Current Events — HabitableZone

Current Events » in reply to re: I'm wearing YOU out?

re: wearing out
Tom Brosz — (archived)

First, just so it's clear, I am trying to define a level of evidence of terrorism, if any, that would justify a preemptive military attack. Not police actions or other less extreme responses.

I have stipulated that waiting for the attack to occur to make the issue cut-and-dried is NOT a morally indefensible position, and from some standpoints, could be considered the only moral choice. Greedo has to shoot first. And of course, the military response would no longer be defined as "preemptive." Yet nobody seems to want to really stand firmly on that rock either.

It was under this condition that we attacked Afghanistan, and most reasonable people (many of them here) agree that this was a valid move. Arguments on how well it was executed are another story. It should still be noted that many of the same characters on the Left who are now against the war in Iraq were equally hard over against the attack on Afghanistan, which makes me suspect their motivations.

Bush obviously disagrees with the "first strike" viewpoint, and he has some points in his favor as well. It's pretty hard to let the American people know that some of them are going to have to die in the cause of moral clarity.

But this puts Bush (or anyone else) in a difficult position. Where DOES one draw the line between leaving a dangerous nation alone and hoping for the best, and waiting to take a first hit?*

The point I've been trying to make, and not very successfully, is that with a terror attack, proving that it is "unequivocably" and "irrefutably" about to take place is damn difficult, if not impossible. I suppose theoretically one could intercept a message with the leader of Iran's signature at the bottom ordering an al-Qaeda attack at a certain time and a certain place. This would certainly justify doing something about the leadership in Iran. But that's not how it works. Most terror groups are not openly supported by the governments of nations. The Taliban was almost a freakish exception, and even they tried to pretend they knew nothing near the end.

Life was much simpler when one could see the armies lining up.

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*And no, Hans Blix was not the answer.

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