Interesting read

[]LoL[Harm]

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/programmes/from_our_own_correspondent/4209595.stm

[Tammarion]

I dunno how interesting it is - 70%+ of the article as about how bad the El Salvador war was.

Then one line tying to Iraq. "Some in the pentagon..." On any given day, 'some in the pentagon' are coming up with ways to fight martians.

All I see is someone with El Salvador experince in trouble now that peace has broken out there, and trying to tie it in to something current.

[Roscoes_C&W]

El Salvadorians make good cleaning persons.

[Rooster]

:rolly:

[]LoL[Harm]

That's right, history teaches us nothing. I still wonder why they even teach that shit in school.

I just guess when we think of nation building we might want to reflect back on our other tries in the past and to weed out what tactics worked and what tactics didn't. I found this interesting as it showed a relatively poor example of the US's democracy building strategery. If you can't find a way to relate that to the current issues on hand then I don't know what to say.

[Tammarion]

I'm not sure - what does the El Salvadoran experince teach us other than a big shiny "WHAT NOT TO DO" on it?

I really don't know what position you're taking on this so i can't rightfully critisize, so heres my position.

- El Salvador is not directly relative to Iraq, as there are few positive approaches that can be successfully used in Iraq. We are attempting to nation-build, instead of simply propping up whatever government favors the US over Russia/Cuba.
- This leaves the negative examples, which is brutallity and human-rights abuses that make Al Garib look like a spanking. The reaction to what's happened already show that the standard we need to meet has changed over the last 20 years.

Learning from history is fine and well, but I don't need a reporter to point out that because the sun has risen in the morning every day since history began, that it will rise again tomorrow.

[Swifty_Johnson]

Besides the blantent biased by the reporter what else is there to read? El Salvador had a long history of violence before America even entered the picture, are we supposed to wave a magic wand and make it stop?

Turning over the country to the communist would not have been any better, as the blood would then have been spilled by them. It was a dammed if you do and dammed if you don't type situation.

Swifty

[Tammarion]

I'm not gonna go around waving the bias flag on here, because it would take tremendous counter-bias to make El Salvador smell good. Like any number of people who got support in the 70s and 80s. Picking the lesser evil was the cold war in a nutshell.

There is some responisibility now to consider who we give the pointy sticks to these days - the same reason we're bashing Russia for selling 100,000 AKs and SAM systems to Syria.

Linking it to Iraq is something that is at present, tenuious. Is anyone saying that we are training death squads to go around assassinating Imans in Iraq?

[Swifty_Johnson]

As I said, it was a dammed if you do, dammed if you don't situation.

We funded the goverment and right-wing death squads did the killing.

If we didn't, then left-wing death squads would have done the killing.

But, there is peace in the country now, one could not claim that to be the case if the communists won. Civil wars are a messy affair, always have been, which is why we are trying so hard to prevent it from happening in Iraq.

As to the bias, it's blantent and screaming from the article, even a blind man can see that. El Salvador was ruled by military jauntas long before the U.S. became involved. Yet, the article made it seem like it was all the U.S.'s fault.

Swifty

[Allison]

I'm not gonna go around waving the bias flag on here, because it would take tremendous counter-bias to make El Salvador smell good. Like any number of people who got support in the 70s and 80s.
/nod /nod

Is anyone saying that we are training death squads to go around assassinating Imans in Iraq?

I think that was the gist of the article, yes. Well, not that we are training death squads, but that it's an option currently on the table. He says that a "Salvador Option" is being discussed in Washington. I don't know if that's true or not. But if it is, I think it's absolutely relevant to take a look at how well that strategy worked in El Salvador.



Swifty, I don't think I read the same article as you. I didn't get the impression, as you did, that the author was trying to make it sound as if the U.S. is to blame for all that ails El Salvador. But, he does think that U.S.-backed death squads are a bad thing. He also thinks that El Salvador was a failure in U.S. policy; and that that policy shouldn't be reconstituted in Iraq. So, he is biased in the sense that he has an opinion on the matter. But, it is an op-ed piece, so, I think it's okay if he states his opinion.

[Allison]

Here's the Newsweek article (http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/6802629/site/newsweek/) that talks about the "Salvador Option."

[Tammarion]

The editor's note is much more realistic - I'm pretty sure that if anyone mentions the country El Salvador in any context in the Pentagon, it gets leaked to the media the next day.

The model I suspect that is getting more looked at would be Israel.

[Tammarion]

And the newsweek article is more informative - the bbc article looks like it was someone trying to copy it, but erasing anything that would be outright plagerism.

And as far as options go - making areas of the world glow in the dark is also an option - the peeps in the pentagon never take anything completely off the table. Its just that 'snowball's chance in hell' level of probibility.

[Noleader]

I pray to god and all things holy that the Israel model is not getting looked at to much... If anything it is the perfect example of what not to do. It has been nothing but conflict and the root of terrorist activity since we created that nation.

[Noleader]

Oh and I support the concept. I personally think it is the only way to end the problem in Iraq. I also think it should bne carried out by US CIA and not Iraq since we do not want to create the foundation for a bruital dictator.

[Tammarion]

I think the Israel model and the Salvador model only differ in degree - Isrealis bulldoze a family's house, the Salvadorans kill the whole family. But its that degree that makes one misguided self-defence, and the other butchery.

What bothers me more is the lack of results from either model - can anyone say that beating up sympathizers would bring us any closer to bagging Al-Zawkari?

Whatever Israel did to be able to pick off the leaders of Hamas in recent days has to be taken a look at.

[Grundy]

Iraqis need more untrained, vengeful people carrying guns and meting out random justice..Just look at how safe America is today.

[Swifty_Johnson]

I think the Israel model and the Salvador model only differ in degree - Isrealis bulldoze a family's house, the Salvadorans kill the whole family.

Both methods are bad, they generate more hate. In WWII they thought leveling whole cities would cause the enemy to surrender, London,Coventry,Dresden,Tokyo,ect were all leveled and many killed, all it did was infuse people with more hate. You can't intimidate a populace this way.

Whatever Israel did to be able to pick off the leaders of Hamas in recent days has to be taken a look at.

Don't hear to much from Hamas lately, I guess the revolving leadership that they had the last few months have taught them a lesson. This is why we have $25 million dollar bounties on terrorist leaders, but as we have learned, money doesn't work all the time.

Swifty

[Rooster]

Both methods are bad, they generate more hate. In WWII they thought leveling whole cities would cause the enemy to surrender, London,Coventry,Dresden,Tokyo,ect were all leveled and many killed, all it did was infuse people with more hate. You can't intimidate a populace this way
Hiroshima

Nagasaki

:ooer:

[Swifty_Johnson]

Nagasaki and Hiroshime still didn't intimidate the population, they still wanted to fight. We intimidated the Emperor who choose to surrender, over the wishs of his army, who tried to stop it even after two atomic bombs were dropped.

Swifty

[Rooster]

You don't think it intimidated them?

Care to back that up with references?

[Tammarion]

I don't think you can intimidate a population into taking a course of action. All you can do is drive them into a state of non-action, leaving the leadership to do whatever they want.

The reason Israel's use of bulldozing is non-productive is because 1) they don't lead gaza or the west bank, and 2) the chances a family would produce a 2nd bomber without a bulldozing is still slim to none.

Now the killing Hamas leadership sounds more interesting because it means that there is a good information network reporting to Isreal in the west bank and gaza. This is what the US is still trying to get up and running in Iraq. And why Abu Garib is so silly, if it wasn't shameful. We needed local information on the conditions of place 1st, before we could imagine getting 'actionable intelligence'. Pretty much we were asking Hatfields to point out which McCoys were the bad guys, in the inital months.

[Swifty_Johnson]

http://www.ww2pacific.com/surrender.html

How do you intimidate a foe who is willing to fight to the death?

Swifty

[Murrie]

by killing him?

[Rooster]

http://www.ww2pacific.com/surrender.html

How do you intimidate a foe who is willing to fight to the death?

SwiftyThat was all military. No one said anything about the military rolling over.

[Swifty_Johnson]

It still gives you the frame of mind. How intimiated were the Japanese when we firebombed Tokoyo and killed more people then both atomic blasts combined? One thing that WWII showed is that mass killing of civilians did not have the intended effect of sapping their will to fight.

The Japanese thought we would not have the stomach to invade and suffer massive losses. They were prepared to die in the millions fighting us. Our navy was crusing off their shores blasting away at targets, and our airforce was removing city after city off the map. What was two more cities to them?

The bombs did have an effect on the emperor, and they pushed him into making the decision, the population was still preparing to die for him, even after two atomic attacks.

Swifty

[Rooster]

No, the military was... You have yet produce evidence to the contrary regarding intimidation of the people.

[Roscoes_C&W]

My buddy Sugasusaki Nishigiwa was there and he says he was pretty intimidated.

[Noleader]

I am sure if Detroit was leveled I would be pretty intimidated...

[Allison]

I am sure if Detroit was leveled I would be pretty intimidated...

Sure ... but also motivated to go kick some ass.

[Tammarion]

A-bomb in WWII are the original shock and awe.
The japs thought that we had enough bombs to pave their country, something that wouldn't happen with firebombings.

The way you intimidate someone willing to fight to the death is to stack the odds so far in your favor he can't even take some of you with him.

[Swifty_Johnson]

http://www.ibiblio.org/hyperwar/AAF/USSBS/AtomicEffects/AtomicEffects-2.html

Nice long read, at the end.

Third, the lack of understanding of the meaning of the new weapon in areas away from the target undoubtedly limited its demoralizing effect. As distance from the target cities increased, the effectiveness of the bombs in causing certainty of defeat declined progressively:

Group of cities:--------------Percent of population
-------------------------certain of defeat because
----------------------------of atomic bomb
Hiroshima-Nagasaki ---------------25
Cities nearest to target cities----- 23
Cities near to target cities---------15
Cities far from target cities---------8
Cities farthest from target cities----6


So after nuking, only 25% of the population was certain of defeat becasue of the bomb in the cities hit, much less elsewhere.

Even in the target cities, it must be emphasized, the atomic bombs did not uniformly destroy the Japanese fighting spirit. Hiroshima and Nagasaki, when compared with other Japanese cities, were not more defeatist than the average. The bombs were tremendous personal catastrophes to the survivors, but neither time nor understanding of the revolutionary threat of the atomic bomb permitted them to see in these personal catastrophes a final blow to Japan's prospects for victory or negotiated peace.

Swifty

[Tammarion]

So basically yer quotes are saying that you can't intimidate stupid people who don't recognize that the object you are pointing at them is a gun. Figures.

[Swifty_Johnson]

No,

More like the years of constant bombing desenceitised them to the destruction, and the horrors of nuclear radiation were so unknown that they could not realise the full impact of what had happened.

We know today what happens, back then it was unknown.

Swifty

[Tammarion]

You say Pa-tei-toe ...

[Rooster]

Pretty good read. Thanks for backing up your stance.