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Originally Posted by irateplatypus
you've only told half the story.
terrorism is defined by tactics more than presentation.
if saudi arabia invaded the US and set up a theocracy... the local resistance militia who skirmish the enemy's troops with guerilla tactics would not be terrorists, but those bastards who set up a truck bomb outside the mcdonald's would be. those crazy canadians who cross the border to blow up US women and children in a call for returning for democracy would be terrorists.
the need to morally equivocate knows no bounds these days.
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It's really not this cut and dry. Attempts to morally seperate acts of terrorism from war will always end up muddled. The U.S. Army has had thousands upon thousands of civilian targets in Iraq even though they've been careful to stress their careful selection of targets to strike with 500lb "surgical" bombings. In your Saudi Arabia scenario (assuming our army was mystically vaporized) what do you think the response would be if everyone in, let's say Dallas, was told they had to move out of their homes for immediate Arabian resettlement? Americans don't have readily available explosives, but the resistance tactics would be esssentially the same.
Suicide attacks? One of the basic criteria for becoming an officer in our army is the willingness to sacrifice troops for strategic gain. There is a guise civil culture, but these are still suicide attacks. We may not understand it, but there is an equally complex culture of martyrdom that guides the behavior of our current enemies.
Back on topic: What about the moral negligence necessary to conduct battle under the auspices of spreading democracy through starkly undemocratic means? This not they way to convince people of the superiority of our form of government.