I agree 100%. Leave the children alone and bring on the bad guys.

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Slowguy

(insert pithy phrase here...)

"Because intentions matter, not just the math of the final result.

Tell that to the families of the deceased. "

the families who lost loved ones that i've spoken too all indicated that, although they wish their son or daughter hadn't died, they took solace in the fact that they died honorably and for a cause. Those I've heard speak said they were glad that their loved ones died so that others could be free. intent does matter.

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Slowguy

(insert pithy phrase here...)

I wasn't going to bother replying to this, but it sticks in my craw.

I'm saddened that you think the lives of our military men and women aren't worth 10% of any other citizen. Or did you not realize that inference

Them thar's fighin words, cuz.

You will never hear me say or imply that the lives of our military personnel are worth less than anyone elses life.

The difference is not quantitative, it's qualitative.

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"People think it must be fun to be a super genius, but they don't realize how hard it is to put up with all the idiots in the world."

"What do we gain by unconditional surrender that's so much more valuable than a negotiated surrender? This is the sort of decision that a leader is responsible for- it isn't something that can be presented to him as a fact by advisers."

I agree. I think we are almost on the same page. The decision is one for the leader to make. The buck does indeed stop with the boss. Our difference is that you believe that the decision was wrong because you think there is no difference, worth the cost, between unconditional and negotiated surrender. I think there was a difference: no negotiated settlement, in the absence of the bombs, would accomplish the legitimate war goals of the US.

You can make the argument that NOT dropping the bomb would have been A moral choice. I make the argument that the bombing was another morally valid choice.

"I think the provisions which make civilian deaths acceptable flow from the rule of double effect. That is, killing civilians, to be morally acceptable, must be the unintended consequence of a justifiable act, not an act in and of itself."

Let's see if we can agree on this point. The principle of double effect permits the killing of innocents if 1. the action is INTENDED to have a good effect; 2. the evil effects are NOT intended as ends in themselves; and 3. the amount of unintended, but forseeable, evil is not out of proportion to the good intended by the prosecution of the war.

I think you are leaving out the third element. Therefore, 1. dropping the bomb(s) was intended to have a good effect; stop the war now. 2. The evil effect, massive casualties, was not intended as an end in itself. 3. The deaths were not out of proportion to the deaths already incurred in the war and those contemplated in a continuation of the war.

Same analysis for the fire bombings: morally defensible and actually horrific.

That's not what I was talking about at all. I was refering to the 10 schoolteachers in our hypothetical scenario.

BTW, you never answered my question....

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Out of curiosity, what are you agreeing to 100%? "Leave the children alone and bring on the bad guys." sounds good but I'm not seeing where it fits in with the recent posts.


I'm basically saying that the A-bombs, although knowing killing civilians (and I suppose in direct contradiction to the Just War Theory) was preferable to invasion which arguable would have killed as many civilians as well as many, many more soldiers on both sides. Vitus979 also said he's rather see 10 civilians die as collateral damage than 1 die intentionally. So by that logic he would have preferred an invasion even if 1-2 million civillians are killed during the course of fightig because at least in that scenario the civilians were not deliberately targeted. Intentions may matter in many circumstances, but when one's "good intentions" leave 10X more people dead I cannot see that as a just or morally defensible outcome. My comment about "telling that to the families..." could apply here too.

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"Out of curiosity, what are you agreeing to 100%? "Leave the children alone and bring on the bad guys." sounds good but I'm not seeing where it fits in with the recent posts. "

vitus said:
"Remember during the first Gulf War when an observations post manned by a couple of Special Forces soldiers was stumbled upon by a small group of children? The soldiers were faced with the choice of killing the kids in an attempt to keep them from reporting to the adults in the nearby town, or letting the kids go, knowing that if they did so, they'd be discovered.

They let the kids go, were attacked by scores of Iraqis, and ended up killing just about all of them, in large part thanks to calling in an air strike.

Know what? That was exactly the right thing to do, even though not killing the handful of children resulted in hundreds of dead Iraqis, in addition to endangering the soldiers themselves."

That's what I was agreeing to.

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Slowguy

(insert pithy phrase here...)

"You will never hear me say or imply that the lives of our military personnel are worth less than anyone elses life."

Except I quoted from your post: ten soldiers for one innocent bystander...

Take a stand, would you kill the bystander?

What did you think of my three statements on the matter?

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Cousin Elwood - Team Over-the-hill Racing
Brought to you by the good folks at Metamucil and Geritol...

"That's not what I was talking about at all. I was refering to the 10 schoolteachers in our hypothetical scenario.

BTW, you never answered my question.... "

After all these posts, I don't remember which question was yours. Ask again. As for the teachers, you don't decide policy based on the feelings of the families. Killing the principal does not guarantee the safety of the teachers, and is not a good deal. plus, it sets precedent so that every time someone wants a person dead, they can take 10 hostages. You can't look at these types of situations in strictly numerical terms. Obviously 10 lives are worth more than 1 life in the very limited terms of quantity, but quantity is never the only consideration.

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Slowguy

(insert pithy phrase here...)

"I'm basically saying that the A-bombs, although knowing killing civilians (and I suppose in direct contradiction to the Just War Theory)"

No, the fact that civilian casualties are a forseeable result of the bombing does not, in and of itself make the act immoral according to JWT.

Vitus979, not to put too many words in his mouth, is saying that the INTENTIONAL targeting of civilians AS civilians is immoral. He is correct. The intent of the actor matters.

I contend that the use of the bomb (and the fire bombings) IS moral because although it was forseeable that civilians would die;

1. the INTENT of the bombing was to produce a good effect: end the war;

2. the evil effect, dead civilians, was not the INTENDED goal, either as an end in itself or as a means to some other end. (an example of a violation of this principle would be mass rape to promote ethnic cleansing, that is the evil effect, raped civilians, can be seen as an end in itself or the fear of rape would promote another end, cleansing);

3. The amount of the unintended evil caused can not be out of proportion to the overall good intended by the war. In this case, the bombing casualties were proportionate to the ultimate good, end the war. The proportions being the Hiroshima and Nagasaki dead on one side, all of the prior deaths incurred in the war and the contemplated deaths involved in an invasion of the home islands on the other hand.

"Intentions may matter in many circumstances, but when one's "good intentions" leave 10X more people dead I cannot see that as a just or morally defensible outcome."

Intentions ALWAYS matter if your intention is to act morally. To be sure, there are plenty who do not think the state has the same moral burdens as an individual. Think Machiaveli and Kissenger.

vitus said:
"Remember during the first Gulf War when an observations post manned by a couple of Special Forces soldiers was stumbled upon by a small group of children? The soldiers were faced with the choice of killing the kids in an attempt to keep them from reporting to the adults in the nearby town, or letting the kids go, knowing that if they did so, they'd be discovered.

They let the kids go, were attacked by scores of Iraqis, and ended up killing just about all of them, in large part thanks to calling in an air strike.

Know what? That was exactly the right thing to do, even though not killing the handful of children resulted in hundreds of dead Iraqis, in addition to endangering the soldiers themselves."

That's what I was agreeing to.


Thanks for the clarification... I agree 100% here too. But you have to admit things are are little different in the "modern" era of US military supremacy where the US soldiers in question could reasonably assume that they would be able to dispatch scores of Iraqis while sustaining minimal casualties. It might have been different if the situation took place in WWII in Germany where there was a little more military parity. If the Americans had let the kids go to tell the Nazis who then came back with scores of troops, the Americans might have been slaughtered. Would the same decision have ben made then? I don't know.

My earlier question was in response to your statement that:

"In a military action, civilian lives are worth more than military ones, and ours are worth more than theirs."

To which I asked: "Out of curiosity, who's worth more: our soldiers or their civilians?"

I know it's sort of impossible to answer in general. However, in the context of WWII, if you were Truman and your advisors said you could either kill 100,000 Japanese civilians with an A-bomb or lose 100,000 US soldiers in an invasion, what would you do? I think vitus979 would choose invasion. I'd choose the A-bomb, as my first duty as president would be to protect American lives. Of course in real life I think the math favored A-bomb much more heavily as there would have been a lot more casualties on both sides (including Japanese civilians) had an invasion taken place.

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"To which I asked: "Out of curiosity, who's worth more: our soldiers or their civilians?"

You're right that this is a difficult question to answer in general. If we use Japan in WWII as the example of "them", then I guess I would say that it's not a matter of their lives being worth less, than ours. If you have to chose equal losses to achieve the same effect, I would rather we lose their lives than ours. The A Bomb in part, destroyed infrastructure and economic assets in addition to killing Japanese, broke the will of the Japanese to continue fighting, and as a result, probably saved both American and Japanese lives in the long run. Bombing cities had never been considered bad form prior to the A Bomb, and was a generally good way to strike at industrial base. I think it's the vast destruction in a single act that offends a lot of people, and the mistaken idea that we intentionally had civilian deaths as the desired ends in and of themselves.

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Slowguy

(insert pithy phrase here...)

If you have to chose equal losses to achieve the same effect, I would rather we lose their lives than ours.

That's a much better way of saying it.

Bombing cities had never been considered bad form prior to the A Bomb, and was a generally good way to strike at industrial base.

I agree, although I guess there's some debate as to how valuable Hiroshima and Nagasaki (and Dresden for that matter) were as strategic military/industrial targets.

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We also look back on the bombs as much worse because we have a better understanding of the long term effects. I think there were multiple reasons for dropping the A bombs including, forceing Japanese capitulation, revenge for Pearl Harbor, intimidation directed at the USSR, and saving lives by stopping the war quickly.

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Slowguy

(insert pithy phrase here...)

But you have to admit things are are little different in the "modern" era of US military supremacy where the US soldiers in question could reasonably assume that they would be able to dispatch scores of Iraqis while sustaining minimal casualties.

No, not in the incidence I laid out.

I don't know how familiar you are with the actual case. The soldiers involved did not enjoy any such thing as military supremacy at their level. They had no expectation, realistically, of surviving a battle with the entire town, and their victory was dang near miraculous.

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"People think it must be fun to be a super genius, but they don't realize how hard it is to put up with all the idiots in the world."

I contend that the use of the bomb (and the fire bombings) IS moral because although it was forseeable that civilians would die;

2. the evil effect, dead civilians, was not the INTENDED goal, either as an end in itself or as a means to some other end.

This is, I think, were we disagree. I don't know how you come to the conclusion that the civilian death wasn't intended goal- as a means to an end. Our goal was to end the war by killing lots of civilians. You can't do that.

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"People think it must be fun to be a super genius, but they don't realize how hard it is to put up with all the idiots in the world."

The civilian deaths were intended. The Japanese had sacrificed thousands, maybe tens of thousands of soldiers and civilians during the war. It became clear to the US that Japanese would choose suicide over surrender in many cases including women and children. The military had to make an impact that was so clear with such overwhelming force that Japan would concede. The US believed that, as promised, if we invaded that Japan would fight to the last man, woman and child.

The other reason was that the US had real hatred for the Japanese, more than the Germans, and were really pissed at what they had done to American soldiers and I think just wanted to inflict pain and punishment. I do happen to think it was the best choice for the time but horrible still.

5280, I picked up that book you recommended at the library- "Flyboys."

I haven't read it yet, but I flipped through the pictures. (Always check out the pictures first!) One of the captions mentions that FDR's son called for firebombing Japan until half their civilian population was destroyed. I found that pretty chilling.

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"People think it must be fun to be a super genius, but they don't realize how hard it is to put up with all the idiots in the world."

I don't know how familiar you are with the actual case.

Actually, not very familiar at all. Sounds like an amazing story. Is there an account online somewhere?

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There are lots of things you will find chilling in there on both sides of the fence. Let me know what you think and I will be checking your recommendation too.

Is there an account online somewhere?

Geez, jhc, you are just killing me with demands for sources this week. :0

I'm sure the account must have been posted online somewhere. It really is an incredible story. You should hear how they directed the fire in from the F16. Craziness.

I'll see if I can find it online. I read about it in print way back, and saw an interview with the soldiers on the boob tube.

As for the other source I promised you, I regret to say that I can't find it. The closest I can come is this acount of police shooting accuracy, which is about 17% in real life. I can't find the corresponding statistics for defensive shootings by civilians. Sorry.


http://faculty.ncwc.edu/...r/205/205lect02a.htm

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"People think it must be fun to be a super genius, but they don't realize how hard it is to put up with all the idiots in the world."

Not a demand, just simply curious... ;)



http://faculty.ncwc.edu/...r/205/205lect02a.htm

I quickly browsed this. Not surprising that shooting accuracy would be lower in "real life" situations, altough 17% is pretty low. Of course the more meaningful number would be how many bystanders are hit by errant gunfire, and how that compares to private citizens....

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Of course the more meaningful number would be how many bystanders are hit by errant gunfire, and how that compares to private citizens....

Well, yeah. The idea is that any round that doesn't hit the target might potentially strike an innocent. Obviously, most don't. I've never seen any statistics for the rates of innocent bystanders hit by either police or civilians, though- it would be interesting. My WAG is that it would be higher for police than civilians, simply because of the situational dynamics. But I think it's rare in either case.

Wish I could find the matching civilian statistic. . . nuts.

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"People think it must be fun to be a super genius, but they don't realize how hard it is to put up with all the idiots in the world."