Do the means justify the end?
- Thread starter Aunty Em
- Start date
Aunty Em
Well-Known Member
Oh bugger! LOL. I must have been halucinating when I wrote that - I'd only had 4 hours sleep in 56 hrs and it was nearly 1 am here. Well that's my excuse anyway. Sleep deprivation - you should try it sometime. I'm often amazed that I can actually still string two gords towether.
Ardsgaine
Active Member
Aunty Em said:
The hallmark of a terrorist is that he targets the civilians of free (or partially free) nations almost exclusively. They wage war against the people of a country, rather than its military, in order to scare the population into acquiescing to their demands. It's a tactic specifically designed to be employed against free countries, because it doesn't work against dictatorships. Try terrorizing a people who are already being terrorrized by their government-- it's redundant. It's also a tactic that is used by would-be dictators. People who think that the deliberate slaughter of innocent civilians is an acceptable means to accomplish their goals will continue slaughtering innocent civilians when they get into power. The ends don't justify the means, because the means will determine the ends.
As far as the Chechens vs the Russians, I can't say for certain which side is the worst terrorists. Certainly the Russians have a bad history of oppression in the region. That doesn't mean that the Chechen government is automatically better. With the democratic reforms that the Russians have made and the liberalization of their economy, my inclination is to say that they are probably the good guys in the conflict. I would have to do a lot more reading about it to be confident of that assessment. I can say with certainty, though, that the particular men who took those hostages were not freedom fighters. Whatever they're fighting for, it's not freedom.
Gato_Solo
Out-freaking-standing OTC member
Aunty Em said:
Surely you must be joking. You can't spin this one. War is fought between 2 armies. Civilians are not targeted at all...unless they grab rifles and start shooting, then they become legitimate targets. Terrorists intentionally target civilians. Using your above logic, driving a car is terrorism because you could kill someone.
LL said:
He said Russians, not Soviets.
As far as the mater at hand, while very uneasy about the actions taken by the Russian army, it beats the hell out the probable outcaome. The terrorists had over 100 grenades & an eqivalent of 250lbs of TNT. They would have leveled that theatre & all inside at some point. Do the ends justify the means? Yes. Don't bargain with terrorists & all that.
There is no justification for not informing the medical community on what was used or at least supply an antidote however. The world knows the Russians & the Americans & the Chinese, among many others have chemical & biologicals from the cold war. This one was a lesser agent, so WTF? That needs to be explained to the world community.
If it happened here, I'd expect a similar response, using local or federal authorities in place of military. Better a few dead than all dead. I would expect local ERs to have serums ready & available though.
How would I handle it? No idea. I'm not in charge of squat. My 9 year old son knows that.
Theoretically, I wouldn't have waited as long as Putin dd. Stop it now. Dn't give the bad guys a stage to spew forth rhetoric. If they want change, follow channels, the UN is always ready 