BF2S Forums When does terrorism become ok?

If someone ever needs to commit acts of terrorism upon your own country, then something is seriously wrong with either them or their country.  Possibly both.

What exactly do you mean by terrorism? If you mean "bombings, shootings etc" then there are a few situations when that could be seen as "acceptable".

But if you mean straight-out terrorism as in terror-ism, then never (as terrorism by definition is a tool of oppression and persecution)

Krappyappy wrote:

Spark wrote:

What exactly do you mean by terrorism? If you mean "bombings, shootings etc" then there are a few situations when that could be seen as "acceptable".

But if you mean straight-out terrorism as in terror-ism, then never (as terrorism by definition is a tool of oppression and persecution)

no one will give you a real definition of terrorism.

if you take it at face value and define TERRORism as actions that cause TERROR then bloody well a lot of things are terrorism, and quite a few of them could be justified.

Here's how I define it.

Freedom Fighting is attacking only government targets.  This means soldiers, politicians, police, other government employees, and government buildings are fair game.  If you end up killing non-governmental employees at the same time, then that's acceptable as long as the government casualties outnumber the non-governmental casualties.

Terrorism is indiscriminately killing or harming non-governmental people.  It can also be applied to destroying non-governmental property.

The difference between our bombing raids and an act of terror is that our raids are specifically aimed at enemy combatants.  Acts of terror involve things like driving into a marketplace and setting off a bomb.

Now, obviously this means that IED attacks are technically not terrorism by this definition, because a lot of the time, they only set these off on military vehicles.  Technically, you could call that freedom fighting.

However, when groups like the Taliban throw acid at the faces of female schoolchildren, that's clearly terrorism, because they aren't military/governmental targets.

Krappyappy wrote:

what about US bombs that miss their mark and hit only civilians?

Accidents don't count as terrorism.

Krappyappy wrote:

or hit the right mark, which was a civilian target all along due to faulty intelligence?

Again, accidents don't count.

Krappyappy wrote:

these actions certainly cause enough terror to fulfill my definition.

I guess that's one of those agree to disagree things.

Krappyappy wrote:

how about the us bombing campaign against japan in ww2? napalm attacks in vietnam? all of these have been justified for one reason or another, but they are clearly indiscriminant killing of 'non-governmental' people.

We could count that as terror, but so would all of the attacks Japan made against China that were equally brutal (if not worse -- Rape of Nanking, etc.)

Krappyappy wrote:

i don't even know what 'governmental people' means. postal workers are government employees, is it ok to shoot them?

They are part of the government.

Krappyappy wrote:

war is war. stop trying to differentiate good war from bad war.

Are you saying there's no difference between Hitler and Churchill?

Krappyappy wrote:

so you are saying that it is acceptable to wage war against postal workers, office clerks, census workers, anyone on the government payroll? that's quite a huge percentage of the civilian population. even garbage collectors are municipal workers.

the plane that hit the pentagon wouldn't be an act of terrorism in that case. the people on board were collateral to the real intent of the task - the us government.

i guess if you restrict the definition of terrorism to be narrow enough, it wouldn't ever technically happen, so it really doesn't matter if it's justified or not.

as for hitler and churchill, they are different people. they fought wars for different reasons. but their methods were the same. both bombed the other guy's country, civilian and military, as much as they could manage. that's my point about war - it's only a method to achieve some goal. it's ugly and people die, but there's no difference in war, only in the politics behind it.

when the govt gets to big or to powerful ....... it is up to us to take it back

theres alot of civilans that work in the pentagon

there is no definition of terrorists ............. theres only the man thats wants to take your life and you have 2 choices ...... yours or his



one picked a fight with the other

SEREMAKER wrote:

there is no definition of terrorists ............. theres only the man thats wants to take your life and you have 2 choices ...... yours or his

one picked a fight with the other

Krappyappy wrote:

um wut? everyone who works in the pentagon is either a federal employee or on federal payroll as a contractor. they are at least as much government employees as postal workers are.

plus, i didn't see you outlining an acceptable ratio of 'governmental' to 'non-governmental' deaths.

I didn't use a ratio.  I simply said, "if the government targets outnumber the non-governmental ones."

Technically, you could use my definition to say that wasn't terrorism if you look at that crash by itself.  More Pentagon employees died than plane passengers.  However, you're still overlooking all of the civilians who died from the WTC crashes and the Harrisburg crash.

When taking into account all 4 planes and all 3 buildings, clearly more civilians died than government employees.

Krappyappy wrote:

can i extend your argument to collateral? if an american bomb kills both enemy combatants and innocent civilians, i am going to assume it's justified. well then as long as an attack on us soil kills some government employees, it's not terrorism even if none of the people involved are military personnel. considering how many civilians are government employees, you could pretty well drop bombs anywhere.

Not true, unless you're talking about D.C.

Krappyappy wrote:

patent nonsense. the only definition of war is organized aggression. what is conventional and unconventional changes with the times, and what is unconventional can easily become conventional. moreover, who's to decide what's 'conventional'? the side that has more planes and bombs?

In practice, yes.  History is written by the victors.  Just because something is subjective doesn't mean you should refrain from making a judgment.  Everyday, we have to make subjective choices.  While I am a relativist, my perception of terrorism will reflect what is most practical for my interests, as I'm sure the same is true of those we call terrorists think of us as the terrorists.

Either way, it comes down to self-interest.

Krappyappy wrote:

so you are saying that it is acceptable to wage war against postal workers, office clerks, census workers, anyone on the government payroll? that's quite a huge percentage of the civilian population. even garbage collectors are municipal workers.

the plane that hit the pentagon wouldn't be an act of terrorism in that case. the people on board were collateral to the real intent of the task - the us government.

i guess if you restrict the definition of terrorism to be narrow enough, it wouldn't ever technically happen, so it really doesn't matter if it's justified or not.

as for hitler and churchill, they are different people. they fought wars for different reasons. but their methods were the same. both bombed the other guy's country, civilian and military, as much as they could manage. that's my point about war - it's only a method to achieve some goal. it's ugly and people die, but there's no difference in war, only in the politics behind it.

War is generally not waged on people...it is waged on capabilities of nation states. The capabilities that are targeted depend on the objective of the operation.

For example, a factory that makes munitions. It is a legal target. The people that work there are not. There is a distinction. You can attack the factory while they are there if it is the only way to achieve your objective. But proportionality has to be taken into account. Conversely, you cannot attack the workers at their homes in order to take out the factory.

The same criteria apply for random government workers. If not for the method of attack used, the attack on the Pentagon would've been legitimate. But the hijackers were essentially using human shields (the passengers on the plane)...which is a violation of multiple international conventions.

As to your last point: yes, war is ugly. And at some levels, the differences become irrelevant to the individual(s) on the receiving end. But intent and targeting processes make all the difference from a legal/moral perspective. Granted, that doesn't lessen the horror of war at the tactical level...but it does differentiate legal actions from non-legal actions.

FEOS wrote:

War is generally not waged on people...it is waged on capabilities of nation states. The capabilities that are targeted depend on the objective of the operation.

plenty of wars are waged against people. see westmoreland's strategy in vietnam, the iran-iraq war, the japanese invasion of china, etc etc. when the 'capabilities' of a nation is mainly its manpower, you can bet on the war being waged on people.

FEOS wrote:

For example, a factory that makes munitions. It is a legal target. The people that work there are not. There is a distinction. You can attack the factory while they are there if it is the only way to achieve your objective. But proportionality has to be taken into account. Conversely, you cannot attack the workers at their homes in order to take out the factory.

i don't think anyone has ever followed this rule. the US certainly isn't above sending cruise missiles to people's homes to kill targets, families and neighbors be damned.

FEOS wrote:

The same criteria apply for random government workers. If not for the method of attack used, the attack on the Pentagon would've been legitimate. But the hijackers were essentially using human shields (the passengers on the plane)...which is a violation of multiple international conventions.

like my example above, if it were a bomb that happened to catch a bunch of random people in its blast, would it be any less of a terrorist attack?

FEOS wrote:

As to your last point: yes, war is ugly. And at some levels, the differences become irrelevant to the individual(s) on the receiving end. But intent and targeting processes make all the difference from a legal/moral perspective. Granted, that doesn't lessen the horror of war at the tactical level...but it does differentiate legal actions from non-legal actions.

what is 'legal' is defined by the side that wins. let's pretend that al-qaeda manages to get the us to surrender. you can bet there would be war-crimes trials for all the civilian deaths caused by us bombs. but all of those are legal as long as the us is winning.

a moral imperative is completely different, it applies regardless of the winner in a conflict, assuming you prescribe to that system of morality.

RAIMIUS wrote:

Do some research on the Law of Armed Conflict (specifically the Geneva and Hague conventions).

Civilian casualties during a military action do not automatically make the action a war crime.
Illegal combatants lose most of their protections.
When the US sends missiles at people's homes it is because they have been identified as combatants (almost always illegal combatants).  It is acceptable to target combatants.

civilian casualties don't automatically make an action a war crime, but they are subject to review, and a percentage of them would doubtless qualify.

not to mention that the geneva conventions forbid the use of mercenaries, who are considered illegal combatants and cannot engage in hostile action. almost all of the 'security contractors' that are in iraq right now would qualify.

again, the winners make the rules. as long as the us can enforce its will, it doesn't have to worry about breaking any silly conventions.

SEREMAKER wrote:

KEN-JENNINGS wrote:

Macbeth wrote:

@ken.     By your own standards if a government were to start doing these things would it be acceptable to do the same thing to the government and its supporters.

If a man tries to kill me, then I probably will try to kill him.  If you are getting to the point that "one man's freedom fighter is another man's terrorist", well freedom fighters don't wantonly target civilians - if they did they'd be called terrorists.  Terrorism hinges on targeting civilian populations to inflict fear.  People fighting for freedom would be pretty stupid to target possible supporters of their cause. 

If my government started bombing and kidnapping innocent people, I'd get the fuck out.  Would I condemn people for trying to exact revenge on those responsible?  Probably not, although ideally peaceful demonstrations would usurp the strong arm of the government in question.

a terrorist doesn't have to target civilans to be labeled a terrorist

I dunno about that. If a group decides to attack Army bases and stuff like that, I'd label them more of a guerrilla group or a militia than terrorists. The word terrorist is thrown around too much these days.

I think the US has a different definition of it though, something along the lines of non-combatant which also includes Military personnel in certain situations. That way alot of people get identified as terrorists.

Krappyappy wrote:

let's replace the plane that hit the pentagon with a rather large bomb, large enough to cause damage to the surrounding areas. it kills exactly 1001 people - 501 of which are federal employees, the rest are non-government civilians. by your definition, that would not be terrorism.

Theoretically, yes.

Krappyappy wrote:

i actually WAS referring only to the pentagon crash, i was careful to be specific.

Yep, but limiting your example to the Pentagon attack overlooks the rest of the coordinated attack.  Logically, you can't really do that.  This was one group of people coordinating multiple crashes, so that's really one big set of attacks for the same purpose.  So again, the civilians lost from that total attack greatly outnumber the government employees.

Krappyappy wrote:

i am talking about everywhere there are federal employees, which is all major cities and plenty of minor ones. then there are military installations and bases, transportation, energy, and heavy industry, all of which are either directly or indirectly controlled by the feds. then you have contractors like halliburton and boeing, which receive substantial government funding. you could even count universities and research labs that get federal grants.

How about this then?  Only governmental employees and contractors directly connected to the military, law enforcement, or lawmaking can legitimately be targeted for freedom fighting.

Krappyappy wrote:

now, sticking to your rule of killing more government employees than 'others', you would be justified in launching attacks anywhere there is even a single federal employee, as long as the number of 'others' is less than the number of government workers killed.

that would mean, yes, you pretty much could drop bombs everywhere.

Theoretically, but again, the results would clearly not work to your favor as being considered freedom fighting unless you took a much greater amount of care to avoid civilian casualties.

Believe it or not, our attacks are usually made with a heavy emphasis on avoiding civilian deaths.  We try very hard to limit our kills to enemy combatants.

Because our enemies usually don't, they can be more easily seen as terrorists.

PureFodder wrote:

FEOS wrote:

SEREMAKER wrote:

one mans terrorist is another mans freedom fighter

lol.

@ OP: never.

That's not to say that armed resistance doesn't have a place. But to use terrorist tactics to achieve one's goals is never justifiable. The problem is when the offended party starts referring to any resistance against them as "terrorist".

This.

If you want to resist an occupying force, opressive government or whatever, stick to genuine military targets. Once you aim your bombs and guns at civillians what you are doing is not ok.

i dunno. the line is very very blurry here, imo.