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Miriam Binder
Earthsea
United Kingdom
5305 Posts |
Posted - 03/03/2008 : 19:38:17
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| Sun Tzu if I am not mistaken ... he also said "All warfare is based on deception" |
"Those who would give up essential liberty to purchase temporary safety deserve neither liberty nor safety" - Benjamin Franklin |
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Fluffy Sheep
Discworld
1159 Posts |
Posted - 03/03/2008 : 20:43:09
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| Ha. I`ve neither read nor studied this, but there`s a couple of folks fairly close who have. I tend to regard them as knowledgeable and learned. That figures, as I tend to regard Moon, and Mim this way too. |
Row faster, slaves! Caesar wants to waterski! |
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Miriam Binder
Earthsea
United Kingdom
5305 Posts |
 Posted - 03/03/2008 : 21:04:17
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 Not really Fluffy, just an avid reader  |
"Those who would give up essential liberty to purchase temporary safety deserve neither liberty nor safety" - Benjamin Franklin |
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Fluffy Sheep
Discworld
1159 Posts |
Posted - 03/03/2008 : 21:26:58
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| Quite |
Row faster, slaves! Caesar wants to waterski! |
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moon23
Calaspia
696 Posts |
Posted - 04/03/2008 : 11:26:35
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quote:
Originally posted by Miriam Binder
Sun Tzu if I am not mistaken ... he also said "All warfare is based on deception"
Mim the world has changed since 9/11, this is something Sun Tzu just couldn't ever have understood. Everyone knows was is about a battle between the free and democratic world and terrorism. |
http://www.moon23.wordpress.com
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Miriam Binder
Earthsea
United Kingdom
5305 Posts |
Posted - 04/03/2008 : 13:03:24
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| Maybe Moon ... then again it could be said that it is a battle between two ideologies. Deception plays a part in both camps as well as terrorism. |
"Those who would give up essential liberty to purchase temporary safety deserve neither liberty nor safety" - Benjamin Franklin |
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moon23
Calaspia
696 Posts |
Posted - 04/03/2008 : 16:58:26
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quote:
Originally posted by Miriam Binder
Maybe Moon ... then again it could be said that it is a battle between two ideologies. Deception plays a part in both camps as well as terrorism.
There is no deception only the battle for hearts and minds. |
http://www.moon23.wordpress.com
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Anubis
Barsoom
231 Posts |
Posted - 04/03/2008 : 18:07:57
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quote:
Originally posted by moon23
quote:
Originally posted by Miriam Binder
Sun Tzu if I am not mistaken ... he also said "All warfare is based on deception"
Mim the world has changed since 9/11, this is something Sun Tzu just couldn't ever have understood. Everyone knows was is about a battle between the free and democratic world and terrorism.
Wouldn't it be lovely if the world was just a battle between the goodies and the baddies. As a kid, like all kids, I believed that once upon a time .... there were the 'merry men' of Sherwood Forest, loyal to their king and the wicked Prince John and Sir Guy of G., collecting the ransom from the ground-down peasants and keeping it for themselves. Then it was Hopalong Cassidy ... or Randolph Scott ... and the same 'goodies' of my childhood Saturday matinees, were transformed into war heroes, Errol Flynn captured Burma from the baddie Japs, Leslie Howard and Raymond Massey showed the Nazi submariners on the 49th parallel how 'democracy' always withstood (and eventually conquered) the black uniformed Gestapo.
BUT even in the films, the 'heroes' were labelled 'bandits' and 'terrorists' by the evil Nazis and Japanese butchers ... because throughout human history, whenever one powerful section invades/conquers another section, that very action evokes a response. The bandits/terrorists/parisans/resistance movements throughout the Nazi world were shown no mercy and expected none. The conquerers always described in these same derogatory terms ... as did Julius Caesar in his "Gallic Wars" .... they were ALWAYS, as they are today, represented as "unlawful combatants".
In today's IRAQ, THE ONLY "illegal/ unlawful combatants" are the military invaders. Many Iraqi men and women are prepared to (and do) sacrifice their lives against the foreign invader. I am sure if this country were occupied by a foreign invader, the British people would produce hundreds and thousands who would likewise expect to be slandered by the invader as "terrorists' (and many of those, in Iraq, who have done this for their homeland have written full accounts as to what has happened to them and their loved ones thus leading logically for them to intervene in the only way they believe possible for fighting a foreign imposed tyranny).
Of course, in many respect, my description of what is happening is ALSO a very simplified, goodie/baddy, version. Miriam knows, I am sure, there are many more than just two ideologies at war with each other. Islam is split and at war with itself, Kurds and other national minorities, other factions ... and behind it all the world forces of capital, determined to control the region and the oil resources. Add to that cauldron the often violent divisions between the exploiters themselves ... all these additional elements are enlarged and confounded by Western policies of aggression. Even with the very very sanitized newsreel footage we receive from these localities, for the majority of Westerners who have never had their homes bombed to pieces and their relatives and friends killed by the "unlawful combatants" from UK and USA, ought to be able to perceive a world with a little less superficiality than to describe it as "a battle for hearts and minds/ between two ideologies". |
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Miriam Binder
Earthsea
United Kingdom
5305 Posts |
Posted - 04/03/2008 : 19:30:46
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| There are many more conflict zones then Iraq Anubis. |
"Those who would give up essential liberty to purchase temporary safety deserve neither liberty nor safety" - Benjamin Franklin |
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Fluffy Sheep
Discworld
1159 Posts |
Posted - 04/03/2008 : 20:28:16
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| You know, I always thought the phrase `the battle for hearts and minds` was rather tongue-in-cheek. I always took it as a euphemism for propaganda. |
Row faster, slaves! Caesar wants to waterski! |
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Daveb
Discworld
1889 Posts |
Posted - 04/03/2008 : 21:28:03
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The UK has been under attack from "illegal/ unlawful combatants" for man years. It used to be the IRA before 9/11 stopped America funding these murderers. Now the focus is on Islamic groups.
I say bring troops home and deport anyone who supports known murdering (terrorist) groups.
It is strange how Prince Andrew did not get the same flack during the Falklands conflict. BTW that was an illegal invasion by Argentina.
The Royals are damned whatever the do, so perhaps the should just do their minimum civic duty and then do as they like and take the huge advantage of the system. Just like politicians, civil servants, benefit cheats and terrorist (religious) preachers. |
We're all doomed!
Head for the hills before they start heading for you! |
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camelot
Barsoom
USA
294 Posts |
Posted - 05/03/2008 : 05:07:19
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| The royals are an easy target in my USA opinion...but a little slack should be given for the celebrity status they have been anointed with…After all, they have not asked for the role of the super star like a Madonna, the Spice Girls, or any of the other mega celebs…but rather have been born into it without choice. Not very fair if you ask me... |
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Anubis
Barsoom
231 Posts |
Posted - 05/03/2008 : 08:49:38
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quote:
Originally posted by camelot
The royals are an easy target in my USA opinion...but a little slack should be given for the celebrity status they have been anointed with…After all, they have not asked for the role of the super star like a Madonna, the Spice Girls, or any of the other mega celebs…but rather have been born into it without choice. Not very fair if you ask me...
So we have no need to guess, if it came to the crunch, on which side you'd have stood in 1776, Camelot. No doubt you'd have stood firm behind John Adams, defence attorney for the British soldiers of occupation, when he described supporters of the American 'free republic' as "a mottly rabble of saucy boys, negroes and mulattoes, Irish teagues and outlandish jack tarrs".
I've spent only a little time in the USA -- but enough to know those world-inspiring 'bells of freedom' are not dead in America, in spite of the creatures currently in power .... |
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moon23
Calaspia
696 Posts |
Posted - 05/03/2008 : 15:06:49
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quote:
Originally posted by camelot
The royals are an easy target in my USA opinion...but a little slack should be given for the celebrity status they have been anointed with…After all, they have not asked for the role of the super star like a Madonna, the Spice Girls, or any of the other mega celebs…but rather have been born into it without choice. Not very fair if you ask me...
In the US you have great inequality, but you don't have to put up with royalty. Still I guess at least our Royalty and upper classes are cultured and civilied (mmm.. thinking about that most of our royals are uneducated philistines.) |
http://www.moon23.wordpress.com
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Edited by - moon23 on 05/03/2008 15:07:47 |
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moon23
Calaspia
696 Posts |
Posted - 05/03/2008 : 15:09:33
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quote:
Originally posted by Anubis
quote:
Originally posted by moon23
quote:
Originally posted by Miriam Binder
Sun Tzu if I am not mistaken ... he also said "All warfare is based on deception"
Mim the world has changed since 9/11, this is something Sun Tzu just couldn't ever have understood. Everyone knows was is about a battle between the free and democratic world and terrorism.
Wouldn't it be lovely if the world was just a battle between the goodies and the baddies. As a kid, like all kids, I believed that once upon a time .... there were the 'merry men' of Sherwood Forest, loyal to their king and the wicked Prince John and Sir Guy of G., collecting the ransom from the ground-down peasants and keeping it for themselves. Then it was Hopalong Cassidy ... or Randolph Scott ... and the same 'goodies' of my childhood Saturday matinees, were transformed into war heroes, Errol Flynn captured Burma from the baddie Japs, Leslie Howard and Raymond Massey showed the Nazi submariners on the 49th parallel how 'democracy' always withstood (and eventually conquered) the black uniformed Gestapo.
BUT even in the films, the 'heroes' were labelled 'bandits' and 'terrorists' by the evil Nazis and Japanese butchers ... because throughout human history, whenever one powerful section invades/conquers another section, that very action evokes a response. The bandits/terrorists/parisans/resistance movements throughout the Nazi world were shown no mercy and expected none. The conquerers always described in these same derogatory terms ... as did Julius Caesar in his "Gallic Wars" .... they were ALWAYS, as they are today, represented as "unlawful combatants".
In today's IRAQ, THE ONLY "illegal/ unlawful combatants" are the military invaders. Many Iraqi men and women are prepared to (and do) sacrifice their lives against the foreign invader. I am sure if this country were occupied by a foreign invader, the British people would produce hundreds and thousands who would likewise expect to be slandered by the invader as "terrorists' (and many of those, in Iraq, who have done this for their homeland have written full accounts as to what has happened to them and their loved ones thus leading logically for them to intervene in the only way they believe possible for fighting a foreign imposed tyranny).
Of course, in many respect, my description of what is happening is ALSO a very simplified, goodie/baddy, version. Miriam knows, I am sure, there are many more than just two ideologies at war with each other. Islam is split and at war with itself, Kurds and other national minorities, other factions ... and behind it all the world forces of capital, determined to control the region and the oil resources. Add to that cauldron the often violent divisions between the exploiters themselves ... all these additional elements are enlarged and confounded by Western policies of aggression. Even with the very very sanitized newsreel footage we receive from these localities, for the majority of Westerners who have never had their homes bombed to pieces and their relatives and friends killed by the "unlawful combatants" from UK and USA, ought to be able to perceive a world with a little less superficiality than to describe it as "a battle for hearts and minds/ between two ideologies".
That sounds complex, most people will prefer Bush and Blair’s simplified version. |
http://www.moon23.wordpress.com
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NewMember
Barsoom
109 Posts |
Posted - 08/03/2008 : 16:40:34
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Anubis, you have a lot to say - and you make a lot of sense! Would you mind me suggesting tho that when you have several paragraphs, you break them up into separate posts? This way I would find it a lot easier to reply to your individualised points?
If anyone disagrees with me on this point, please shout me down - just a personal preference. |
"It is impossible to enjoy idling thoroughly unless one has plenty of work to do" Jerome K. Jerome |
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Prince Harry Fighting