When I was a kid, I had a discussion with a family friend who happened to be a lawyer. I did not understand why the person who executes a death sentence is not committing premeditated murder.
He explained to me that murder is the _unlawful_ killing of a person. The execution of a death sentence is lawful, therefore it is not murder.
Regardless of one's position on the morality of capital punishment... and regardless of whether you _like_ the definition of the word "murder..." it _is_ the definition, and it is possible to understand it and to apply it in deciding what acts should be labelled murder.
Similarly, terrorism is "the _unlawful_ use or threatened use of force or violence by a person or an organized group against people or property with the intention of intimidating or coercing societies or governments, often for ideological or political reasons." Definition AHD4, emphasis mine.
Now, deciding what is and is not lawful can be difficult enough in domestic matters (as I am well aware at the moment, living as I do in Massachusetts) and it is far more complicated in international affairs. So this doesn't really answer any questions. But it does _raise_ some questions.
If, for the sake of argument, you assume that the intention of the U. S. bombing of Nagasaki was not primarily to take out a military target, but to create "shock and awe" in the Japanese populace, military, and Emperor, in order to convince them to surrender--that is, to intimidate or coerce them--then it was terrorism if unlawful, and was not terrorism if lawful. On the whole, given that the U.S. was attacked and was in a state of declared war with Japan, I think most would label it as lawful.
On the other hand: would our characterization of the bombing of Nagasaki be affected if its purpose was neither military, nor a psychological message aimed at Japan, but a psychological message aimed _at Stalin and at the Soviet Union_--one saying "We have these weapons of mass destruction and we are willing to use them?" Perhaps that would make it a terrorist act after all--but one directed at the Soviet Union, not at Japan.
Something that I don't recall seeing recently in the arguments about whether or not 9/11 was terrorism is this. Since we in the United States were, in fact, terrorized, we are inclined to see it as a terrorist act. The question is, what specific actions was Osama bin Laden trying to intimidate or coerce us into taking? I'm not very clear on this. Now, suppose the psychological message was aimed _at Arabs_ and was "Al-Qaeda is big, strong, courageous, and capable of attacking the United States with impunity. Join us." If this was the nature of the act, then, by the dictionary definition, would it constitute terrorism?
-- Daniel P. B. Smith, dpbsmith@world.std.com alternate: dpbsmith@alum.mit.edu "Elinor Goulding Smith's Great Big Messy Book" is now back in print! Sample chapter at http://world.std.com/~dpbsmith/messy.html Buy it at http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/1403314063/
Oh, Their demands have always been clear; withdrawal from Saudi Arabia and the Middle East and cessation of any other activities which oppose Islamist activities including abandonment of Israel. Given the long history of treating Muslims as second class people who must be somehow controlled, in their eyes they are simply responding to Western aggression.
We and the British (and French, even the Dutch) have a long history of opposing Islamic fundamentalism by various sorts of interventions and support of Secular Arab authority. And probably a good thing too, though with baleful long term implications.
I believe they would say that the long sustained pattern of interventionism was unlawful. That said, most nations who waged aggressive war or theatened it during the 20th century put forth similar rationalizations.
Fred
From: "Daniel P.B.Smith" dpbsmith@verizon.net Reply-To: English Wikipedia wikien-l@Wikipedia.org Date: Fri, 13 Feb 2004 12:53:34 -0500 To: wikien-l@Wikipedia.org Subject: [WikiEN-l] Re: Definition of terrorism
Something that I don't recall seeing recently in the arguments about whether or not 9/11 was terrorism is this. Since we in the United States were, in fact, terrorized, we are inclined to see it as a terrorist act. The question is, what specific actions was Osama bin Laden trying to intimidate or coerce us into taking? I'm not very clear on this. Now, suppose the psychological message was aimed _at Arabs_ and was "Al-Qaeda is big, strong, courageous, and capable of attacking the United States with impunity. Join us." If this was the nature of the act, then, by the dictionary definition, would it constitute terrorism?
The question is, what specific actions was Osama bin Laden trying to intimidate or coerce us into taking? I'm not very clear on this.
It might not be the US government. Could apply to trying to coerce the government of Saudi Arabia, for example - into removing US forces. Or affect Algeria. Or cause instability in the Phillipines/Indonesia area.
Charles
Daniel P.B.Smith wrote:
When I was a kid, I had a discussion with a family friend who happened to be a lawyer. I did not understand why the person who executes a death sentence is not committing premeditated murder.
He explained to me that murder is the _unlawful_ killing of a person. The execution of a death sentence is lawful, therefore it is not murder.
Regardless of one's position on the morality of capital punishment... and regardless of whether you _like_ the definition of the word "murder..." it _is_ the definition, and it is possible to understand it and to apply it in deciding what acts should be labelled murder.
Similarly, terrorism is "the _unlawful_ use or threatened use of force or violence by a person or an organized group against people or property with the intention of intimidating or coercing societies or governments, often for ideological or political reasons." Definition AHD4, emphasis mine.
Now, deciding what is and is not lawful can be difficult enough in domestic matters (as I am well aware at the moment, living as I do in Massachusetts) and it is far more complicated in international affairs. So this doesn't really answer any questions. But it does _raise_ some questions.
As you say the problem is with the word lawful. (The Massachusetts court is certainly to be commended for its recent enlightened position.) It frequently happens that a law is passed and treated as lawful only to be struck down as unconstitutional (=unlawful) more than a century later. A more important question can be, "_whose_ law applies?" Extrapolations are always on dangerous ground, and exporting domestic law to an international situation is a fine example of that. The US attack on Iraq may have been perfectly lawful under domestic law, but was just as unlawful under international law.
If, for the sake of argument, you assume that the intention of the U. S. bombing of Nagasaki was not primarily to take out a military target, but to create "shock and awe" in the Japanese populace, military, and Emperor, in order to convince them to surrender--that is, to intimidate or coerce them--then it was terrorism if unlawful, and was not terrorism if lawful. On the whole, given that the U.S. was attacked and was in a state of declared war with Japan, I think most would label it as lawful.
Not so fast. It represented an escalation of weaponry. Even the Germans showed restraint over the use of poison gas on the battlefield. Their equipment was set up to use it in Crimea, but they didn't.
On the other hand: would our characterization of the bombing of Nagasaki be affected if its purpose was neither military, nor a psychological message aimed at Japan, but a psychological message aimed _at Stalin and at the Soviet Union_--one saying "We have these weapons of mass destruction and we are willing to use them?" Perhaps that would make it a terrorist act after all--but one directed at the Soviet Union, not at Japan.
Speculative. The Soviet Union was a non-combatant in the Pacific theatre until August 10, 1945, i.e. the day after the Nagasaki bomb. With the end in sight it joined the war for a quick territorial grab.
Something that I don't recall seeing recently in the arguments about whether or not 9/11 was terrorism is this. Since we in the United States were, in fact, terrorized, we are inclined to see it as a terrorist act. The question is, what specific actions was Osama bin Laden trying to intimidate or coerce us into taking? I'm not very clear on this. Now, suppose the psychological message was aimed _at Arabs_ and was "Al-Qaeda is big, strong, courageous, and capable of attacking the United States with impunity. Join us." If this was the nature of the act, then, by the dictionary definition, would it constitute terrorism?
Looking back at that time, the Anthrax scare was a far more effective terrorist tactic despite the fact that very few lives were lost. We still don't know who did it, and the "terrorists" apparantly lived to fight another day -- thus not only effective but also cost-effective.
Ec