Ah, but it doesn't have to be a police state! I remember in High Schoool joining the United Nations Club, with great hopes that the UN could control all of the little outbreaks, bring peace to the world, by using trained peacekeepers to 'police' the problems. True, soldiers don't make good peacekeepers but police officers can and do make good soldiers.
They were the dreams of the young, my militia battalion was ready to be called up to go to the Middle East as 'peacekeepers' in 1967; fortunately, we didn't. And as the years progressed, I found it difficult to keep the peace in domestic assaults as a police officer; between my wife, my kids, and my dog and cat in my family. Cuz people are human. It worked to some degree in India and the British Crown Colonies before 1947; usually when a dictator arose, he was sharply reminded that he owed his loyalty to the Crown, if he didn't play along he was either exiled or given the Golden Handshake on his way to the noose. And Britain, and to some extent the U.S., were the only two countries in the world where it worked. Probably because the others - France, Germany, Spain, Portugal, Italy - had a different approach to colonial issues. Anyway, we're stuck with this poor old world of ours; all we can do is our small bit to obey Jesus two main commandments. Pat -----Original Message----- From: Ian Lynch [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] Sent: 2008/06/09 12:23 To: [email protected] Subject: RE: [social] FW: Go Navy/ hummmm Don't we all wish! On Mon, 2008-06-09 at 11:24 -0700, Pat McBride wrote: > Read the book by Tom Clancy about the way that Iran took over Iraq? Truth > is, indeed, much stranger than fiction. Maybe, just maybe, we (meaning > USians, Canadians, Brits, and whoever else is involved with the Middle East > and Palestine) should have invited Saddam and Osama to a peace conference on > one of the small islands in the Arabian Sea. [And I know that some of the > terms are not politically correct, IJDGAD] Then, when they're happily > settled and loaded down with their kind of coffee, announce that the coffee > was laced with AIDS germs, run like hell to get off the island, and send a > cruise missile to get rid of the AIDS germs. > > Will work? Won't work? Bad idea? Good idea? > > Kind of drastic, I know, but look at all the lives that would be saved. If it was only that simple. Removing dictators only works if you have stability to fill the vacuum. Iraq is a good example and Yugoslavia too. People forget that without the dictator in an artificially created country, civil unrest would escalate. One of the reasons the dictators have to rule with a rod of iron is because the countries comprising the federation would fall apart without it. The simplistic view that taking out one person will change everything is really naive. It's an emotional response linked to vengence and an over-simplified view of what is right and what is wrong. Of course this plays to the average voter who wants simple answers that they can understand. it's probably why we are not going to have a peaceful world anytime soon :-( > If we were back in the good old days, with political officers, Gurkha and > British (and Canadian) soldiers looking after things, both Saddam and Osama > would have been hung a long time ago; probably for Being A Nuisance In A > Public Place, or Impersonating A Human Being. And without a police state similar to the ones we object to, someone else would simply pop up to take their places. There are enough potential dictators waiting in the wings for opportunities. Ian -- New QCA Accredited IT Qualifications www.theINGOTs.org You have received this email from the following company: The Learning Machine Limited, Reg Office, 36 Ashby Road, Tamworth, Staffordshire, B79 8AQ. Reg No: 05560797, Registered in England and Wales. --------------------------------------------------------------------- To unsubscribe, e-mail: [EMAIL PROTECTED] For additional commands, e-mail: [EMAIL PROTECTED] No virus found in this incoming message. Checked by AVG. Version: 8.0.100 / Virus Database: 270.2.0/1493 - Release Date: 08/06/09 17:25 --------------------------------------------------------------------- To unsubscribe, e-mail: [EMAIL PROTECTED] For additional commands, e-mail: [EMAIL PROTECTED]
