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Comment by hetspookjee | Hacker News Reader

Off topic but I'm having increasingly more difficulty with the term Terrorist. How'd you call American intrusions in sovereign states? Just somewhat recently the drone strike of the General Soleimani on sovereign grounds were an act of terrorism if perceived through the eyes of most Iranians, and possibly Iraqis as the strike was on their ground. Terrorist is a term that is stretched and applied beyond meaning.

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I would define terrorism as forced coercion of an outside group (or group perceived to be "outside") through violent actions. Controlling through fear. So yes, any assassination, and especially that one, would be terrorism. However, terrorism committed by independent actors makes them terrorists, but terrorism committed by the state is more appropriately classified as military aggression, or acts of war.

The whole point of the military doing anything short of all out war is to scare an "enemy" into compliance through threat of violence. So it's not classified as terrorism for the same reason as lethal action by police is not murder. The blessing of the state changes its definition.

That's not the standard understanding: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/State_terrorism

We all know how things are - the world is not a fair place. It never was, and so far its rigged in a way that it never will be. Strong oppress the weak. Skillful strong oppress in a way that weak don't even notice but that's another topic. The word terrorist currently means 'enemy of me', if me is state powerful enough to project its power on others. US took any other meaning internationally from this word over last 17 years pretty effectively.

If you actively object the biggest military in the world, there is no safe place on this planet. A country that effectively uses black op sites to do torture on suspects that would be illegal back home, a country that actively uses a prison to indefinitely detain (and torture) suspects without any legal process (and so on and on... really, there are whole books about this), has absolutely 0 issues with bombing some enemy general. It can be even in the centre of Brusel for all they care, if the benefits outweigh the cons. If they kill 50 kids along, all they do is try to minimize media damage. Do you see many americans shedding tears over this? From outside its pretty hard to spot any, and anybody who cares knows how things are.

Let's not pretend wars are something nice, fair and some gentlemanly approach is applied. Almost anything that works will be used.

See, the general assumption is. If its a white rich nation (except Russia) doing something, its moral. If its a rich ally of the said nations, its moral.

I doesn't matter what they do, commit war-crimes, liberate people from democracy(to free the people) and install dictators, fund terrorists, lie to the international community about wars, kill people in embassies, it doesn't matter. It is you who are at fault, for not being able to understand their deeper moral motives.

Everything that the enemy does, that is either illegal or it's just lies and propaganda to improve their image. They can do nothing right.

Now, With this context you can understand very clearly how to think and feel about who the terrorists are and who the bad guys are.

Terrorism is committing violent acts targeting non-combatants for political goals

That’s a bit loose. Terrorism aims to inspire terror, those violent acts have to be extreme and indiscriminate to do so.

For example, missiles from unmanned drones hitting civilian targets like schools and hospitals.

Note the statistics here [0] - of course the numbers are very fuzzy but at the worst case scenario it's 1:2.5 civilians: military targets. So for every 2.5 military targets, 1 civilian. That fits the bill for extreme and indiscriminate.

[0] https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Drone_strikes_in_Pakistan

Hitting is not the same as targeting, so no.

Also, one needs to indicate the difference between e.g. a hospital building acting as nothing but a hospital, and one that has been evacuated of patients and used as a militant staging post.

That seems like the loose understanding between the two. Were the 1944 USAAF bombings of Krupp Stahl works terrorism? They would be according to your understanding.

This reminded me of the song "Pirates & Emperors", which you might enjoy: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UQBWGo7pef8

Too long, didn't listen: If you rob with a little ship, you're a "pirate", but if you steal with a big fleet, thou art "emperor".

Thanks. I really appreciate the link. Especially the reference to duck typing, haha.

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