Comments on: Being freed doesn’t end the suffering for the kidnapped girls of Boko Haram

By: Richard Aubrey

Richard Aubrey — Tue, 05 Apr 2016 20:15:19 +0000

y81. Not to pull MOS on you but mine were 11B10 and 71542. The latter was old style–now it would be 11Asomething or other–for Airborne Infantry Small Unit Commander.
So I’m not talking a tactical situation, but an example of something so horrible that we might not do it, or might not do it until too late. It might include nuking somebody.
However, use of tear gas is illegal. Neither tear gas nor rubber bullets get any sympathy or benefit of the doubt from slightly over half of our citizens, none of the dem party, none of academe, and none of the media.
However, to get to your point. Some places are so valuable they have to be defended on the ground from fixed positions. Maneuverability would only be useful to get a better shot at the attackers. Can you imagine the PR effect of, for example, mowing down a bunch of fourteen year old girls? Or tear gassing them?
Gas is only legal when used against US citizens–see Waco.

By: y81

y81 — Tue, 05 Apr 2016 19:59:02 +0000

Richard Aubrey: U.S. troops facing Iranians would not take static defensive positions, like the Iraqis, but would utilize their superior mobility. So deploying waves of 14 year old boys would not be a viable tactic. Additionally, such a tactic might work once, but after that, it would be easy to deploy non-lethal means (tear gas, rubber bullets) against troops so lightly armed.

By: Assistant Village Idiot

Assistant Village Idiot — Tue, 05 Apr 2016 14:15:13 +0000

My son’s experience in Rwanda suggests that some find healing years later, but not all, and never complete. There are specific ministries that take on this work, and they have trouble raising money. I have made my living working with human tragedy, but this one is beyond me. I could not do it.

By: Richard Aubrey

Richard Aubrey — Tue, 05 Apr 2016 10:57:41 +0000

blert.
I think they should be called “The Three Inevitable Conclusions” in that nothing visible seems to contradict them.
I suppose an example of the “too horrible” issue would be:
US troops facing Iran ground forces. As in the Iran-Iraq war, the Iranians get a bunch of kids and give them each a plastic key[to heaven] and, this time, two hand grenades. Thousands of them. Instead of using them to clear mines, the kids are sent at US lines in masses.
Let them come in with their grenades…or kill them.
Kids. You know that slightly over half of our citizens and about 110% or our media would blame US troops for the atrocity. All the dem party. All of academia.
And then it’s some of the most horrible PTSD one could conceive for the troops.
Unless they held their fire and died.
In which case, slightly over half the population would say the Iranians were pretty slick, by golly.

By: blert

blert — Tue, 05 Apr 2016 10:12:55 +0000

Aesop — the reference was to “The Three Conjectures”

That’s the magic search phrase.

By: AesopFan

AesopFan — Tue, 05 Apr 2016 03:14:53 +0000

Richard Aubrey Says:
April 4th, 2016 at 4:06 pm…
Some time back, Richard Fernandez of Belmont Club speculated if Islamist terror organizations would ever manage to put together a tactic or strategy to which the answer, the only answer, is so horrible we might not do it. Or might wait until too late.
* * *
I didn’t find the article you refer to, but this one (from 2003, which is early indeed) comes close to making the same point:
http://belmontclub.blogspot.com/2003/08/are-suicide-attacks-ultimate-weapon.html
“Suicide bombing is warfare’s least cost effective weapon because it puts any consideration of a negotiated settlement between the combatants out of the question. In economic terms, it destroys the Pareto optimal frontier and reduces conflict to a zero-sum game. …When faced with a fanatical enemy bent on killing everyone the battlefield choices are rapidly narrowed to either the acceptance of your own destruction or the total annihilation of the enemy. And it is the zero-sum game that Islam should fear. For the value of that game is the expected value that Islam will annihilate the world minus the expected value that the world will annihilate Islam. … And the eventual reaction of nuclear-armed Israel, Russia and India to the unlimited slaughter of their populations does not bear thinking upon. And it will not be surrender, but rather something else. That is the cost effectiveness of suicide bombing.”

I found it via this very interesting article exploring a number of plausible scenarios with the same burden – how bad does bad have to get, before something really bad is forced upon us?

http://markhumphrys.com/islamism.nightmares.html
“If the West was going to go down, if our very existence was under threat, if the barbarians threatened to destroy everything we have achieved over the last thousand years, would we use our nukes? I think we would have to, to survive, and the moral blame would lie with the aggressors.”

By: Nick

Nick — Tue, 05 Apr 2016 00:46:39 +0000

Unless your culture had its passport stamped in Athens, Jerusalem, and Rome, it probably shouldn’t be called a civilization. There’s no pleasant way to communicate that fact.

By: Sharon W

Sharon W — Mon, 04 Apr 2016 23:51:36 +0000

Thank you, Neo, for putting yet another face on evil in our present times.

By: Geoffrey Britain

Geoffrey Britain — Mon, 04 Apr 2016 23:40:22 +0000

“If you are not prepared to use force to defend civilization, then be prepared to accept barbarism.” — Thomas Sowell "This is truly evil, the way they were treated by Boko Haram." Lizzy They are simply following orders... Allah's.

By: y81

y81 — Mon, 04 Apr 2016 23:08:40 +0000

tibby: Take it up with Jonathan Swift or Charlie Chaplin.