Dog tags glorify war (?)

you assumed i supported the war. kinda dumb. especially when i stated that while i support a battle to protect innocents, a battle over material possessions is not just. did you miss that? probably so.

 

I wear one of my dad's from when he was in the coast guard. A friend of mine has a dog tags... one is a picture of his mom (who died of cancer) and the other is a pic of himself.

I don't see why anyone has to make a big deal over it.

 

No power doesn't bring insight.

But if insight is developed from studying a nation, and that insight lets us see that a genocide is taking place, then we have a duty to people to stop it if it would prevent further tragidies.

Better answers to killing are always our highest priority, but in the middle of a large scale ethnic slaughter, a solution of any sort must happen right away. Negotiating in these cases is impossible because theres nothing we can appease them with thats acceptable.

If it can't happen right away, then the civilians need to be protected. We can't just ship off ethnic groups to somewhere it's unrealistic and that would really spread tensions. It creates diaspora.

So if you can come up with an option that protects civilians in the middle of a genocide other then sending in soldiers, that ideal. If you have a compromise for the DRC, Chad, or Sudan, I'd love to hear it.

But if you don't have another soultion other then being a passafist in the face of genocide means you're apathetic towards genocide.

Our apathy while we could prevent it makes us just as guilty as the people who commited genocide.

You're domino theroy lacks perspective. Wars have ended genocides in the past, and if they can end them again, they're worthwhile. Knowing your state can't retain soverignty if you commit genocide is a step for the entire world to actually denounce this practice.

There should be no dark corner of the planet which can allude fundamental human rights.

You know what spreads war? Apathy towards genocide.

Like Djibouti. Djibouti began with ethnic gang fights in the early 90's. soon militias began to form across Burundi and Rwanda

These conflicts raged in Burundi from '93 untill 2005, although there are still armed militas refusing to recognise the Burundi governments authority.

Rwanda weaves a much sader phase of the story. The Majority ethnic group of Hutu's were subjegated to the Tutsi's during colonial rule, and in 1994 the Rwandan genocide took place, with about a million murdered with machetes.

It didn't end their, of course, the ethnic fights between Hutus and Tutsi's spread across Africa, culmimintating in the Second Congo Civil War, also known as the African world war in '98.

All these events resulted in about 10 million lives, and these ethnic clashes are still going on.

Inaction towards genocide spreads war and ethnic cleansings elsewhere.

If we had intervened in Rwanda, the governments of the 9 African nations in the Second Congo Civil War wouldn't have been involved in sponsoring militas.

It would have saved millions of lives.

The fact is, there might still need some troops there, but after the initial actions, the main role of the security force could have been shifted to UN troops, with gradual reductions untill there was no more need for them.

That's much better then the realities of inaction. Apathy has lost the blood of ten million people on our hands. It's inexcusable.

 

Kinda long winded again
your genocides don't happen overnight.Not having any solutions myself doesn't make your solution of attack the best answer.You can only attack after the fact and once again genecide is only an excuse for war,if it was our reason we would be in somalia.The horrors of genecide become lies in the mouths of our polititions.To excuse the killing of a people and the destruction of their way of life in the name of genecide is the most apathatic act of all.There are better answers.Put your guns away.

 

so you support war,make up your mind.Battling to protect innocents is only propaganda,an excuse to kill and destroy those you don't like.We are all"innocent"and we're all guilty.

 

cause it is what it is,war is fashionable

 

I was under the impression that soldiers now do not have dog tags. I was under the impression (CNN, I beleive) that they are "chipped" with an under the skin ID, like you actually use for dogs.

The only reason for dog tags or anything like that is to help identify bodies. In most prison camps the tags are not allowed on prisoners.

 

now everyonea's gonna wanna getta chippa anna crewcut

 

1984 is here. But from the Right, not the Left as Orwell assumed.

My problem is not that it would "hurt" (the explaination in an other antiprivacy article I read, that it isn't as bad as a mosquito bite) but that it is an invasion of privacy. I certainly don't want my self, my kids, my dh or ANYONE to be tagged, not even prison inmates. Everyone is entitled to privacy.

If this happens, it will not only be military or DOD workers. If people like Bush and his evil minions stay in power, they will want ALL OF US to be tagged. Except themselves and their powerful friends, I would think. Fucking facists.

For more details see ZDNet.

 

keep trying to justify your being okay with people being wiped out by genocide. just so long as their blood isn't directly staining your own hands, i suppose you'll sleep well. me, i'd never sleep again knowing i we could stop the wanton slaughter of helpless people and did nothing.

 

yeah that's right.i keep forgetting we're stopping genecide when we send those missles overhead.i keep thinking that we're creating it.i guess it was all those dead bodies.You're wrapped up in the propaganda.It was a just massacre because they couldn't control their leaders.Thats what they thought when hit the trade towers.As long as everybody believes that,they have just cause to kill.It will never end.Genecide happens between two competing groups.It itself is an act of war.Take away the competition and you have no reason for it.Germanys economy was shit after ww1,the jews controled much of the business in germany.The people couldn't compete so they followed a ruthless leader out of desperation.It wasn't because the german bloodlines made them evil.Hussan did it to keep power.Power that we gave him in the first place.Bosnia was again between two competing factions.Take away the competition for survival and once again there is no reason for genecide.All that's to fucking simple though.Better off we attack.Blood on my hands?No,the blood is on the hands of the complacent who's only answer to a problem is to attack.

 

it's one way for singles to meet
.Next they'll tap them directly into the brain so those of us with"unpure" thoughts can be weeded out.

 

It's hard to be succinct when you're dealing with international relations with half a continent. Somalia isn't a genocide, it's a fallout of governments breaking into rival gang factions. Somalia has become an anarchy, and desperatly needs help, but the situations different from genocide, and could be dealt with differently, such as helping the African Union set up a temporary transitonal government.

Well the whole process of Tutsi, Hutu violence took over a decade to kill ten million people. We're you not paying enough attention to come up with a solution, or is ten million people not enough to justify sending in peacekeepers.

Our politicians aren't exactly brining up intervening in genocide very often and sending in peace keeping infantry is very different from dropping bombs wearing blindfolds that you imply.

Furthermore, the targeting of ethnic groups isn't a "way of life" for any society. Saying so is patronising callous racist bullshit.

Sending in international peacekeeping troops isn't going to destroy culture. Certainly not to the degree ignoring a genocide has.

You're indecision over a decade is ten million reasons why indescion won't work. If there we're better answers you'd have one.

Sending in soldiers should be a last resort, and genocide often creates a last resort scenario. If a war in '94 killed 100,000 people, it would have been worth it 100 times over.

That's all hindsight though. What matters now is how we can help in desperate situation.

 

You'll be glad to know then, that isn't true.

 

who said it was a way of life?i said we're destroying their way of life.Not all of them are involved in the genecide.Quit twisting words and tell me why we have to consider the last resort before considering the first.Why were 10 million killed before we felt a need?
No our government doesn't send in troops.They prefer"surgical strikes".It's like a video game to the public .Our boys don't get hurt.Sending in a peacekeeping force is only a fantasy.By supporting a war effort you're, no matter how it's worded,only supporting war.

 

That's not true either.

The secret kabals weilding all the power in Germany after WW1 was nazi propaganda. The jewish people had much less economic leverage then they did prior to world war 1, but this was one of many things, including the loss of WW1 that the Nazi propaganda blamed on the jewish.

Of course it wasn't that Germans we're evil either. Most Germans we're victims of the War, including many German soldiers. Just because most of the Germans weren't evil, doesn't mean we should have allowed the Nazi's to have their way with Europe.

Hussein did it to consolidate power. Reagan and the CIA helped fund the Iraq-Iran war, but the US didn't put Hussein in power. Iraq's genocide aginst the Kurds ended our diplomatic relationship with Iraq, and furthermore genocide isn't a war strategy.

Agressive War entials expending military resources to consolidate power. In the sense of an aggressive war, people in controlled areas are viewed as a resource.

Genocide is an act of hatred, where race is used to justify expansion for the means of exterminating ethnicity. Women are targeted specifically for their ability to create more of the ethnicity.

Even in the crulest of situations, war's seek to keep civilians alive so they can produce more resources, where genocides look to conquoer people specifically out of racial hatred, and desire to kill which overrides their sense of strategy, killing many of their own soldiers as a result.

I'm not justifying war, but thir is a difference between war and genocide.

Bosnia was competition between many factions, some of which were genocidal paramilitary. Bosnia wasn't a competition for survival, it was more a competition for territory, but genocide was used by elements of each side as repercussions.

Not as simple as you make it seem, considering how little of a grasp you have on each situation. And you're right, blood should be on anyones hands who's first solution is to attack, but when all other means are exhausted, if you don't help civilians who are waiting to be murdered, you're guilty.

Peacekeeping isn't sending in bombs to kill all the ethnic groups who have the uper hand in the midst of a genocide or killing the militas it's setting up barriers between camps with soldiers and providing humanitarian aid while you negotiate a peace deal.

 

We would be stopping a genocide that's happening, and you say to do that requires destroying their way of life. It sounded like you were implying that genocide was their way of life.

The first resort is negotiations, which we have tried extensively throughout the 90's in parts of Africa where this was going on, but it is obviously very difficult to bring in different factions in the middle of full scale ethni slaughter, and more to the point, full scale ethnic slaughter already makes the timetable for negotiations unacceptable.

10 million isn't a magic number. I already said that we should have gotten involved in Rwanda in the apex of the violence. 10 million is the number we're at now after letting racist genocidal militias fester.

That's naive, with a failure to grasp what the situation means for the people involved. In the past, the government did prefer the prescion strike method, largely because the public was so apathetic and ignorant to human rights in the world.

However if we took charge and sent in troops when they we're most needed, the world would know the horrors we discovered when our soldiers stumbeled across mass graves with machete wounds. No longer would people like some here be allowed to wallow in a VH1 induced stuporous apathy.

Only when the world awakens can it find peace. If that takes toops in the middle of the situation to protect both sides and negotiate a deal, then it's worth it.

If you call that war, great. We should go to war.

I would join the military, because there are things worth protecting.

 

this is different than simply setting up border stations.However when we set up these border stations we bomb first.Having the power doesn't give us the morality.

 

O.k. let's take charge,but i wanna be president.Too bad there's more than 3 people in the world.War is uncontrolable.Atrocities happen during war,but i guess those don't matter as long as we're playing hero.By time your feble voice is interpetted in washington all that comes out is war.If we have the power to change that then certainly we have the power to change the reasons it's needed in the first place.Why even consider it?