Glenn Greenwald in Salon

[Michael Tee]

from Glenn Greenwald, Cause & Effect in the “Terror War”


<<As always, the most confounding aspect of the reaction to the latest attempted terrorist episode is the professed confusion and self-righteous innocence that is universally expressed.  Whether justified or not, we are constantly delivering death to the Muslim world.  We do not see it very much, but they certainly do.  Again, independent of justification, what do we think is going to happen if we continuously invade, occupy and bomb Muslim countries and arm and enable others to do so?  Isn't it obvious that our five-front actions are going to cause at least some Muslims -- subjected to constant images of American troops in their world and dead Muslim civilians at our hands, even if unintended -- to want to return the violence?   Just look at the bloodthirsty sentiments unleashed among Americans even from a failed Terrorist attempt.  What sentiments do we think we're unleashing from a decade-long (and continuing and increasing) multi-front "war" in the Muslim war? . . .

<<Ultimately, we should ask ourselves:  if we drop more bombs on more Muslim countries, will there be fewer or more Muslims who want to blow up our airplanes and are willing to end their lives to do so?  That question really answers itself.>>

Read the whole article.  It’s concise and very astute.


http://www.salon.com/news/opinion/glenn_greenwald/2009/12/29/terrorism/index.html

[Plane]

Why are we bothering with killing them?

Why don't we simply stop feeding them?

[Michael Tee]

<<Why are we bothering with killing them?

<<Why don't we simply stop feeding them?>>

Who exactly are you feeding?  What are you feeding them?

Is Greenwald right or wrong when he says that more bombing and killing of Arabs will result in more Arabs willing to die trying to blow your planes out of the sky?

Do you think you can stop every Arab who wants to blow your planes out of the sky, or do you think it's more likely that every so often, one or more of them will succeed?

[sirs]

<<Ultimately, we should ask ourselves:  if we drop more bombs on more Muslim countries, will there be fewer or more Muslims who want to blow up our airplanes and are willing to end their lives to do so?  That question really answers itself.>>

This is of course if you buy into the asanine premice that we're simply arbitrarily lobbing GP bombs all over the Muslim world in some effort to occasionally hit an Islamic terrorist.

Too bad that doesn't mesh with reality or the truth

[Plane]

Is Greenwald right or wrong when he says that more bombing and killing of Arabs will result in more Arabs willing to die trying to blow your planes out of the sky?

So far, he is wrong.

Do you think you can stop every Arab who wants to blow your planes out of the sky, or do you think it's more likely that every so often, one or more of them will succeed?

In spite of tightening security ? You are right there is no potential for security improvements to ever be enough. This problem must be struck at its roots.

[Kramer]

Is Greenwald right or wrong when he says that more bombing and killing of Arabs will result in more Arabs willing to die trying to blow your planes out of the sky?

So far, he is wrong.

Do you think you can stop every Arab who wants to blow your planes out of the sky, or do you think it's more likely that every so often, one or more of them will succeed?

In spite of tightening security ? You are right there is no potential for security improvements to ever be enough. This problem must be struck at its roots.

a whole lot of progress could be made if we just dropped PC

[Michael Tee]

Is Greenwald right or wrong when he says that more bombing and killing of Arabs will result in more Arabs willing to die trying to blow your planes out of the sky?


<<So far, [Greenwald] is wrong [in claiming that more bombing of Muslims will incite more of them to risk everything to blow an American plane out of the sky.]>>

So you believe that no matter how many Muslims are maimed or killed by American bombing, none of their relatives will ever try to revenge themselves by blowing up U.S. civilian planes or other targets?

That seems highly unrealistic to me.


<<You are right there is no potential for security improvements to ever be enough. This problem must be struck at its roots.>>

If "striking the problem at its roots" means what I think you mean, i.e., bombing the shit out of Muslims, given the mobility of the "roots" in the 21st century, how do you expect to know where the roots are, how can you strike at a continually moving target (example, Sudan to Afghanistan, Afghanistan to Pakistan, Afghanistan to Yemen, Afghanistan to Somalia, not to mention the home-grown Muslim terrorists of England and Western Europe) and how many years of such bombing would you think are required before you get all the roots?

[BSB]

I didn't know we were bombing Nigeria and London.

[Michael Tee]

Every night, BSB.  Every fucking night.

[BSB]

Ah huh...

[sirs]

Asanine premice, Tee.  Every fricken night

[Plane]

Is Greenwald right or wrong when he says that more bombing and killing of Arabs will result in more Arabs willing to die trying to blow your planes out of the sky?


<<So far, [Greenwald] is wrong [in claiming that more bombing of Muslims will incite more of them to risk everything to blow an American plane out of the sky.]>>

So you believe that no matter how many Muslims are maimed or killed by American bombing, none of their relatives will ever try to revenge themselves by blowing up U.S. civilian planes or other targets?

That seems highly unrealistic to me.

If I told you that every American ever killed by a Jahiadist was replaced by fifty increaseingly angry Americans would you consider that to be highly realistic?

 

Don't tell one side to be timid and the other side to feed rage.

Do you think of Arabs or Muslims  as a diffrent species ?

Do you really think that the more one side is hurt the more they fight, and for the other side the more they are hurt the less they fight, I am not impressed by your " realism  ".

Give to me the same advice you should give my opponent , "act wisely".

[Michael Tee]

<<If I told you that every American ever killed by a Jahiadist was replaced by fifty increaseingly angry Americans would you consider that to be highly realistic?>>

Yes, of course, that was exactly Greenwald's point.  Too bad you didn't bother to read the article I linked to.

<<Don't tell one side to be timid and the other side to feed rage.>>

It's your side that is feeding the rage.  You've been fucking with the Arabs and the Muslims since the end of WWII, and your British and French pals long before that.  I'm not telling anyone to be timid, but I AM pointing out that you're provoking the whole mess and everything you pretend to be reacting against, from U.S.S. Cole to the Sept. 11 attacks and beyond, is entirely retaliatory in nature.  YOU'RE the ones who have to back off.

<<Do you think of Arabs or Muslims  as a diffrent species ?>>

No, and again, it's too bad you didn't bother to read the article.  That was exactly Greenwald's point, considering how angry America got after 9-11, why on earth would you think the Arabs get any LESS angry when YOU fuck with THEM?

<<Do you really think that the more one side is hurt the more they fight, and for the other side the more they are hurt the less they fight, I am not impressed by your " realism  ".>>

You SHOULD be impressed by my realism, but your ignorance is preventing you.  What you missed is that America is a rich and selfish nation similar to ancient Rome in that a small corps of professional soldiers (mercenaries,) many of them foreigners, are recruited to do the nation's fighting for it, while the leadership (Cheney, Rumsfeld, Bush Jr., etc.) that started the wars does everything it can to avoid combat.  What you missed is that your victims are impoverished and desperate, and have nothing to lose. 

If you weren't so blinded by the myth of America as a fighting nation instead of a bunch of chickenshit fantasists who let others fight their wars and are fed a steady diet of John Wayne or Rambo movies, with Presidents who never went to war dressing up in flight suits and prancing all over the decks of aircraft carriers safe in American harbours, you'd recognize the real world soon enough - - YES, your lean and hungry victims are much more likely to try personally to avenge their murdered kith and kin than are the fat and pampered survivors of Cantor Fitzgerald brokers, yes they will go to any lengths including the murder of "innocent" civilians to do so, and no, they are not hampered by any bullshit "love your enemies" religion that leads them to forgive those who fuck with them. 

Furthermore, in case you haven't noticed, while the spectacle of jets and missiles raining down firepower on isolated mud huts manages to instill a lot of rage in most of the world's population, and incites huge appetites for payback, even among the wealthy Muslims who aren't even touched personally by the violence, the occasional successes of the oppressed against their oppressors does not seem to incite the American middle class or wealthy citizens into putting their lives on the line to retaliate.

<<Give to me the same advice you should give my opponent , "act wisely".>>

Exactly what I gave you, but the problem is that you're so blinded by your "Rambo" myths that you wouldn't recognize wisdom if it snuck up and bit you on the ass.  So you'll go on down the same blind path, bombing, killing, torturing and murdering and creating more and more jihadis that you CAN'T eliminate, all the while professing that only by eliminating the roots can you solve the problem.   You're just stuck in a rut and you're the prisoner of your own sick fantasies of violence and mass murder.

[BT]

What you missed is that America is a rich and selfish nation similar to ancient Rome in that a small corps of professional soldiers (mercenaries,) many of them foreigners, are recruited to do the nation's fighting for it, while the leadership (Cheney, Rumsfeld, Bush Jr., etc.) that started the wars does everything it can to avoid combat.

You do realize that both Rumfeld and Bush wore the uniform, Rumsfeld for 20 years. Both were pilots.

[Michael Tee]

What I realize, as Colin Powell stated in his biography, was that the Air National Guard was a refuge for rich white boys whose families' money and connections bought them a respectable way of staying out of combat for the duration of the conflict.

What I realize is that ALL of them - - Rumsfeld, Cheney, Bush Jr., Wolfowicz, Perle, Feith . . .  and the list goes on . . . did everything they could to avoid combat.  Air National Guard was, as Powell suggests, one such way.  Three deferments and "other priorities" (Cheney) was another.  

Infinite were the ways, but at the end of the day, not one of them had risked a hair on his head.