http://www.kwtx.com/home/headlines/70327592.html

My opinion, for what it's worth - absolutely not. Terrorism is, by definition, a criminal act, not an act of warfare. Did we give combatant status to the officers that the Red Army Faction blew up in Germany during the Cold War? Hell, did we give combatant status to the officers the Russians shot during the Cold War? No, and we didn't do it for the guys in Beirut, either. It sucks that this happened, and I feel bad for the victims, but they were not combatants. Period. End of story.

11/17/2009 10:11:34 PM

terrorism isn't even necessarily what it was anyway. this is dumb.

[Edited on November 17, 2009 at 10:19 PM. Reason : /]

11/17/2009 10:19:09 PM

Quote :

"Did we give combatant status to the officers that the Red Army Faction blew up in Germany during the Cold War? Hell, did we give combatant status to the officers the Russians shot during the Cold War? No, and we didn't do it for the guys in Beirut, either."

Source? I honestly don't know either way, but I would think that we would have and that overall this seems like it would be a formality we do in most cases in the same way that we declare a state of emergency anytime it rains real hard.

Also, it would seem to me that we would define the difference between being a combatant and not when we're talking about soldiers who have died is whether they died as a result of an attack on the military as opposed to an accident, or an attack on an individual (such as a bar fight).

[Edited on November 17, 2009 at 11:18 PM. Reason : asdf]

11/17/2009 11:16:21 PM

Quote :

"Rep. John Carter, R-Round Rock, whose district includes Fort Hood, introduced legislation Tuesday that would give the soldiers and civilians who were killed or injured in the Nov. 5 shooting at the post’s Soldier Readiness Center the same legal status as troops who are killed or injured in Iraq or Afghanistan."

(1) it's only been introduced as a bill, from some podunk congressman. it will die in committee.

(2) why is it republicans who are consistently the most clueless about basic military decorum?

11/18/2009 12:45:17 AM