Skip to Content.
Sympa Menu

internetworkers - Re: [internetworkers] the cowards at the Pentagon

internetworkers AT lists.ibiblio.org

Subject: Internetworkers: http://www.ibiblio.org/internetworkers/

List archive

Chronological Thread  
  • From: James Dasher <jdasher AT ibiblio.org>
  • To: machett AT ibiblio.org, "Internetworkers: http://www.ibiblio.org/internetworkers/" <internetworkers AT lists.ibiblio.org>
  • Cc:
  • Subject: Re: [internetworkers] the cowards at the Pentagon
  • Date: Sun, 7 Dec 2003 21:16:44 -0500


On Sunday, Dec 7, 2003, at 20:24 US/Eastern, Alan MacHett wrote:

Why the hell are we using jets to kill individual people? The intended
purpose of the A-10 Thunderbolt is to destroy tanks. This is only one of
a long list of such abuses of military might ... the cruise missle attack
in Yemen, Apache attack helicopters picking off individual soldiers in
Iraq I (the Apache, too, was created to destroy tanks), and all the way
back to the bombing of Qaddafi's residence, to name a few notables.

I know people who use the calculators on their computers to balance their checkbooks. Surely, for hundreds of dollars less than the price of a new computer, these people could by calculators?

Also, battleships were originally designed for naval surface combat. Why do we use them for offshore bombardment, when a marine can do the job cheaper?

Y'know, it's not even cost effective. Compare the cost of fueling,
arming, flying, etc. a jet fighter -- add to that the mistake of killing 9
children and maybe not killing the intended target -- to the cost of
sending some special forces troops by helo'. Well, who knows; maybe it
*does* cost less money to send the A-10, but wouldn't it be so much more
honorable and satisfying to have troops capture an enemy in a show of
force rather than send some stick-jockey to play his video game on
faceless and unsuspecting people below?

Even better: A Marine private makes less in one year than your average cruise missile costs US taxpayers. Factor in the R&D, the cost to support the infrastructure to maintain and fire the cruise missile, and I'm sure that it would cost less to let a reasonably well-trained Marine private die taking a beach than it does to use overwhelming force to defeat an enemy and save US lives.

Yeah, "honor"; I know that's a hard word to choke down in this day and
age. Today marks the 62nd year since the attack on Pearl Harbor. Those
are the kinds of soldiers I admire. Those guys went through hell for a
good cause, and they didn't have high-tech gadgets to distance themselves
physically and emotionally from the enemy. It, and maybe Korea, were the
last "good" wars the US fought in; the rest are all just about somebody
else's money.

"Good" because lots of US soldiers died? "Good" because lots of civilians died? You started this rant because 9 civilians died. How many civilians do you think died in WWII or Korea?

Also, part of the US force advantage has been and will continue to be firepower from a distance. Rifles that shoot accurately from further away (say, an M-14 at 200 yards) are better than rifles that shoot more bullets less accurately (e.g., the ever-popular AK-47 at under 50 yards).

These disparities extend back to the Revolutionary War and the Civil War. For a more recent example, the casualty ration in Somalia exceeded 50:1. I don't have the exact figures with me, but it was roughly 17 Americans dead and more than 1,000 Somali combatants dead. And all we were trying to do there was feed people. (Ironically, the subsequent investigation into the Battle of Mogadishu hinged around the commanding general's request for gunships - the A-10 is a gunship - and whether their presence would have saved more US soldiers, and prevented our victory from costing so many American dead.)

Cheers -





Archive powered by MHonArc 2.6.24.

Top of Page