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Comment by graycat | Hacker News Reader

Of course there are answers: ISIS just attacked NATO -- definitely Darwin award material. NATO can "wipe the desert clean" in less than an hour anytime NATO is willing to do what ISIS does -- create civilian casualties. By clean, in the ISIS areas, no more buildings, oil infrastructure, vehicles, tents, flocks, camels, or people. None. Then, the end of ISIS and whatever beliefs, determination, goals, history, etc. Dead people don't attack NATO, and NATO can convert ISIS and everyone in the ISIS areas to dead people in an hour. The only question is, when will NATO do that.

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When will NATO destroy an entire nation, civilians and all? How is that a remotely reasonable response? That's like suggesting that Pakistan would be justified in nuking Washington DC because American drone strikes have killed civilians there. There's no world where its justifiable to murder a nation of civilians, ever.

While I agree with the point you're making, how many civilians are left in ISIS controlled territory though? I don't have any numbers, but I wouldn't be surprised if 50% has fled and another 40% has been killed by ISIS. So how many people are there, not including the people that chose to join ISIS?

I've seen some footage from Sinjar after it was retaken by the Kurds: not a single building was left standing. It's hard to imagine anyone still living there.

> There's no world where its justifiable to murder a nation of civilians, ever.

Yup, and that's just what ISIS is trying to do -- everyone in the world, convert to radical Sunni Islam and follow ISIS or die.

To heck with the details: The US, France, Germany, England, all of NATO has a right to defend themselves.

With the ISIS ideology, they will be trying to kill everyone else, infidels, as long as there is just one ISIS person left.

At this point it is not enough to stop the ISIS killings. Instead, we must stop the ability of ISIS to do harm outside of their area.

Sure, taking the desert area of ISIS and wiping it clean is not reasonable, but neither is ISIS.

I don't want to kill them. I especially don't want to hurt the girls and young women, especially the ones they have made into sex slaves. I don't even want to hurt their flocks and camels.

But I want to stop ISIS now and forever in the future. I don't want to spend even one drop of NATO blood. I don't want to spend even one US penny more than necessary. But I want ISIS stopped. We are not obligated to put up with their wacko nonsense. It is our responsibility that they be stopped. If they had any responsibility or deserved any from us, then they would long since have stopped their wacko, medieval nonsense. Since they have not stopped and have no sense of responsibility, we need just to stop them.

Stop them from the air. Take out their leaders and their oil infrastructure. Occupy their oil areas and take the oil. For the rest of the area, we might for a while try to send them back to tents, flocks, and camels cooking their food with camel dung. I I suspect it won't work, that all they have is what their radical clerics tell them, and those clerics will stop only when dead.

Basically they have a wacko, violent, ugly, stupid medieval culture enabled by oil money and nothing else, are 1000 years out of date, with no hope of moving ahead the needed several hundred years. No hope.

And their nuke threat is real. Time to stop them.

France isn't a part of NATO, and hasn't been for 50 years. Which is probably one of the reasons they were selected as a target.

Armies are good at breaking down nation-states by destroying the opposing military and means of production. Putting the middle east aside, as it's still happening, I think the history of the 20th century aptly demonstrates that organized military force isn't effective in defeating revolutionary movements. The Vietnamese were successful in ejecting France and the US, the Irish were able to defeat the British Empire, the Yugoslavians were successful against the Germans.

The Germans pretty much did what you suggest NATO is capable of, given the will. They executed hostages in reprisal. They blew up towns and burned crops. They rounded up partisan leaders and hung them on the roadside. Again, didn't really work. From a humanist perspective, I don't think that is the type of conduct NATO countries aspire to.

You don't stop revolutionary movements by blowing stuff up. You have to undermine the base of ideology or grievances.

> France isn't a part of NATO, and hasn't been for 50 years. Which is probably one of the reasons they were selected as a target.

You're mistaken [0][1][2].

[0] http://www.nato.int/cps/en/natolive/nato_countries.htm [1] http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2009/03... [2] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Member_states_of_NATO

> France isn't a part of NATO, and hasn't been for 50 years.

Page

http://www.cnbc.com/2015/11/16/why-nato-probably-wont-help-f...

clearly claims that France is a member of NATO.

> You have to undermine the base of ideology or grievances.

Would be nice. That would be the nice way. For Viet Nam, my position was, and remains, just come home. And now the US and Viet Nam get along fine. We could have gotten along fine starting as soon as the Japanese left -- Viet Nam liked us then, we got rid of the Japanese who had taken over their country and they had helped downed US pilots, and could have liked us continually and more and more to the present. I never did understand why Ho, a dishwasher from Paris, was so eager to get free dinners in Moscow and Peking just to torque off the US.

What you said about Germany did work for a while, and what defeated Germany was mostly just the US, especially the US Eighth air force with B-17s leveling German cities, ones that were at all connected with war production and likely more.

But ISIS is no longer a "revolutionary movement" and, instead, is essentially a nation state. So, I don't recommend occupying them and hanging their leaders from lamp posts. I don't want diplomacy, negotiations, surrender, unconditional surrender, or treaties. We can't settle for their promising to stop their nonsense or even stopping their nonsense. And I don't want to try to occupy them like W did -- that would cost US blood and treasure, and not one drop of blood and not one dime more treasure than it takes to defend the US.

Instead, given their strong culture and many very clear statements, we have to make sure they are no longer able in any sense to pursue their nonsense. At this point, I will pay attention their capabilities, not their statements or behavior, and want to make sure they have no capabilities to inflict harm outside their territories. Sure, in part that would mean that no one, except maybe some boys under 6 or some girls under 10, from the ISIS area is ever permitted to leave.

They are eager to die and to kill us. We can help them die, and without dying ourselves. We don't have to be ashamed of helping them die the way they want.

In particular they must not have the resources or ability to get a nuke bomb. Essentially they have to be sent back to tents, flocks, and camels, tightly controlled, with their oil taken, and that's at least. The only safe way to remove a boot on their necks and just forget about them is, basically, to kill all of them. It's come to that -- they make that fully clear in all their propaganda. So be it.

They would love to light off a nuke in NY harbor, and I'm just 70 miles from there. 'Nuff for me -- defend ourselves.

The only serious tool they have is our reluctance to kill their civilians, which are really just their children and most of their women. They have that tool only due to our extreme, nearly suicidal, generosity. We don't owe them that.

I'm sure that in WWII the US killed a lot of really nice, wonderful civilian people in both Japan and Germany. But, we had to win the war, and we did. And Japan and Germany had killed a lot of really nice, wonderful civilians before we did.

"Nuke" -- ISIS said the wrong word. There are no extenuating grievances, history, or considerations. It's back to tents, flocks, and camels right away or, and likely soon, just "wipe the desert clean".

Saddam said the wrong word -- nuke. ISIS is really slow at learning and really fast to forget.

W was a total fumble bumble, but his sense of responsibility as POTUS to defend the US was correct. I'm sure the next POTUS, either Hillary or any of the Repub candidates, will also take that responsibility seriously. I don't like Hillary, but she is not stupid; I very much don't like Hillary, but she is likely the best informed and brightest in the race; I believe and very much hope she loses, but I am fairly confident that, as part of being a responsible POTUS, and I am sure she has plenty of pride for that, she would be ready, willing, able, and eager to tell the USAF to level the ISIS areas -- wipe the desert clean.

ISIS wants to take their magic carpet ride to Allah, and it's about certain they will. I'm very sorry the ISIS area innocent women and children have to go along for the ride.

A threat of a nuke in a US harbor -- we need to make sure we don't have to worry about that at all, and we can, and I believe that we should and will.

"We don't want the smoking gun to be a mushroom cloud"; I didn't, and don't, think that statement was appropriate when C. Rice said it, but I believe it's appropriate now. We don't want to wait; the Paris attack was enough for a Pearl Harbor wake up call.

For the ISIS areas, France is fully capable of wiping "the desert clean" in an afternoon -- they better do it.

> France isn't a part of NATO, and hasn't been for 50 years.

France is a NATO member, and has been the whole time NATO has existed. It withdrew from some NATO structures (e.g., the integrated military command) in 1966, but rejoined the integrated military command in 2009.

(1) as many others have already pointed out France really is part of NATO

(2) France has something they label the 'force de frappe', which, though vastly reduced could turn a relatively large area of desert into a parking lot overnight, so even if they are part of NATO they don't actually need it to respond on an extremely high casualty level if the French get pissed off enough. Fortunately, France is one of the more levelheaded nuclear powers and has - to date - not even put that option on the table. But I would not take that as a given or forever.

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