Disgusting Mail article, need to rant...

[Castiel]

we attacked them....
they never started the war...
the taliban did not finance, train and supply the people who were involved in 911 (as far as I know but I may be wrong)

You don't actually know any of that as fact. The public simply doesn't have that kind of information.

Besides 9/11 was not the only terrorist action that has happened.

What we do know, is that the Taliban Regime have and continue to help finance and support various Terrorist and Islamist groups including al-Qaeda and others.

If they are allowed to regain power in the region, it could and in all likelihood would further destabilize the entire region. When you have nuclear powers that are at risk of insurgency and a failure of statehood then allowing a State that will actively support and encourage that failure is something we should all be extremely concerned with.

 

[SteveOBHave]

It must be lovely sitting, foaming at the mouth in naive righteous indignation, comfy in you nice secure ivory tower armed with a keyboard... Meanwhile, back in the real world...

Don't be any more obtuse than you need to be. Are you suggesting that because I don't spend every day of my life having bullets whizzing past my head I don't have the right to make a call on this? My anger comes not from the action of the snipers but from the apparent happiness and testosterone filled flexing that comes from you lot and this article. Personally I find it horrific that two guys ended up with "big holes" in their heads and that your response is "that's war and it's glorious!".

Erm...pretty speechless really. How on earth can you associate the two?

Because it's war man - and it's justified because we're the good guys and they're the bad guys. ****** to the poor people with their shadows burnt into a concrete slab.

The fact that many of us are filled with testosterone is testament to the fact that we are following our human instinct. Just because you don't have those manly traits, don't try and put the rest of us down for having it. Man up.

And it does make them better because we don't plant bombs willy nilly waiting for some unsuspecting person to walk on it and then get blown up. We don't walk onto a train carrying an explosive device to take out hundreds of people who have probably never even held a gun or have no idea how to make a bomb.

War isn't insanity, sitting back and being victims of terror is insanity. Sort your priorities out.

It disturbs me that human instinct has such a great bearing over rational discussion and rational action. I beat my chest at the gym and get all manly and testosterony with my wife in bed not by shooting some dude in another country.

Don't get me wrong - the animals that walk into a tube station and blow themselves up are the lowest of the low. If I were in the situation where I were standing in front of one of them with a gun and it was them or me and the people around me, no questions I would pull the trigger. This is not a one sided argument, I'm not saying that one side is more righteous than the other - I'm saying they're both wrong. I'm not bothered that my stance evokes a "girly man" image because I am more comfortable with that than the image of the "getting what they deserved camp".

My point here is that yes they're doing their jobs, it's **** that they have to, but why is it ok to sit here and go all "Team America" over it. Does no-one think that it's awful that anyone has to die in this way?

 

[gettothechopper]

The Taliban were put in power by the USA after they armed/funded them so they could overthrow the USSR who controlled Afghanistan at the time. After 9/11 the decision was made to remove the Taliban as they were helping to train/supply terrorism (notably their links to Al-Qaeda)

the USA did not put into power / fund / arm the Taliban

it was the Mujahideen that the USA supported, after the USSR left, the more radical elements of which became the Taliban
the other half of the Mujahideen became the Northern Alliance - our allies during the invasion

 

[Macro]

Don't be any more obtuse than you need to be. Are you suggesting that because I don't spend every day of my life having bullets whizzing past my head I don't have the right to make a call on this? My anger comes not from the action of the snipers but from the apparent happiness and testosterone filled flexing that comes from you lot and this article. Personally I find it horrific that two guys ended up with "big holes" in their heads and that your response is "that's war and it's glorious!".

I guess you don't see the irony that you are using the exact same emotional charged, evocative, exaggerated language you criticise the Daily Mail for to try and "glorify" your view point and paint anyone who doesn't agree with you as a "sad little testosterone filled grot bag".

 

[eatcustard]

Does no-one think that it's awful that anyone has to die in this way?

No, they will kill us without hesitation, and we need a population cull.
Live by the sword, die by the sword.

So you can go to the gym in the safe knowledge that our lads are going a great job, killing Talibobs

 

[Castiel]

The Taliban were put in power by the USA after they armed/funded them so they could overthrow the USSR who controlled Afghanistan at the time. After 9/11 the decision was made to remove the Taliban as they were helping to train/supply terrorism (notably their links to Al-Qaeda)

It should be noted that Taliban means "students" and is a common name for groups to use, the Afghan Taliban and Pakistani Taliban are completely unrelated they just have the same name, it causes a lot of confusion, similar to how a lot of people believe "Kung Fu" to be a martial art when in fact it is the Chinese words for "martial art".

None of that is entirely accurate.

The Taliban were not "created" by the CIA. They are simply an offshoot of the Mujaheedin fighters who were financed and helped by the US in their fight against the USSR.

Tehrik-i-Taliban or the Pakistan Taliban are Pashtun, much like the Afghani Taliban, and while they may state they have no affiliation or connection to each other, the tribal and regional connections belie that statement somewhat.

It a very complex situation, with both Afghani and Pakistani factions both against and in support of each other, including those factions in the Pakistani Army itself.

The entire region is Tribal, few recognise any authority other than their own tribal councils and the border between Afghanistan and Pakistan may as well not exist for them.

This makes conducting effective operations incredibly difficult and politically dangerous.

 

[SteveOBHave]

I guess you don't see the irony that you are using the exact same emotional charged, evocative, exaggerated language you criticise the Daily Mail for to try and "glorify" your view point and paint anyone who doesn't agree with you as a "sad little testosterone filled grot bag".

No I do and I accept that it was a little OTT - but I hardly would call my view glorified. In myself I do feel justified in being disgusted at the apparent happiness of people getting their brains pasted...

No, they will kill us without hesitation, and we need a population cull.
Live by the sword, die by the sword.

So you can go to the gym in the safe knowledge that our lads are going a great job, killing Talibobs

I get the irony and I get the overall picture - I just don't believe in seeing it as the only option and I sure as hell don't agree with being happy about it.

 

[Castiel]

Don't be any more obtuse than you need to be. Are you suggesting that because I don't spend every day of my life having bullets whizzing past my head I don't have the right to make a call on this? My anger comes not from the action of the snipers but from the apparent happiness and testosterone filled flexing that comes from you lot and this article. Personally I find it horrific that two guys ended up with "big holes" in their heads and that your response is "that's war and it's glorious!".

That is not how it cam e across in your original post, if it had I for one, would have no issue with that.

I repeat

******* animals.

You sad little testosterone filled grot bags that are happy to sit there an justify one person slaughtering another because it's 'war'?!?!?!?

They may be doing their job but it doesn't change the fact that they're by proxy no better than the people who came over here and blew British people up. Soldiers going into another peoples country and killing them, occupying their towns - telling them how to live?

This world is never going to get better as long as the answer to one persons insanity is more insanity. And it's not going to get better as long as dullards like you lot sit there and wave the flag saying that they've got what they had coming to them.

******* animals.

The bold part seems to suggest that you include the snipers themselves in your rant.


To make myself clear;

There is no glory to be had in killing another human being, but neither is there any in allowing others to kill indiscriminately if you have the means and opportunity to stop them.

 

[SteveOBHave]

That is not how it cam e across in your original post, if it had I for one, would have no issue with that.

The bold part seems to suggest that you include the snipers themselves in your rant.

To make myself clear;

There is no glory to be had in killing another human being, but neither is there any in allowing others to kill indiscriminately if you have the means and opportunity to stop them.

Granted - it was a fairly knee jerk post - I wouldn't be the first to be guilty of that. Fundamentally it's still the same message, just somewhat toned down.

Regarding the snipers? The article really does lean toward them being pretty stoked about their kill rate and also the method of the kills.

The pair, who competed at the 2006 British Army Sniper Championships, tallied up the deaths by drawing stickmen above their chosen shooting points - and if a stickman had no head, it indicated that that fatality had been caused by a direct hit to the skull.

This is either on the writer for his depiction or directly on the snipers themselves. Possibly a little harsh as an interpretation but one must wonder at the entire tone of the article.

 

[Castiel]

Granted - it was a fairly knee jerk post - I wouldn't be the first to be guilty of that. Fundamentally it's still the same message, just somewhat toned down.

Regarding the snipers? The article really does lean toward them being pretty stoked about their kill rate and also the method of the kills.



This is either on the writer for his depiction or directly on the snipers themselves. Possibly a little harsh as an interpretation but one must wonder at the entire tone of the article.

Forget what the article says. Each sniper has his own way of tallying, he also has his own way of dealing with the emotional impact of what he does. Dehumanisation of the target is one way (A common one, that never actually works), they would go insane otherwise.

I would not take the article as an indictment of how those snipers actually feel about what they do. Bravado and competition within a unit is one thing and should never be taken out of that context to be seen as indicative of the personal feeling of individual soldiers and the actions and situation in which they find themselves.


Take the article at face value, it is merely a piece of patriotic propaganda designed to lift spirits and moral among those who are fighting on our behalf and to denigrate those we current see as the enemy.

The reasons and political ideology of why we are fighting and the right or wrong of it should not be attributed or blamed on the soldiers themselves.

 

[Ewaf]

Awesome, that will teach the ****ers!

 

[SteveOBHave]

Forget what the article says. Each sniper has his own way of tallying, he also has his own way of dealing with the emotional impact of what he does. Dehumanisation of the target is one way (A common one, that never actually works), they would go insane otherwise.

I would not take the article as an indictment of how those snipers actually feel about what they do. Bravado and competition within a unit is one thing and should never be taken out of that context to be seen as indicative of the personal feeling of individual soldiers and the actions and situation in which they find themselves.

I get that - it's a pretty vicious job.

Take the article at face value, it is merely a piece of patriotic propaganda designed to lift spirits and moral among those who are fighting on our behalf and to denigrate those we current see as the enemy.

The reasons and political ideology of why we are fighting and the right or wrong of it should not be attributed or blamed on the soldiers themselves.

It's the face value that I find disturbing. I see the necessity of the moral boost - I see the necessity of the troops feeling that they're doing right by the people at home but in my mind it doesn't change the distaste at the perceived and accepted necessity of war.

Awesome, that will teach the ****ers!

*sigh* no I don't think it will - it'll stop them breathing for sure, stop them thinking - it's not teaching them anything.

 

[fullmetaltony]

Words cannot convey the amount of disgust I have towards the Daily mail.

Camping is a genuine problem and noob tactic in online gaming and there they go glorifying how easy killstreaks are to obtain using that tactic.

Way to go Daily mail fail, buncha noobs!

 

[Castiel]

but in my mind it doesn't change the distaste at the perceived and accepted necessity of war.

I wish that war was unnecessary and anyone who has fought in one with tell you what I tell you now,

No-one who has experienced war or the taking of another's life feel anything but distaste at the necessity of doing so. You spend more time pooping your pants than glorifying or revelling in it and anyone who tells you different wasn't there.

Don't let the media or the comments of those who see the entire thing as an extension of their entertainment quota colour your view on the reality of what the people actually involved feel.

 

[mast3r]

What happens in WAR? people die... What happens when you kill two enemies or perhaps terrorist who played their part in the killings of 100s or 1000s of innocent? with one bullet... Gloating? either way i am sure if the gun was pointing the other way they would have it all over their (Taliban) media and press.

This is not a point of what is fair or what is right, its a war over there.

 

[[TW]Sponge]

Amazing work from our guys, I like it.

 

[setter]

I dont see much wrong with the article tbh, i have a friend currently serving as a sniper in the irish guards in afghanistan, and he has taken out a few taliban fighters, including one who was in the middle of planting an ied.

 

[BennyC]

General GD'er : "HERD DERP WE GOT TWO FOR THE PRICE OF ONE LOL WTF"

General Taliban militant : "HERP DERP WE BLEW THREE OF THEM UP HAHA LOL"

You're not as dissimilar as you think.

I was just about to post a similar point.

The enemy has no problem dancing about in the street and celebrating kills from an IED or suicide bomber.

I don't really find it distasteful. In fact to me it's just an account of a very rare shot.

 

[[TW]Sponge]

Isn't the aim to kill them all anyway? Then people moan when we do?

Don't get what's wrong here.

 

[StoutMeister]

"a Quigley" it is then.

Cooel beans!