The official all things terrorism thread

If everyone can take Northern Ireland out of this and actually look at the examples given it might help

 

Sorry mate, I was still on answering the bit about why I believed soldiers should follow orders every time, as you disagree with that.

If you mean that a soldier goes rogue and starts gunning down innocent civilians, then yeah, that would be completely out of order.

 

I have stuck to the NI thing because this is the NZ thread

 

It's on a case by case basis for me. You can't apply one scenario to another. So for me - SS soldiers following orders in a concentration camp exterminating civilians - terrorism. Soldiers following orders burning down a village in Vietnam and killing all male civilians simply because they didn't know who they could trust - terrorism. Allied forces following orders to shell civilian occupied French towns because German soldiers were tanked up and holding up there - not terrorism.

 

All three of these examples are in all out war, the situation changes (rightly or wrongly) in those circumstances.

1 Follow orders or be killed as a traitor, what would you do?
Many of these people were not happy with what they did but wanted to get home to their family's alive.

2 Leave behind possible enemy combatants that come from behind and kill you, what would you do?
Not enough troops to take prisoners and carry on

3 Big tactic of real war, civilians were hit all over the theatre during the war in an attempt to kill the moral of the countries involved (not nice but war isn't).
I grew up in a terraced street with 4 houses missing from the row in front of me and 7 missing from the row behind me (we called them the little croft and the big croft when I was a kid), I suspect many kids around Europe grew up in similar circumstances.

The closest to terrorism was probably Vietnam where quite a few went "rogue" and probably earned the name, other than that the rest were actually "following orders" in the belief it was for the benefit of their country.

 

'Simply' These guys are at war. As Diego has mentioned in the previous comment, if you don't have the manpower to take POW's and you see them as a potential threat then you need to do something about it. Potential threat = Your life could be in danger = You or them.

 

Norman Schwarzkopf, General Custer and Napoleon having some late night bantz

 

The strobe lights were cool though

 

Join in bud, all views welcome

 

True ... and it's the 'judgement' of one individual that is where this enquiry appears to be aimed ...

 

Has HIAG been on recently?

 

48 dead yesterday

 

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I think the Nazi’s tried the old ‘I voz only following orders’ excuse.


It didn’t wash.

 

The leaders who give the orders were rightly charged. The foot soldiers never were as they were only following orders.

 

49

 

I hold my hands up to blind loyalty towards our armed forces. Dragging this up after all this time after the IRA boys were pardoned doesn't sit well with me. IRA were confirmed to be in the crowd that day that's more than enough for me to suggest that they should be no investigation.

If we want them boys to protect us to the best of their ability then they should never need to worry about the threat of prosecution when in war zones.

 

Disagree with that. You have to have accountability in war, otherwise you get scenarios like you did in Bosnia where Soldiers executed young men and boys and dumped them in mass graves. Or scenarios like Sudan where soldiers literally drag women and children out of their homes and rape and kill them.

 

That's just out and out mass murder, though. We are talking about the British Army here, I trust that they aren't going to go around raping women and children. That would be exceptional circumstances which nobody would argue against any charges brought.

A couple of loose rounds in a war zone? **** happens. Build a bridge and...

 

This. This is what I've been trying to get across, but you've just done it far better.

 

https://www.independent.co.uk/news/...DI_XLAFcSMmn-6iFKTBwerus3od6QRrfa9TJjNuNkIZb8