A word about peace

"None of us will feel safe again behind the shield of military might and stockpiled arsenals. There can be no safety until the root cause is faced. In this moment of shock I don't think anyone of us has the answers. It is imperative that we pray and offer solace and help to each other. But if you and I are having a single thought of violence or hatred against anyone in the world at this moment, we are contributing to the wounding of the world."

Deepak Chopra

[Jimbo]

Bomb Iraq today! Make peace Tomorrow!

Jimbo

[HDPM]

Here's a quotation from Col Jeff Cooper off his website thing for ya Jimbo. I think Col Cooper values shot placement more than Deepak.

"During the holidays just past, we were feted with the usual exhortations about "peace." Peace is a nice thing, but it is not overly impressive. All you need to do to achieve peace is to give up, and as to that, we will all have all the peace we need - all too soon. Perhaps we should consider the paraphrase "Peace on Earth - To Men of Good Will." Those people who want all infidels dead do not seem to fit into that category."

[IrishHand]

Jimbo is right, but not right enough. If you bomb enough, that in and of itself will create a lasting peace.

[MMMMMM]

Actually, I think Chopra has a point in that thoughts of violence and hatred do contribute to the wounding of the world.

However, just what the "root cause" (of whatever he is referring to here, and of other problems too) may be, is not so clear.

One common root cause of violence and hatred is ignorance/stupidity, but there are other causes.

[IrishHand]

Another cause is my desire to deliver ordinance to evil-doers.

ENS Irish, USN

[MMMMMM]

The potential problem with this attitude is that those evil-doers utilize the same justification for doing harm to us, since they see us as the evil-doers. So while I agree that the Iraqi regime should be deposed, and while I despise terrorism and consider it to be an abominable practice based on an intrinsically flawed and morally bankrupt philosophy, I wish for more specific reasons for acting violently than merely that which what you state above. Of course, such additional specific reasons do exist, and the evils that terrorists and the Iraqi regime are doing are indeed greater and less justifiable than the evils we are doing. Furthermore, their philosophies are more warped and delusional than are our own.

[IrishHand]

It's completely relative. As you point out, they consider us 'evil doers', and according to their beliefs, we are. In fact, according to many neutral, objective observers, the US has a long history of passive/aggressive behavior all over the world. Anyone who deludes themselves into thinking our military went into Afghanistan or is going to go into Iraq for any reasons apart from furthering the economic and political goals of our government is, to use your word, delusional.

If our motives were as nice as we like to declare (in the case of Iraq, liberating it's populace from a horrible tyrant and lowering the supposed threat he poses to the world), then (a) we'd have ended his regime years ago, and (b) we'd have ended the existences of a ton of governments in recent history (which we haven't because atrocious though their policies were/are, they were bright enough to cave into any demands the US came up with economically and politically).

[MMMMMM]

It is somewhat relative, but objectively speaking, we are generally more right more often than they are.

[IrishHand]

lol /forums/images/icons/grin.gif