Looks like we just bombed Yemen

[billvon 2,400]

Just found out that the country that bombed Yemen and killed the six people (all suspected Al Quaeda) was the US. As bombings go, this one was quite well planned - the six targets dead and little collateral damage. Still, I worry about the precedents we're setting. I imagine we won't take well to a bombing in the US by an Israeli operative, even if he only killed four suspected Arab anti-Semites. He would have a pretty good case, though, that it's just business as usual for the US.

[Brisco 0]

I heard/read somewhere that we did this with the knowledge & blessing of the Yemen government that has finally been cracking down on militants there.

Brisco

Experience is what you get when you don't get what you want.

[diverdriver 5]

Lovely, the CIA has become an offensive agency. I thought waging war was to be part of the armed forces. Of course, I'm not so naive to believe the CIA has never done offensive things before. But this is pretty overt.

Chris

[QuickDraw 0]

Non American version available here

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/middle_east/2402479.stm

-- Hope you don't die. --

I'm fucking winning

[diverdriver 5]

Quote

Non American version available here

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/middle_east/2402479.stm

Quote

A BBC correspondent in Washington says this would be the first time the US had carried out such an attack outside Afghanistan.

Yah, that little Phillipine thing wasn't really an attack. Just a bunch of gunfire but no attack until now.

Big time

[PLFXpert 0]

They said from the beginning it was a great U.S. victory, killing one of the 15 top Alquida leaders.

[Trent 0]

I hear a lot of bashing here on the US's policy on what's going on lately. Be it reasons for going to war with Iraq, the action in Afghanistan, or the elimination of terrorists wherever they are.

How about these naysayers and anti-anything-Bush-does people make a few reasonable suggestions on what they'd like to see happening. It seems that people put a lot of thought into what they don't like. It would be interesting to see if transferring that energy to thinking about productive, reasonable, and feasible alternatives would yield anything of value.

Oh, hello again!

[wmw999 2,122]

If we really did this with the full knowledge of the Yemeni government then I really don't have an issue with it. If we didn't, then I think Billvon's comment about our response to another country bombing in the US for their own purposes is pretty apt.
My issue is the "we will do what we want to because we're the US" attitude that some seem to have. So the alternative is to COMPROMISE sometimes, and figure that if we work with other countries on the important things, and not just the unimportant ones, then we'll be part of the world community. Like environmental agreements, the UN, and little things like that.
Compromising only when you don't really care about the outcome isn't compromising. It's like asking your 3-year-old if they'd rather wear blue socks or green socks today.Wendy W.

There is nothing more dangerous than breaking a basic safety rule and getting away with it. It removes fear of the consequences and builds false confidence. (tbrown)

[Galen 0]

Supposedly they, CIA, wa working with the Yemen Gov't.

[QuickDraw 0]

I think something got lost in the translation here.
I posted the link mainly because we seem to believe only what we read/see at the time,
i was simply giving the option of other un-biased (?) external information, the more pieces of the jigsaw you have, the more of the picture you see.
I also heard this over an hour ago before Bill put up the post, i just thought it was strange we knew and the U.S didn't

-- Hope you don't die. --

I'm fucking winning

[PLFXpert 0]

This has been on CNN and NBC for a couple days now. Just tune in to your local news.

Paint me in a corner, but my color comes back.

[lummy 4]

Quote

I also heard this over an hour ago before Bill put up the post, i just thought it was strange we knew and the U.S didn't

I read it in the morning paper, so it's not THAT new, unless of course this is a second bombing....

I promise not to TP Davis under canopy.. I promise not to TP Davis under canopy.. eat sushi, get smoochieTTK#1

[PLFXpert 0]

It's not new, at all.

I saw it on CNN day before yesterday. It could have been yesterday, but I"m pretty sure it was the day before.

The clip definitely said we (the US) did it and were pleased with the outcome.

[QuickDraw 0]

Whoops

-- Hope you don't die. --

I'm fucking winning

[happythoughts 0]

Quote

My issue is the "we will do what we want to because we're the US" attitude that some seem to have. So the alternative is to COMPROMISE sometimes, ...

Would someone remind me of the part of the "compromise" where we said it was ok to bomb the WTC?

Bush said "We are coming to get you. You are with us or against us."

If we could find them in Yemen, do you think that the Yemeni govt did not know they were there?

We didn't start the party. It's house rules. Yep, we're the big dog on the block, you've crapped in our yard. We have come off the porch and now we're in their yard. I don't want to hear the "unfair" complaints.

Japan didn't get to complain after Pearl Harbor.
These guys don't either. They get to be the example for this century.

In case anyone is unclear on my opinion: Find them all, then kill them.

Bill

[riddler 0]

I think the government doesn't know how to deal with terrorism, so they are settling into a role of terrorist retaliation. Look for this to be a future trend with the US - small highly specialized teams that go in with one objective - to destroy one facility or kill a small group of people. It's what happens when we decide were going to be the world's police. But it's also nice to have the impunity when we are attacked to go after the attackers anywhere in the world. I suspect there will be many mistakes made and lots of cover-ups.

Trapped on the surface of a sphere. XKCD

[freeflir29 0]

I was a little shocked. I saw it on CNN either last night (11-4-02) or this morning. I thought it was a bit "Israel Like" of us but I'm definately glad to see it. So many terrorist acts could have been prevented had the US had policies in place to deal with people like Abu Nidal and Carlos. Instead frustrated warriors had to let them live on to terrorize another day because of some stupid law. If we had Yemen's permission I think it's great. I will go ahead and assume we did since if we didn't they would be raising holy hell by now in the media. I have talked at length with people from Yemen. The hatred of the "militants" there was pretty shocking. Even to me. When someone tells me that his son is 8 years old and he has started training him to kill Americans I really didn't have much of any emotion except sadness really. It's pretty hard to believe someone can live with that much hate. I just told the guy he needed to take up skydiving so he would have at least 60 seconds of his life where he could think about something else. Either that...or kill himself now and save some soldier the trouble.

[billvon 2,400]

>How about these naysayers and anti-anything-Bush-does people
> make a few reasonable suggestions on what they'd like to see
> happening.

I assume you're referring to me.

First off, if Yemen did indeed agree with the US's attack, then I have no problem with it. I don't see a problem with using the US military to go after criminals in another country provided we have permission/approval of that country. Same with us - I assume we would have no problem with Mexico sending their army into the Arizona desert near the border to capture or destroy a terrorist camp there, assuming we gave our OK.

Second, Bush sometimes does some smart things. The diesel pollution bill was a good law that he signed into being, and I think it's great that we're going through the UN before we take action against Iraq.

But suggestions? Here they are:

1. Stop incidents like 9/11 before they happen. Stop creating and funding radical terrorist groups like Al Quaeda. In today's terms, stop funding Kurdish terrorist groups in Iraq.

2. Get our noses out of Middle Eastern politics. Stop supporting Israel against the Arabs, stop supporting warlords against India. There will never be peace there; the best we can do is avoid getting dragged into the eternal war there.

3. Stop our dependence on the Middle East. Either tell the oil companies in no uncertain terms that they are completely on their own, or put the money we would use on the latest Mideast war into fuel efficiency measures that will let us ignore OPEC and their antics.

4. Go through the UN when we have problems with other countries. For quite a while, the administration seemed very grumpy that people were insisting they go through the UN, but they are now working to get a proposal that will be acceptable to France, Germany and the other permanent members, and that's great.

[flyhi 24]

Quote

Of course, I'm not so naive to believe the CIA has never done offensive things before. But this is pretty overt.

Why and how do we know it was the CIA? I don't doubt they did it, but I don't understand the virtual press release about it. I agree with Chris that the smart thing would have been to remain covert and move on to the next action. Almost seems sophomoric the way it was handled and released.

Shit happens. And it usually happens because of physics.

[happythoughts 0]

"But suggestions? Here they are:

1. Stop incidents like 9/11 before they happen. "

We had that option. The WTC was car bombed by the same people before. What did we do? Talked about it. Ignored it. Tried to be reasonable with unreasonable people. Diplomacy. That didn't work then either. They came back on 9/11.

Richard Gere stood up and said we should treat them like "wayward brothers". He sounded like a retard doing it.

The "attack the US and hide" technique was used by Abu Nidal in the Achille Lauro incident. He hid in Arab countries for years. Through diplomacy, we requested his extradition. He was finally turned over after it became financially expedient to do so because Libya turned off his cash.

If we had dealt with this problem in 95 in this manner, we wouldn't be dealing with it now and 3000 Americans would be alive.

These people see diplomacy as a sign of weakness and a tool to delay our response. They are playing people for suckers.

[wmw999 2,122]

So are you suggesting that we attack all Arabs, all Muslims, all men with turbans and beards, or what?
How do you propose we stop incidents like Oklahoma City?
Wendy W.

There is nothing more dangerous than breaking a basic safety rule and getting away with it. It removes fear of the consequences and builds false confidence. (tbrown)

[billvon 2,400]

>If we had dealt with this problem in 95 in this manner, we wouldn't
> be dealing with it now and 3000 Americans would be alive.

95 was way too late; Al Quaeda was already coming for us. How about in the 80s when Reagan poured billions in aid and weapons into the Mujahideen, creating both the Taliban and Al Quaeda? Personally, I'd rather there simply not be a terrorist problem to begin with than have to debate options to deal with the terrorist problem. And if we don't create terrorist groups we won't have to deal with them.

It's no different than anything else. You can debate treatment for lung cancer, and indeed there are several good (and some not so good) treatments, depending on when you contract it and what type it is. If your goal is to not get lung cancer, though, don't smoke.

[freeflir29 0]

Quote

Why and how do we know it was the CIA?

Because it was a reported to be a Predator UAV that launched a hellfire missle. Predators are sort of a joint Air Force/CIA/+several differen't other intel agencies project. Sort of like the U-2, SR-71, and "spy" sattelites. Why was it released....I think that's pretty simple. The CIA and the Bush administration has been beaten up pretty bad since 9/11. The war in Afghanistan has been somewhat anti-climatic and there have been several high profile terrorist acts around the world since then. It was a political move. I can guess that the psychological impact on would-be terrorists is nice too. There you are...in your own back yard.....just driving down the road and WHAM.....lights out. and it was carried out by an unmanned machine. A little intimidating I would think.

[happythoughts 0]

Quote

So are you suggesting that we attack all Arabs, all Muslims, all men with turbans and beards, or what?
How do you propose we stop incidents like Oklahoma City?
Wendy W.

I never said anything remotely resembling that.
Re-read that.

All Arabs didn't bomb the WTC. Some did. We should go find the ones who did and kill them all.

We knew where Abu Nidal was. We should have gone there, blockaged the country. Give them 24 hours to turn him over. After 24 hours, go get him. Find out who funded them. Go after the source of the funds.

Pretty soon, word gets around. Attack the US? Bad idea. Playing a game by these idiots rules is what has gotten us into this mess and keeps us there.

[jumperconway 0]

What is this? A voice of reason! Cudos