Human shields gather in Iraq

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Ok, here's a question. While I'm not necessarily saying that I wouldn't bomb the building lets spin this scenario. If you're justified in blowing up an Iraqi building full of innocents to get a few military then if Sadam sent terrorists over here to blow up government facilities and kills innocent along with the government workers wouldn't that be just as legitimate? We are at war.

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Ghostshooter...the Devil's advocate:evil:
 
buzz_knox -

Interesting that you speak of natural consequences, when the real situation involves nothing of the sort.

A person who goes cliff-diving in three feet of water, or plays eighteen holes of golf in a lightning storm is subject to the natural consequences of his actions, and as such deserves no sympathy. But that is not what we are talking about. If a military commander orders the destruction of a hospital or water-treatment plant (leaving aside the question of those being legitimate military targets), knowing that there are civillian noncombatants inside, he is commiting an act of deliberate, premeditated murder.

I dislike collateral damage when it happens by accident. When it happens intentionally, that is evil.

- Chris
 
I think that depends upon what you call an "innocent". If it were, say, an apartment building where some people happened to live and didn't necessarily know what was going on in the basement, thats one thing.
To surround a military position with volunteers holding a full knowledge of what they are protecting, I say most certainly not innocent. Terms immediately which come to mind are fool, bullseye, idiot, oxygen thief-you get the idea.
I would have a lot more respect for them if they would pick up arms for Saddam-not to say I think they would be right, but I would hold more respect for them.
I would give even more respect if they readied themselves to take care of the wounded in the area as caregivers and unarmed to demonstrate their courage.
 
Let's cruise back to the article for a second...

They plan to act as human shields, hunkering down in hospitals, water-treatment plants and other civilian installations to dissuade U.S. commanders from targeting those facilities.
Click to expand...
You might be able to make an argument for some kind of combatant status if they were protecting SAM sites and airbases. But they aren't.

- Chris
 
Collateral damage cannot happen intentionally given the current political climate. In recent years, we generally don't engage in operations when we know that civilians will be injured. And that's one of the reasons that our military has been generally ineffective.

[Edited upon noting that the article brought up arguably civilian targets].
 
Good point Chris, but I think Hans should be inspecting these so-called civilian facilities, as Saddam has a record of hiding things in these places which aren't supposed to contain anything of a military value.
So now you have a dilemma-if for example, Saddam has used the storage area of a hospital to set up a C&C site which will be used to direct the killing of our soldiers, and you know there are these people surrounding the building, you have your choices-you may bomb the site, saving a lot of your allied soldiers and killing the volunteers, you might warn the volunteers to vacate by a leaflet drop just prior to bombing, or you leave it alone, causing "innocent soldiers" to die because you failed to do what you could to protect them?
 
I don't have a link handy but I heard a couple of days ago that one of the Canadians who went there to act as a human shield was killed in a traffic accident soon after arriving. Oh the irony. :D

Greg
 
I think S.H. would more than likely blow one of these places up to kill these human shields, to make it look like we did it way before any US or NATO force actually dropped any bombs near them.
 
Delmar:

Good point Chris, but I think Hans should be inspecting these so-called civilian facilities, as Saddam has a record of hiding things in these places which aren't supposed to contain anything of a military value.
Click to expand...

Sadam probably does hide weapons in places like that. However, if you read the article, the "human shields" aren't going to be people that Sadam is going to tell his secret weapons locations to. Or do you think inspectors should search every civilian building in Iraq?

From the article:
They include Italian legislators, South African Muslims, German musicians and a flurry of Americans, from church leaders and professors to four women who lost relatives in the Sept. 11, 2001, terror attacks.
Click to expand...

Give Sadam a little credit. He may be insane, but he's not an idiot. He's not going to advertise the location of his secret stuff by sitting a bunch of foreigners in front of it.
 
Let's see......... A bunch of American "useful idiots" decide to sing kumbya next to a high value military asset.

Sounds like a "target rich environment" to me. Darwinism at its finest...........

Yanus
 
Demise,
You might be right, but the fact is that Saddam has no more cards left to play but public sympathy, so I wouldn't hold out for him actually putting WMD's where the moron's are just to get the world fighting amongst themselves over what should be done. I doubt he would confer with the squatters before doing it, but neither would I put it past that creep to put weapons grade plutonium in a pediatrics ward.
 
I wonder just what they're shielding... I mean, maybe some of the idjits will notice that they've got strange chemical trucks rolling in and out of the unmarked building that's right next to the daycare center...

Nyah....
 
I can just see Sean Penn doing an imitation of Robin Williams in "Good Morning, Vietnam"......BIG DOGS, LANDING ON MY FACE :what:
 
Most are leaving this weekend, and the rest are going to "hunker down" in buildings that are very unlikely targets. Now that's dedication to a cause! I thought shields were supposed to be in front of the target..not on a departing flight or in a cellar.

Saddam has probably given the order to blow up those locations at the drop of the first bomb anyway - if for no other reason than to eliminate his paranoid belief that those human shields might be spies.
 
they are choosing to defend a military installation that belongs to an enemy of the United States. That makes them combatants.

Owen
 
I really only have a single question, but it's on the technical side, and I really don't have enough data to even start to provide the parameters...

How many "human shields" does it take to preserve a target from a military munition, aircraft dropped?

Even leaving out nukes, it does get interesting...

More interesting, as far as I'm concerned: where can we find the required quantity, and how much do I need to donate to ensure their arrival on site before the munition?

Another interesting thought: will they have time to get the required publicity for the loss and erect the monument to the "fallen" before the follow-up comes and destroys the target?

If a tree falls....

I agree with the hamburger/wall image, and, if they want to do it, I think we should provide!
 
So, they aren't acting as human shields in front of Iraqi secret police headquarters, military command and control centers, military bases etc etc.

They are going to act as human shields on buildings that would not be targeted in the normal case.

So, whats the point then of them acting as human shields?
 
Let's cruise back to the article for a second...

quote:
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
They plan to act as human shields, hunkering down in hospitals, water-treatment plants and other civilian installations to dissuade U.S. commanders from targeting those facilities.
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

You might be able to make an argument for some kind of combatant status if they were protecting SAM sites and airbases. But they aren't.

- Chris
Click to expand...
BTW, installations like hospitals, water-treatment plants, dams and nuclear powerplants are already protected by the humanitarian international law and must not be targeted!
 
These people are living out their own silly propaganda about the vicious drooling idiots of the American military trying to wipe out Iraq babies and are huddling on what they consider civilian "targets". The fact that the propaganda they believe in is empty bull puckey means that they are safe.

I don't believe any such group of people who have no particular resouce to intelligence or are otherwise operating on pesonal opinion have the right to decide the fate of the world. If they want to get in the way that is their decision and the results are their responsibility and no one else's. So called civilian sites have been covers for military gear in the past, so that title is not valid. However, if these people are not at valid military targets they are safe.
 
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When the shooting starts there are NO civilian casualties. There is no collateral damage. This thinking is what lost us the last few skirmishes we were in. If it comes down to killing do it hard, sharp, fast, ruthless, and be done with it. If they die for what they believe in, fine that is their choice. Will I feel sorry for them, not hardly.
 
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