thinkprogress.org— "I think this is a case where the use of military force against a training camp to show the Iranians we?re not going to tolerate this is really the most prudent thing to do."
May 5, 2008View in Crawl 4
You cannot attack a military base on the soil of a foreign country without a declaration of war. The declaration can be explicit or it can be implicit, but if you bomb a military installation in a sovereign country, you have declared war.
We're not talking about the "bombing of greater Iran" here. We're talking about targeting a military training camp. I don't believe it's in the middle of a civilian populated area. I don't believe there would be any civilians harmed nor alliances lost. You're right that it could bring about other negatives which Iran would be responsible for, but if we are to sit by and allow an actionable specific target to continue to kill our troops then we have no right having a military. We need to protect our troops no matter what the circumstances are that brought our troops to this venue. If we're not going to protect them then I completely support your argument of bringing them home overnight.
You're right, but it this situation it cannot be described as simply "whenever we feel like it". It is in response to their actions -- so that we can stem the flow from Iran and stop them from harming our troops. If it were possible the best response would probably be to better police the border with Iran, but that would most likely mean getting a lot more feet on the ground than we have there now.
dynamisMay 6, 2008
It would be nice if it was that easy.
sparselyMay 7, 2008
Nuclear =/= green energy
Closed AccountMay 7, 2008
Ah, great.A Fox apologist will now try to change the subject.
caferrellMay 8, 2008
You cannot attack a military base on the soil of a foreign country without a declaration of war. The declaration can be explicit or it can be implicit, but if you bomb a military installation in a sovereign country, you have declared war.
dynamisMay 8, 2008
We're not talking about the "bombing of greater Iran" here. We're talking about targeting a military training camp. I don't believe it's in the middle of a civilian populated area. I don't believe there would be any civilians harmed nor alliances lost. You're right that it could bring about other negatives which Iran would be responsible for, but if we are to sit by and allow an actionable specific target to continue to kill our troops then we have no right having a military. We need to protect our troops no matter what the circumstances are that brought our troops to this venue. If we're not going to protect them then I completely support your argument of bringing them home overnight.
dynamisMay 9, 2008
A better and more pertinent comparison would be Clinton sending cruise missiles to target an Afghan training base when he was president.
dynamisMay 12, 2008
You're right, but it this situation it cannot be described as simply "whenever we feel like it". It is in response to their actions -- so that we can stem the flow from Iran and stop them from harming our troops. If it were possible the best response would probably be to better police the border with Iran, but that would most likely mean getting a lot more feet on the ground than we have there now.