I agree that you make a lot of good points, and SDAI covers most of them. I'll just add a couple:

If you are intent on killing the man, why not just do it and avoid bombing the children?

I personally think this is a brilliant idea, and it has crossed the minds of others as well. Cripes, for what we spend on a single B-2 bomber, we could probably figure out a way to make an assassin invisible.

Naturally, this would set off a precedent for plugging world leaders, and since world leaders make the rules of war, assassination as a military policy is against the rules. Bleeding and dying is what the cannon fodder is for. Sitting in bunkers and moving little models around a table is what world leaders are for.

In my more cynical moments, I think that an all-out assassination frenzy would do a lot to skim the authoritarian/totalitarian crust off the top of the human race. But that's before my coffee.

...This is otherwise known as "first strike".



When the Japanese did this in 1941, it was called "infamous". Rightly so. I do not want my nation, which I love very much, to become "infamous" by its own definition.



There's that "cop=killer" equivalence again, but never mind. In case you hadn't noticed, we haven't exactly been sneaking up on them.

Off to the Renaissance Faire.