Aswad
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Joined: 4/4/2007
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quote:
ORIGINAL: vincentML
See my reply to Kirata at #146
I did. I've read every post in the thread, and I'm fairly certain you meant #148.
I will not insult the non-conscripted members of the armed forces of any nation by presuming to call them victims. They knew what was expected of them, and signed up for it. Nor will I insult the general population of the USA by suggesting that their moral fortitude is inferior to that of citizens of other nations. There isn't a sufficient body of evidence to infer a difference on a population level. Accordingly, a different answer must be sought as to why the USA is disporportionately involved in this sort of thing.
No rational person will dispute that the war was ill-advised, or that politics are doing their deficient thing, as always. But you seem to neglect the important point that a military will either answer to itself, or to the civilians (generally through a government as a proxy for the civilians). It is generally recognized as preferrable that the military answer to the civilians. That being so, the government, which is in the final analysis an extension of its people in any democracy, or any society- formally democratic or not- which is capable of replacing it with a democracy, sets a course and the military follows that course to the best of their abilities. It is unavoidable that the civilians will not have a military appreciation of the cost of a war in human terms, and will thus allow things less important than lives to influence the course set. As such, this system does what it is supposed to do, even though the people- and the government as an extension of them- do the wrong thing.
This happens in all countries, and those that are concerned with having a professional military take the necessary steps to ensure that the servicemen in all branches are screened, trained, supervised and monitored, with an eye to eliminating any servicemen that are unable to participate meaningfully in the service rendered by such a military. Sometimes, a rotation is all it takes, and other times there's nothing you can do to habilitate or rehabilitate them, and then you have to let them go. How important their function is, and their potential for damage, is a vital part of deciding what measures to take. Maybe you can't afford mistakes, like in Afghanistan, and then you have to get them off the front lines, regardless of whether the means is a desk job or discharge. If their constitution does not improve to the point where they can serve gainfully, there is no other option than to keep them off the front lines permanently.
The USA does not do this properly. As a consequence, some American soldiers kill their brothers in arms, some commit war crimes, and some bungle their missions. Such things are not unheard of in armed forces that are more concerned with the level of professionalism, but they are much less frequent. You will note that there are, for instance, several reports of excesses among UK troops in the Iraqi prison system, but even the number of allegations are fewer than for the US ones.
Using my own country as an example, we have definitely had some instances of people showing pressure.
When an IED took out Jokke, the servicemen in 4th Mechanized Infantry were noted to be more eager to engage for a while, with a willingness to accept greater risk to accomplish the mission than was considered ideal. There were a few incidents of doors being spray painted with the 'Punisher' logo, as well, and concerns that the target verification might have been sub par- albeit well within ROE- during the offensive where the man who made the IED in question was the primary target. Such was more than sufficient to replace the CO, on account of having failed to nip a possibly negative trend in the bud. At no point was it even suggested that they might have jeopardized their missions, or their allies. The matter was, however, seen as serious because it might evolve into unacceptable attitudes.
Note that this was during the offensive phase of the war. Stricter standards apply now.
The mission has evolved. It's about facilitating the provincial reconstruction efforts, training the Afghan forces, hitting the financial supports of the various enemies (as you hopefully know, the Taliban is one of five major factions we're in war with in Afghanistan), arresting enemy higher-ups and handing them off to the Afghan courts (going on a hundred with no civilian casualties so far, how's yours doing?) and generally prepping the place for a graceful exit with as little backlash as possible. One result has been opening negotiations with the Taliban.
The job is sensitive, and pissing on corpses will make it harder.
In other words, those men were not doing their jobs, but rather the enemies' jobs, which is treason in any practical sense. That's one of many reasons why codes and discipline matter. Because they're costing lives, and potentially the stability of a fragile country in one of the most critically unstable regions of the world. Because if they had a code and the discipline to stick to it, they would know that whatever they do, they don't fuck up the mission to blow off steam. Hand over their guns, yes. Sit down and cry, yes. Vegetate, yes. Suicide, maybe. Mess things up for everyone else, no. Shoot everyone in the mess hall, no. Piss on the corpses of people they're trying to end hostilities with, fuck no.
Just because the politicians are incompetent doesn't mean a serviceman has to emulate that example.
quote:
Just a matter of degrees.
With all due respect, I would like to question the grounds for that assertion, if you can disclose it.
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People die and are maimed and you play with semantics. FFS!!
People die and are maimed and you make nonsensical statements about how there can be no goobledygooky wars, so it seems quite appropriate to try to bring semantics ("meaning") into the picture, yes. According to my notion of honor, an honorable war is possible. But my notion of honor likely has little relation to your use of the word, which seems closer to the colloquial meaning, in which case you might as well say "there can be no socially acceptable, civilized and posh wars of aggression", to which I would be inclined to reply "well, duh...".
quote:
Clearly you have no concept of what shit-in-your-pants atrocities and blow-your-head-off artillary takes place on battlefields. If you can cite more horrific activities please do so.
The same activities (quality) take place on a smaller scale (quantity) outside of battlefields.
Civilians in peacetime have certainly undertaken similar activities.
Among ones I have seen, I could mention people being jointed or impaled or eaten alive. Those are not unique to the battlefield, and it's not something I would want to witness again. No doubt, you know as well as I do that such is not the full extent of what people do to other people in civilian conflicts, and that it would be pointless to list them all. In a war, on a battlefield, scale enters into the picture, but the atrocities remain the same.
As wars go, the one in Afghanistan is nowhere near the worst ones in terms of what atrocities occur, with what frequency they occur, or how many people are subjected to atrocities. Nanking alone exceeds the sum of the both the war in Iraq and the war in Afghanistan, both in numbers, frequency and range of atrocities. In short, the net suffering is less.
To be clear, I'm not suggesting the war in Afghanistan is trivial or benign.
I'm simply saying that lumping all wars together is selling short a huge amount of human suffering.
quote:
To quote the Brando character Special Forces Coionel Walter E. Kurtz in Apocalyse Now: Oh, the humanity! the humanity!
I believe the line was "Oh, the horror... the horror."
Health,
al-Aswad.
_____________________________
"If God saw what any of us did that night, he didn't seem to mind.
From then on I knew: God doesn't make the world this way.
We do." -- Rorschack, Watchmen.
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RE: The actions of a few disgrace all allied troops. - 
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