All Bets Are ON

[John Hall]

That must be why we still have problems with Indian attacks.

The Indian attacks stopped when 'raiding the settlements' was equivalent to
seeing every Indian village in range wiped out.  A lot of those Indian wars
were not fought to get some chief to sign a piece of paper.  They were
fought so even the most testosterone pumped 17yr old wouldn't dare get on
his horse to go raiding.


Well, it does make sense to try and find them all.

They already see the destruction of the West as a form of self-defense.  You
stop it when they find out that the result is their own destruction.

The following is apparently making the rounds in the Arab world:

(2030) at the WTC memorial.
Daddy, what happened to them?
Some bad Arabs crashed into them and made them fall down.
Daddy, what is an Arab?
Don't worry son.  We don't have Arabs anymore.



Finally, consider Henry V Scene 3 Act 3:

How yet resolves the governor of the town?
This is the latest parle we will admit;
Therefore to our best mercy give yourselves;
Or like to men proud of destruction
Defy us to our worst: for, as I am a soldier,
A name that in my thoughts becomes me best,
If I begin the battery once again,
I will not leave the half-achieved Harfleur
Till in her ashes she lie buried.
The gates of mercy shall be all shut up,
And the flesh'd soldier, rough and hard of heart,
In liberty of bloody hand shall range
With conscience wide as hell, mowing like grass
Your fresh-fair virgins and your flowering infants.
What is it then to me, if impious war,
Array'd in flames like to the prince of fiends,
Do, with his smirch'd complexion, all fell feats
Enlink'd to waste and desolation?
What is't to me, when you yourselves are cause,
If your pure maidens fall into the hand
Of hot and forcing violation?
What rein can hold licentious wickedness
When down the hill he holds his fierce career?
We may as bootless spend our vain command
Upon the enraged soldiers in their spoil
As send precepts to the leviathan
To come ashore. Therefore, you men of Harfleur,
Take pity of your town and of your people,
Whiles yet my soldiers are in my command;
Whiles yet the cool and temperate wind of grace
O'erblows the filthy and contagious clouds
Of heady murder, spoil and villany.
If not, why, in a moment look to see
The blind and bloody soldier with foul hand
Defile the locks of your shrill-shrieking daughters;
Your fathers taken by the silver beards,
And their most reverend heads dash'd to the walls,
Your naked infants spitted upon pikes,
Whiles the mad mothers with their howls confused
Do break the clouds, as did the wives of Jewry
At Herod's bloody-hunting slaughtermen.
What say you? will you yield, and this avoid,
Or, guilty in defence, be thus destroy'd?



-----Original Message-----
From: fork-admin@xent.com [mailto:fork-admin@xent.com]On Behalf Of Paul
Prescod
Sent: Sunday, March 10, 2002 9:27 AM
To: FoRK
Subject: Re: All Bets Are ON

I see that as neither effective nor moral. The brother or cousin that
you can't find will be on the next set of planes. Once the polarization
of the situation is complete, people will sacrifice their families
because they will see the destruction of the West as a form of
self-defense. This is the usual cycle.

>...
> 3) I'm well aware of the violation of Western moral norms involved here.
I
> didn't say I liked it.  But I'm afraid I prefer it to the more socially
> accepted solution.  Namely: declare war and start destroying towns and the
> people who live in them.

The socially accepted solution is the destruction of organizations
(government or otherwise) that support terrorism. Towns should only get
involved if they are havens for combatants.

 Paul Prescod


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