OT: Red Line

If atrocities are being committed, and one has the power to stop them, doesn't one have a moral obligation to act? Isn't it complicit to not act?

Dead children is pretty emotional.

The statement was simple: keep gassing civilians, and we'll keep blasting your air bases. Let's see if it works.

One report was that the raid took out 20% of Assad's air force. So he can only launch four more gas attacks.

What atrocities did anyone stop? Earlier you seem to indicate dead children were of no concern to you.

Yes, they are.

For almost half a century the US has chosen to allow its own citizens to fund the murder by terrorists of many children. The perps didn't hide their activities, but no charges were brought.

Trump being the conscience of the world requires more than the willing suspension of disbelief.

What about US citizens paying for bombs to be planted outside MacDonalds, timed to go off at Saturday lunchtime?

That's a big change.

In the past it has been "pay for children to be murdered, with impunity".

Bad things happened in the past, like the Holocost and the Rwanda genicide, things the US - and others - could have mitigated but didn't. But that was then; the moral situation of the attack on the base in Syria shouldn't be affected by what happened in the past, except as an example of moral failure through inaction.

This is an interesting book:

It's about people who feel compelled to do absolutely everything they can to help others. One couple keeps adopting handicapped kids, 20 or so so far, because they can't stand to turn any one away. Another couple lives in poverty so they can send every possible dollar to less fortunate.

I fund several charities, mostly to provide medical care in Africa and Asia. The problem is, how much? If I give $12,000 a year to fund 20 surgeries in Africa, how can I justify stopping at 20, if I could afford more? How can I buy a season pass to Sugar Bowl when it leaves one more woman to suffer? Huge dilemma. I'm glad I'm not the President.

That's awful; any terrorist bombing is awful. But there is no easy way to stop Irish Americans (and I'm one) from sending money to the old country.

There has been some legal action in the USA to stop gun-running and financing of IRA violence, but it's hard to track most of the cash flow.

If you are looking for root-cause blame, England should be first on the list.

Who said that?

I did. The "pay for children to be murdered" is simple fact. Nobody has been called to account for that, so it is "with impunity".

Precisely.

I don't believe in collective responsibility; people are responsible for their actions and inactions, not those of others.

There is/was a lot of very open activity, particularly in the Boston area, of course. The US authorities could have made simple minimal attempts to disrupt it, but chose not to.

As I said, I don't believe in collective responsibility. If you are looking for "root cause" then you have to go back to the Garden of Eden.

The British have dirty hands in many countries; so do the Americans. I object to people using rose-tinted glasses to avoid seeing that.

There is no black-and-white; it is all shades of gray.

...Jim Thompson

China sounds downright chummy.

It shouldn't have been that difficult to distinguish between legitimate cha rities and IRA fronts.

Particularly if you don't try all that hard.

Tom Gardner wasn't looking for a root cause. He was looking to see who paid for the bomb that went off near where his mother was standing.

Root causes are interesting, but current problems need to be solved now. Th e UK government did take responsibility for solving the problems that its p redecessors had created generations earlier, and wasn't happy that the US g overnment didn't feel all that much urgency about helping with the solution s.

Oh boy. Accidental mis-spelling no doubt!

Let's check the economics.... $100 million to blow holes in a runway.

I think it means there can only be four more similar reports.

Yeah, we also killed a pretty huge number of Viet Cong and North Koreans. In many cases it was more than the numbers of troops they had in the fights.

From other "reports"... "Despite the Pentagon?s assertions, it has been reported the at the Syrian air force is actively flying out of the base nonetheless?even if it is of ?idle interest? to the Defense Department. The airbase?s runway was never targeted, and thus remains intact. The Shayat airbase hosted two squadrons of Su-22M3/M4 bombers and one squadron of Mig-23ML/MLD fighters?and it appears a good number of those jet survived the attack."

?These squadrons were distributed in three different parts of the airbase, and it looks like the missiles hit two out of three sectors. As a consequence, they got 5 Su-22M3s, 1 Su-22M4, and 3 Mig-23ML fighters for a total of 9 aircraft destroyed (the Pentagon claimed 20, but so far, we can only count 9, then subsequently in a recent press release the Pentagon changed the story to 20% of Syrian air power destroyed.),? Center for Naval Analyses military analyst Michael Kofman wrote in his personal blog. ?The squadron of Su-22s located in the northwest of the base seems largely untouched, which is why one of the planes was shown on video launching from the base within the same day.?

The Pentagon seems to be playing fast and loose with the numbers in this case.

I'm curious, where did Assad get his airforce? Do you think they will make him more airplanes?