Re: Politically Correct Response

[<Jhk789@aol.com>]

In a message dated 9/15/2001 8:35:13 PM Pacific Daylight Time, a0019874@airmail.net writes:


> The point I would like to make is that war creates many situations that,
> under normal conditions, we would abhor and not consider.  However, in
> war, things and people do change.  Let's drop the guilt trips on the
> Korean War. 


Don,

According to your logic, we should have forgiven
the Nazi & Japanese war criminals at the end of WWII.
Why did we try some of them for war crimes?

Unless we apply the same humanitarian law on us
as well as to others, we will become hypocrites.
The world will never respect us.

As for distinctions between combatants and civilians,
the most important test would be whether someone is
engaged in fighting with weapons and hostile intention.
The following press statement of the Human Rights Watch
would be helpful:

      "....Last night, President Bush said that the United States "will make no distinction between the terrorists who committed these acts and those who harbored them." Yet distinctions must be made: between the guilty and the innocent; between the perpetrators and the civilians who may surround them; between those who commit atrocities and those who may simply share their religious beliefs, ethnicity or national origin. People committed to justice and law and human rights must never descend to the level of the perpetrators of such acts. That is the most important distinction of all.There are people and governments in the world who believe that in the struggle against terrorism, ends always justify means. But that is also the logic of terrorism. Whatever the response to this outrage, it must not validate that logic. Rather, it must uphold the principles that came under attack yesterday, respecting innocent life and international law. That is the way to deny the perpetrators of this crime their ultimate victory."

John2