[RAGNAR]

Originally Posted by sck5

General Petraeus would be the first to say (and has said) that we arent going to win by military means. That means we need a political settlement which is harder to achieve when nobody trusts us and all are afraid of us. (not that we are there yet, but will be if we keep at it)

First, with all top brass needing initiation via grad work, these men are already compromised -- less than most of us, but compromised.

Second, there is absolutely no reason why we can't bring these regimes to their knees militarily, then set terms for rebuilding -- it's worked consistently in the past.

Third, what makes you think people in that part of the world are incapable of seeing the obvious? Torturing these animals spares these people an ever-escalating response from us. Further, it brings animals to justice. Don't project the Left's racism and patronizing presumptions on everyone.

As I understood the real difference between the two positions (and ignoring what may be semantic arguments about what may or may not be torture) is that on the one hand there are those who think torture is OK if it saves American lives due to uncovering info that would otherwise not be uncovered.

You mean as you continuously misunderstand what you're reading. Torturing under specific circumstances is a calid option for all free nations. If Americans ever act like these people, they should be tortured.

On the other hand there are those (like me) who think that far more American lives are lost through creating a situation where millions of people hate us so much they want to kill us than can possibly be saved even if the people on the other side are right and there is some sort of Jack Bauer thing going on.

To hell with what people who can't differentiate between law enforcement and preemptive defense on the one side, and torturing for the sake of torture, or to intimidate, etc.

All of this completely ignores the moral repugnance that used to be a foundation of US policy back when we considered torture to be illegal.

Again, you're dropping context like the average religious dogmatist has to for his limited, rationalist, arbitrary belief system to stand.

So we all want to save lives (our guys first). We are just disagreeing about how best to do that.

That "just" doesn't absolve your side of the 101-level need to be rational versus dogmatic. (You may be doing this innocently, but this equivocation of motives is an age old way of slipping poisonous ideas by.)

You havent convinced me yet nor have you convinced the military.

It's becoming ever-more clear that talking to you isn't going to get you to rethink anything.

As for the military:

1) You can't know what they think.

2) In other contexts you might argue that we can never know what they're doing.

3) This nation's military doesn't act or get educated outside the culture of the day. (This is just another reference to authority dodge.)

4) The political realities of the day are such that the military is not in a position to execute such an approach -- even if it's the right approach.

I

will be happy to because whoever wins in the election, now that McCain is the Repub candidate, there will be an end to this disgraceful policy. We just have to wait another few months.

Don't count your chickens, brother...

If someone perceived as weak is elected and we're attacked, there's no telling what pragmatists like the three remaining candidates might do to look tough/efficacious/ on it.