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PaperclipPerfector  1d ago (text post)   6003 thread views

Culture War Roundup for the week of December 1, 2025

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is literally in the manual as an example of an illegal order that would be a violation of the laws of war.

Well, if that's true, screw that manual and screw your laws of war. You don't let the enemy survive after you've drone striked them once. You finish the job. Nothing in the calculus changes that led you to issuing that strike just because you didn't do a perfect job the first strike.

...other than the fact that they are no longer a threat to you.

Are they more or less of a threat to me than a terror suspect attending a wedding in some Afghan village?

Less, given that they are hors de combat, while the terrorist in the Afghan village is still capable of perpetrating armed acts against you.

Which "combat"? There's no "combat" between a narco-boat in the middle of the sea and a drone flying a mile overhead. If anything, the "combat" began is when the drone operator identified the target, and it ends when the target is destroyed. Saying it in a fancy way doesn't change anything.

Less, given that they are hors de combat

The terrorist in the Afghan village is not engaged in combat at all. He is not engaged in terrorist activities by attending a wedding, there is no reasonable standard by which his immediate actions constitute combat. Yet we bomb him and those around him anyway. If this is acceptable, which it evidently has been for decades now, then it must be because his allegiance is sufficient to justify striking him, regardless of his present actions. And if that be the case, how does similar logic not apply to narcos in boats?

By what moral logic is it acceptable to bomb a crowded wedding to kill one of the guests, but bombing narcos engaged in smuggling becomes a serious crime only when the second bomb drops? What do you suppose the first one was for?

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