Over-reaction and Over-correction

[chris_gerrib]

Sometimes over-reaction and over-correction can be worse than not reacting at all. For example, during the Civil War, General George McClellan was so famously cautious as to prompt President Lincoln to ask if he could borrow McClellan's army "since he wasn't using it."

At times I think we're approaching McClellan-ish levels of caution with terrorism. Please don't get me wrong - there are terrorists and Islamic fundamentalists who are out to kill as many Americans as possible, and they aren't terribly picky as to which Americans. On the other hand, when I hear of "Jihad Jane", (actually Colleen LaRose), the 4 foot 11 inch suburban housewife / woman who talked to her cats, I suspect that she's only marginally more dangerous then The Three Stooges. Which is why, like Jim Henley, I think we need to treat her like a plain ole-fashioned criminal / kook.

Towards the end of McClellan's tour, during the Maryland campaign, he had a chance to crush Lee at Antietam. But he was so scared of Lee that he kept two Army Corps - a force nearly equal to Lee's - in reserve the entire battle. I'm concerned that, if Al Qaida ever gets smart and changes from the current strategy of "big attacks"* to a series of little attacks, we'll scare ourselves silly and over-react. Putting your enemy in proper perspective is important.


* Considering both the last to "big attacks" (Hasan and the Underpants Bomber) resulted in fewer casualties combined than one US drone strike, they are "big attacks" only in the minds of some.

Comments

[daveon.livejournal.com]

So you'd have backed the British up bombing Boston where there was active pro-IRA fund raising going on then?

Just asking. Or does this approach only apply to "other" people?

[jordan179.livejournal.com]

No, because I'm an American. But we were giving them just cause for war by allowing the IRA backing. Fortunately for us, we were so strong that the British dared do no such thing.

[daveon.livejournal.com]

Boogle.

[daveon.livejournal.com]

Apart from Boogle^2.

The British didn't do it because it would have been:

1) Wrong
2) Stupid
3) WRONG
4) As counterproductive as internment was in the early 70s
5) WRONG!!!!

Just because you have a moral vacuum where your sense of right and wrong are meant to live doesn't mean the rest of us have.

[jordan179.livejournal.com]

Not sure what "Boogle" means, squared or otherwise. Do you perhaps mean "Boggle?"

Why do you consider supporting terrorist attacks, or permitting your citizens to support terrorist attacks against another country to not constitute an act of war, when it obviously would be if the attacks were carried out by the first country's military? Is the same funding magically sanitized when passed through non-governmental hands?

[chris-gerrib.livejournal.com]

He doesn't. He considers randomly bombing terrorist sympathizers (especially when that group is poorly defined) as counter-productive and wrong. It creates both more sympathizers and more terrorists.

[jordan179.livejournal.com]

Whoever argued for "random bombardment" of anyone?" It wasn't me ... perhaps Dave imagines that "random bombardment" is how one normally prosecutes a war?

[chris-gerrib.livejournal.com]

Well, killing millions of terrorist sympathizers certainly sounds like carpet-bombing to me.

[jordan179.livejournal.com]

Well, killing millions of terrorist sympathizers certainly sounds like carpet-bombing to me.

Aside from the fact that "carpet-bombing" doesn't mean what you think (the word you were looking for was "area bombing"), the "millions" was constructed by analogy with the "millions for defense" quote. In most cases, the number of people who would have to be killed to destroy terrorist organizations would be far less. And the vast majority of them would be enemy combatants, whom it is always permissible to kill in war.

[daveon.livejournal.com]

I was going to reply, but I don't think you even grasp the knot you're tying yourself in here.

[daveon.livejournal.com]

or permitting your citizens

So under your logic America was committing an act of war against Britain in the 70s,80s and early 90s?

Would you agree? Or is reality a little more complicated?