We are developing the social individualist meta-context for the future. From the very serious to the extremely frivolous... lets see what is on the mind of the Samizdata people.
Samizdata, derived from Samizdat /n. - a system of clandestine publication of banned literature in the USSR [Russ.,= self-publishing house]
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The making of an atrocity Read Squander Two on Bloody Sunday.
… of course hiding amongst non-combatants gives you a huge advantage. Such tactics would give anyone — the British, the Israelis, the Americans — the same advantages, yet they don’t use them. There’s a reason why civilised people disallow such behaviour, and that is that every single time you step into battle disguised as just another member of the public, you make Bloody Sunday more likely.
I would add that one defining characteristic of a terrorist organisation is that it wants to make Bloody Sunday more likely.
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For most western democracies’ armies, civilian casualties are a bug. For Al Quaida, Hamas, etc, civilian casualties are a feature.
Until that changes, such organizations need to be fought.
Sam Harris writes about the idea of the ‘perfect’ weapon.
Imagine a weapon that will destroy your chosen target but leave no collateral damage.
You could destroy a munitions factory but leave the hospital right next door to it completely safe.
Or you could kill all enemy soldiers hiding in a school but leave the schoolchildren without a scratch.
Equally you could adjust the settings on your weapon to include the hospital and schoolchildren as part of the target.
Does anybody believe that the United States and Nato would use the weapon in the same way as Al Qaeda or the Taliban?
Thought not.
Other examples are possible.
Interesting comment, as all the news about Bloody Sunday totally fails to take into account the context of Free Derry.
This reminded me of a post by Steven Den Beste several years ago in which he said that the purpose of terrorism is not so much to sow terror as it is to provoke a reprisal.
Yes, SDB is correct about what the terrorists theorize will happen, but they are wrong about what actually happens.
In the real world, as happened in Iraq and Afghanistan, the capriciousness and visciousness of fanatical islamist rule alienates the civilian population, and the use of the civilian population as shields quickly provokes reactions against the islamists.
That is pretty much what has happened, and continues to happen, anywhere these lunatic groups take over an area and use it to launch attacks that invite retaliation.
Of course there are angry reactions if civilians are killed by mistake or through carelessness, but people aren’t stupid, as soon as they feel safe in doing so, they turn on the terrorists who brought the problems into their midst to begin with.
Like most everything else they believe, the islamofascist terrorists are as wrong about this deal as they are about the 72 virgin thing.
It is living without the fear of gangs of nuts going around whipping and beheading people that ordinary citizens anywhere want. The alleged support for islamofascism is just as phony as the alleged support for totalitarian socialism in eastern Europe or Asia.
As soon as the commissars or mullahs falter the slightest bit, the pot starts to boil over.
Fanaticism is not a sign of strength and solidity, but a symptom of fundamental weaknesses, and brittle fragility.
That’s why it explodes or implodes when faced with any determined resistance which cannot be intimidated into acquiescence.
The function of free people in the world is to provide that determined opposition at every opportunity, from a meeting of the local school board or city council to the great affairs of nations and civilizations.
What do you think all this pc/multi-culti nonsense is all about, anyway?
Its sole purpose is to get you to sit down and shut up as a pre-condition to doing what you’re told.
Resistance is not futile, it is required.
VR:
Not in Gaza it hasn’t.
Very Retired, the terrorists set the agenda. And the lunatics, I am afraid, do win. Perhaps some folk get fed up with the terrorists’ agenda, but in the long term that agenda prevails. Look, indeed, at what is happening in Afghanistan. And what now hangs over Israel.
The world is mainly run by former terrorists?
Gaza in firmly under the control of hamas, an iranian puppet, and its people are utterly brutalized. What’s more, the great moralists of the international community have abandoned them to their fate.
The recent unrest in Iran is a better analogy and/or example of what I was talking about. The brutality against its own citizens when they dared to disagree with official doctrine that we saw in Tehran is a daily reality in Gaza for anyone who might raise their voice in opposition.
Repressive measures work for as long as no one can believe there is any possibility of successful opposition.
That is the lesson from the eastern european dissidents, from their own testimony, that they were buoyed by any signs of support and encouragement from the rest of the world.
We have had the same testimony from numerous countries in which a totalitarian system held sway, all around the world. There are dissidents now in Cuba who will someday be recognized for their courage, just as those who spoke out in the past have been.
Those who speak out against islamofascism risk more every day than any of us can ever imagine. The fact that there aren’t more is understandable when the penalty is a death sentence not only for the speaker but their entire family.
Theocrats, like any other totalitarians, can be very successful at controlling captive populations. The tip off to their weakness is their fear of all the ways that “other” ideas might sneak in and cause someone to question what they say and do.
My objection to the spread of pc codes and other forms of repression isn’t that the wrong ideas are pushed on the one hand and repressed on the other, but that any ideas are somehow declared “beyond the pale” and cannot be allowed.
But, then, I am not afraid of life, or ideas, and I have no urge to stop others from thinking the “wrong” way.
It is coercion I object to—stupidity I merely regret, whether my own or someone else’s.
In his essay “Sanctuary”, Bill Whittle expands eloquently on the uniform-vs-mufti thing and its moral implications. It’s a pity that I cannot link to it without an arduous month-by-month search of his archives — since he joined the PJTV collective his personal site has suffered neglect.
“Fearless Dream” reports that links to Sanctuary seem to be broken:
Sanctuary (part of second edition only), Part 1 (broken) and Part 2 (broken) – May 18, 2005
(Not much help, I know, but may prevent others wasting their time looking.)
The thing about this argument is that it cuts both ways. The use of un-uniformed irregulars is just a tactic that is used when the resources of the enemy are overwhelming. It’s a force multiplier for the weak, whatever their ideology. Go back to the American Revolution.
Neither fair nor correct, Dale. The American Revolution made very little, if any, use of un-uniformed irregulars. The Continental Army was completely regular, if ill-uniformed due to lack of money for “proper” uniforms, but most soldiers bore some indicia (patches, caps, belt buckles, etc.) of their military status, and they fought in regular units. The state militias may have been called “irregulars”, but only because they were not members of the national army. They too wore uniforms (to the extent possible) and conducted themselves in military fashion.
Furthermore, while the CA and state militias employed tactics which, for the time, were considered “irregular” (i.e., not lining up in conventional rows, engaging in small-scale skirmishes rather than massive engagements of large armies, etc.), they did not hide among the general populace inviting wholesale retaliation against civilians. And neither did they target civilians themselves. To suggest that there is any similarity whatsoever between them and, say, Hamas, is completely unfounded.
Dale is right. The only real question is how much real support the terrorists in question enjoy withing the population.
This is also the reason I resent the term ‘war on terror’ – it is absolutely meaningless, and avoids calling a spade a spade.
Alisa, I presume that you composed your last post while my response to Dale’s was confined to smitebot purgatory. If not, and you disagree with my objection to his post, please provide some specifics. (“Dale is right” is a bit less than compelling!)
But I agree with you that the phrase “war on terror” is totally meaningless.
Laird, indeed your comment was still in the smite-pipe. FWIW, my response was to Dale’s general point – unfortunately my knowledge of American (or for that matter most other) history is so limited that I wouldn’t presume to comment on it either way. The general point being, at least as I see it, that terrorist tactics in and of themselves are not necessarily objectionable, as long as they have the support of the “host” population. Here, for example, is a part of history I am better familiar with.
The tactic of hiding amongst the civilian population is only effective against an enemy that is to some extent playing by the “rules” themselves. It becomes ineffective when the situation is most desperate, when the enemy is prepared to massacre those civilians every day.
Having such tactics used against you is a kind of perverse complement.
That said, in reading the whole article it is claimed that this – avoidance of civilian casualties is the reason the non-uniformed soldiers can be executed. I had always thought it was to deter spies.
In my more depressed moments, I think we are all human shields for whatever authorities we try to live under.
Well, thank you for that cheery thought, cjf!
Alisa, I’m going to have to disagree with your last point. I think that terrorist tactics are, “in and of themselves”, objectionable. But I think we’re going to have to both better define “terrorism” and distinguish between two different terrorist tactics.
I define “terrorism” as intentionally targeting civilian noncombatants, generally on a random basis, in a military conflict. This excludes “collateral damage” where the civilian casualties are unintentional (obviously, at some point indifference to civilian deaths reaches a level where it becomes indistinguishable from intentionality, but we needn’t discuss that here), and it also excludes attacks against governmental and military targets (so blowing up the USS Cole or US embassies are not, in my opinion, “terrorist” actions).
As to actual terrorist tactics, targeting civilians and hiding among them are entirely separate matters. One can hide among civilians while confining one’s attacks to legitimate military targets. But if a terrorist does choose to hide among civilians a significantly higher level of “collateral damage” is justifiable on the part of the other side. As, for that matter, is summary execution of the terrorists if found.
From what I can tell of the Irgun, they seem to have been terrorists and their actions indefensible. Frankly, I doubt that they did anything to advance the cause of Israeli independence.
Laird, I truly am continuously baffled by this distinction between military and civilians, uniformed or not. I find it meaningless, and I also suspect that historically it is largely a myth. Wars are fought between nations (or otherwise defined collectives). The fact that within each nation war efforts are divided between those who are doing the actual shooting (uniformed), those who maintain the actual logistics enabling said shooting (some uniformed, some not), and those who provide the economic, moral and other means enabling the above (possibly excluding children and the elderly, who largely do not fit that category) has no moral bearing on anything. As far as I can see, this division is born out of mere practical concerns. What we may call ‘terrorism’ or ‘guerrilla warfare’ or whatever is a way to fight a war when those practical concerns do not apply, for whatever reason. To paraphrase, it is simply war fought by other means.
Dale and Alisa are right, I think.
In tactical terms, the French resistance movement in WWII were similar to the Taliban or Hizbollah now. They made full use of their ability to mingle with civilians, and exploited the (initial) unwillingness of Germans to engage in collective punishment or arbitrary attacks on civilians. There is nothing inherently dishonourable about asymmetric warfare.
I disagree, Alisa. Wars may be nominally fought between nations, but in truth they are waged by the political leadership of nations (kings, princes, emperors, potentates of every stripe). Ordinary citizens are no more culpable than the cows in the fields (and, in fact, are viewed in much the same way by their political masters). Governmental and military installations are legitimate targets; civilian ones are not (although obviously there is some “fuzziness” to that line; I’d have no problem with targeting a munitions factory, for example). However, intentionally and indiscriminately targeting civilian noncombatants (bombing a restaurant, for instance) is beyond the pale.
Incidentally, the fact that wars are waged by political elites is the reason targeted political assassination should be the primary, and the most ethical, tactic of warring nations. Which, of course, is precisely the reason that it is uniformly decried as unlawful, even unthinkable. (Thomas More’s Utopia is a dreadful place, but at least he got that one thing right.)
What you are essentially arguing is that the whole concept of “terrorism” is fallacious. I find that a curious position for an Israeli to take.
Laird, war is a collectivist affair, whether individualist among us like it or not. You may be forgetting that we are free from participating (yes, we can always choose to go to jail or even be shot instead). Once we are in, we are in, uniformed or not, shooting or just feeding and clothing those who are doing the shooting.
And yes, my position is indeed curious (although always subject to change given enough rational argument and factual evidence), but then I am a strange bird in many ways:-/ Palestinians are often making the argument that in Israel there are no real civilians, since most of us serve in the military for a certain period, and I think that they have a point. But, as I said, I think my position applies everywhere, including places where there is no (nearly) universal compulsory military service.
All that said, personally I am for making every possible effort to spare as many lives as possible, first on my side, and then on the side of the enemy. But that is only a secondary priority, the first one being winning the war. And, I don’t expect anyone, especially my enemies, to have priorities anywhere similar to mine. After all, if our priorities were similar, as were our cultures, we probably wouldn’t have been in a war to begin with.
Fair enough, Alisa. We’ll just have to agree to disagree on this one.
What else is new Laird:-) What’s important is that when there is a war, everyone knows what side he or she is on, and I think it is most likely that you and I will find ourselves on the same side.
Indeed. 🙂