Terror as a Tactic

If you defend a terrorist, you are a terrorist.

If you are part of a group, even if you have good intentions, but one or more members of your group engages in terrorism, you either condemn them or you are one of them.

You can't be an innocent bystander when the acts are deadly and hateful.

Now being willing to denounce people you don't like as terrorists but defending people you do like is morally reprehensible.

Now, if you are a terrorist, you actually occupy a less hypocritical position than those who do nothing.

Terrorism, aimed at innocent people is seldom effective.  I suppose the atomic bombing of cities did work and some might not consider that terrorism, but certainly many of the dead had committed no offense except being born Japanese.

In fact the terror in the two world wars sort of undermines the western moral outrage, any tactic that would lead to victory was acceptable, carpet bombing, poison gas, random missiles.

It didn't work, what did work was bombing industrial and military targets, to at least some extent.

I realize that those wars were fought to stop tyranny, at least from our perspective, but they were filled with terrorist acts by both sides.

None of them ended either war, except the atomic bomb one, which is a terrible lesson to say the least.

We will remain strong against both domestic and foreign terrorism, we always have and I expect we always will.

However we have a president who espouses sinking to the same moral plane as our enemies.

Lets not.

Our hearts go out to Barcelona and to Charlottesville.