Terrorists or Freedom Fighters

[Pax]

Originally posted by JCG


Yup. Anyone who says that sustained and indiscriminate violence against civilians (not military or government targets), is ok, pretty much doesn't deserve to succeed at whatever goal they are working towards.

Let's take the case of ETA. There are Basque separatists that totally reject their violent actions (several of which have hurt Basques too) and participate in protests against them, even if they might share what, superficially, are similar goals (with the added difference, of course, that ETA would do everything in its power to forcefully implant quite a different type of government, in any future Basque state, including resorting to even more terrorism....)

Consider this how many revolutions have come about peacefully. Most Revolutions happen when I minority of people take up arms against the ruling system. Such was the case with the American revolution.

[Spiffor]

Originally posted by Azazel
Freedom fighter: someone who's main goal is the liberation of a certain group of existing opression.

That definitely makes Arafat a freedom fighter then (which he was, so everything is fine )

[mrmitchell]

Terrorist: the guy who lost.
Freedom fighter: the guy who won.

[Dr Strangelove]

Originally posted by Pax Africanus
So MrBaggins,
You're saying that the Firebombing of Dresden and nuking Hiroshima are not Terrorist acts but 9/11, blowing up and hijacking airplanes is. I personally would be more terrorized by Dresden than 9/11. Defining terror as to cause fear. The purpose of Dreseden and hiroshima was to break the spirit and resolve of the Axis to conduct war. I believe Al queda saw the Pentagon, whithouse, and wtc as centers of western power and thius military targets as well as hoping to break the spirit of the west to continue what they see as a cultural/religous war. I believe President Bush sees it the same way. anyway this would make 9/11 not a terrorist act but would include Hiroshima as a terrorist act. The past defintion of a state has included land as a prerequisite but members of organizations classified as terrorist or hate groups normally have more allegiance to the organization than to the land they reside in.

We were not at war with al Queda at the time of 911, though I might remind you that prior to 911 al Queda had conducted a number of attacks on Americans throughout the world, including the first attempt to destroy the World Trade Center, the bombings in Kenya and Tanzania, and the bombing of the Cole . All this merely for defending Kuwait and having a favorable foreign policy towards Israel.

Regarding Dresden and Hiroshima all I need to do is point out that it was the Germans and Japanese who first used the tactic of terror bombing in WW2. At the time of the bombing of Drersden the Germans had begun a policy of farming out the production of small parts to shops and homes in their cities in an attempt to maintain production in the face of the destruction of their large factories. Thus they turned the cities themselves into war factories. Hiroshima was one of the few remaining unbombed harbors of the IJN. First and foremost though the Axis powers had begun the terror bombing. Today people point the finger at the US (and Britain) because by the war's end the Allies had built much more powerful air forces. I assure you that in 1942 no one outside of Germany and Japan saw it that way.

[Pax]

I'm sure that Al Queada felt we were at war with them.
i'm not pointing the finger at the U.S. and Britain to say that they are bad. I'm pointing to an act and asking is this terrorism.

If you consider Dresden a legitmate target, then it seems that you would consider a discriminated attack on a particular building not terrorism.

[JCG]

Originally posted by Pax Africanus
Consider this how many revolutions have come about peacefully.

Perhaps not all previous revolutions could have been peaceful at the time...but today, 2004, there's a difference between a revolution that has an active popular support (or at least widespread sympathy) and at least chooses its targets wisely (thus not alienating that support), and one that basically says "we will kill anyone, anytime, anywhere, for as long as we have to, in order to achive the XYZ...and to hell with everything else that stands in our way."

Most Revolutions happen when I minority of people take up arms against the ruling system. Such was the case with the American revolution.

Not an expert on the subject, but even in that case, perhaps it could be argued that much more than a tiny minority of the people were at least somewhat dissatified with the colonial administration and favored some sort of change in the situation (plus I don't remember hearing/reading that the American Revolutionaries were killing or hurting people left and right using indiscriminate methods).

[Dr Strangelove]

Originally posted by Pax Africanus

If you consider Dresden a legitmate target, then it seems that you would consider a discriminated attack on a particular building not terrorism.

Remember that this was a real, declared war against a group of people whose avowed goals were the subjugation of all non-German and non-Japanese humanity and the elimination of huge chunks of it including not only Jews and Gypsies, but also most dark skinned peoples.
By distributing war production throughout their cities the Germans had managed to more than double their production of tanks and warplanes. Thus Dresden was literally a huge war factory. The World Trade Center on the other hand was not at all involved in war materials production.

[Az]

Originally posted by Spiffor

That definitely makes Arafat a freedom fighter then (which he was, so everything is fine )

That's obviously not correct. As long as he was given power in the west bank and gaza, he constituted opression of his own.

[Urban Ranger]

Originally posted by MrBaggins
Only independent organizations can be terrorists... if "violent acts" are linked directly to the government, then that would be considered open war, or espionage.

What about White or Red Terror, say McCarthyism? Isn't that terrorism?

[Urban Ranger]

Originally posted by JCG
Yup. Anyone who says that sustained and indiscriminate violence against civilians (not military or government targets), is ok, pretty much doesn't deserve to succeed at whatever goal they are working towards.

Is it okay to send in troops to remove a legitimate government to install your own puppet, but not okay if you kill of a political opponent? Why?

[JCG]

Originally posted by Urban Ranger

Is it okay to send in troops to remove a legitimate government to install your own puppet, but not okay if you kill of a political opponent? Why?

In principle, neither of the above situations would be "okay".

That's where context, interpretation and, to put it bluntly, political/ideological leanings come into play.

[Pax]

Would Ted Kazcynsky be considered a freedom fighter since he was very discriminating in his targets and his manifesto is a declaration of war against industrial society.

[Sirotnikov]

this thread (i only read the first page) fails to distinguish several things about this king of fighting.


Every organzation can be analyzed according to 3 criteria.

Goal: If the real goal is liberation of an oppressed nationality , then it's a freedom fighter.

Means: this divides into two: Method and Target.

Method: Either standard warfare or guerilla warfare.
Target: Either government and military, or civilians / indiscriminate.

Now a terrorist organization is an organization that uses violence (usually guerilla warfare) against the target "civilians / indiscriminate killing".


An organization can be both "freedom fighters" and "terrorists".

The former describes their end goal, and the latter describes the target of their violent warfare methods.

[Pax]

Actually the subversive purpose of this thread is to prove that there is no real distinction between a terrorist and a freedom fighter. There are no organizations that exist specifically for the purpose of terrorizing. Each organization has a specific goal and theoretically when that goal is met they would cease hostilities. Also, each organiziation has what it considers to be legitimate targets. targets could be the taxpayers for a given country, office workers, munitions factory workers, key individuals, or property. Each group basically uses the means available conventional and unconventional to acheive their goals.
Once again since the goal is never to terrorize then their is actually no such thing as a terrorist.

[DinoDoc]

The shear stupidity of this thread amuses me.