazel. Also, Tristan has some perfectly valid points. Reading your posts definitely had my head nodding. JD-sama and Azazel already put forth arguments against Vlad Slavakovich's position so I won't ramble on about his position, except to say Islamo-fascism isn't real, there are no truly fascist-Islamic regimes or groups to my knowledge. If you're referring to extremist Islam and militant groups donning such a label, then I will get back to you...
| Azazel wrote: |
| what do you think is there a really good reason to support soldiers serving in the military? |
Honestly, I realize I haven't thoroughly thought about this question in some time. But now that I have given it more thought and have seen this discussion I'm fairly certain of where I stand on the issue.
It all depends. As many have already stated, if it was a war where North America was being invaded, or a Nazi Germany situation where a confirmed, extraordinary threat to not only many innocent lives but to liberty itself has arisen then I would fully support the reasoning soldiers use as well as the actions they take in order to defend liberty. If that was what they were defending.
Now, in the current situation the world is in, I have to say I do not support the actions of the Canadian troops in Afghanistan or the Allied forces in Iraq, no matter how much they believe they're helping foreign cultures, peoples and governments. But, I do respect the willingness to put one's life on the line for a cause no one can be sure of. I don't know if it's willful ignorance or true bravery or discipline, but willingly putting yourself within death's reach is something to be deeply contemplated, if not respected or admired; whether or not it's you or someone else. We will all face death someday, but it's different here. Dying for what one believes in is beyond something I can describe. I cannot even imagine myself in that situation. That doesn't stop me from voicing my opinion and defending it against someone in such a situation. So essentially, I agree with JCPRuckus when he says:
| JCPRuckus wrote: |
| I think that the willingness to fight and die for what you believe in is an admirable trait in anyone, even if I don't agree with what they believe in. For instance, while I find their actions unconscionable, I have to respect the fact that the 9/11 hijackers were willing to die in order to strike a blow against a system that they believed was oppressing them. |
~~~~~~~~~~~
This is where an opponent of my position would pipe up and say, "Well if you wouldn't put your life on the line in this situation, how can you disrespect those who do, who fight for all of our freedom?" I like to think if Canada was invaded right now, I'd run out, grab a gun and start fighting regardless of whether it was hopeless or useless. I'd like to think that; I don't know if it would turn out like that. But it isn't anything like that right now. I respect veterans of past conflicts like WW1 and 2, I simply don't believe the militaries of the world today are fighting for freedom when it comes to situations like Iraq/Afghanistan. I believe many of the troops believe that they are fighting for freedom, maybe Bush even does (disregarding what I already believe there), but that doesn't make it so. As everyone has said already, in WW2 people were fighting for freedom, in WW1 and many skirmishes before those, the fight for freedom and the threat to it were very real. The War on Terror is a farce, and those who claim that freedom is what we as westerners are fighting for when we drop bombs on the Middle East or use secret service agencies to fund "the enemies of our enemies" are either completely ignorant, are wishfully thinking, lying through their teeth, or have hidden motives.
I'm pretty sure we westerners have a lot more freedom than we know what to do with. That doesn't mean we can drop our guard (especially from domestic threats), and it doesn't mean there aren't threats right now (domestic or foreign) it just means I think we should be the last people attacking foreign lands "to defend freedom".
Putting a sticker on your car is anything but a display of respect for military officers, and it sickens me every time I see such a thing. The people who do this barely think about war, its costs, or anything other than America's Top Model, the football game, or what a dumbass celeb. has done to fuck up his/her life.
I'll admit to playing a lot of violent, war-centric video games, but I do not support the action of killing anyone in real life. I like my killing to be harmless and internet-related. When I know that a huge toll of civilians have been wiped from the planet because of something like the War on Terror, Vietnam war, Korea, etc. it really makes me stop and think about what the hell is going-on on Earth, and why it has continued to this point.
I don't support the troops because I don't agree with the reasoning behind the recent string of offensives the west has launched, especially if people in the military know the war is a farce and started under false pretenses. So no, there isn't a really good reason to support the military, "the troops", in a war such as the War on Terror. I don't want them to die, I don't want them to kill, and I don't want them to be deceived into doing either.
_________________
"It is not difficult to avoid death, gentlemen; it is far more difficult to avoid wickedness, for it runs faster than death." - Socrates, in Plato's Apology
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motch_master
Prole
Post #56017
Joined: 27 Apr 2008
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Posted: Thu 2008-05-22 06:04
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| Politics: Atheist |
Country: Roman Empire |
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Post Rating: 0.0/4 (0 votes cast) |
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Hi all. As you can tell, I'm new here. love the content. I wanted to say this since I joined, but wasn't sure how to put it until now.
First, I'ld like to say that I think that this is the sickest batch of opinions I've read (I support freedom of speech, so you have every right to say these things). Of course we should support the troopes. Their job is hard enough. They volunteered to join the military to protect our country from outside threats. You don't like the war, so you won't support the troopes? Fine, just don't go crawling to them when a war that you support comes along. It's one or the other, you can't have both.
About the war in Iraq, do you want to pay outragous for oil? Don't tell me that Iran wont fill the void if we leave. Remember what happened when we left Veit Nam? Cambodia, Khmer Rouge, Killing fields? Google it. When we left Viet Nam in 1975, the killing fields started up. Proof. Proof that to save 10,000+ American troops, 2,200,000 had to die the next 4 years. Is an American's life worth so much more then a foreigner's?
(BTW, I know that there are alot of untapped sources in NA, but since those enviromentalists get their way, not that I don't support protecting the enviroment, that wont be an option.)
Another thing, Iraq posses no threat, Afganistan posess co threat, We can even survive Iran. We went into Afganistan because we wanted to get rid of terrorists, and the Afgan gov't wouldn't do it. We asked, several times, but they wouldn't. In Iraq, the UN were telling the Iraq gov't to stop performing acts of genocide, etc, but Sudam wouldn't budge. That little useless entity called the League of Nations... Ya, the UN was becoming like that. I don't agree with Bush's domestic policy's, but he is right on the ticket on foreign policies.
Show of hands, who here says "I don't agree with Bush on X," but instead says "BUSH IS A FREAKIN NAWTZI WAR CRINIMAL!!!" Like in this day in age, it's okay to criticize someone who is performing the most difficult job in the free world... in the planet. Does the US population watch a miner doing his job everyday, and half the populace hate him? I don't think so.
Finaly, if you see someone being raped, what do you do? Would you do something about it, or would you do what I hear alot, not get envolved. Hey, the rapist is not a threat to you.
(I'm sure that there are some people out there nodding their heads up and down. for that, good for you) |
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One Of The Few
Minister of Truth
Post #56033
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Posted: Thu 2008-05-22 11:42
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| Politics: National Libertarian-Capitalist |
Country: Scotland |
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Post Rating: 0.0/4 (0 votes cast) |
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I actually made a similar post a while back, motch_master. That was in early 2007, when it didn't look like the surge would work at all and the danger of genocide seemed very real. Since then there has been significant progress in Iraq (although you don't hear much about it) so my worries have subsided at bit. Nevertheless, the danger is still there and any reduction of coalition prescence in Iraq should be handled with the utmost care.
For clarification purposes, I have to say that I opposed the war in Iraq from the start. I'd anticipated a long conflict in Afghanistan which I think should have taken priority over any future ventures. I also think the timing of the war was largely dictated by the weather (military operations would have been far less successful if the war had started a few months later) and the way it was started totally discredited the already ridiculed UN.
However, I subscribe to the "you break it, you buy it" rule of invasions. Turn a country into rubble and you have a moral responsibility to build it up again; the sheer fact that this costs your country lives is hardly a reason to ditch this moral responsibility. Until Iraq is a reasonably stable country with a working democracy and economy, able to defend itself against foreign invasion, the US and its allies have a responsibility to the Iraqi people.
I didn't necessarily oppose invading Iraq in the future, but I think the war on terror should have taken priority over an invasion of Iraq. I suspect a lot of people in the Bush government, including Bush, saw Iraq as their legacy: a lasting, swift and efficient victory that would mark them down in history. Afghanistan- inevitable a chronic, difficult conflict- didn't fit this script. There were right that it would be how they would be remembered by history, at least.
EDIT: Welcome to the forums, by the way. You join us during a transitional phase, but I'm sure you'll find it very enjoyable once it becomes whatever it will become.
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If you can't say what you mean then you'll never mean what you say
God holds no fears
Death no worries
And while good is readily attainable
Evil is readily endurable |
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motch_master
Prole
Post #56054
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Posted: Thu 2008-05-22 23:56
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| Politics: Atheist |
Country: Roman Empire |
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Post Rating: 0.0/4 (0 votes cast) |
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| One Of The Few wrote: |
I actually made a similar post a while back, motch_master. That was in early 2007, when it didn't look like the surge would work at all and the danger of genocide seemed very real. Since then there has been significant progress in Iraq (although you don't hear much about it) so my worries have subsided at bit. Nevertheless, the danger is still there and any reduction of coalition prescence in Iraq should be handled with the utmost care.
For clarification purposes, I have to say that I opposed the war in Iraq from the start. I'd anticipated a long conflict in Afghanistan which I think should have taken priority over any future ventures. I also think the timing of the war was largely dictated by the weather (military operations would have been far less successful if the war had started a few months later) and the way it was started totally discredited the already ridiculed UN.
However, I subscribe to the "you break it, you buy it" rule of invasions. Turn a country into rubble and you have a moral responsibility to build it up again; the sheer fact that this costs your country lives is hardly a reason to ditch this moral responsibility. Until Iraq is a reasonably stable country with a working democracy and economy, able to defend itself against foreign invasion, the US and its allies have a responsibility to the Iraqi people.
I didn't necessarily oppose invading Iraq in the future, but I think the war on terror should have taken priority over an invasion of Iraq. I suspect a lot of people in the Bush government, including Bush, saw Iraq as their legacy: a lasting, swift and efficient victory that would mark them down in history. Afghanistan- inevitable a chronic, difficult conflict- didn't fit this script. There were right that it would be how they would be remembered by history, at least.
EDIT: Welcome to the forums, by the way. You join us during a transitional phase, but I'm sure you'll find it very enjoyable once it becomes whatever it will become. |
Thanks, I remember reading your post (which gave me courage to write this one) but I wanted to give my own two cents. War does have alot of worries in this day in age (Media more powerful today and all that) and wont end in a week (which I'm sure the majority of anti-war people think the US is big and strong enough to win a war in a week. It can, but they wouldn't like to process  ) Me, I was too young to have my own opinion when it started, but found it ridiculas what the anti-war people were proposing (immediate withdraw, talk with Iran, com'on). I wish that I knew more about foreign affairs more, but we are in this now, and need to finish it.
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Leave Iraq?
Fact: we left Viet Nam in 1975.
Fact: Afterwards, the killing fields sprang up. Pol Pot did not fear USA because we left, and did not expect us to enter a war in the near future.
Fact: The Killing Fields and other Khmer Rouge activity killed 2.2 million people in four years. If we stayed in Viet Nam, those figures could be avoided.
McCain '08 |
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JD-sama
Minister of Truth
Post #56055
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Posted: Fri 2008-05-23 01:18
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| Politics: Communist |
Country: United Kingdom |
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Post Rating: 0.0/4 (0 votes cast) |
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| motch_master wrote: |
| Hi all. As you can tell, I'm new here. love the content. I wanted to say this since I joined, but wasn't sure how to put it until now. |
Welcome to the board.
| Quote: |
First, I'ld like to say that I think that this is the sickest batch of opinions I've read (I support freedom of speech, so you have every right to say these things). Of course we should support the troopes. Their job is hard enough. They volunteered to join the military to protect our country from outside threats. You don't like the war, so you won't support the troopes? Fine, just don't go crawling to them when a war that you support comes along. It's one or the other, you can't have both.
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Ouchie ^^.
Like I said before this debate has great potential to be confused by semantics. What exactly do we mean by support? For this reason I think it's more sensible to examine the reasons given for support rather than support itself.
If the support we give them is merely a product of the difficulty and danger of their profession then it is logically given to all troops of the world; I can understand this support but I would probably use the word respect.
If we support the troops in doing things we disagree with because they also pledge to defend us and our nation state then we are bound to support the troops regardless of their action. We support the troops the troops who degrade prisoners on a caprice, who rape and murder. This is obviously not why we support an individual, the adoption of a duty we support does not provide an unconditional guarantee of support regardless of other actions.
Perhaps we support troops because they only engage in actions we disagree with the under command of their superiors whilst the actions they partake in without command are ones we support.
In most other fields of argument we don't find this ,I was only following orders, argument very convincing. Knowingly taking an immoral action is rarely justified successfully simply by pleading to hierarchy. This said, I have some sympathy for this position, perhaps a certain degree of unquestioning hierarchy is necessary for defence.
In this particular case, however, it seems that the troops had many opportunities to voice protest or resign their positions before conflict, this would have caused problems for them and we can all understand their choice not to do so, but do we support it?
I also disagree with your "it's one or the other" assertion, a military force is not some unified conscience that will get offended if we condemn one of its actions. Troops make a choice in the advent of every war, sometimes we will desire the troops to obey and sometime dissent, to support a particular choice is only logical. Claiming to support the troops regardless of this choice is just insultingly disingenuous; unless support means nothing more than " I hope you don't die".
| Quote: |
About the war in Iraq, do you want to pay outragous for oil? Don't tell me that Iran wont fill the void if we leave. Remember what happened when we left Veit Nam? Cambodia, Khmer Rouge, Killing fields? Google it. When we left Viet Nam in 1975, the killing fields started up. Proof. Proof that to save 10,000+ American troops, 2,200,000 had to die the next 4 years. Is an American's life worth so much more then a foreigner's?
(BTW, I know that there are alot of untapped sources in NA, but since those enviromentalists get their way, not that I don't support protecting the enviroment, that wont be an option.)
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The idea of americans paying outrageous prices for oil is actually kinda funny. Seriously though, do you think that your nation as a whole will turn a profit from this escapade? Is it morally supportable to wage wars in order to secure resources for personal consumption?
I actually agree that coalition forces shouldn't withdraw, for similar reasons to OOTF, but that doesn't mean that people who think they should withdraw should support them in not doing so.
| Quote: |
Another thing, Iraq posses no threat, Afganistan posess co threat, We can even survive Iran. We went into Afganistan because we wanted to get rid of terrorists, and the Afgan gov't wouldn't do it. We asked, several times, but they wouldn't. In Iraq, the UN were telling the Iraq gov't to stop performing acts of genocide, etc, but Sudam wouldn't budge. That little useless entity called the League of Nations... Ya, the UN was becoming like that. I don't agree with Bush's domestic policy's, but he is right on the ticket on foreign policies.
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I don't actually have a problem per se with forceful interference in non-democratic sovereign states. That said, a full scale ground war and the dismantling of an already splintered state always seemed wrong minded to me. There are many military options which don't involve creating chaos, despite their religious bluster and saber rattling dictatorships are rarely in power through lack of common sense, they can be threatened, bribed and forced into more amenable positions without clumsily lopping off the hydra's head.
Also, genocide in iraq hasn't been a major factor since '91. Sadam had many other questionable human rights policies but I believe the issue was with a theoretical ability of Sadam to perform further acts of Kurdish, or otherwise, genocide not that he was currently performing them. All in all these factors likely played an almost non-existent role in the actual decision to invade.
The UN is made useless largely by countries like the US treating it in the way you describe.
| Quote: |
Show of hands, who here says "I don't agree with Bush on X," but instead says "BUSH IS A FREAKIN NAWTZI WAR CRINIMAL!!!" Like in this day in age, it's okay to criticize someone who is performing the most difficult job in the free world... in the planet. Does the US population watch a miner doing his job everyday, and half the populace hate him? I don't think so.
Finaly, if you see someone being raped, what do you do? Would you do something about it, or would you do what I hear alot, not get envolved. Hey, the rapist is not a threat to you.
(I'm sure that there are some people out there nodding their heads up and down. for that, good for you) |
Of course it's ok to criticise people in public office, noone is saying that it's an easy job but the whole point of the position is that it is open to criticism.
Miners are accountable to their bosses whom are accountable to their customers, a great deal of criticism falls allong these relations. Democratic head's of government/state are accountable to the citizenry and that citizenry should never hold back their criticism.
As to your rapist analogy, applying this to nation states the first world should probably invade and rule over most of the third world. We tried that trick before and it didn't work too well. Furthermore such a justification for intervention would suggest we tackle the most egregious human rights violations first. Iraq might have been a contender in the past, and egregious it certainly is, but in terms of immediacy surely the US should have invaded N. Korea, Sudan and Myanmar first?
_________________
"I wanted to know the world that was outside of the well.
So I tried hard to get out from the bottom of the well.
I wanted to know the world that was outside of the well.
So I climbed up numerous of times despite falling down over and over again.
But then I realized it.
The higher and higher I climb, the pain increases when I fall down again.
When my interest in the world outside of the well began to equal the amount of pain,
That was when I finally realized the meaning of the story to Der Froschkönig."
-Frederica Bernkastel |
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One Of The Few
Minister of Truth
Post #56063
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Posted: Fri 2008-05-23 12:40
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| Politics: National Libertarian-Capitalist |
Country: Scotland |
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Post Rating: 0.0/4 (0 votes cast) |
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| motch_master wrote: |
| War does have alot of worries in this day in age (Media more powerful today and all that) and wont end in a week (which I'm sure the majority of anti-war people think the US is big and strong enough to win a war in a week. It can, but they wouldn't like to process ) Me, I was too young to have my own opinion when it started, but found it ridiculas what the anti-war people were proposing (immediate withdraw, talk with Iran, com'on). |
I agree that most people don't understand the implications of military conflict. In fact, I think that people on both sides of the fence and indeed some people well up the political hirearchy don't understand how tough a ground war is, especially in urban areas.
To give some idea of this, in military terms, there are disturbing parallels between fighting in Iraq and fighting in Stalingrad. Both the German army of the day and the modern coalition armies (particularly the UK and USA) were highly equipped, multi-faceted (air power plus artillery power plus land power) and were facing a vastly inferior force in terms of training and weaponary. However, air power is pretty useless in a confrontational urban scenario, as are tanks and aritillery. The two hardest kinds of warfare for an advanced army are jungle (sorry, rainforest) warfare and urban (sorry, African-American) warfare, since these kinds of wars take away many of the key advantages of an advanced army over a guerilla force.
I actually don't think talking with Iran is such a bad idea, but it has to be done properly. Though I credit it more to difficulties, I think the current US administration has handled Iran relatively well (considering the circumstances) by combining dialogue with the threat of military force. Also, by threatening strategic bombing rather than invasion, their threats actually have some credibility. The Iranian leadership is I think a much more straightforward partner in such dialogue than good ol' Saddam, since the Iranian leadership is collective (so it's more cautious) and accountable (to the top ayatollahs, who are nothing if not coldly pragmatic) so this kind of diplomacy is more likely to work.
| motch_master wrote: |
| I wish that I knew more about foreign affairs more, but we are in this now, and need to finish it. |
A good online source on US foreign affairs (both modern and historical) is time.com, the website of the famous magazine. They have quite a loose editorial line, so there is a lot of different perspectives. They also go into a lot more detail and research issues more deeply than even a good broadsheet newspaper, so the article quality tends to be good. Their back issues section is also an excellent way to get an idea of what was going on in the middle-to-upper class attitudes towards the Vietnam war in the mid-1970s. A lot of understanding foreign affairs is just reading as much about issues as possible and then trying to fit them together.
_________________
If you can't say what you mean then you'll never mean what you say
God holds no fears
Death no worries
And while good is readily attainable
Evil is readily endurable |
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maslo2727
Filthy Animal
Post #58550
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Posted: Sun 2009-01-18 02:48
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| Politics: World Revolution |
Country: United States of Oppression |
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it has nothing to do with the troops... its the damn 'democracy' that send troops out there... as for respecting them... it'd probably be best to be on the 'good side' bc when this place goes to hell, it'd be nice to have someone with training watching your back..
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I reject your reality and substitute my own! |
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Azazel
Committee Leader
Post #58588
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Posted: Thu 2009-01-22 23:42
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| Politics: Democratic Socialist |
Country: United States |
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Post Rating: 0.0/4 (0 votes cast) |
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| Quote: |
| it has nothing to do with the troops... its the damn 'democracy' that send troops out there... as for respecting them... it'd probably be best to be on the 'good side' bc when this place goes to hell, it'd be nice to have someone with training watching your back.. |
as I have already said, "democracy ordered me to do it" is not a valid excuse for killing innocent people, and if this place did go to hell, you can bet that the U.S. military had a hand in it.
_________________
"that doesn't make it right, just makes a whole lot of people wrong"-BSG
"Freedom is the freedom to say that 2+2 = 4 if that is granted, all else follows"-Orwell
Right and wrong are not concrete, rather they are relative to one's nature and nurture and fluctuate between each person.
"If you let him... he will broke your arm"-coach borris.
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