The Case for Bombing

a few things for pacifists to keep in mind

1) BEFORE sept 11 the US supplied something like 80% of all humanitarian aid to afghanistan.

to claim that the US doesn't care about afghani civilians is rather ridiculous seeing how in essence the US fed roughly 20% of the population

2) bin-ladin cannot be tried under the Int'l Criminal Court b/c the ICC has no provisions regarding terrorism.

This is something you lefties have yet to realize. the ICC is not a panacea for the world's ills, the fact that it had no measures whatsoever against terrorism is one of the reasons why it was ridiculed so much in policy circles.

3) you have no right to criticize the humanitarian food drops. i find it absolutely disgusting that well-fed westerns can criticize these food drops in light recent events. if you find it so reprehensible that the US is air-dropping food then get over to afghanistan and tell the hungry refugees that by eating these rations they are only supporting US imperialism (snort)

4) food convoys will not work as evidenced by recent taliban action. they captured 4 WFP warehouses (funded overwhelmingly by the US) and have returned only one. any food convoy is in direct threat of being attacked and its workers taken hostage. you forget that the US is not explicitly forbidding relief workers from continuing with food transportation. rather, these workers on the ground have decided to do so themselves. in other words, you are in no right to criticize the decisions of others.

5) pacifists have YET to come up with a serious policy alternative to military action that effectively removes the terrorist threat to the United States and indeed most of the world. So long as a state sponsors terrorists they entire world will be at risk. Merely going over bin-ladin and taking him to court will not solve this. In fact, if you lefties were actually educated on the subject you'd realize that bin-ladin isn't the brains behind al-qaeda, rather its his two lieutenants that do most of the planning (one of which incidentally just got killed in a bombing attack)

most importantly, keep in mind that Sept 11 attacks were not caused by american foreign policy in the middle east.

again, if you actually kept up with world affairs you'd realize that both china and russia have far more imperial ambitions in the region and treat muslims FAR worse then the US.

russia is currently waging a scorched-earth war in chechnya and have killed tens of thousands of muslims. china routinely tortures its muslim prisoners and oftentimes force feeds them alcohol or pork before they are executed. yet, one does not see the kremlin on the receiving end of a Boeing 767.

also keep in mind other US foreign policy initiatives in the middle east.

who ended Israel/France/Britain's imperial ambitions in the region during the '56 war? the United States

who has been THE key negotiator for peace b/w the israelis and palestinians, to such a degree that everyone on every side was begging the US to maintain its mediator role after a new president came to office?

also, remember that the LAST war the US fought was AGAINST a christian nation (serbia) in defense of a muslim one.

in other words, the people who attacked America did so not b/c of anger of american foreign policy, but rather because they are jealous. they look at their own pathetic lives, squandered by decades of mismanagement and stagnation and are jealous that americans can become fat and lazy at no cost to themselves.

this is why pacifism will not work, and why changing US foreign policy will do nothing. we are not dealing with a rational enemy who will change their activities based upon proper US actions. Rather, these are people who will only change their activities once they find themselves on the business end of a cruise missile