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Re: Republicanism still an ...

Russ
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SubjectRe: Republicanism still an offence in England? (wasRe: Queen mother (of
FromRuss
Date2002-04-17 20:00 (2002-04-17 20:00)
Message-ID<20020417140022.06878.00000620@mb-ch.aol.com>
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Newsgroupsalt.fan.tolkien
Followspaulh
FollowupsDavid Flood (41m)
paulh (42m) > Russ
In article <6ibrbu433583lp36uqfocqv10oc2djg4r2@4ax.com>, paulh <paulh@fahncahn.com>writes:

paulh
On 17 Apr 2002 17:15:40 GMT, mcresq@aol.com (Russ) wrote:

Quite frankly, IMO a force for which overall 70% of it's 'victims' were

other

combatants cannot be termed a terrorist force.

What utter rubbish. Can you show me anywhere credible, other than in your opinion, where terrorist forces are defined as those which only kill X% or more of 'civilians' vs combatants..

A common definition of terrorism I've seen around here is deadly violence purposefully directed against and intended to kill civilians.

Well the main one I've seen is when a group of self-elected citizens go around killing other citizens for political motives without being part of a government sanctioned unit and wearing a recognisable uniform.

That describes virtually every world war 2 resistance group.

And quite frankly, I've never seen anybody but you define terrorists that way. Most people, for example, reconize that there can be perfectly legitimate non-terrorist guerilla groups.

In the early part of the 'Troubles' the IRA was very much supported by the Catholic population and was even sent arms by the Irish Republic. They almost exclusively fought in defense of their own towns and neighborhoods against invading forces (whether loyalist paramilitary or police and sometimes both together). Were they terrorists then?

Since neither you nor I can read people's minds, a perfectly valid method

for

looking at the question is to look at the *results* of their actions.

No its not... thats just an excuse...

The *fact* that 70% of those killed by the IRA were other combatants and 30%

were

civilians is pretty stong evidence that the IRA were not targeting and

killing

civilians as a modus operandi.

Terrorism is just that.

Boy, that's a stunning piece of logic: terrorism is terrorism. Thanks for clearing that up for me.

The IRA used the cover of being civilians to commit various acts of terrorism. Thats what defines a terrorist organisation (roughly). They set off bombs in public places, they pulled people out of cars and shot them in front of their girlfriends and then said 'whoops.. wrong nationality'.. . Mind you I think the Other side (protestant) were just as bad..

And I will state again (lest you make a false accusation), this is a

different

issue than the question whether an organization has committed individual terrorist acts. The IRA did. So did the British Army.

But as one is a terrorist organisation and the other is an Army then its not the same thing.

OK, so if an IRA unit ambushes a British Army patrol, they are terrorists. But if a an Army unit fires into a peaceful civilian demonstration, they are not terrorists?

Were the Nazi SS terrorists?

Your logic is completely circular. IRA members are terrorists. Why? Because they belong to a terrorist organization. Why is it a terrorist organization? Because it's members are terrorists. Why are they terrorists? Because they commit terrorism. What is terrorism? Terrorism is terrorism.

<snip>

Amazing turn around from a few days ago (when the Palestinians were Terrorists and the Israelis were Angels of Mercy)

I'm sorry if the facts are getting in the way of your opinion, but facts are facts and the numbers are the numbers. If you want to argue that the

numbers

should be interpreted in a different way, then be my guest.

But you don't have facts. You're justifying terrorism based on statistics.. THIS organisation ISN'T cos it met Ratio X, this one IS because it was 2% too low. Disgusting...

Maybe, but you have yet to proffer another valid analysis.

Russ

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David Flood (41m)
paulh (42m) > Russ