So, because it's a war that did not directly involve the US, you disregard it's existance?

It seems like this is a difference in colloquialisms that led to misunderstanding. But the fact is you're still incorrect. Even we assume the second Gulf War was the one that happened in 1990, bin Laden wasn't on Saddam Hussein and Iraq's side in that war. In fact, he appealed to Saudi Arabia to let him lead a volunteer army along the lines of the Mujaheddin in Afghanistan into Kuwait to help expel Iraq. Instead, Saudi Arabia refused him and let the US establish bases in their country for the purpose of driving Iraq out of Kuwait. This was one of bin Laden's major grievances with his home country and the US.

No, but we don't disregard its existence. But it's apparently most commonly known by a different name here.

Huh, and here I thought it was just "Us" and "Them."

Oh well, luckily the good guys all get along while the bad guys are riddled with infighting.

What about it? First off, Iraq started that action by invading Kuwait: no invasion = no coalition response = no 9/11 argument of "payback" from bin Laden and al Qaeda.

Second, considering that the US Army had limited action around major Iraqi population centers, and thus very little opportunity for unfortunate collateral damage incidents, it's a stretch to say Army actions in Desert Storm caused a retaliatory 9/11 through thousands of civilian deaths. On the contrary, the action of Desert Storm was halted before military ground forces made it to Baghdad and other major cities. The few collateral damage incidents in Baghdad (from air actions), of which some are still questioned as being legitimate claims, took nowhere near thousands of lives of Iraqi civilians.

The premise was that the US Army caused "thousands" of civilian deaths in Iraq prior to 9/11, and that they directly led to the Osama and al Qaeda decision to plan and execute the actions of 11 Sep 2011, is false. This particular bit of revisionist history requires a DeLorean and a well-timed lightning bolt. If anything, after Desert Storm US and coalition forces were trying to prevent civilian deaths with the no-fly zone in northern Iraq, to protect the persecuted civilian Kurd population.

I'm not trying to paint a rosy picture of the history there because there are plenty of screw-ups and deliberate actions to which we can point and say "yep, that didn't help matters", but if one is going to make a claim like that, then sheesh, at least use a source with a timeline that makes sense with regards to the premise.

Actually, his biggest grievance was the USA's support of Israel, but do we really want to open up that can of worms?

As you'll note above, I never said it was his biggest grievance. But you're right. He wanted to drive all the Jews into the sea. This is your reason for why it's so terrible that we caught and aerated his carcass?

I just had a new thread idea!

binladen finally got killed, just because PSN is not working, and the Seals finally got time to put a bullet in his head. Simple as that.

Thank you for making the first reasonable argument on this thread.

How many times are you going to miss the point? The killing of innocents is wrong, no matter who the perpetrator is.

to bring a GOG quote into the mix - "There are no innocents. It is all of us, through action and inaction that we determine our fates."

However I mostly agree with you. The indescriminate killing we see too often, is of course wrong. It becomes a grey area when some of them might be capable of killing you (and willing), others may be consciously harbouring those people. It all puts together our nasty insiped society.

This death is a celebration of that. Enjoy the parties guys, "It is in our nature to kill ourselves", cheer, drink, be merry, kill more later.

"How long Preston, till all this is gone? Till we've burned every last bit of it?", "Resources are tight, we'll get it all eventually".

I'm afraid I really hate the world right now.

Well, that is what war is all about: to kill people and break things. Sure, folks can come up with fancy rules, such as the Just War Doctrine, where combatants and innocents are defined. However, people are going to get hurt in war. Even Innocents. Even Non-combatants.

It becomes even more cloudy when one tries to determine exactly WHO is an innocent or non-combatant. I small child with a bomb attached to her chest is certainly an innocent, but is she a combatant? Einstein and the rest of the Manhattan Project were certainly non-combatants, but were they truly innocent?

I am against war. Even taking out the emotional and moral objections of killing potential innocents, destroying human and physical capital with reckless abandon is no way to manage a planet with finite resources. However, war is a fact of human nature, ever since we, as humans, first started walking upright and forming tribes. The 'Us vs. Them' mentality is as much a product of Darwinist Evolution as our opposable thumbs.

Arguing that people die in wars is not an valid argument against killing an evil person. Wars will occur into the foreseeable future, and innocents WILL die, but this doesn't mean we shouldn't rid the Earth of evil whenever and where ever we find it.

Or, perhaps I miss your point. If I have, I apologize.

At least since Duke Nukem Forever is all about fighting against space aliens, there won't be any extra delays made to backtrack and "retcon" any bin Laden references. You know, "Finding this guy took Forever" quips and such.

Yes, as I said before accidents DO happen. But in a "modern" world with supposedly better intel and methods/arms to bring to bear to pinpoint attacks and minimalise collateral damage than there has to be a limit set(in theory or practice) that is simply "not acceptable" for any side.

That's what this started to be about, not accidental deaths in war in general being bad but too high a number of accidental civilian deaths.

The point of war is to kill people and break things. I think this is already an irrational act. Trying to set rules for how irrational it should be seems rather futile. In the end, the goal of any war is to win, and if you start to lose you will be more and more likely to break any rules that are set on you regardless.

War sucks, I think everyone agrees with this. Deciding how bad it should suck seems more academic than practical.