I think that's one of the deepest posts I have ever seen Mole make.

"Violence, naked force, has resolved more issues in history than has any other factor. The contrary opinion that violence doesn't solve anything is merely wishful thinking at its worst. People who forget that always pay."
- Starship Troopers

See I'm gonna contradict myself now coz my previous post is exactly what I believe and would like to be true BUT I know that with human nature it would NEVER work to have peace. Humans can't do peace, we're just too violent as a race. Someone would always want more and when told 'no', take it by force. That's essentially all war is, just on a larger scale than one person! Proven by the fact me and Ox are psycho's in games

haha, at least you admit it. And though a war-free world would be nice, yea, I agree, not likely.

I used to work pretty close to policy makers at the Belgian Home Office, which covered topics like privacy laws, counterterrorism, intelligence gathering, border controls and asylum. I.e. all pretty controversial topics that have to do with fundamental rights and/or respect for human beings and have a potential to go wrong really quickly. Of course, I was never at the actual policy making meetings (that would have been rich ), but I can tell you that even though I don't always agree with policies there was very little 'we do it because have to do it, whether it's right or wrong' on that level. I'm sure it was there on the executive levels - the actual field workers in intelligence and counterterrorism services for example, but that's not who actually call the shots.

Point being, I don't expect my government to do dirty work. Some things are inevitable, yes, but basic respect for human beings is never not an option. There's no one who's ever going to convince me that gulags like Guantanamo are a viable long-term solution to anything. Nor is torture ('legal' torture or the torture that is being exported to other, less discriminating countries when it comes to human rights). [On a related note; it's long been proved that torture is very likely to produce fabricated and false infomation.] http://www.livescience.com/4651-torture ... rking.html

It doesn't really matter whether the government is honest about it or not. Maybe to us, but not to the people who are on the receiving end. Should we really expect them to make a difference between what we as a people want and what a government is doing to them? How could they know the difference anyway?

I'm all for pragmatism, but I don't think pragmatism should be confused with being inhumane.

God I sounds like such a fucking hippie.

Ok, firstly, bitches, word on the street is that the evidence found during the raid suggests OBL was coordinating terrorist activity from his location. So you guys may have been too hasty to state that his function was negligible.

Secondly, at the moment i'm not sympathising with people who claim the hit was unlawful, against human rights, immoral, etc. Law and justice are not always the same thing, but anyway, surely if he was coordinating terrorist activity from that location, that situation is considered a battlefield and therefore he's a legit target.

Coordinating some actions, sure. Coordinating a global and vast network of terrorists from a shithole in Pakistan, unlikely. And that it would be making things a battlefield and him a commander or whatever is just American newspeak, tbh.

Let's make it clear that I think he totally had it coming, and that I am not exactly mourning his death. I am in no way opposed to the idea. It's the execution (heh, as in, way it was carried out) I'm talking about. Is the US justified in taking action against Bin Laden, sure, but unilateral actions on foreign soil and shooting an unarmed man is a little fuzzier. Not to mention totally illegal by any international law, but only if a country that isn't part of the incrowd does it.

We should be piling on pakistan and their shady role in this, tbh. Soaking up billions of money from the US every year to keep terrorists at bay and whoop, Bin Laden is found in a townhouse near a Pakistani military base. The fuck? Sounds like a protection racket to me. "Sure sure we can protect you from evil terros give us money - no we don't know where Bin Laden is but he is VERY dangerous so keep giving us money". The fact that the US didn't even dare telling anyone in the Pakistani army or intelligence service about the operation is quite telling.

I guess I believe that the moment you decide to take any action TOWARDS taking an [Innocent] human life, 10 human lives, 1000's of human lives, you instantaneously waive your human rights. I'm not saying it's right to a shoot an unarmed man, but this man coordinated attacks which lost thousands of innocent lives. Why wait till he's got a gun?

To paraphrase dragon age, there won't be tales of your 'heroic' full frontal charge at an enemy resulting in your death, always stick to the flanks.

Human Rights to me, should be for the guy that stole £20 from a cash register because he had no money to feed his kids. Not the guy that walked in to the garage, killed 3 people without hesitation for the sake of £20 to feed their heroin addiction. Lock 'em in a hole for all I care. Short story is the Osama Bin Laden destroyed so much and hurt so many people. I think that far outweighs 2 bullets to the head while he's chilling at home.

As Derf said, Law and Justice are two separate things. My brother once literally threw a bully of a bus because he was picking on another kid on the bus, the bus driver refused to leave the stop until they settled so the bully was making everyone late too.

What my brother did was technically assault, but 40ish bus passengers got to their destination on time, the kid got his bag back and the rest of the bullies gang sat there quietly and my bro got thanked by the driver. Unlawful, but just.

I feel like this is going to read like I'm trying to convince you, I'm not - I'm just stating my side in the matter.

EDIT: Forgot to mention, when I say about "higher ups" etc, I don't have a massive working knowledge of it or anything, but I'm not necessarily talking the office dwellers here making the decisions.

I consider bin laden a valid target. Just like if someone attached our president or congress or something, that would be a valid target as well. Military, government, police, valid targets. Civilians, not so much. The fact it was in Pakistan... so what? We've been blowing up people with missiles in Pakistan for years. The fact they'd whine about one of the most successful military raids in years is ridiculous. If we'd jumped over into India or something, that's a different story.

I think the way the US handled this is disastrous for all armed services in developed countries around the globe. I don't understand at what point did the US think it is a good idea to throw all the fundamental ideals out of the window that make up the core of their armed forces. At what point was it a good idea to substitute courage, honour, justice for cheap murdering. I am truly and deeply ashamed that a country with exemplary patriotism like the US would opt for cheap murdering. The ones who pulled the trigger killed the honour in US armed forces. They should have stood down and say fuck no, we don't go that low. I think the execution itself was more damaging in the eyes of the thinking people than any bomb OBL could have ever devised, with his dying breath he delivered a truly crippling blow, he showed that the elite of the west are nothing but cheap murderers.

Brothers in arms holds a meaning that most people do not understand and I do not want to think that my brothers are simple minded killers. The uniform reminds us that we represent the higher ideal, we are the line of humanity, we do not murder unarmed people because the situation was there. We make the tough choices and pay for them in our own little private hell.

I agree that OBL life was done for but not like this. I don't really give a shit about people celebrating about OBL death, for i mourn the death of honour in US armed forces. I cannot express the disgrace in words.

assuming they were sent in to kill him and that's it... I dunno. Even then I'm not sure I'd go that far. But the SEALs were apparently under orders to capture him if possible, kill him if he resists, and he resisted. They had interrogators on the ship in case the SEALs managed to take him alive.

http://www.latimes.com/news/politics/la ... 8641.story

We probably won't ever know the truth.... except the SEALs were wearing helmet cams. So if those videos ever leak, we might have a better answer.

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article ... eader.html

Includes some description of what happened.

@Peltz, the closest experience I have to anything like this would be paintballing so I don't really understand at all what it's like on the field, but I just don't see the point in [as a bad example] waiting for him to open fire, etc before taking him out? I'm not sure that's the exact point your getting at, but what I mean is we're a long way from the days where it'd be "pistols at dawn" as it were and having an honourary fight.

Nah the point is that the Deltas, rangers, seals, marines, these are the heroes of american people. They have a face and a rank, they are your neighbours, brothers, fathers etc. And by sending them on a assassination mission they pretty much took a dump on it. The instrument they used for removing the cancer was the worst possible choice. Use a cruise missile, send assassins, nobody gives a fuck but when you send someone who stands and represents something better in us on an assassination mission then that's just fucked up.

I would go as far as to suspect if the team had any non-lethal weapons at all in their arsenal and it was an assassination mission from the start. The tools of the trade show the true intent.