From: Charles Hixson (charleshixsn@earthlink.net)
Date: Wed Mar 26 2003 - 11:43:20 MST
Lee Corbin wrote:
>Cory writes
>
> ...
>
>>So, here, most Iraqis must know that they cannot win
>>against any one of the coalition nations in an all out
>>war, let alone all of them. If to them, being overrun
>>by the infidels or western imperialists, or whatever
>>association the may rightly or wrongly have, is the
>>worst fate, then they logically must do anything they
>>can to circumvent this.
>>
>>
>
>"Anything"? You are putting forth the interesting
>thesis that any act is justified in order to avoid
>losing a war. There are pluses to this view, and
>minuses.
>
>
...
>Lee
>
>
Justified is an interesting word. Perhaps a better term would be "an
expected reaction". I don't see much on either side that is
justifiable, in any absolute sense. In a more limited sense,
self-defense is normally recognized as legitimate. But as to what
should be an expected reaction... here we get back to theft being a
hanging offense. If they see they have nothing to loose, then one
should expect them to do all they can, for revenge if not for victory.
Once you have killed their children, most people would have few scruples
at violating normal ethics to achieve revenge. It's one of the most
powerful motivators that people have. (In the bible "Vengence is mine,
saith the Lord", particularlly to eliminate it as a legitimate ethical
basis for one individual revenging himself on another.) So you had
better expect it if you go in for mass bombing of civilian locations.
And we haven't been as scrupulous as we were claiming we would be. So
we had better expect extreme reactions by some reasonable fraction of
the populace.
In short, they've got good reason to hate our guts. (Thank you, Mr.
President.)
-- -- Charles Hixson Gnu software that is free, The best is yet to be.
This archive was generated by hypermail 2.1.5 : Wed Mar 26 2003 - 11:50:28 MST