-----BEGIN PGP SIGNED MESSAGE----- James wrote:
What is this, Henry Kissinger's vanity website or something? It reads like one of his Nixon era State Dept. memos on Vietnam or some shit. Pure felgercarb.
What objective criteria do you use to tell good analysis from bad?
Mr. Bin Laden must be flattered no end if he thinks that the U.S. reallly considers him personally, or even his entire organization, that much of a menace.
You mean the way some people around here are convinced that this list will somehow be declared a terrorist organization? Like that?
Doubt he's that stupid, though.
Probably not. ~F. -----BEGIN PGP SIGNATURE----- Version: Hush 2.0 wl8EARECAB8FAju3g1EYHGF1dG8zMDEwOTRAaHVzaG1haWwuY29tAAoJEKadvsVlUK4P hxcAnjQynztwyO7pYffppJLeL7XstFXPAJ43NKHs9i2t3XCWpdjwF0LN3fe14g== =UPMk -----END PGP SIGNATURE-----
auto301094@hushmail.com wrote:
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James wrote:
What is this, Henry Kissinger's vanity website or something? It reads like one of his Nixon era State Dept. memos on Vietnam or some shit. Pure felgercarb.
What objective criteria do you use to tell good analysis from bad?
dict.org cites Webster's Revised Unabridged Dictionary (1913): War War, n. OE. & AS. werre; akin to OHG. werra scandal, quarrel, sedition, werran to confound, mix, D. warren, G. wirren, verwirren, to embroil, confound, disturb, and perhaps to E. worse; cf. OF. werre war, F. querre, of Teutonic origin. Cf. Guerrilla, Warrior. 1. A contest between nations or states, carried on by force, whether for defence, for revenging insults and redressing wrongs, for the extension of commerce, for the acquisition of territory, for obtaining and establishing the superiority and dominion of one over the other, or for any other purpose; armed conflict of sovereign powers; declared and open hostilities. Men will ever distinguish war from mere bloodshed. --F. W. Robertson. Note: As war is the contest of nations or states, it always implies that such contest is authorized by the monarch or the sovereign power of the nation. A war begun by attacking another nation, is called an offensive war, and such attack is aggressive. War undertaken to repel invasion, or the attacks of an enemy, is called defensive. This is not the definition used in the analysis, which references the much-bandied "war on terrorism". Granted that the English language is no longer what it was after nearly a century of concerted corruption through constant misuse by all stripes of propagandists, disinformation artists, and damned liars, but any analysis that supplants shoddy analogies and metaphor for precise usage (and I'm wondering for what reason) is suspect. Also granted that this is what the politicians are touting, with only tangential suggestions of conflict with other states. That's just for starters. It gets worse from there. Since that's the major premise of the article, though, I see no point in proceeding further.
Mr. Bin Laden must be flattered no end if he thinks that the U.S. reallly considers him personally, or even his entire organization, that much of a menace.
You mean the way some people around here are convinced that this list will somehow be declared a terrorist organization? Like that?
Or like the way governments have got into the habit of placing individuals into roles formerly reserved for nations and states. They should be more careful about that. Sets a dangerous precedent, if you ask me.I don't think the idea is to acknowledge sovereign powers, either, incur an obligation to treat with, etc., but that's the inescapable conclusion. Better hope the sheep don't look up, huh?
Doubt he's that stupid, though.
Probably not.
~F.
Some people may hope he is. jbdigriz
on Sun, Sep 30, 2001 at 05:55:50PM -0400, James B. DiGriz (jbdigriz@dragonsweb.org) wrote:
auto301094@hushmail.com wrote:
dict.org cites Webster's Revised Unabridged Dictionary (1913):
War War, n. OE. & AS. werre; akin to OHG. werra scandal,
<...>
1. A contest between nations or states, carried on by force,
<...>
Note: As war is the contest of nations or states, it always implies that such contest is authorized by the monarch or the sovereign power of the nation.
Which neatly gets you into the problem of what to call a "civil war".
I've had this discussion with several European friends. Seems there's a
few definitions of "war" to be found, even in standard dictionaries.
Not all refer to nations or states. Others may note that a "nation" is
not identical to a "state". There are stateless nations (e.g.:
Palestine), and states which are host to people of several nations
(e.g.: the Swiss Federation).
I use the somewhat informal, though largely conformant, definitions of:
Nation: a group of people identified by common culture, language,
beliefs, or institutions. (my own distilation)
War: armed hostilities, especially between nations. (The Oxford
Encyclopedic English Dictionary).
One of the most asinine arguments I've heard to date was a commentator
on the BBC/PRI "The World" radio program a couple of weeks back. Her
statement was that by calling this "a war", the US was validating the
deaths at the WTC/P5 attacks as casualties of war.
Bollox.
Deaths aren't justified or not. What declaring war (formally or
otherwise) does is put both combatents and other parties on notice (as
the US was most decidedly not prior to the attacks) that there is a
state of armed hostilities. Actions supportive of the (admittedly ill
defined) enemy may be construed as acts of war against the US. And
innocents are best advised to stay out of the hot zone.
Peace. By any means.
--
Karsten M. Self
At 03:25 PM 9/30/2001 -0700, Karsten M. Self wrote:
One of the most asinine arguments I've heard to date was a commentator on the BBC/PRI "The World" radio program a couple of weeks back. Her statement was that by calling this "a war", the US was validating the deaths at the WTC/P5 attacks as casualties of war.
Bollox.
Deaths aren't justified or not. What declaring war (formally or otherwise) does is put both combatents and other parties on notice (as the US was most decidedly not prior to the attacks) that there is a state of armed hostilities. Actions supportive of the (admittedly ill defined) enemy may be construed as acts of war against the US. And innocents are best advised to stay out of the hot zone.
This is IMHO naive. Have you ever been in a brawl? Unlike most silver screen fights my experience is that the first person to get in a good one usually decks the opponent and its over. If the first one to throw the punch can sneak up on the opponent or create over confidence in the other party by getting them to think that no violent reply will be forthcoming if attacked (in New York we called that "sucker punching") then the odds of success are that much more increased. "The Art of War" is still a good source of combat advice. steve
-----BEGIN PGP SIGNED MESSAGE----- Hash: SHA1 on Sun, Sep 30, 2001 at 03:45:07PM -0700, Steve Schear (schear@lvcm.com) wrote:
At 03:25 PM 9/30/2001 -0700, Karsten M. Self wrote:
One of the most asinine arguments I've heard to date was a commentator on the BBC/PRI "The World" radio program a couple of weeks back. Her statement was that by calling this "a war", the US was validating the deaths at the WTC/P5 attacks as casualties of war.
Bollox.
Deaths aren't justified or not. What declaring war (formally or otherwise) does is put both combatents and other parties on notice (as the US was most decidedly not prior to the attacks) that there is a state of armed hostilities. Actions supportive of the (admittedly ill defined) enemy may be construed as acts of war against the US. And innocents are best advised to stay out of the hot zone.
This is IMHO naive. Have you ever been in a brawl?
Have you ever been in a brawl where one side (or both) has friends?
Unlike most silver screen fights my experience is that the first person to get in a good one usually decks the opponent and its over. If the first one to throw the punch can sneak up on the opponent or create over confidence in the other party by getting them to think that no violent reply will be forthcoming if attacked (in New York we called that "sucker punching") then the odds of success are that much more increased. "The Art of War" is still a good source of combat advice.
Sucker punching tends to violate the norms of honorable conduct. If you
down the first guy, but have to deal with three of his friends, the
issue becomes a bit less clear cut. Concepts of "unfair advantage" tend
to escalate: sucker punches lead to friends, knives, back alleys,
and/or heat.
That's more or less where the perps of the 9/11 attacks find themselves
at the moment.
The other side of the argument is the bee'n'the bull theory. Sure, the
bee can get in the first lick, but you've now got one pissed-off bull.
If your sucker punch *doesn't* land the fellow, you've got consequences
to deal with. I'd say the US is currently stung, but by no means
hurting in any diminished-capacity sense of the word. This doesn't
strike be as good strategic thinking on our oponents' part.
I did make a halfhearted attempt to search through TAoW looking at
strategic guidelines. I'll give it another shot and see what I turn up.
Peace.
- --
Karsten M. Self
"Karsten M. Self" wrote:
There are stateless nations (e.g.: Palestine), and states which are host to people of several nations (e.g.: the Swiss Federation).
In fact it is the normal condition. China, India, Russia, Indonesia, Iran, and even our very own UK. All put together, well over half the population of the world.
participants (5)
-
auto301094＠hushmail.com -
James B. DiGriz -
Karsten M. Self -
Ken Brown -
Steve Schear