Defending your country is not murder.

[Tez3]

What if the covenant was undermined from the very beginning?

No, it says if the country sends it's troops to fight it damn well looks after them. No clauses, no ifs, no buts. If you use the military, you look after them.

 

[K-man]

In the end, let's assume that the 9/11 story is straight and upstanding against all scrutiny, except let's pin it on a group of religious fanatics in Texas or Britain or Austrailia. Now, lets imagine that a hyper power demands that you hand over your own people without any sort of evidence and then invades when you balk. Maybe it's still justifiable at this point. Maybe. In 2006, a poll was conducted and the average Afghan tribesman knew nothing about 9/11.


Let's forget about imagination and stick to facts, not conspiracy theory. A group of religious fanatics based in the Middle East hijacked four airliners. They flew two into the World Trade Centre, one into the Pentagon and were probably trying to put the last one into the White House. This group of fanatics, led by Bin Laden, claims responsibility for the attacks and gives his reasons. This caused the death of nearly 3000 innocent people. If a foreign power did this it would most likely have led to an immediate declaration of war and massive retaliation. Whether the average Afghani tribesman knew or not is irrelevant. (The fact is, the average Afghani tribesman and his family was under constant threat from the Taliban anyway.) However, the Taliban government did know and offered sanctuary to Bin Laden and his terrorists. They allowed terrorists from around the world access to his traing camps. They had the same blood on their hands.

Suspicion quickly fell on al-Qaeda, and in 2004, the group's leader, Osama bin Laden, who had initially denied involvement, claimed responsibility for the attacks.[1] Al-Qaeda and bin Laden cited U.S. support of Israel, the presence of U.S. troops in Saudi Arabia, and sanctions against Iraq as motives for the attacks.

Now, ten years later, the war has expanded, we've got double tap drone strikes, night raids, and DU sprayed everywhere. The war has expanded to not just the particular group of religious fanatics, in your home land. People you know are getting killed everyday. Your children can't go to school because it'll be bombed. You can't walk around in a group larger than three or you'll be bombed. You can't open your mouth and complain or some neighbor might take reward money and claim you've been working with the "enemy" bringing a night raid to your household where who knows is going to get shot, maybe your daughter.


The means of waging this war is not the point. Much of what you say is true, but war is war and how it is conducted in this area is US policy, not British. However it is only the tribesman's daughters that can't go to school. The Taliban has tis thing about women that gives them no rights or freedoms. The son's are perfectly free to go to school and, unless the Taliban is using the school as a bomb making factory, the chances of a school being attacked is quite low. You can walk around with as many people as you like unless you are carrying weopns. Just look at any market. (I presume you are referring to the civilian murders in Iraq that I mention in a previous post.) You can't open your mouth to complain because if you criticise the Taliban you and your entire family will be killed on the spot, not just your daughter. Terrorism is on every doorstep in Afghanistan.


Now, ten years later, I agree ... we shouldn't be there. But for different reasons.


Maybe you come home from work one day and your house is destroyed and the only thing that is left of your family are bits and pieces of their clothing fluttering in the trees?


OK. **** happens! I would be distraught.


Would you pick up a weapon and repel the invaders? Would you want revenge? How do soldiers on the other side know who is an enemy and who is simply a guy who had enough and decided to sell his life to remove this threat to everyone he knows? If you would attempt to repel this threat, then the rules of engagement don't matter. You agree that it's justifiable, you agree that you would do the same. Therefore it doesn't matter why or how the insurgent died, because the resistance is justified.


Quite possibly. But if I did, I would be accepting of the fact that I could now be killed at will by the opposing force. I would have voluntarily become a combatant.


Your point about democracy is valid, maybe if we don't consider propaganda and vote rigging, but lets assume that democracy is clean and squeaky and always results in the will of the people. The soldiers on the ground, when faced with an obvious case of being thrust into an immoral situation by there governments have a choice to end the war, at least for themselves. They could quit. They could leave the field. They could refuse to engage. Vietnam probably ended because of this more than anything else. People weren't willing to fight anymore. It's the individual that could make a difference in the end.


Democracy is not always squeaky clean but it is at least an attempt to exercise fairness. It is light years ahead of the next alternative which would be a benign dictatorship. The Taliban system of government is not even on the scale!


Soldiers can't quit. They have contracted to serve their country. They can't strike and they can't decid what job they'll do or what job they won't. Within certain parameters they can't refuse to obey a lawful command, but they must not commit acts outside their rules of engagement. That is the issue in this case.


The Vietnam war didn't end as you suggest. The Vietnam war ended with the defeat of the US forces on Vietnamese soil. Nothing to do with the individual. The South Vietnamese regime was a corrupt puppet of the US administration, (which was obsessed with Communism being evil). It was a war that was promoted with lies and misinformation.

Which brings me back to where I left off. A government that sends its country's troops to war has an obligation to support those troops to the best of its ability. That doesn't seem to be the case in this instance. :asian:

 

[Tez3]

We shouldn't have gone into Afghanistan or Iraq for that matter but we did, the country sent the troops in rightly or wrongly and now they should look after those troops.
Cameron promised that wounded soldiers who could do their military job would be kept in the military but he's kicked them out. Service personnel serving in Afghan have received redundancy notices despite being told they wouldn't. Equipment needed to protect soldiers hasn't been supplied. Royal Marines are arrested for doing their job, the job their country asked them to do, their country shouldn't then penalise them. Pay has been frozen, the military get very little extra for fighting, they stil have to pay all taxes including council tax even though they aren't in the UK. Compensation given to the wounded is cut and in some cases the government has gone to court to try and cut it further.


http://anordinarysoldier.wordpress.com/page/2/

 

[Makalakumu]

Two things of import here that I think really do apply to the topic of this thread.

The Vietnam war didn't end as you suggest. The Vietnam war ended with the defeat of the US forces on Vietnamese soil. Nothing to do with the individual. The South Vietnamese regime was a corrupt puppet of the US administration, (which was obsessed with Communism being evil). It was a war that was promoted with lies and misinformation.

Which brings me back to where I left off. A government that sends its country's troops to war has an obligation to support those troops to the best of its ability. That doesn't seem to be the case in this instance. :asian:

I completely agree and I agree with the parallels to Vietnam. Now, take a look at this.

http://www.sirnosir.com/the_film/synopsis.html

In the 1960’s an anti-war movement emerged that altered the course of history. This movement didn’t take place on college campuses, but in barracks and on aircraft carriers. It flourished in army stockades, navy brigs and in the dingy towns that surround military bases. It penetrated elite military colleges like West Point. And it spread throughout the battlefields of Vietnam. It was a movement no one expected, least of all those in it. Hundreds went to prison and thousands into exile. And by 1971 it had, in the words of one colonel, infested the entire armed services. Yet today few people know about the GI movement against the war in Vietnam.

Rather than put up with the mistreatment. Rather that attempt to fight a limited imperial war of aggression and corporatism where you can get thrown in jail for simply doing your job. Do what the vets in Vietnam did and end the war yourselves.

"Sir, no sir."

I like that.

 

[Tez3]

Two things of import here that I think really do apply to the topic of this thread.



I completely agree and I agree with the parallels to Vietnam. Now, take a look at this.

http://www.sirnosir.com/the_film/synopsis.html



Rather than put up with the mistreatment. Rather that attempt to fight a limited imperial war of aggression and corporatism where you can get thrown in jail for simply doing your job. Do what the vets in Vietnam did and end the war yourselves.

"Sir, no sir."

I like that.

I think that our service people would prefer not to end a war by losing it. They have their pride in a job done properly and losing a war that way would offend them.
You lost the war, the service people didn't end it. Your army was one of conscripts not professional soldiers, there's no comparison. Again you are trying to derail the thread.

 

[Makalakumu]

I think that our service people would prefer not to end a war by losing it. They have their pride in a job done properly and losing a war that way would offend them.

How about losing the war the old fashioned way?

http://rt.com/news/taliban-us-nato-afghanistan-869/

Many analysts also believe that the Taliban will quickly recapture power in Afghanistan no sooner than the core of the foreign combat forces leaves. By the end of this year, only 108,000 allied troops, including 68,000 from the US, will remain. Their main task is to train the Afghan National Security Forces that are to replace them after a total withdrawal in 2014.

Washington and NATO hope Afghan forces will take over the fight against the Taliban after 2014. But many analysts see a multi-factional civil war ahead.

It's not a derailment. I'm simply putting forward another option to be considered rather than keep fighting a limited war where simply doing your job can land you in jail.

"Who wants to be the last person to die for a mistake?" John Kerry

 

[Tez3]

How about losing the war the old fashioned way?

http://rt.com/news/taliban-us-nato-afghanistan-869/



It's not a derailment. I'm simply putting forward another option to be considered rather than keep fighting a limited war where simply doing your job can land you in jail.

"Who wants to be the last person to die for a mistake?" John Kerry

Professional soldiers fight, it's what they do and their country should look after them, simples. They fight and do nasty things so the rest of us don't have to. The war doesn't matter, it's the way the country treats it's service people that does. the country decides where, who and what they fight, they do it and the country looks after them.


Your quote just contains stuff that is common knowledge, here at any rate, everyone knows what is likely to happen. We've also known it for a long time. This is why many of us are actually training the Afghan army and police to take over in the hope that yes they do manage to not to descend into the hell that is the Taliban controlled Afghanistan. To up and leave now is irresponsible.
It's just another derailment. Start another thread and leave mine to the discussion of how the military should be treated by their country.

To lose a war means actually being beaten in warfare not leave a country and then them go ape.

 

[arnisador]

"Study: Britain invaded 90% of the countries in the world. Only 22 countries have never been invaded by Britain."

That's seriously badass.

 

[Makalakumu]

The war doesn't matter...

This has been a long contentious thread. I'm sure you didn't mean something this extreme. Surely, there is a line you would not cross.

That said, don't look for the government to tell you where that line is. They always find ways to make anything they want hold to the letter of the law.

 

[Makalakumu]

That's seriously badass.

Unless your skin is brown...

 

[K-man]

This has been a long contentious thread. I'm sure you didn't mean something this extreme. Surely, there is a line you would not cross.

That said, don't look for the government to tell you where that line is. They always find ways to make anything they want hold to the letter of the law.

I'm sure Tez did mean that, exactly. It is the principle here that is important. It doesn't matter if it was the war in Afghanistan, Iraq or Timbuktu. Any country that sends its troops out onto the battlefield, under stress most of us will never have to endure, to see things we hope never to see and to carry out duies that we hope we never have to do ourselves, owes its troops the total support of the nation. Unless someone has experienced such a situation first hand, I don't believe that person is in a position to judge.

 

[Tez3]

I'm sure Tez did mean that, exactly. It is the principle here that is important. It doesn't matter if it was the war in Afghanistan, Iraq or Timbuktu. Any country that sends its troops out onto the battlefield, under stress most of us will never have to endure, to see things we hope never to see and to carry out duies that we hope we never have to do ourselves, owes its troops the total support of the nation. Unless someone has experienced such a situation first hand, I don't believe that person is in a position to judge.

That's exactly what I meant. Perhaps I should have said 'which war doesn't matter' but it is the principle, we ask so much of our military yet often give so little back. We don't just ask them to go to war, we ask them to help in disasters, not just here but abroad, they fill in when there's strikes (my husband went firefighting with four hours training), they give up their leave and work as security for the Olympics ( no, they didn't get paid extra) they do much and don't actually ask for much back just what the Aussies call a 'fair go'.


Yes Great Britain has invaded all those places, sometimes by war sometimes not, it's always punched above it's weight but that's the past. I don't think quite honestly an American has any place in making comments about 'brown skinned people', we outlawed slavery a long time before America, we've never pursued a policy where had separate toilets, cafes, schools etc for white people and black so don't go down that route of criticising our past. It's the present we are talking about. We've learnt from the past and the one good thing we have from it is the Commonwealth.

 

[Makalakumu]

That's exactly what I meant. Perhaps I should have said 'which war doesn't matter' but it is the principle, we ask so much of our military yet often give so little back. We don't just ask them to go to war, we ask them to help in disasters, not just here but abroad, they fill in when there's strikes (my husband went firefighting with four hours training), they give up their leave and work as security for the Olympics ( no, they didn't get paid extra) they do much and don't actually ask for much back just what the Aussies call a 'fair go'.


Yes Great Britain has invaded all those places, sometimes by war sometimes not, it's always punched above it's weight but that's the past. I don't think quite honestly an American has any place in making comments about 'brown skinned people', we outlawed slavery a long time before America, we've never pursued a policy where had separate toilets, cafes, schools etc for white people and black so don't go down that route of criticising our past. It's the present we are talking about. We've learnt from the past and the one good thing we have from it is the Commonwealth.

I don't really want to get into the racism aspect. Just note that all of the wars of conquest seem to be following a historical pattern when it comes to recent colonialism.

Anyway, I do think the war does matter. There is one obvious reason, but i won't Godwin this thread. here is a more subtle, but impactful reason. People come home from these with incredible hurts and they need our care, because, at least on paper they signed up to protect us. That said, lets consider the cost. For the war in Iraq, the US has spent trillions of dollars. When you consider the hurts that soldiers received there and the long term care, that will cost us more trillions. When you consider that all of this was paid for in debt, the interest payments will balloon the cost. Now, add in all of the wars we're fighting at this time.

What will you tell the unborn who will have to sacrifice and pay for this? What will you say to them in order to explain why their standard of living is so much lower? What will you say to their face when they can't afford an education, when they can't afford a home, when they can barely afford to have children? This is not hyperbole. I am still paying taxes to pay for Vietnam. These wars have a social cost that goes far beyond the span that they take place. What will you tell the children who aren't even born?

Fill in the "insert explanation here". I really want to see how you will justify this to the future. To people who never had a chance to vote. To people you will love in your own family. To people that may be taking care of you in your old old age, if they are still able.

Please fill in the quotation marks.

 

[Tez3]

You really want to derail this don't you? Okay I'll play. You're waffling, all this emotive stuff about the unborn etc. We've had wars in our country for a couple of thousand years now, if you have a while I'll recite all of them. We still have babies being born and we still manage to pay for their care and everyone elses. Our standard of living has got better and better over those couple of thousand years so it's a nonsense to say one war will bankrupt us. If you remeber we had the Falklands War a little while ago too, that didn't bankrupt us either and standards of living have gone up since then too.
Btw on the cost of wars you did very nicely financially out of us for the Second World War we only finished paying you a couple of years ago. Fifty odd million pounds a year since the war, not bad eh. Got you out of that recession in the forties. Beggered us of course but we bounced back as we always do. Your military is hugely bigger than ours and therefore costs more. The way we organise things here such as the NHS etc is different so what you say is perhaps relevant to the USA but not here.

 

[Tez3]

In my lifetime we have been looking after the survivors of the First World War, the Second, Greece, Palestine, Korea, Aden, Cyprus (twice), Malaya, Northern Ireland, Oman, the Falklands, the Balkans, 1st and 2nd Gulf war.
Not all wars are about conquest, four of those conflicts were where our troops wore the UN beret. Often we go in to act as a buffr between warring factions, what that actually means is that both sides get to shoot at us.

 

[Makalakumu]

You know the pound has inflated because of the wars? Imagine where you'd be with different policies. How much more wealthy could you be if people had been more discerning about the war itself.

Anyway, this is all a hidden cost and if we're going to talk about supporting the the troops, let's get real about what that means. It means forcing the unborn to pay. And I'm still curious what you would tell your great grandchildren. Would you say that everything was right and true and that you were protecting them against a grave threat or would you explain that the war was a fraud and that the government of the time dragged us into a mess? What do you think they would say?

Remember, these are the people who will really be supporting you. Justify it.

 

[Tez3]

It's all about the money with you isn't, not honour, not freedom, not anything but the money. The price I assume of being capitalist. How much does it cost, let's throw money at it, lets buy it, it's all money money money.
The pound 'inflated', what it blew up? there's a great number of things that cause inflation and recession much of it coming from America. The war hasn't caused that much of a dent in the economy.
You sound like one of those preachers who love the over dramatic 'statements' and whipping the crowd up into a frenzy, very much the American telly evangelist in fact. However the world doesn't work the way you think it should and all this over dramatic stuff about telling your great grandchildren ( at my age it's not likely I'd be around when they are born especially as I don't have grandchildren so yet another over dramatic sweeping statement) about the war is nonsense, pure fantasy to be honest. You are still assuming we are stupid which offends me, we all know what politicians are, we know how the world works, we know how and why these wars are started and finished, what we are asking is that if the country uses it's troops it looks after them.

It seems to me you think you are the first one who has realised that governments are at best useless at worst corrupt, do you know how many governments we've had? More than enough to have long ago realised what politics is about. We are pragmatic and cynical about politics and you are teaching your grnaparents to suck eggs when you claim to educate us about politics and big business. We know that the first Iraq war was for oil and the second because Bush jnr wanted to finhed what his father had started. Our troops went because we have pledged to support the USA and we did now we need the troops looking after. We are the USA's best friend and ally and we hope that we keep our promises which is worth far more than money.

 

[Tez3]

Like the love parents have for their children love for one's country isn't conditional.

 

[Tez3]

http://www.bbc.co.uk/ethics/war/overview/covenant.shtml

[h=3]Military covenant[/h]"Britain has a 'duty of care' to its armed forces. This began as an unspoken pact between society and the military, possibly originating as far back as Henry VIII's reign. The pact was formally codified as a 'covenant' in 2000. It is not a law but is reinforced by custom and convention.
The covenant only officially applies to the army, but its core principles are taken to extend to the air force and navy too.

Soldiers will be called upon to make personal sacrifices - including the ultimate sacrifice - in the service of the Nation. In putting the needs of the Nation and the Army before their own, they forego some of the rights enjoyed by those outside the Armed Forces.
In return, British soldiers must always be able to expect fair treatment, to be valued and respected as individuals, and that they (and their families) will be sustained and rewarded by commensurate terms and conditions of service.
In the same way the unique nature of military land operations means that the Army differs from all other institutions, and must be sustained and provided for accordingly by the Nation.
This mutual obligation forms the Military Covenant between the Nation, the Army and each individual soldier; an unbreakable common bond of identity, loyalty and responsibility which has sustained the Army throughout its history. It has perhaps its greatest manifestation in the annual commemoration of Armistice Day, when the Nation keeps covenant with those who have made the ultimate sacrifice, giving their lives in action.
Army Doctrine Publication Volume 5
​

The 'duty of care' to troops includes paying towards healthcare, which can be physical care for injuries or mental support for Post Traumatic Stress Disorder and other problems. The Ministry of Defence also provides support for bereaved families.
The law gives the government 'combat immunity', which prevents soldiers from claiming compensation for injuries they received in combat except under official compensation schemes. Because soldiers cannot take the Crown to a civil court, the covenant is viewed as important in protecting soldiers' rights to compensation."

 

[K-man]

You know the pound has inflated because of the wars? Imagine where you'd be with different policies. How much more wealthy could you be if people had been more discerning about the war itself.

This is just not true. The pound has not inflated. In fact the Australian dollar has even risen against the pound. The Euro has devalued thanks to Greece and a few other countries that don't believe in paying tax. But the US dollar is down because of 'fiscal easing'. You can't just keep printing money to pay for services. Every time you print more money the value of the currency falls. Best example would be the Zimbabwe dollar. ($1 US = $373 Zim)

But, this thread is not about justifying war, Afghanistan or other. It is not about past colonial ambitions. It is about the treatment of service personal both during and after their service career.

So back on thread, we have 5 Royal Marines who are in custody over the death of an insurgent after a fire fight. We don't have all the facts. Do you think they are being treated fairly, based on what we do know?