Terrorists and resistance fighters

http://www.bangornews.com/editorialnews/article.cfm?

Saddam Hussein's capture does not mean the end of armed resistance to the American occupation of Iraq. But whom are we fighting? Let me begin my answer by quoting some verse.


You know the rest. In the books you have read, how the British Regulars fired and fled, -- How the farmers gave them ball for ball, From behind each fence and farm-yard wall, Chasing the redcoats down the lane, Then crossing the fields to emerge again Under the trees at the turn of the road, and only pausing to fire and load

Obviously, this is from "Paul Revere's Ride," by Henry Wadsworth Longfellow. And the poet drew some conclusions. The image of civilians ambushing an occupying foreign army in order to drive it out from their land he considered powerful and deeply inspiring.

another man's freedom fighter, this silly aphorism has always bothered me. Most of the time it was used to justify supporting or defending the worst types of of terrorists. IRA, FLNM, PLO etc. People who kill indiscriminately for freedom. Where on the planet is there a free nation established by such a movement?

Terrorists are defined by their tactics and freedom fighters by their goals.

AJ

"Freedom fighters", guerillas and insurgents target the military and gov't. Terrorists target civilians.

But one that conveys no meaning: tactics and goals are seperate catagories, and so cannot be mutually exclusive. It is a commonplace that a laudable goal can be pursued by foul means, and a dispicable one pursued by fair means.

The term "terrorism" is a mere propaganda coinage, without any real meaning whatsoever.

On one level, it could be taken as indicating a tactic, but in that regard, it is far too broad to be of any use: all use of violence aims to strike terror into surviving on-lookers. Even in conventional force combat, the aim of killing a soldier is not so much to subtract his efforts from the fight, but to strike the terror they might be next into the men beside and behind him. The rule of thumb in tactical manuals is that if one quarter of the personnel and equipment in a force are disabled, its combat power may be considered effectively broken.

Those persons who are commonly called terrorists are simply private individuals who have arrogated to themselves the use of violence for some political end, which is traditionally a prerogative of the sovereign alone. The thing is really more a species of trade-unionist's exclusion, like a Carpenters' local complaining that non-union tradesmen are erecting back porches in the city. It is the competition, rather than the work itself, that is being complained of.

The only meaning conveyed by use of the word is that the utterer does not approve of the violence being so described, and hopes to sway other people to share that distaste without too much thought or effort. Thus, it says something about the person using the term, and nothing about the persons to whom the term is being applied. That any meaning is conveyed is thus a species of accident, and never, really, the "meaning" ostensibly intended by the speaker.

The only meaningful question is whether an act of violence in war is within the bounds of the laws of war, or is not. An attack that aims solely to kill enemy civilians is, beyond any conceivable argument, a crime of war. An attack that aims to kill enemy combatants, and also injures some enemy civilians, may be a crime of war, but may well not be, depending on a great many highly variable, and ultimately subjective, criteria. An attack that aims to kill enemy combatants, and does this only is, beyond any conceivable argument, a legitimate act of war. These judgements are wholly independent of whether one opposes or supports a combatant force in its goals or its character.