SEALs operate in afganistan, which would be hard to inssert via scuba, unless you walk a looooong time

Yeah, but why do they operate in Afghanistan to begin with? Why isn't this Force Recon territory?

ST6 (SEAL team six) is the descendant of the failed Iran rescue group from the early '80s. It exists and trains essentially to do just this sort of thing. It mostly trains to rescue hostages. But I get what you are saying as a departure from the acronym (Navy - SEa Air Land)

Not sure, im assuming all special forces are being used for the purposes of the war on terror, the Rangers are trained to jump out of plains, but there is no need for that so all special forces are used for counter terrorism purposes

I just remember being trained as a regular Marine to repel from a helicopter for insertion. And I was just a regular Marine with green belt MCMAP training, not Force Recon with black belt MCMAP and advanced MARSOC training.

http://www.democracynow.org/2011/5/2/jeremy_scahill_on_killing_of_bin

@Draugnor: The Battle of Whithaven, where Jones tried to blow up a British port.
Also I don't know how the Stoning of a British soldier during the Boston Massacre could be justified unless you can justify any killing for any rightous cause, such as al Qaedas...

Long thread.

But obi I want to respond to this:

"If every life is sacred and special--no life is."

You're wrong.

That assumes that life is all there is. Your statement is only true if human lives are the only things that exist. But since they stand out in a universe of formlessness, they are sacred indeed.

I agree with smiley. Much Osama was a terrible person who deserved to die, it is a true tragedy that he or anyone else should be killed. He had a life too, and much as it may have been filled with things we find distasteful, he had hopes, fears, dreams, and loves, just as any victim of 911 had.

Bringing in utilitarianism though - 911 was about 1000x more tragic than this was, based on volume. Thus I am much less sad about this than that. Lol.

And I am also no foolish idealist. He needed to be killed. It was the only viable option. It is still tragic but it is all that was available. What is perhaps the most tragic of it all then is that Osama felt he had to kill anyone in the first place. That is the original tragedy.

Again, Whithaven was in the middle of the war, not the opening salvo. And many reports suggest that JPJ realized the fire was out of control and let someone go alert the town. His goal wasn't the whole port. But even if it was, we were already at war so it is the same as bombing a freight yard or factory during WWII.

As far as the Boston Massacre goes, the British killed five civilians. The uprising only cost British *military* lives. Boston did *not* kill a bunch of British civilians. The redcoats, however, killed 5 civilians resulting in the riots.

And I will point out that had Al Quaida just attacked the Pentagon and not used a civilian ariliner to do it, I would have found their attack perfectly acceptable as far as the rules of war are concerned.

Thucydides:By committing murder Bin Laden showed a disregard for the sanctity of life, which is what all murderers do. Therefore his own life is no longer sacred as he has shown he doesn't consider the life of others sacred. Because of this the only just punishment for his crime of murder is execution, and because his life isn't sacred for the above reasons it still upholds the sanctity of life.

"As far as the Boston Massacre goes, the British killed five civilians. The uprising only cost British *military* lives. Boston did *not* kill a bunch of British civilians. The redcoats, however, killed 5 civilians resulting in the riots."
According to President Adams, the British soldiers were killed first, and they fire into the crowd to disperse it in a life threatening act. They were tried for their actions and founded not guilty by a US court...

Al Qaeda was already at war with the US, remember the US embassy bombing in 96?

http://edition.cnn.com/2011/WORLD/asiapcf/05/02/bin.laden.dead/index.html?hpt=T1

DNA confirms it was bin Laden. Now some of you can stop being idiots.

An interesting note:

The New York Post's cover today read "GOT HIM! US Forces shot the bastard!" and The Daily News ran "ROT IN HELL!"

Well, you can't deny their passion, that's for sure! ;)

kreilly89 + 1

@ Draugnar

Those planes hitting the World Trade Centers was a terrorist attack (albeit a very large one). That plane hitting the Pentagon was a declaration of war.

@Gunfighter - I would agree except the plane was a commercial airliner full of civilians, making it a terrorist attack as well. Who was terrorized by it? Anybody who flies in a commercial airliner.

@Fasces - still irrelavent. How does civilians attacking a soldier = Al Quaida attacking *civilians*?

hey someone give me a transhuman perspective on this

http://www.disinfo.com/2011/05/kids-celebrating-osama-bin-laden%E2%80%99s-death/

@ Draugnar

Of course. It was a terrorist attack and a military attack.