Quote:
Originally Posted by That Guy
congrats on misreading this thread and missing the point.
Taking down brutal dictators or those that target americans isn't something i'm against. it's the willingness to flush thousands of non combatants in the crossfire that i'm seeing in these threads thats the issue. the only point i've been making is that killing the wrong people doesn't help anyone.
we did that in vietnam, and it didn't help us there. it's happened quite a bit in iraq and afghanistan and it just makes it harder to "win" or accomplish the mission or whatever when you say "hey, we're here to help" right before you blow up the wrong town.
the "wars" or conflicts or whatever you want to call them against non nation states requires a LOT of intel and discipline in targetting or you end up taking two steps foward and three steps back. which just lets you pile up bodies and further bad will. fighting to fight is nice and all, but if you're not moving towards the end game, you're losing.
again, my point is simply that going in and killing whoever "just cause" doesn't work or help us in the long run. trust me, it's been done. and it has nothing to do with hugging trees.
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Are you even responding to my posts? Where did I express a willingness to flush thousands of non combatants in the crossfire, or not to care about killing "the wrong people"? Why insult me accusing me of "misreading the thread", when you make a reply to me not addressing anything I said?
You said we deliberately killed people for being in the wrong place, that we shoot everything in sight. I pointed out those premises are faulty. And that you misapplied the "abusive husbands" situation in excusing a mobs reaction to violence. Feel free to try defending your strawmen now, if you want. But please don't accuse me of missing the point of the thread when you don't even address the point you reply to.
So what is this latest post of yours about? Lots of intel and discipline are needed to fight non-nation states? We actually tried that in vietnam, iraq, and afghanistan. So I'm not really sure what or who you're arguing against. We've gotten better at it through the years. Not because we're more virtuous people percentage-wise now than before, but from experience and tech. Yet we still hit the wrong house, the wrong people on occasion. Do you think we as a people, or whole armed forces, do it deliberately? Do you think that real life weapons and people have become perfect like some video game? Or do you realize you're arguing for more of the same?
PS. Look at reports of drones in Afghanistan and Pakistan. High resolution cameras are no more accurate at picking out who's who than eyes of people on the ground. With drones, we've just decided we can shoot without getting local confirmation. This has had mixed results, we can shoot at people we think are the bad guys more quickly, but we're still also hitting "the wrong people" you cite.