So, bomb the entire city the enemy leader lives in, rather than drop a guided bomb on his palace? Kill women and children? Draw and quarter people with IFVs?
If you'll go back and read my post, you'll note that I said that it was good to circumscribe the scope of war by limiting the
theatre.
So no, bombing an entire city rather than guided-bombing his palace would be stupid.
However, that said, it is the terrorists (er, Insurgents...er...Indigenous Peoples Who Are Rightfully Angry Because They Have Been Downtrodden By Corporate America) who have made this a conflict that is impossible to prosecute in a conventional way. They do not wear uniforms. A sniper on a rooftop is just a peaceful citizen by the time he stashes his rifle and gets down the stairs.
A defense-only strategy cannot hold forever against a determined adversary. So in order to effectively defend ourselves, we must attack. But our resolve weakens when innocents are killed and innocents are killed because our adversaries
know that we cannot tell the difference between a non-uniformed combatant and a bystander. And they
know that our resolve weakens when this happens, and
that is why they do it.
They hide among their own innocent people, knowing that those innocents will be killed, because
that is their strategy.
So what shall we do? Do nothing about a car careening toward a Marine base, because it
might just be high-spirited youths out for a joyride through Beirut, ha ha, good times? Or use force in our own defense, knowing that it may lead to innocent casualties, and regretting that fact, put pressing on because in the end, more lives will be saved than if we do nothing?
-BP