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  1. #11
    Council Member Fuchs's Avatar
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    Hmm, personal background instead of argument?

    Maybe I should tell you a tale about the great qualification of some Mr. Udet and some Mr. Göring in air war, both being aces and all - they still got almost everything wrong. Göring was especially known for brushing aside arguments with references to his superior experience.

    I think your method is systematically flawed.

    - - - - -

    Many arguments were held back on my part because they're unlikely to resonate in this environment, but since you refer to lives put at risk, I will -as an observer from a neutral country- nevertheless now pull out some of those arguments:

    In worst case a nasty surprise by Libyan air defence effectiveness may cost about five pilots' lives.

    Meanwhile, the cruise missile strike has -if the positions weren't abandoned anyway- likely killed about 20-200 men. As a neutral observer, I cannot ignore these costs of war so perfectly as you do.

    - - - - -

    There's also a more general theme about elegance in warfare (sounds weird, but "elegance" is really about reducing something to the necessary extent). The lack of attention to elegance has grossly increased costs of warfare and defence policy in general. I do more than just suspect a very widespread negligence here, and this topic is merely a symptom of it.
    To make the point about elegance properly would require a two-page article, though. It's not a good topic for a forum reply and I don't expect anyone to understand this point.



    edit:
    There was recently a speech of Obama about the Libya crisis. He said "...the U.S. will stand up for ... the dignity of all people."
    Well, where I come from, "dignity (in this case apparently meaning ~"Menschenwürde") means a lot, and killing several people in favour of reducing the risk to one or two own people is not understood to being the same as "to stand up for the dignity of all people".

    Maybe - just maybe - people here could get away from business as usual with its "victory" focus, accept that this time it's really about being the "good ones", not about pursuit of "interests" - and think accordingly.
    Last edited by Fuchs; 03-23-2011 at 04:55 PM.

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