Caesar's campaign against Vicengitorix in Gaul, and
The German assault on Leningrad and the Russian response.
The world has gone mad, and forgotten what war means. What it is, and how silly "rules" and "international law" are. The historical result of assuming that pollyanna-ish approaches to war solve anything is worse than the results of war itself --- in the long run.
All it does is create huge wars out of small ones. It postpones the inevitable. And the total casualties end up being ten times higher than if a real and total war were waged against aggressors at first blush: complete, relentless, brutal and final. No rules.
Can anyone present a single war that was prevented (not merely postponed with monstrous results) by negotiations and reasoning with the aggressor?
Anyone?
Just a single example...
I think Isaiah 17 is around the corner.
Damascus is about to glow in the dark.
They are part and parcel of the Iranian Revolutionary Guards.
They are trained by the Iranian government.
They are supplied by the Iranian government.
They are paid by both the Syrian and Iranian governments.
There are really only two ways one could possibly regard Hizbolla under the GC. One is as an 'irregular militia'. That one is right out as the GC requires that an irregular militia be composed of indigenous forces answering to a clear chain of command.
The other is as soldiers out of uniform carrying out indiscriminate attacks against civilian targets. That makes them war criminals who can be subjected to summary execution after a speedy field Courts Martial.
I caught those programs on THC and I completely agree with you. Some have compared our leaders to Neville Chamberlain croaking about 'peace in our time' while clutching worthless bits of paper.
I disagree. We have the opposite problem. We are at war yet we refuse to prosecute it as vigorously and as violently as wars must be prosecuted in order to win swift, decisive, unquestionable victories.
After 9-11 President Bush said "If you harbor terrorists or aid terrorists we shall treat you like terrorists."
Well Mr. President we have two regimes in the Middle East who are not only doing that, they are openly crowing about it. Yet, you do nothing. No, strike that. You do worse than nothing.
You negotiate with them. You give them a legitimacy they have neither earned nor deserve. All they merit is a rapid and violent stamping out with whatever level of violence is required to bring a speedy end to the matter.
It's time we offer the Israelis whatever assets they require and offer to reduce the bulk of the Syrian and Iranian armies and their bases to pink mist and rubble.
It's also high time we stop treating these goons as legitimate national leaders and sparing them from personal consequences of their actions. This crap about Assad and Ahmenidjad being 'civilian leaders' is foolish.
They need to know that they are targets on a very personal level.
Once the homes and families of a few Iranian Mullahs vanish in a high order detonation the rest of them will calm down. They can't all be hiding in their bunkers 24 X 7.
Turn Assad and his 'cabinet' into quivering gobs of meat stuck to the walls and Hizzbolla will quickly lose its bluster. Let the UN be damned if they don't like it.
Sorry to pop in your general direction but watching the Israelis deal with the massacre of a bunch of civilians and this subhuman thug masqerading as a person crow about it have pushed me over the edge.
It's way past time for these monsters to die.
L