Is terrorism Ok? (If the US is doing it?)

G

genxsis

Inactive
Last night on ABC news, there was a report that the CIA has been, and will continue to conduct operations in Iran to destabilize it's government. This includes producing counterfeit currency to circulate in their country. They are also printing false rumors in the newspapers their to turn the people against the government.

If you want to know if what we are doing is "right" or not, just go back and read the above paragraph, and replace "CIA" with the intelligence agency of some other country, and replace "Iran" with "USA". I mean, how would you feel here in the US if you ended up with a counterfeit $20 and discovered it was produced by the Iranian government to help hurt the US economy? Would that make you support Iran? Or would it make you hate them more?

If this sort of thing is what we are at war against, I guess we are ultimately at war with ourselves, if indeed we do the exact same things.
 
I've got news for you, pal. Hostile governments such as Iran's already *do* counterfeit American currency. They also try to hack/infect US computers, and, not coincidentally, plant terrorists here. Would you prefer that the CIA showed up in Iran and tried to get everybody to sing Kumbaya instead?

Tim
 
Nothing new, CIA involvement in the ME goes way back. "He who does not learn from history..."

Link:http://www.nytimes.com/library/world/mideast/041600iran-cia-index.html




Corbis / Bettmann
By JAMES RISEN


The Central Intelligence Agency's secret history of its covert operation to overthrow Iran's government in 1953 offers an inside look at how the agency stumbled into success, despite a series of mishaps that derailed its original plans.

Written in 1954 by one of the coup's chief planners, the history details how United States and British officials plotted the military coup that returned the shah of Iran to power and toppled Iran's elected prime minister, an ardent nationalist.

The document shows that:


Britain, fearful of Iran's plans to nationalize its oil industry, came up with the idea for the coup in 1952 and pressed the United States to mount a joint operation to remove the prime minister.

The C.I.A. and S.I.S., the British intelligence service, handpicked Gen. Fazlollah Zahedi to succeed Prime Minister Mohammed Mossadegh and covertly funneled $5 million to General Zahedi's regime two days after the coup prevailed.

Iranians working for the C.I.A. and posing as Communists harassed religious leaders and staged the bombing of one cleric's home in a campaign to turn the country's Islamic religious community against Mossadegh's government.

The shah's cowardice nearly killed the C.I.A. operation. Fearful of risking his throne, the Shah repeatedly refused to sign C.I.A.-written royal decrees to change the government. The agency arranged for the shah's twin sister, Princess Ashraf Pahlevi, and Gen. H. Norman Schwarzkopf, the father of the Desert Storm commander, to act as intermediaries to try to keep him from wilting under pressure. He still fled the country just before the coup succeeded.



badbob
 
A BIG difference

Is the fact that the government of Iran has stated on many occasions it wants to DESTROY America.
We have consistently told them we want to live in peace with them.
How long should we let this go on before we do something about it?
 
No, it's not right. It merely displays the utter hypocrisy in geopolitics and on the right. It's ok for us to do it but not for them.

Is the fact that the government of Iran has stated on many occasions it wants to DESTROY America.
We have consistently told them we want to live in peace with them.
How long should we let this go on before we do something about it?
Click to expand...
lol no they haven't and no we haven't

Call me if we start sending suicide bombers into grade schools in Iran
Click to expand...
Call me if we start seeing Iranian suicide bombers in American grade schools.

Oh but the Israeli schools! Bull****. The Israelis are equally as guilty of the exact same atrocities as the Iranians. It doesn't excuse their actions, it doesn't excuse the actions of the Iranians and it doesn't excuse our actions.
 
I see...counterfeit currency and rumors are on the same level as suicide bombers, etc.

got it :rolleyes:

No hypocrisy on my part....just different standards for what constitutes terrorism

and of course I don't hate the Israelis:D ...that is another crucial difference
 
Never said they were the same, simply pointing out that you cannot justify a wrong by pointing to the wrongs of others. But if you really want to get into the details then bombing schools and other civilian structures is no better than sending in a suicide bomber.

I have no hatred for Israelis either, I just don't pretend they're innocent victims nor do I fool myself into thinking the same of Americans.
 
Never said they were the same, simply pointing out that you cannot justify a wrong by pointing to the wrongs of others.
Click to expand...

Seriously, didn't they teach people this kind of thing in grade school where ya'll came from?
 
You can understand how I might get confused....since the Israeli's had not been mentioned at all previously....evidently you dragged them into this because you love and respect them:p

I was not justifying anything....but just like I don't think a stern talking to is torture I don't think counterfeiting and rumors is terrorism

It pains me when someone equates waterboarding to decapitation

And killing is wrong so we are all diminished if a suicide bomber is shot before he can press the button...the fact that he was going to murder a bunch of innocents and we only shot him to prevent that doesn't matter

And accidental deaths are just as wrong as intentional deaths

There is only right and wrong...if we had any decency we would just sit back and do nothing...about anything...you know...except blame "the right"
 
And killing is wrong so we are all diminished if a suicide bomber is shot before he can press the button...the fact that he was going to murder a bunch of innocents and we only shot him to prevent that doesn't matter.
Click to expand...
This is only true if you accept that killing is always wrong. Most people at least allow for killing in self defense.

I was not justifying anything....but just like I don't think a stern talking to is torture I don't think counterfeiting and rumors is terrorism

It pains me when someone equates waterboarding to decapitation
Click to expand...
If waterboarding is no big deal then I'm sure you'd not mind if we went ahead and did it to somebody you care about, such as your wife, kids, or parents. Since they're likely no more or less guilty of anything that some of the other people we've subjected to it. Or heck, how about just doing it to you. And then holding you for a while (say a year) while making no promises that you'll ever get a trial or be released.

Also I think it's likely we'd define "counterfeiting and rumors" as terrorism if it was done against us...then again, we're willing to define a lot of things as terrorism when it suits us.
 
You can understand how I might get confused....since the Israeli's had not been mentioned at all previously....evidently you dragged them into this because you love and respect them
Click to expand...
The issue of Iranian suicide bombers in schools was brought up, something that's happened not in the US but in Israel.

You can understand how I might get confused....since the Israeli's had not been mentioned at all previously....evidently you dragged them into this because you love and respect them
Click to expand...
This isn't a stern talking to, just like a naked dogpile and spreading feces on a man's face is not a stern talking to. Waterboarding is not a stern talking to and intentionally attacking a nation's economy is not a stern talking to.

It pains me when someone equates waterboarding to decapitation
Click to expand...
No one does. Decapitation is not torture.

And killing is wrong so we are all diminished if a suicide bomber is shot before he can press the button...the fact that he was going to murder a bunch of innocents and we only shot him to prevent that doesn't matter
Click to expand...
The point is that it's not ok to attempt to kill that potential suicide bomber by dropping a laser guided bomb in his neighborhood without giving a rat's ass about the "collateral damage".
And accidental deaths are just as wrong as intentional deaths
Click to expand...
When those accidental deaths could have been avoided by simply not attacking in the first place, yes. When those accidental deaths are not accidental but due to negligence and incompetence, yes. When those accidental deaths are accepted by the people here because it's better than ten innocent Iranians die than ten Americans, yes.
There is only right and wrong...if we had any decency we would just sit back and do nothing...about anything...you know...except blame "the right"
Click to expand...
There is no universal morality in the first place but it would certainly be better to "just sit back and do nothing" than go in and cause far more problems than we could ever hope to solve. But it's ok because the masses believe the lie that killing them somehow makes their families not want to kill us.
 
I lived where cattle were raised as a youngster. My great grandfathers advice was: If you mess with the bull long enough you will evetually get the horn. If we play regime changers and supporters in the middle east and get attacked by them should we be suprised?
 
Last night on ABC news, there was a report that the CIA has been, and will continue to conduct operations in Iran to destabilize it's government.
Click to expand...

***Business as usual, unfortunately. As someone posted, last time we messed with Iran's elected government, we ended up with the Ayatollah. The inevitable blowback from these CIA doings tends to be discounted because it often doesn't come for many years and the political cycle is so much shorter. Of course, since much of what prompted it is either unknown or long forgotten by the American public, it looks like the counter-attack or retribution is coming out of nowhere and for no reason.
 
"This isn't a stern talking to, just like a naked dogpile and spreading feces on a man's face is not a stern talking to"

Sorry...but I go with Ann Coulter on this one.....if it happens in a frat house hazing it is not torture.

As to messing with their economy....you are right...we should issue a public apology..I ....for one ..........am ashamed

JC...who exactly had their wife or kids waterboarded??

For that matter perhaps you can provide me with a list of people "coerced" that were totally innocent of any wrongdoing

Unlike Bill Clinton, I don't subscribe to the everybody does it defense, but threads like this make me wonder.....why is this news

Because I assumed stuff like this goes on ALL the time
 
Sorry...but I go with Ann Coulter on this one.....if it happens in a frat house hazing it is not torture.
Click to expand...

Frat house hazings are voluntary and consensual. I'm saddened that you, along with Ann and Rush, fail to see the difference there.

JC...who exactly had their wife or kids waterboarded??

For that matter perhaps you can provide me with a list of people "coerced" that were totally innocent of any wrongdoing
Click to expand...

For the former, nobody that I know of. But innocent people are innocent people, whether a man, woman, or child. Our wives and children are no more (and conversely, no less) deserving of a waterboarding than any given innocent man.

To the latter, I have no such list. We have, however, released plenty of people without any charges whatsoever. I mean, obviously that's not proof of innocence, but to paraphrase from elsewhere I wasn't aware we were being required to prove negatives now.
 
What the CIA has done may not be the best in a perfect world. But people have always been fighting and killing each other and likely always will. Within that context, the USA has provided more people with more blessings than any other nation or society in human history. The USA liberated China from the Japs, India from the Brits, Europe from the Nazis, and much of the USSR from the Bolsheviks. Praise be to the Almighty Father who has guided our past statesmen.

What the CIA is doing is trying to finesse the enemy in the continuing world wide war of Islam against the Infidels. I wish the CIA all the best in the attempt. The alternative is a Dresden-Hamburg style firebombing of Tehran, a retalitory Israeli nuclear strike on various ME cities, an American Hiroshima as envisioned by Al Qaeda and enabled by NK, Iran, Pakistan; and world economy that hits a depressive period that makes the 1930s look like a picnic.

In the ideal world the Mullahs would give up their addiction to the thought of their own supremacy and thirst for blood. Absent their turning of the heart, I say about the US use of dirty tricks and mass bombardment 'the more, the sooner, the better'.

If you are foolish enough to try a case for cultural relativism, do a Yahoo search on the phrase 'Stoned to Death'. The result, an MPEG of a young woman stoned-to-the-death under a white sheet, should change your mind.

Moderation in the pursuit of just punishment and deterrance against further aggression is no virtue.

Now excuse me while I go watch 'Home Makeover', a secular statement of how it is that this the greatest country of all time, ever.
 
The people on here who excuse this sort of behavior amaze me. We constantly are trying to influence this country or that using these sort of tactics, and then are surprised and outraged when they strike back with state-sponsored terrorism.

Because we do some good things does not excuse evil deeds.

Waterboarding is torture. Period. Whether the people who are being waterboarded are guilty or not has no bearing on that fact. There can be no place for torture in a free society, whether the people being tortured are "guilty" or not.
 
Waterboarding is torture. Period. Whether the people who are being waterboarded are guilty or not has no bearing on that fact. There can be no place for torture in a free society, whether the people being tortured are "guilty" or not.
Click to expand...

Well yeah, it'd be nice if this argument carried any weight in today's America. But obviously it doesn't. Here you have people claiming that humiliating and demeaning acts (such as spreading feces on somebody's face) aren't even torture (hint: torture need not be only physical), and that those who are tortured are somehow required to prove their innocence. Such people will never care about the idea that torturing even the guilty might be wrong.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top