Call me nuts, but I think that’s an important fact that should be addressed

Yes Rodent militaries makes use of euphemisms which distance people from destructive acts. Terms like “collateral damage” and “friendly fire” are examples of this. Environmental Biologists do the same when they refer to “culls”. That these euphemisms distance the reality of the destruction involved from parlance is not a phenomenon that you are the first to point out and in fact, has been pointed out and criticized in the mainstream media over and again and especially during Operation Desert Storm.

However, when Western military spokespersons or politicians apologize or express remorse for errant strikes which killed non-targeted non-combatants, that is not an example, or demonstration of a military euphemism, or “sugar coating”. It is an expression of remorse.

Okay, de-FO’d but Stop right there – that’s your error. Go back, read what I’m saying and you’ll see I’m talking about the comforting phrases we use to sugarcoat what we’re actually doing. Think of it like Newspeak and we’re on the right track.

That’s why I invoked St. George – we (by which I mean our military, politicians, pundits and civilians) say things like “We don’t deliberately kill civilians”. What we mean when we say that is “We kill civilians”, with the added rider that “We try not to, but the nature of our wars means we kill them in really quite large numbers”.

Call me nuts, but I think that’s an important fact that should be addressed – looked at dispassionately, rather than an turned into an exercise in semantics where insufficiently charitable readings are… Well, you know the rest.

Well yes it is. Your bone of contention is that the West is using force against the Taliban because you are convinced that no Western troops should be in Afghanistan fighting the Taliban and ergo, you don’t give a damn about those Afghanis who as I wrote before: expressly demand that UN sanctioned ISAF forces stay in Afghanistan until the elected Afghan government can subdue Taliban terrorism on their own. You aren’t against war per se, what you are against is British, American or Western forces waging war.

Orwell, was most certainly not an isolationist stopper who didn’t give a damn about the atrocities committed by the totalitarians opposed to Western forces and instead would endlessly rail against Western forces fighting them. But you are.

What is truly sickening is how smug you are about your transparently hypocritical opposition to war and near total disregard of the atrocities perpetrated by their enemies, who are also the enemies of Afghan democrats.

Well, not really, is it? You asked for an example of military personnel saying that all these civilians are dying for a good cause, and my response is “I thought the war itself was meant to be a good cause”. Not an unreasonable point, I’d have thought.

Still, whatever – I can see we’re going nowhere fast with this one. I’ll just note the irony that a reference to Orwell’s noted essay on the defence of the indefensible dropped in the HP pond without a ripple, and Foxtrot Oscar.

This isn’t “spin”. It’s the actually-existing situation on the ground. You can see this by watching the news or picking up a paper – we are in fact “fine with killing civilians if it produces results”. Of course we regret it and try to avoid it, but if we weren’t fine with killing civilians then we would’ve packed up and gone home back in 2002.

Are you getting this? NATO forces in Afghanistan, for instance, have been blowing that shit up 4 Realz in tha real world, week in week out, for almost ten years and in doing so, they have also been oops-accidentally killing lots of innocent people… And they plan to keep doing it, because they are working to a pre-existing plan!

What’s the world coming to when you have to explain this stuff to war supporters? It’s a war – this is the way wars work.

Can you back up your opinion with even one statement from Western military forces… that they died “for a good cause”?

The appropriate pro-war response here is to note the horrors of the Taliban etc. or even just shrug and say, C’est la guerre. After all, if these people aren’t dying for a good cause, what are they actually dying for and why the fuck are we even killing them in the first place?

No, that’s your spin Rodent. Western military forces whether in the middle east or elsewhere do not regard killing civilians as fine if it produces a very large number of dead Al Qaeda bodies. Western military forces, in sharp contrast to their Al Qaeda enemies, strive to adhere to the principles of distinction and proportionality and when they err and kill civilians who they did not wish to target, they express remorse precisely because they value the principles of distinction and proportionality.

Who isn’t looking unpleasant facts in the face…?

@Rodent: The type of person who considers conditional phrases like “with intent” to be a rhetorical suit of armour, as if it matters to the people rubbed out.

The painful emotional reaction of people whose close ones were killed does not obviate, cancel out, nor turn into a mere convenient rhetorical device the need to establish intent to determine the degree or kind of culpability.

Especially when we actually mean “We kill lots and lots of civilians, but we didn’t mean it and they died for a good cause”.

Can you back up your opinion with even one statement from Western military forces in which following an errant and unintended strike that killed non targeted, non-combatants, it was expressed that “they died for a good cause”? No? Then why do you leap to such cynical a priori conclusions about what you consider the persistent bad faith of Western military forces? Is it merely out of your emotional need to have Western military forces always acting in bad faith?

From reading Flying Rodent thoughts I conclude the following… War crimes are only committed by countries with constituent assemblies.

If that’s the case, “reading” isn’t your strong suit. My point is that, while this Tamimi guy may be all kinds of evil shits, his comments quoted here don’t come close to announcing that “killing civilians is fine if it produces results”.

On the other hand, that is a very succinct way of describing the attitude of the armed forces, political and pundit classes of the United States of America and Great Britain, towards civilian casualties. When a NATO plane Oops-obliterates 27 Afghan villagers, we express sorrow and deny “deliberately” targeting civilians. This is a weasel-word used for PR reasons, because the obvious truth is that we consider civilian deaths to be an unfortunate but inevitable outcome, and a price worth paying for achieving our military objectives.

Hence, it’s fair to say that western military forces throughout the middle east regard “killing civilians” as “fine, if it produces results” such as a very large number of dead Al Qaeda bods. St. George of Orwell had harsh words for people who tried to sugarcoat this kind of stuff in moral impunity.

What do you think of George Galloway?

For roughly the six hundredth time, I think he’s a mendacious, puffed up little arse who would blow a treeful of orangutans for a vote while smoking a cigar. I think he’s a bullshitter and a vainglorious twat; that he attracts whiffy characters like Honey 2 Tha B and is a shameless opportunistic fraud. OTOH, I don’t think he’s a Nazi and I think that the panic-stricken outcry around these parts every time he waggles a little finger is nothing short of hilarious.

Who isn’t looking unpleasant facts in the face…?

The type of person prone to saying things like “But there’s such a huge difference between murderous terrorist attacks and Whoopsie-we-murdered-your-entire-family military fuck-ups”, well represented in this thread. The type of person who considers conditional phrases like “with intent” to be a rhetorical suit of armour, as if it matters to the people rubbed out.

How does apologizing for an errant strike that killed civilians who weren’t targeted make the unpleasant facts of war a fairy story?

You didn’t read Orwell on nationalism and language? I suggest you start there. Summary – it’s very easy to make the unacceptable sound palatable with evasive words and comforting phrases. “We do not deliberately kill civilians” is very, very different from “We do not kill civilians”. Especially when we actually mean “We kill lots and lots of civilians, but we didn’t mean it and they died for a good cause”.

Don’t get too humpty about it though – my original point was that a) These quotes don’t prove Tamimi supports attacks on civvies* and that b) suicide bombing is just a tactic, like shooting people or blowing up tanks, and is thus amoral in itself. It takes people and application to make it defensible or abhorrent.

You were the one who wanted to talk about intent and effect, after all.

This is to say, we should look these unpleasant facts in the face when talking about our wars, and not invent comforting fairy stories about how much less nasty it is when we rub out families, because it was all a big Oopsie and everyone is very sorry about it.

OK, who is it that isn’t looking unpleasant facts in the face when talking about wars? How does apologizing for an errant strike that killed civilians who weren’t targeted make the unpleasant facts of war a fairy story?

If that’s the case, “reading” isn’t your strong suit. My point is that, while this Tamimi guy may be all kinds of evil shits, his comments quoted here don’t come close to announcing that “killing civilians is fine if it produces results”.

On the other hand, that is a very succinct way of describing the attitude of the armed forces, political and pundit classes of the United States of America and Great Britain, towards civilian casualties. When a NATO plane Oops-obliterates 27 Afghan villagers, we express sorrow and deny “deliberately” targeting civilians. This is a weasel-word used for PR reasons, because the obvious truth is that we consider civilian deaths to be an unfortunate but inevitable outcome, and a price worth paying for achieving our military objectives.

Hence, it’s fair to say that western military forces throughout the middle east regard “killing civilians” as “fine, if it produces results” such as a very large number of dead Al Qaeda bods. St. George of Orwell had harsh words for people who tried to sugarcoat this kind of stuff in moral impunity.

What do you think of George Galloway?

For roughly the six hundredth time, I think he’s a mendacious, puffed up little arse who would blow a treeful of orangutans for a vote while smoking a cigar. I think he’s a bullshitter and a vainglorious twat; that he attracts whiffy characters like Honey 2 Tha B and is a shameless opportunistic fraud. OTOH, I don’t think he’s a Nazi and I think that the panic-stricken outcry around these parts every time he waggles a little finger is nothing short of hilarious.