quote:
Originally posted by dogscoff:
Heard a good opinion on this yestrday.
Rather than bomb the already starving ppl in Afghanistan, how about if NATO responded by filling up their bombers with food and dropping *that* on them. Put a big American flag and a few words in Afghanistani (arabic?) on each parcel so there can be no mistake as to who it's from.
See how many suicide bombers Bin Laden can recruit after *that*.
Obviously it's not a perfect plan (I think you'd need to arrest / assasinate a few leading terrorists as well, just to satisfy the need for justice / revenge) but it's certainly an interesting idea.
Your approach is a bit 'literalistic' but definitely pointed in the right direction. Once we have caught up with the
individuals responsible for the actual terrorism, we need to improve our relations with the Islamic world and the "Third World" in general. While there have always been fantics around, and always will be, the pool of potential terrorists is far larger than it would be if we 'civilized' Westerners were less indifferent to the poverty and suffering of people who aren't close enough for us to actually see them in our personal lives. A campaign to extend the benefits of "globalization" to the poorest people in the world would be far more effective than eleventy-zillion dollars spent on weapons, security systems, and covert operations to combat terrorism directly. In the meantime, we will have to spend some money on these, though.
But in the end, dmm's observation is important to remember. I feel certain he is referring to Satan's famous line in Milton's
Paradise Lost: "'Tis better to rule in Hell than serve in Heaven". Yes, some people want power for themselves at literally
any cost. But not very many. Since some people are just plain crazy, we will never totally eliminate the threat of terrorism, but we can sure reduce the number of other people who see it as viable option, and become pawns for the really crazy ones.
[This message has been edited by Baron Munchausen (edited 18 September 2001).]