if I take someone's life,

[ulysses]

I see little difference in the moral acceptability of the method I employ, be it fists, knife, gun, napalm or nuclear bomb. It is a question of efficiency, not ethics, at that point.

Civilians have been specifically targeted in modern warfare for almost 100 years. The making of a war is no more moral for its use of conventional armaments. This is not to dodge the importance of nuclear weapons or their use in Japan, but rather to point out that they, almost alone, erase the illusion that some of us are safe in our homes while others have to deal with the reality that our wars create. How many noncombatants have died in Iraq due to conventional arms to nary a twitch from much of the rest of the world? What reaction would have been created by the same number of deaths from a nuclear attack on Baghdad?

Peace to the dead of Hiroshima and Nagasaki, of Dresden, of Hamburg, of London, of Warsaw, of Nanjing, and more.

[nadinbrzezinski]

1. Note to the wise

war has always targetted civies...

That is the truth....

And as much as people want to believe otherwise, we truly have... didn't start in modern times either

[ulysses]

2. guess I had in mind in the "aerial bombing" sense.

But yeah, it has.

[nadinbrzezinski]

11. Use infectious cows sent over the ramparts

in medieval Europe, or a bomber, the only difference is the efficiency

The Geneva Conventions were supposed to spare civies, and I could make the case that the only war that happened (in limited fashion) was WW I

Hell, the troops that came to the promised land put every man, woman and child, (and their animals) to the sword.

Less efficient, but in the end you are still dead

[ulysses]

12. excellent point.

I hadn't considered siege warfare, much less Biblical. :)

(did I really put a smiley after that?)

[nadinbrzezinski]

13. Yes, yes you did

I spent ten years as a medic with a national red cross society.

Got shot plenty of times....

We used to joke the drug dealers have not signed the damned conventions

We also used to joke that them red crosses were wonderful target acquisition devices. And if you speak to any army medic or navy corpsman don't be too surprised to hear that joke as well. It is kind of very international...

Trust me, where the rubber meets the road at times you think they are nice theory

That said a couple times the drug dealers were justified (I had volunteers for dinner that day)... for those who don't know the theory my ambulances lost all their neutrality when they loaded, well intended mind you, an Army LT who was armed to the teeth and injured. I did remove all toys, but we were no longer neutral... so getting shot on the way out was actually kosher. Thankfully they didn't hit anything vital, mind you they came THIS CLOSE to the Oxygen regulator. I considered leaving all O2 tubes back at HQ if we were sent back. Yes, you need Oxygen to take care of patients, but hit one of these suckers just right... you are going to go sky hi.

It does remove some of the horrors, that is the conventions do... but only when all sides are willing to play by them and be ahem nice.

[NutmegYankee]

3. Been making that argument in another thread all night.

Any almanac of history says you are right.

[DaveJ]

4. It's always civilians

I think most countries have either formal or informal rules against assassination, but killing civilians is just fine.

Way to protect their own asses, when they are the ones starting the wars.

[TomInTib]

5. Don't forget El Chorillo.

Poppy incinerated 100,000 Panamanians in a matter of hours.

And then there were those pesky Injuns....

[patrice]

6. And any "Christian" who says that the Innocent Dead are NOT Jesus, doesn't

know what Christianity is.

[rug]

7. That's true, but civilians survived Dresden.

[ulysses]

8. civilians survived Hiroshima and Nagasaki.

[rug]

9. Very, very few.

Although your point stands, there is a difference.

[ulysses]

10. it's crude as hell to point out that the issue is efficiency,

but there it is. That's the difference. Firestorm from hundreds of planes or a blast from one, it doesn't make much difference to the dead.