Let me set things straight...

Hey, im f-ing tired of people rambling on about the military when they dont know **** about how we operate. Ive heard it all in my time in the Corps, ive been called brainwashed, ive been called a murderer, Ive been called mindless, all that stupid ****. So lets get it all out on the table. If you got questions about what we are taught, or how we are trained, then ask them. If you think were brainwashed then tell me why and let me straighten things out. I am serving my country proudly and I would be happy to help you guys straighten out any misconceptions of the Military and our ethos. I am an Ifantry Marine, my job is to locate, close with, and destroy the enemy. Let me tell you what its really like on my side of the wire.

You must get out in the world a lot and meet quite a few fascinating people, so why do the opinions of a few kids on a message board matter so much to you?

Actually, I'd say the most annoying thing about you is how much you obsess over the fact that you're a marine.

I guess I'm just wondering if the removal of your humanity is a requirement or if it's something you volunteer for.

Hmm, it would be nice to know how you rationalize away the moral imperative against taking human life.

Okay, serious posting, please.

Consider:
He has not killed anyone yet.
He is most likely to kill in self-defence, or in the process of self defence.
If he does not, it is usually to attack an 'enemy' of America, who may have a remote chance of becoming a terrorist and blowing you up at kindergarten, pre-school, or where-ever you go often.
He is risking his life for his country. Admit it, the salary is average, and the training is hard, however, you risk your life in the armed forces.
If someone wants to be patriotic, they may see joining the military as a way to do this.

Though I may not agree with his position, his opinion should be respected, and you should consider it for once from his point of view, rather than jumping on the 'wtf ur a murderer' bandwagon. Just because he swears often and does not bother with grammar and spelling on a forum does not mean he is stupid. Many people in the military are actually very intelligent (However, not all). (To Specopss: Yes, to look more intelligent, you should use proper spelling and grammar, and I don't think you're unintelligent.)

I realize and accept everything in that post, but I'd still find it interesting to know what the necessity of war actually is.

A world without war is not possible at this point in time. And won't be for a very very long time.

Common misconception: We are at war with the Middle East due to September 11th.

Also, it's not a soldier's job to question those who give him orders. A soldier is just that: someone who has resigned their lives to following out the orders given to them by their superiors under the guise of patriotism. If he does anything wrong, it's the fault of those who issued the orders, not him.

Do you think you'll enjoy killing an enemy? And if so, do you personally think it is right or wrong?

You mention about only killing in self-defence and what not. But in a heated combat do you actually think you'll be able to choose morals and being rational over adreniline? Trehe have been lots of mistakes made when people are under pressure, and marines are no exception. How confident/worried are you about being able to follow your 'rules', so to speak, in a situation like this?

Maybe I just have a sick mind but I think I'd enjoy killing my enemy. I'd be torn if I killed a civilian but if I saw someone who was definately an Enemy I think I'd kill them with a smile on my face.. O_o

I don't believe your brain washed and I support you and our Troops! Whether it's the Marine Corp, Army, Navy, Air Force, or Coast Guard I support them all.

We got Al Zarqawi :-D

Oh, the threat of being blown up by a psychopath is real. Sure, it's not as big a threat as, say, falling in the shower and cracking your head open... but Raptor, let's not forget that the threat of terrorism is real.

Terrorist attacks are not difficult, and they're not easy to stop. The thing stopping terrorism in America is not security, nor the "war on terrorism", but rather, the lack of people willing to perpetrate terrorist acts in America. If there were lots of terrorists you'd be seeing, like, 1 attack a day in America. You know, like they have in Baghdad? Or for that matter, Israel which cops several a year even in the quiet times.

Humans are terrible at assessing relative statistical risk.

Uh dude, they weren't THERE until you attacked them, and they're certainly not going to come attack America if you leave.

They'll be far too buy fighting for political control in Iraq in their various political/ethnic/religious/tribal groups to bother going to America, and even if they wanted to it's not feasible. Bear in mind, a major part of them are constituted of former military and Ba'athists. You're confusing a resistance fighting insurgency (or rather, insurgencies) with the pan-national death-cult known as Al Qaeda,that attacked you on September 11. They're not the same thing at all.

It's not just civilians. If you think your fighting in Iraq is what's keeping America safe from terrorism, you're just as clueless as any bloody dullard on the street who's massively afraid of teh Arabs and doesn't understand how statistically unlikely it is that he'll be blown up.

Again, it's not all those window dressing security measures or the "war on terrorism" (much less the war in Iraq) keeping people safe. It's the small number of people in the world (outside of a couple of combat zones) who are actually willing to build a bomb and set it off in a crowded place.

I find the fact that you openly deempathize the value of a human life to be quite frightening. Making it out be almost a game or who can get thier first kill in this "right of passage." Trying to justify it by proclaiming these people are not human.... Yes, they are humans. They are husbands, wives, fathers, mothers, brothers, friends, just like you and the rest of your soldier companions. War isn't about who can run around and "find, close with, and destroy" the most people first.

And again, your defense for the impact on innocent victims is frightening. "We want to have a war here so you better pick up and leave your home or else we can't be held responsible if we accidentally blow you and it up while trying to get the 'bad guys'."

[quote]Thats simply not what professional warriors want to do.
Professional warrior? Why not spend all that time, energy, and money on being professional peace activists and trying to get countries to unify together, rather than constantly running around killing each other. That sounds much more productive and "better", not to mention civilized.

[quote]We are there to win the hearts and minds of the innocents, we are there to help them build a stable country and to create an ally. Why would I wanna kill someone I want on my side?
Then why do you do it? Why are you there killing people in their country if you want them to be your ally? Why are we always trying to take over so the country is run by America's ideals and standards? Why must America try to force everyone else to follow our guidelines, rules, policies, and views? Why do they not want us there in their country if we truely are helping them? Why don't we just mind our own business and deal with our own issues back at home instead of having thousands of soldiers overseas worrying about someone elses?

I love how people are so humane and moral about soldiers killing people that they don't care about, yet will jump on the "who cares?" bandwagon when someone else states that they are sad about so-and-so dying or so-and-so being killed in Iraq or by their relative dying. **** you *******s and your bull**** hypocracies. If you're going to play the ethics card, then at least be ****ing consistent. I swear you dip****s surprise me more and more every day. For once, hig surprised me in a positive way. I'll reply in a more senseful way tomorrow, but at this time I'll just point out that 90% of you bemoaning the loss of human life in warfare can suck my balls for giving people **** about that one girls' suicide, that guy who knew a girl whose father was killed in Iraq, or me mentioning the pope dying. Eat ****.
much love,

Bj

specops, sorry I was an asshat about stuff I have no frame of reference for, and I just hope you can get back home with as little missing as possible.
[COLOR=DimGray]
[/COLOR][COLOR=DimGray]But war is still something to be avoided, and America has no business being a 'Global Policeman'.[/COLOR]

As for BJ, my only answer is that I think most people suffer from a soft-focus misanthropy; the more defined the person becomes through personal knowledge and experience, the more likely they are to be affected by that person's death. Mortality is something that happens to other people, and thus is irrelevant to most folks.

So, basically, considering that in reality they are just as human as any American, you have to completely delude yourself into believing they are a lower life form in order to justify and live with killing your enemy.

The mere fact that humans possess and exercise the primal competitive instinct necessary to fight for political terrorities and kill thousands of their own in the process shows that they are nothing higher than monkeys with guns, hats, and bibles. The savagery of their ways will ultimately always prevail. Undoubtedly, the entire race will annihilate itself long before it comes anywhere close to true enlightenment, and the Earth will save itself.

[quote=Raptor]
The mere fact that humans possess and exercise the primal competitive instinct necessary to fight for political terrorities and kill thousands of their own in the process shows that they are nothing higher than monkeys with guns, hats, and bibles. The savagery of their ways will ultimately always prevail. Undoubtedly, the entire race will annihilate itself long before it comes anywhere close to true enlightenment, and the Earth will save itself.

If you are going to take that line of thought than you are obligated to admit that all life on Earth is doomed, not just humanity. Two scenarios exist: either we will unleash some horrific and irreparable imbalance on the world, permanently crippling all living creatures, or they will outlive us anyway and perish when the world becomes a smouldering rock less than a light-minute away from the sun. Savage though we are, our progress is the best chance life on this planet has for preservation.

[quote=higbvuyb]
Consider this: The 'enemy' may be trying to protect their own friends/brothers/family, and in doing so, shoot you or your fellow Marines.

Consider this:

[quote=Abu Musab al-Zarqawi] By Allah, the only thing they shall receive from us shall be a slashing sword. We will have more battles with them, the horror of which will turn even their children's hair white.

[QUOTE=higbvuyb]If the US economy collapsed due to an oil shortage, many people would suffer/die. However, this may not be an acceptabe tradeoff for the deaths of many tens (if not hundreds) of thousands of civilians.
US citizens are not going to die simply because they can't drive their hummer to the corner grocery store anymore. :rolleyes:

And if the US is so heavily dependant upon preserving oil in the middle east, to the point where we would need to enter into a war and kill thousands of people (both innocent and "bad"), don't you think it makes more sense to research alternative sources for fuel? If we were able to get the majority of our resources from countries outside of the terrorist-filled Middle East, then who cares what they do over there. Let them destroy the oil, just means they won't be getting any money. We could just sit back and laugh, instead of running over there trying to babysit them.

Those who try do dispense absolute justice set themselves up to deliver the worst injustices.

So you're one of the believers that [COLOR="black"]G[/COLOR]od is the only one who can truly determine who deserves to live and die?

[quote=Raptor]higbvuyb, I strongly suspect there is a remote chance of you becoming a terrorist. I wish I was in the Marines so I could riddle you with bullets and call it a "kill" instead of a "murder."

The majority of American people seem more frightened of their own shadow, and I see no reason to live in such fear. "Terrorists" are nowhere near as much of a threat to us as we make them out to be. A few stooges with box cutters hijack some planes one day, and we want to go to war with half the Middle East.

For a carnivorous predator you sure are a fucking pussy.

It's funny how the people who AREN'T afraid of the terrorists get called pussy.

[COLOR=#e0e0e0][FONT=Arial][quote=HigbvuyibiujdfquvjsnETC.]Even if one researched alternative energy supplies, it would take many years to convert industry to using these sources of power, and implementing this is nome places may be hard (cars) or impossible (plastics, you can't make plastic out of solar energy, etc.)
[COLOR=Black] So... we shouldn't even bother? It is easily within our power to market hydrogen fuel in modern automotive systems in the next four years; it would not be difficult to sustain such a reaction, and once we had applied it for use in an internal combustion engine it would be a short leap to run power stations on hydrogen fuel. The only byproduct of such a reaction would be water, which could easily be cycled back into the equation to be broken down into even more hydrogen; this is not rocket science. The only real obstacle to a full hydrogen fuel conversion is the energy industry's reluctance to let go of such a huge cash cow as Arab oil.[/COLOR]
[/FONT][/COLOR]

[quote=Arwon]It's funny how the people who AREN'T afraid of the terrorists get called pussy.

Oh, my comment wasn't really specific to this thread, it's just an observation I've made and decided to post here.

[quote=higbvuyb]Even if one researched alternative energy supplies, it would take many years to convert industry to using these sources of power, and implementing this is nome places may be hard (cars) or impossible (plastics, you can't make plastic out of solar energy, etc.)

I'm no expert, but surely oil isn't the only source of hydrocarbons in the world? I think we could manufacture them, it'd take a lot of energy but if we all converted to things like solar energy energy would essentially be free anyway.

You use the words 'while we do this' which implies that the Industry actually has such plans to elimate oil-fuel dependence. Comment?

[quote=higbvuyb]Yes, natural gas, etc, but this requires far more energy, and so plastics would be very costly. Like, jewelry costly, if we had to make it from CO2, H2O, and electricity.


Accidental double post, or what?

Right, so the problem is energy. If we get to a point where you can extremely easily harness the power of the sun, wind, tides etc then energy will be so cheap we can use tons of it to make plastic. No problem.

And yeah, it was a double post.

Aren't we overusing plastics for the most part?

"I would kill every man women and child in iraq if it got me home ten minutes earlier" We need more brave soldiers like this man.

Huh? Alternate fuels ARE being researched. Implementing these new fuels, such as ethanol, is a very costly procedure though. The US economy can't afford to have gas prices sky-rocket AND make a new fuel source.

All of you are acting as if everything is in black and white. Nothing is as simple as you're all trying to say.

Firstly, once again, the US actually has very cheap petrol, most of the rest of the world is paying 7 dollars a gallon or more.

More importantly though, the high prices are actually a spur to new fuel sources. Higher oil prices are good. The higher the price, the more economically viable other energy sources are and the more companies will actually explore for them.

80 dollars a barrel or more makes a whole range of alternate energy sources viable, both in terms of more-difficult-to-access types of fossil fuels (such as tar sands) and the further development of various renewables sources. The high prices are what makes these other things viable... cheap fuel meand there's no incentive for companies to implement them.

No, I mean the people. Citizens won't stand for paying the gas prices and funding a new energy source.

For the record, I like how when me and a few DAers spam a thread in OFF TOPIC it gets the banhammer, but when topics here start being about ****ing NOTHING that has to do with the original topic, its okay. So I'm going to ignore all the energy idiocy and just reply to the main idea k thnx.

First off, the "war" in iraq is unjust, shouldnt be there, blah blah blah etc. That being said, we ARE there, and we've unleashed a whole ****storm. Pulling out at this point would only let the region get even more destabilized, which is bad. So reconstruction obviously should be put number one.

second, joining with the express purpose of wanting to fight in iraq makes you a pretty big ****ing moron in my eyes. you want to serve your country, fine, rock on, i support that. you want to do it by blowing up houses that MIGHT have people inside that MIGHT wish you harm? No dice.

LoS, don't fight thread drift. It's natural, threads want to be free!!!

War is an ugly thing, but not the ugliest of things. The decayed and degraded state of moral and patriotic feeling which thinks that nothing is worth war is much worse. The person who has nothing for which he is willing to fight, nothing which is more important than his own personal safety, is a miserable creature and has no chance of being free unless made and kept so by the exertions of better men than himself.
-John Stuart Mill

I absolutely guarantee you that Mill would not have supported either the War on Iraq or the War on Terrorism.

I think I speak for everyone when I say I just can't wait until the War on Terrorism is over and there wont be anymore terrosim left. Man I cant wait.

Just because I'm not willing to end someone else's life doesn't mean I won't stand up for myself and my beliefs. There's ways to accomplish things without the use of force.