Quote:
Originally Posted by Xaccers
Of course that's a valid point, unless of course the reason why West Belfast, South Armagh, or Leeds weren't carpet bombed was because there were alternative tactics available, such as police raids on houses, now there's a thought.
Similarly, raids on houses have taken place in Iraq, correct?
It's not all carpet bombings is it?
In fact, carpet bombings in comparison with house raids with troops is a rare thing wouldn't you say?
There are thousands of times more house raids by soldiers than there are carpet bombings right?
Not forgetting that the IRA did take steps to have areas cleared of civilians in many bombings by alerting the authorities.
That's one major difference between the insurgents and the IRA.
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Yes, you're entirely right. There were alternative tactics available then in Northern Ireland as there are now in Iraq. That these strategic house raids are regularly carried out in Iraq is not in dispute, nor is the fact that house to house searches cause less collateral damage than carpet bombing.
Factually the house raids in Iraq far outweigh the number of carpet bombing incidents. However, the significantly lower number of carpet bombing incidents have claimed many more innocent civilian lives than house raids.
The fact is that carpet bombing, heavy artilliery, missile and mortar fire has taken place in Iraq in densley populated areas and killed civilians (even when the option of house to house was available). As I stated earlier this is a part of the changing face of "distance conflict", due in no small part to the fact that the French realized very early in their military campaigns that dead soldiers do not win wars.
My argument is that anyone who thinks that the use of such munitions can in some way be controlled to minimize civilian casualties in these circumstances is barking up the wrong tree. I have witnessed the after effects of this type of ordnance and worse (see flechettes) in Beirut and other theatres and, even when deployed by the most professional of soldiers, there is
no way to legislate for potential civilian casualties if the environment is a predominantly civilian populated area.
I'm not saying the current tactics in Iraq are right or wrong (either way they don't seem to be working) but simply that if the ends justifying the means involves the use of indiscriminate (beyond targetting) fragmentational ordnance in civilian areas then it is entirely 100% likely that innocent civilians will be killed. No amount of "careful targetting" will prevent the fact - so quite why anyone would seek to say they are trying to minimize civilian deaths and casualties whilst using ordnance designed specifically to fragment is beyond me.
Civilians will die - even with the best will in the world that is unavoidable. Once a war starts no amount of hand wringing, conscience cleansing or well intentioned soundbites regarding "careful deployment" will change that fact.
Military commanders attempt to expunge their consciences and the consciences of their suborbdinates by using the argument that they are trying to prevent civilian losses. The best way to prevent such a magnitude of civilian losses is not to use certain ordnance - but this takes us into the realm of "house to house, street by street" and the potential for military losses on a far greater scale. It comes down to economics of personnel. If you can kill the baddies with minimum losses to yourself then you do it - fact (and indeed objective) of war.
Based on what the military know to be factual regarding the design and deployment capabilities of certain ordnance there is no logical reason for them to excuse or to seek to excuse the deaths of civilians once that ordnance has been utilized in a conflict situation. That is a fact of life.
On Northern Ireland.
Had the British army / establishment sought to carpet bomb selective parts of Belfast or South Armagh citing their losses and the embedded terrorists and their support infrastructure in those areas they would have been quite justified (based on current military losses in Iraq vis a vis the figures for military losses in any three year period in Northern Ireland) in doing so.
There would have been no reasonable argument against the the use of carpet bombing / artilliery use / mortars or missiles to affect the suppression of insurgents / terrorists in Northern Ireland (or Bradford for that matter) beyond the fact that it was morally and democratically unjustifiable in the eyes of an otherwise civilized society. That, and a preference for counter insurgency, infiltration and effective intelligence gathering (not really available options in Iraq), is why it was never used as an option. The result? A thirty year war.
This brings me back to my point of exercising democracy on our own doorsteps. The notion of carpet bombing, the use of heavy artilliery, rockets, tanks and mortars in civilian populated areas is entirely acceptable to the civilian population of Britain and America in certain conflict situations - as long as it isn't happening on their own street or area.
Fragmentational ordnance may be dirty, morally objectionable and a very real threat to civilians but that is how they were designed and they work. That is the reality of war.
I realize this is all off topic (apparently some bloke got hung) and apologize for the length of the above. If anyone would like to discuss these things in detail perhaps we should start a new thread or move to pm or email to exchange views?