From: Harvey Newstrom (mail@HarveyNewstrom.com)
Date: Mon Dec 30 2002 - 00:33:29 MST
On Sunday, December 29, 2002, at 11:54 pm, John K Clark wrote:
> "Harvey Newstrom" <mail@HarveyNewstrom.com>
>
>> The US bombed canadian troops in Afghanistan without verifying their
>> identity.
>
> Preventing friendly fire casualties is an important issue but has
> little to
> do with what we were talking about, it is not a moral problem it is a
> technological problem.
? We were talking about whether our new policy of shooting first and
asking questions later was going to lead to unacceptable losses. You
specifically stated that only one American had been lost this way. I
pointed out a case where Canadians were lost because we shot at people
without specifically knowing who they were. This was not a case where
we mistakenly thought they were terrorists due to misinformation. This
was a case where we saw people with weapons in a location and killed
them without finding out who they were first.
>>> Me:
>>> The bozo was riding in a jeep in Yemen with 5 known members of
>>> al-Qaeda when he was blown up by a Hellfire missile fired from a
>>> unmanned Predator drone.
>
>> Or he might have been a reporter working on a story. Or he might have
>> been an undercover agent infiltrating the group. Or he might have
>> been
>> a negotiator trying to make a deal. Or he might have been an
>> unwitting
>> neighbor who wasn't told about the terrorists' double life. Or he
>> might have been a hitchhiker. Or he might have been a kidnapped
>> American was being held by the terrorists.
>
> Sure, anything is possible, but that's not where I'd place my bet at
> the
> time. I think I would have won too, he wasn't a reporter he wasn't
> hitchhiking, he wasn't a undercover agent, he wasn't negotiating; Ok
> maybe
> he was doing something else that was innocent
I don't like "betting" with peoples lives. Nor do I like authorizing
assassinations without any evidence. We can't kill people for crimes
if we don't know who they are or what they might have done. In this
case, we killed extraneous people to get the one that was slated for
death. I sure hope that we don't keep up that ratio on every secret US
assassination.
> too but I doubt it and I've got more important things to worry about.
> I'm
> curious Harvey, the next time a Predator drone finds 5 top level
> members of
> al-Qaeda riding in a jeep in the desert of Yemen what do you suggest
> we do,
> have a jury trial to decide to fire the Hellfire or not? Should we do
> the
> same thing every time a soldier wants to pull the trigger on his
> rifle? War
> is a dirty business and innocent people are going to get killed even
> by the
> "good guys", but there are people out there who want you and I dead and
> that's a dirty business too, one I'd really like to prevent
If our soldiers can't kill the enemy without killing innocents, I'd say
get better intelligence and planning. If they can't follow him to get
the opportune moment, we need better assassins. If they can't quickly
identify the targets to distinguish the enemy from the allies, we need
better field support. If we can't save innocent lives, why are we
fighting? If we are willing to kill unrelated innocents to try to win
our cause against the enemy, how is that different from the terrorists?
Just giving up and saying that it is too difficult to save innocent
lives is not a good answer.
-- Harvey Newstrom, CISSP <www.HarveyNewstrom.com>
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