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Not at all. The religious wars were not about not merely saving lives from being fraught with heresy, but saving souls. For the people involved it was a MUCH MORE important issue than this; the Protestant Reformation and Catholic Counter-Reformation sparked wars, were the cause of executions, confiscation of property, banishment, you name it. The point is that because group A didn't like what group B was doing, they went to war. If group B's actions are basically internal, it shouldn't matter whether they have a different religion, a different economy, treat their people differently, or eat their eggs pointy side up or pointy side down. |
I guess we will just have to disagree as to the comparison. I still believe it's not even close to being the same.
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| Okay, in that case why can't Freedonia decide that because the US has a death penalty and is taking the lives of its citizens that they should go to war with us, and proceed to nuke our cities? From their perspective, they're right. They don't want the people of the US to suffer under our tyrranical regime, after all. |
Tyranical Regime? Give me a break. Obviously with wording like that, you aren't thinking about this too clearly. So it's bad that the US accidentally takes innocent lives, But had we not done anything. Manymanymany more civilians would die on purpose? That logic makes no sense.
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No -- While I empathize with the people of Iraq, I am saying that that is not in itself enough to justify going to war. |
Speak for yourself. I think it is the BEST reason to go to war.
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Only if Iraq attacks, or is absolutely on the verge of attacking us, do we have a good case for war. (Do note, however that Lincoln rightly warned about preemptive self defense, pointing out that a warmonger could always claim to see an immediate attack even if no one else could) |
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The only other good reason, at least under our current obligations, is if so much of the rest of the world agrees that it is justified that there is no chance of numerous "justified" wars springing up for similar rationales. That is to say, a war authorized by the UN that otherwise didn't exist is a special exception and doesn't set a precedent. |
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I don't have a problem with that, and I think that there are numerous times when it's important, for example in the Balkans, or Rwanda. But that hasn't happened here, and it's no good for us to just decide that it should have therefore we'll go to war, since then it's no longer a special exception again. |
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Well, we are a signatory to the UN Charter, as well as a founding member. And we promised not to go to war unless it was because we were attacked, or because we were called in by an ally who was attacked, or if there was Security Council authorization for the use of force. So ability, we may have. But not justification according to international norms, and not within our treaty obligations. |
Basically what the UN is saying is. "We don't want to give you the go ahead, that would cause people to be pissed at us, but go ahead and do it, and we wont stop you" The UN has no backbone.
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At this point we have just placed ourselves in the same boat as Iraq -- we're in violation of the Charter! If we were not the militarily most powerful country in the world, we'd be begging for someone to go to war with us in Iraq's defense, and begging for UN sanctions, if not an authorization of war against us by them as well. I don't much care for my country being a proponent of 'might makes right.' |
Then why isn't the US taken to war crimes court? I mean the US is powerful, but not powerful enough to take on the rest of the world I am afraid.
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No, that's us. The UN authorized the first Gulf War and they didn't even have to, since we could have acted in collective self-defense with Kuwait. They authorized the Korean War. And the Balkans. And Somalia. |
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The US stopped authorization for war for humanitarian reasons in Rwanda because _WE_ were scared of how it would play domestically if US soldiers were killed, just as happened in Somalia. We have no backbone. |
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The reason the Security Council hasn't given permission is because they don't believe a) the US when we tell them without providing evidence that Iraq is in violation, and b) that the situation can still be solved without resorting to war, which is probably admirable since the whole point of the UN is to prevent war. |
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| Not at all. Only going to war if you're attacked first is how we keep there from being an insane amount of war. |
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Otherwise you're basically encouraging people to go to war just because they ****ing feel like it. After all, it's equally as just as anything else according to your logic. |
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I mean seriously, give me one reason why the US should not go to war with England over the fact that the people over there are oppressed by virtue of having a monarchy. I'd feel pretty damn oppressed if _I_ lived under a monarchy, after all. Must be just! Let's do it! Dumbass. |