NationStates Jolt Archive

We're not facing an enemy like we've ever faced before. We're not using tactics that we've ever used before. Civillians aren't always innocent, and fourteen year olds carry AK47s. People are fighting us with no objective but to create fear, and they're causing damage to us while leaving nothing for us to strike back against.

Our forces may be twenty first century, but our laws date back to the Romans. We're fighting with our hands tied in a world where pregnant women deliver bombs, And still we're supposed to adhere to international laws? The laws of nature don't even apply here.

The laws were written at a time and a place when you could tell the difference between peacetime and wartime. And we can't any more. So rather than just breaking the law, why don't we write some rules which we can fight a war against terror by?

We're not facing an enemy like we've ever faced before. We're not using tactics that we've ever used before. Civillians aren't always innocent, and fourteen year olds carry AK47s. People are fighting us with no objective but to create fear, and they're causing damage to us while leaving nothing for us to strike back against.

Our forces may be twenty first century, but our laws date back to the Romans. We're fighting with our hands tied in a world where pregnant women deliver bombs, And still we're supposed to adhere to international laws? The laws of nature don't even apply here.

The laws were written at a time and a place when you could tell the difference between peacetime and wartime. And we can't any more. So rather than just breaking the law, why don't we write some rules which we can fight a war against terror by?
I think a reordering is inevitable. The Treaty of Westphalia inspired system of states as primaries is collapsing as borders become physically porous and intellectually meaningless. There is a lot of work to be done in the field of political philosophy. We need to integrate non-state actors fully into our perspective. That means, for example, rewriting the Geneva Conventions.

so lets make make toucher leage and to hell with the Geneva convation its just a waste of good paper


The US has clamed the moral highroad on this war and its more and more acting like its enemy its sad when you think about it

We can try rewriting international law, but there's one flaw: hardly anyone ever follows it. If anything, international law should reflect natural law better, without the foo-foo additions that are found in such documents like the UN Charter, the Law of the Sea, or the Geneva Protocol.

I never understood how they enforced international law.

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We can try rewriting international law, but there's one flaw: hardly anyone ever follows it. Nah, y-think?

If anything, international law should reflect natural law better, without the foo-foo additions that are found in such documents like the UN Charter, the Law of the Sea, or the Geneva Protocol.Go on then, take a shot at writing a law or a clause like you suggest. We'll see if it works.

Where were you when I called for a revision to the Geneva Conventions and had 4 people all over my ass saying that the world is the same? :P

I've never liked "Rules to War". War is a situation of last resort where all rules have failed.
The only "rule" to war for a soldier is to protect those you've sworn to protect. That generally means you kill the other side before they can kill you. It's wrong to handicap your ability to protect your people. If a prisoner knows of something that will kill many lives, how is it moral to limit the methods you can use to learn that intel and save those lives? If a person is helping your enemy in any way, how can you not eliminate them?

The US has clamed the moral highroad on this war and its more and more acting like its enemy its sad when you think about itSo lets write something that lets us preserve life, liberty and security, rather than sacrificing one for the other two

Where were you when I called for a revision to the Geneva Conventions and had 4 people all over my ass saying that the world is the same? :PSleeping?

Note that rewriting international "law" (better called conventions since there is no international authority that isn't actually a national authority on loan) is useless until the political-philosophical groundwork is done for us to understand exactly what the modern global system is all about. Even the word "international" is a relic, as it presupposes the interaction of nations. So rewriting the Geneva Conventions or any other document would be premature for the time being. But until this work is done we're going to continue to have a chaotic system that nobody understands.

Not so easy--international law basically means treaties and conventions that we've locked ourselves into through the combination of Senate approval and Presidential signature. It's equally difficult to get out of them as a result.

Basically, we'd have to get the Senate to overturn the various treaties we've made with foreign powers that deal with the treatment of prisoners, etc., or we'll have to negotiate new ones. Needless to say, since our treatment of prisoners in Abu Ghraib has come to light, and especially since it looks more and more like the orders to torture prisoners came from the very top (giving the order and trying to find a way around the conventions so you can get away with it are the same in my book, especially when you stretch the law the way these mo-mos have done it), it's going to be tough to get our international partners to go along with us on this.

And honestly, I don't think it would be a good idea anyway. We are supposed to abide by these rules of war because we believe in the essential human dignity of everyone--theoretically, at least. We are supposed to have honor that these enemies lack.

In the end, that honor is important, unless we just plan to conquer like the Romans did--take over and be willing to kill everyone in the area if they resist, or at the very least, ship them off to another part of the empire and use them as slave labor. If we're serious about helping these people form their own stable government, though, then we have to abide by our own laws, even when they bite us in the ass. Otherwise, we're literally no better than the person we supposedly liberated them from.

We can try rewriting international law, but there's one flaw: hardly anyone ever follows it. Nah, y-think?

If anything, international law should reflect natural law better, without the foo-foo additions that are found in such documents like the UN Charter, the Law of the Sea, or the Geneva Protocol.Go on then, take a shot at writing a law or a clause like you suggest. We'll see if it works.
What I meant was natural law closer to what Cicero described. Cicero said that natural law was the basic ethics that most governments are founded on. War can override natural law with instincts, but it can be applied. Natural law has been, in a more or less modified form, the founding basis of nearly all governments. However, over the years, natural law has been distorted into an unneccessarily utopian interpretation. Cicero knew that humans could never live in true harmony, and natural law is based on that fact. However, I think that Geneva and other treaties try to say that the world must be a utopia.
If anything, international law should follow the lines of natural law: explicitly state the sovereignty of nations, describe violations of sovereignty, degrees of sovereignty, and what each nation has a right to do. It shouldn't address much else, especially concerning domestic law, which is the mistake international law of today frequently slips into.

Not so easy--international law basically means treaties and conventions that we've locked ourselves into through the combination of Senate approval and Presidential signature. It's equally difficult to get out of them as a result.

Basically, we'd have to get the Senate to overturn the various treaties we've made with foreign powers that deal with the treatment of prisoners, etc., or we'll have to negotiate new ones. Needless to say, since our treatment of prisoners in Abu Ghraib has come to light, and especially since it looks more and more like the orders to torture prisoners came from the very top (giving the order and trying to find a way around the conventions so you can get away with it are the same in my book, especially when you stretch the law the way these mo-mos have done it), it's going to be tough to get our international partners to go along with us on this.

And honestly, I don't think it would be a good idea anyway. We are supposed to abide by these rules of war because we believe in the essential human dignity of everyone--theoretically, at least. We are supposed to have honor that these enemies lack.

In the end, that honor is important, unless we just plan to conquer like the Romans did--take over and be willing to kill everyone in the area if they resist, or at the very least, ship them off to another part of the empire and use them as slave labor. If we're serious about helping these people form their own stable government, though, then we have to abide by our own laws, even when they bite us in the ass. Otherwise, we're literally no better than the person we supposedly liberated them from.
I don't think Spoffin is asking about the practiallity of rewriting international law. I feel, rather, he is asking if the world ought to redefine international law.

Not so easy--international law basically means treaties and conventions that we've locked ourselves into through the combination of Senate approval and Presidential signature. It's equally difficult to get out of them as a result.

Basically, we'd have to get the Senate to overturn the various treaties we've made with foreign powers that deal with the treatment of prisoners, etc., or we'll have to negotiate new ones. Needless to say, since our treatment of prisoners in Abu Ghraib has come to light, and especially since it looks more and more like the orders to torture prisoners came from the very top (giving the order and trying to find a way around the conventions so you can get away with it are the same in my book, especially when you stretch the law the way these mo-mos have done it), it's going to be tough to get our international partners to go along with us on this.

And honestly, I don't think it would be a good idea anyway. We are supposed to abide by these rules of war because we believe in the essential human dignity of everyone--theoretically, at least. We are supposed to have honor that these enemies lack.

In the end, that honor is important, unless we just plan to conquer like the Romans did--take over and be willing to kill everyone in the area if they resist, or at the very least, ship them off to another part of the empire and use them as slave labor. If we're serious about helping these people form their own stable government, though, then we have to abide by our own laws, even when they bite us in the ass. Otherwise, we're literally no better than the person we supposedly liberated them from.
I don't think Spoffin is asking about the practiallity of rewriting international law. I feel, rather, he is asking if the world ought to redefine international law.A strange day when I find myself agreeing with Purly Euclid rather than Incertonia, but yes, thats basicly what I'm saying. Its looking more and more like the rules which protect liberty aren't enough to protect life as well, and I'm wondering if we can't find a better middle ground.

The US has clamed the moral highroad on this war and its more and more acting like its enemy its sad when you think about it

You do know why the British lost the US Revolution? No, they didnt let us win.
We kicked their asses 'cause we had better tactics (No offense to modern Brits...if your a Revolutionary War vetran, your too old for me to care about you though :P), the Brits lined up in fields with their nice bright red coats and waited for us to line up as well, so we didnt.
We sat in trees and shot them with hunting rifles.
So, in the modern world a military uniform is basicaly the equivalent of a bright red coat, expecting the enemy to have a front line is like forming up in a solid line, and WWII tactics are dead.
I wouldnt advocate using civilians or children as soldiers, biological bombs and whatnot.
But like it or not, we are entering a new age of strategy and tactics. Sure, for a while it'll be like the (US, again) Civil War, where tactics were a bit unsure, you had weapons capable of firing more than once every thirty seconds, but people didnt know how to use them, so they lined their troops up the only way they knew how.
Toward the end people started getting the fact that this was not acceptable anymore, so they formed the first modern tactics, of course everybody pretty much forgot this in WWI which lead to horrible casualties and all that.

Not so easy--international law basically means treaties and conventions that we've locked ourselves into through the combination of Senate approval and Presidential signature. It's equally difficult to get out of them as a result.

Basically, we'd have to get the Senate to overturn the various treaties we've made with foreign powers that deal with the treatment of prisoners, etc., or we'll have to negotiate new ones. Needless to say, since our treatment of prisoners in Abu Ghraib has come to light, and especially since it looks more and more like the orders to torture prisoners came from the very top (giving the order and trying to find a way around the conventions so you can get away with it are the same in my book, especially when you stretch the law the way these mo-mos have done it), it's going to be tough to get our international partners to go along with us on this.

And honestly, I don't think it would be a good idea anyway. We are supposed to abide by these rules of war because we believe in the essential human dignity of everyone--theoretically, at least. We are supposed to have honor that these enemies lack.

In the end, that honor is important, unless we just plan to conquer like the Romans did--take over and be willing to kill everyone in the area if they resist, or at the very least, ship them off to another part of the empire and use them as slave labor. If we're serious about helping these people form their own stable government, though, then we have to abide by our own laws, even when they bite us in the ass. Otherwise, we're literally no better than the person we supposedly liberated them from.
I don't think Spoffin is asking about the practiallity of rewriting international law. I feel, rather, he is asking if the world ought to redefine international law.A strange day when I find myself agreeing with Purly Euclid rather than Incertonia, but yes, thats basicly what I'm saying. Its looking more and more like the rules which protect liberty aren't enough to protect life as well, and I'm wondering if we can't find a better middle ground.
Yes, I do agree with my statements, although probably for different reasons than you do.

Surely its not a case of 'us' (by that i mean americans - i'm not one) re writing international law as much as it is persuading 'them' (i guess thats me) to accept new standards. After all, the whole point of International law is that all countries have equal say in what the rules are. Americans complain about anti americanism from europeans all the time if you phrase everything you do in terms that make it clear you think you are the centre of the universe then you really do have it coming.

We can try rewriting international law, but there's one flaw: hardly anyone ever follows it. Nah, y-think?

If anything, international law should reflect natural law better, without the foo-foo additions that are found in such documents like the UN Charter, the Law of the Sea, or the Geneva Protocol.Go on then, take a shot at writing a law or a clause like you suggest. We'll see if it works.
What I meant was natural law closer to what Cicero described. Cicero said that natural law was the basic ethics that most governments are founded on. War can override natural law with instincts, but it can be applied. Natural law has been, in a more or less modified form, the founding basis of nearly all governments. However, over the years, natural law has been distorted into an unneccessarily utopian interpretation. Cicero knew that humans could never live in true harmony, and natural law is based on that fact. However, I think that Geneva and other treaties try to say that the world must be a utopia.
If anything, international law should follow the lines of natural law: explicitly state the sovereignty of nations, describe violations of sovereignty, degrees of sovereignty, and what each nation has a right to do. It shouldn't address much else, especially concerning domestic law, which is the mistake international law of today frequently slips into.

Pearly it might quite surprise you that Cicero is no longer considered to be cutting edge when it comes to legal philosophy. I know its only been a couple of millenia but in certain areas, he has in fact been superseeded, concveniently perhaps, so has the idea of natural law. Natural law has one really big flaw in that their is no universal legislator. If everyone in the world folowed the same religion this would not be an issue as the priciples of law would be those that correctly applied the will of the deity. Different g_ds/belief systems = different conceptions of "basic ethics" = no possibility of natural law.

DP :roll:

There is a diference between tactics used and many of the laws that we are supposed to adhere to.

A simple statment such as "rewrite international law" is rather far-reaching. Which specifically?

Do we simply do away with protections for prisoners under the idea that torturing everybody you feel like will hopefully return a nugget of intel?

If so, then we put ourselves in the position of being little better than the despot we have just removed from power. Statements of humanitarion intent become an empty bits of dialog

We find ourselves angered by the actions of terrorists who behead civilans, but our response seems to be to become then. If so, then what are we fighting for? Our way of life? We will have adopted theirs at that point.

I find it interesting how a country who calls themselve a beacon of freedom should find it so easy to abandon those freedoms that were won so hard. The same people who guard their right to bear arms in case their governmetn should every try to oppress them willingly handing it as much power to interfere in their lives as it chooses.

On some level, it is a natural reaction. We want to pay back those that do evil to us, and we want to do whatever it takes to survive.

But that should not mean automatically going to extremes simply for reasons of emotion and expediency.

Perhaps some fiddling with some of the conventions is in order. However I see a wholesale rush to abandon them altogether in the meantime rather than any offering up of constructive and specific changes. I don't think that is terribly helpful either.

-Z-

I said it in another thread, and I will state it again. But first I will say this: Redefining international law is a slippery slope issue. There can be repurcussions. I am a conservative, and even I would be worried if we drastically changed international law. Propositions like the one I stated in the other thread and will be reprinting here might become the norm:

If terrorists kill an American, we send out special forces units to hunt down and kill ten of their people. If they kill twenty, we kill one hundred. If they send a plane into a building, we force foriegn governments that have terrorists operating in their nations to help us by threating to destroy one of their major cities. Sure, that all might recruit more people to the terrorist cause. Kill them too. Show no reguard for foreign boundaries. If foreign forces get in the way, shoot them. If the offending terrorist was a suicide bomber, go after the terrorist's family. They will think twice about driving a car packed with explosives into a crowded street or building if they know that their families will be jailed and executed.

It would work, but the tactic is also extremely harsh, if not downright inhumane. I for one like international law the way it is. It takes extraordinary men and women to get around the red tape and get the job done, but that is what we need. Extraordinary times call for extraordinary people. Massive changes in law leave holes for attrocities. The is from the point of view of a conservative. I find current international law to be increadibly irritating, but that is why it is there. It is supposed to be a restraint. Same goes for the U.S. Constitution, it was ment to be hard to change because otherwise you can imagine what sorts of whacky amendments the country would have. Treaties and alliances were also ment to be hard to get out of. They are ment to serve as a preventitive from rash action. One is also supposed to use restraint when entering into treaties and alliances. They can prove to be harmful if entered into too quickly and with too little skepticism.

There is a diference between tactics used and many of the laws that we are supposed to adhere to.

A simple statment such as "rewrite international law" is rather far-reaching. Which specifically?Sorry, on rereading it looks like I skipped the part where I suggest that people actually try to come up with something now that'll work better that doesn't involve giving the legal authorities carte blanche.

We can try rewriting international law, but there's one flaw: hardly anyone ever follows it. If anything, international law should reflect natural law better, without the foo-foo additions that are found in such documents like the UN Charter, the Law of the Sea, or the Geneva Protocol.

Lets not even get into the fact that whenyou say "hardly anyone ever follows it" you should perhaps rephrase that to read "we hardly ever follow it". You are of course from the country that brought us such great moments in international law as My Lai and Gitmo.

I am constantly astonished at the frequency the human race keeps making the same old mistakes.

An increasing number of individuals are killing themselves just to cause you a tiny bit of harm, and you are buying your leaders explanation that they are doing this just because they have an irrational hatred of you, further it's being suggested that torturing the friends, relatives and countrymen of these individuals will solve this problem. does that sound likely?, do you really think people take their own lives for no good reason? can you not see that every time you mistreat or kill a prisoner you increase the membership of these guerillas?

Did this tactic work for Britain in Northern Ireland, is it working for the Israelis or the Russians?

This type of warfare occurs because the side with the biggest guns continually takes advantage of the people with FA, and they usually have to really get oppressive before anyone's willing to risk their life to fight back.
Someone noted above that at one time you were on the other side of this equation, how do you think the UK government reported that uprising to the people of the UK? and how did that end again?

I am constantly astonished at the frequency the human race keeps making the same old mistakes.

An increasing number of individuals are killing themselves just to cause you a tiny bit of harm, and you are buying your leaders explanation that they are doing this just because they have an irrational hatred of you, further it's being suggested that torturing the friends, relatives and countrymen of these individuals will solve this problem. does that sound likely?, do you really think people take their own lives for no good reason? can you not see that every time you mistreat or kill a prisoner you increase the membership of these guerillas?

Did this tactic work for Britain in Northern Ireland, is it working for the Israelis or the Russians?

This type of warfare occurs because the side with the biggest guns continually takes advantage of the people with FA, and they usually have to really get oppressive before anyone's willing to risk their life to fight back.
Someone noted above that at one time you were on the other side of this equation, how do you think the UK government reported that uprising to the people of the UK? and how did that end again?

I am going to go ahead and assume you were refering to me with your statements. Yeah, you do realize that I was giving an example right? Sure, I do believe that the tactic would work. Ethnic cleansing always works if you do a thurough job of it. Problem is, very few do a thurough job of ethnic cleansing. It is a horrible evil act, but it works. By the way, I am in no way asserting that the Israelis are attempting to kill off all of the Palestinian people. I am still in the right wing. I will likely always be there. I never said I wasn't. I simply stated that a restructuring of law based on extraordinary times unless absolutly neccesary is a very bad idea.

A strange day when I find myself agreeing with Purly Euclid rather than Incertonia, but yes, thats basicly what I'm saying. Its looking more and more like the rules which protect liberty aren't enough to protect life as well, and I'm wondering if we can't find a better middle ground.Just out of curiosity, what sort of middle ground are you suggesting? And would looser rules than the ones we currently follow have the effcet of harming the liberty we cherish? Don't we run the very real risk of becoming what we are trying to fight?

A strange day when I find myself agreeing with Purly Euclid rather than Incertonia, but yes, thats basicly what I'm saying. Its looking more and more like the rules which protect liberty aren't enough to protect life as well, and I'm wondering if we can't find a better middle ground.Just out of curiosity, what sort of middle ground are you suggesting? And would looser rules than the ones we currently follow have the effcet of harming the liberty we cherish? Don't we run the very real risk of becoming what we are trying to fight?Yes, but even that seems preferable to dying to those we try to fight.

I really don't know, it was kindof an internal conflict thing when I started this thread, I'm not sure to quite how far I'm playing devil's advocate.

International conventions and treaties become inconvenient to the US - lets get rid of them. International allies of the US become inconvenient - lets get rid of them. International protest against the US is inconvenient - lets get rid of them or ignore them altogether.

The US are the only nation that wants to rewrite international law to suite their own purpose. If you follow these laws, you make sure that you dont become what you are fighting. War makes humans become animals - its about survivalonly. Thus why the environment - the treatment of PoWs and civilians, of people who dont fight anymore or have never fought, is neccessary to be regulated by laws. Terrorists dont follow laws - naturally, they are terrorists and dont belong to any physical or spiritual body that could be bound by laws. Terrorist means they violate everything a "normal" human believes in. You'll not get terrorists to follow laws by getting rid or losening international law.

I am strongly against rewriting any of the conventions that make sure that PoW and civilians or people who suffer from war, must be treated humanely. Inconvenient or not, they are the basis to determine war crimes, otherwise you open doors for dictators and murderers to treat humans like the dirt of the planet.

A strange day when I find myself agreeing with Purly Euclid rather than Incertonia, but yes, thats basicly what I'm saying. Its looking more and more like the rules which protect liberty aren't enough to protect life as well, and I'm wondering if we can't find a better middle ground.Just out of curiosity, what sort of middle ground are you suggesting? And would looser rules than the ones we currently follow have the effcet of harming the liberty we cherish? Don't we run the very real risk of becoming what we are trying to fight?Yes, but even that seems preferable to dying to those we try to fight.

I really don't know, it was kindof an internal conflict thing when I started this thread, I'm not sure to quite how far I'm playing devil's advocate.I guess my point would be that looked at from the wider point of view, terrorists have largely been unsuccessful. They haven't effected much in the way of political change. That's small comfort to those directly affected by those terrorists, and I don't want to downplay what damage they've done, but in comparison to more formal wars where the Geneva Conventions and other treaties have applied, the damage terrorists have done is minimal.

Here's the problem I really have with removing the Geneva Conventions. It doesn't do us any good in the short term or the long term. Say we start torturing prisoners in hopes of getting them to tell us of future plans or attacks--information extracted by torture is unreliable, because after a certain point, the person being tortured will say whatever he thinks you want to hear, regardless of whether it's accurate or not. Why do you think that confessions as a result of torture are inadmissable in court? For precisely that reason.

So in the short term, any intelligence gains are offset by their unreliability, and what do we gain in the long term? We're already in danger of having our immunity from the ICC removed by the UN. Our soldiers won't have the protections those conventions provide currently. Our allies who care about those protections won't be willing to join us in coalitions, and we could wind up being ostracized by the international community, and as powerful as we are, we're not big enough to stand alone.

We can try rewriting international law, but there's one flaw: hardly anyone ever follows it. If anything, international law should reflect natural law better, without the foo-foo additions that are found in such documents like the UN Charter, the Law of the Sea, or the Geneva Protocol.

Lets not even get into the fact that whenyou say "hardly anyone ever follows it" you should perhaps rephrase that to read "we hardly ever follow it". You are of course from the country that brought us such great moments in international law as My Lai and Gitmo.
But it's not just the US. It is the Sudanese government and the SPLA. It is the Myanmarese government and the rebels they are fighting. It is the Red Army and the Chechen terrorists. It is the Phillipino government and the Moros/Abu Sayyef. Name me a war that is currently being fought, and both sides adhere to "international law".

We're not facing an enemy like we've ever faced before.

You need to read up on the Black Hand (http://www.spartacus.schoolnet.co.uk/FWWblackhand.htm). They had a minor involvement in the Great War: terrorism is not new.

There is nothing new under the sun; the geneva conventions take into account quite a number of things, including civilians who are terrorists. The conventions are set up to protect innocent civilians from collective punishment and unjust imprisonment, which creates more terrorists than it dissuades. You should read about the people freed from Guantanamo after over a year (http://observer.guardian.co.uk/uk_news/story/0,6903,1168976,00.html), and then think about the videotaped beatings of these men (http://observer.guardian.co.uk/international/story/0,6903,1217973,00.html). We got the wrong guys, and we tortured them, and if we'd followed Geneva - which requires a hearing to determine whether combatants are POWs - we might not have wasted our time and their sanity.

The laws of nature don't even apply here.
Pardon him, Theodotus: he is a barbarian, and thinks that the customs of his tribe and island are the laws of nature.

I think by definition, if the "laws of nature" don't apply, you don't understand the laws of nature.

The laws were written at a time and a place when you could tell the difference between peacetime and wartime. And we can't any more. So rather than just breaking the law, why don't we write some rules which we can fight a war against terror by?

What you're seeing is the failure of the war metaphor. A war on poverty? Let's occupy Watts and set up a command post! A war on drugs? Good thing we had that war, now nobody can buy any drugs! (http://www.mnftiu.cc/mnftiu.cc/images/war.008.gif)

Quick: are we at war with North Korea? We were at war, we still have troops near them, and we never signed a peace treaty.

War is not the answer to every problem. The Bush admin went into Iraq in order to have a nice, conventional war that would have a 'Mission Accomplished' banner and a clear end to the war. It's not so simple now. If you feel that a "war on terror" is the answer, tell me how we know we've won (and how we know we've lost).

But it's not just the US. It is the Sudanese government and the SPLA. It is the Myanmarese government and the rebels they are fighting. It is the Red Army and the Chechen terrorists. It is the Phillipino government and the Moros/Abu Sayyef. Name me a war that is currently being fought, and both sides adhere to "international law".

None of these are international wars; these are all internal conflicts. A different set of rules apply. (Good luck finding mentions of any actual international conflicts in the US media!)

The Geneva Conventions are being violated by China in its occupation of Tibet - but I think it can safely be said that their intention is not to liberate Tibet and bring democracy and freedom.

But it's not just the US. It is the Sudanese government and the SPLA. It is the Myanmarese government and the rebels they are fighting. It is the Red Army and the Chechen terrorists. It is the Phillipino government and the Moros/Abu Sayyef. Name me a war that is currently being fought, and both sides adhere to "international law".

None of these are international wars; these are all internal conflicts. A different set of rules apply. (Good luck finding mentions of any actual international conflicts in the US media!)

The Geneva Conventions are being violated by China in its occupation of Tibet - but I think it can safely be said that their intention is not to liberate Tibet and bring democracy and freedom.
Well, Rwanda, Uganda, and Burundi frequently send troops into the Democratic Republic of the Congo. And then there's the now quiet, but virtually ceaseless fight between Ethiopia and Eritrea. How about the ongoing skirmishes between Lybia and Chad?

Well, Rwanda, Uganda, and Burundi frequently send troops into the Democratic Republic of the Congo. And then there's the now quiet, but virtually ceaseless fight between Ethiopia and Eritrea. How about the ongoing skirmishes between Lybia and Chad?

And these are countries that you think the US can learn from? You think the US would be safer if it were more like Rwanda or Uganda?

Upright Monkeys, good posting. Well researched, and double points for quoting Shaw ;).

Yeah, the argument that this terrorism is somehow new to this world, or somehow outside the capabilities of US law enforcement or military is laughable; showing a deep ignorance of both our enemy and our own capabilities.

The main problem today is the current attempt to "use a sword to cut your hair", the use of massive invasion forcess to fight small cells of terrorists. In truth, its a pathetic mismanagement of resources.

Don't get me wrong, the Bush team has a sound stategy framed for the reduction of terror cells' financial backing, the isolation of specific leaders in a global manhunt, the political isolation of those few regimes who openly support terrorism, and the aid of regimes who fight terrorism and corruption at the same time. But their field trips are costing their war on terror dearly.

War on terror. Right there you have a change of what defines war.

Declaring war on a noun is never going to provide a uniformed army to shoot at.

Just like the war on drugs, when you actually declare war on a concept as opposed to a nation..whaddaya expect?!

Personally I think the word 'terror' and all its derivitaves are fast becoming the most overused and hollow words in current use.

What exactly is the definition of 'terror' any more?

War on terror. Right there you have a change of what defines war.

Declaring war on a noun is never going to provide a uniformed army to shoot at.

Just like the war on drugs, when you actually declare war on a concept as opposed to a nation..whaddaya expect?!

Personally I think the word 'terror' and all its derivitaves are fast becoming the most overused and hollow words in current use.

What exactly is the definition of 'terror' any more?
Perhaps the "War on Terror" moniker is a little misleading. I feel that sometimes, if one isn't an American, it is. But let's be frank about it. The war is against Islamic extremist, although certainly not against Islam. They can take either the form of nation-states, or they can easily blend into a crowd. They use crime, political intrigue, and propaganda to further their goals. However, their weapon of choice is terror, and that is why this name, while misleading to some, is still appropriate.