Doctor who helped locate Osama given 33 years jail term

[jtb1127]

You don't understand the difference between a normal raid of a house where there may be a terrorist present along with a number of known women and children, and a military operation conducted by highly trained killers specifically designed to assassinate OBL and all the males present?

What are you talking about? Sure I do. But what makes you think Pakistan wouldn't have sent a hit squad after OBL? This is like the third time asking.

 

[Formaldehyde]

What makes you think that anybody knew bin Laden was present with any certainty the day after they followed the courier to this address? That is why they waited so many months while bin Laden could have gotten away again.

If they had simply handled it like they did with any other suspected terrorist, I doubt anybody would have gotten killed. And if there had been any gunfire it would have clearly been their own fault for resisting, instead of being targeted assassinations.

 

[jtb1127]

What makes you think that anybody knew bin Laden was present with any certainty the day after they followed the courier to this address?

That doesn't matter for this particular debate because in the two situations present, Pakistan gets OBL or the US gets OBL, that remains constant.

If they had simply handled it like they did with any other suspected terrorist, I doubt anybody would have gotten killed. And if they had, it would have clearly been their own fault for resisting instead of being targeted assassinations.

Yeah but for God's sake, what makes you think Pakistan would have been more likely to handle it like "any other suspected terrorist"?

Here's what's going down here. Classical Hero asks:
"Let's say America did the right thing and told the Pakistanis about the whereabouts of Bin Laden, what do you think they would have done?" and then you gave the response that I quoted:

Spoiler :

They would have immediately surrounded the house and arrested him? And they would have likely done so without killing all the males and shooting one female, just like civilized human beings do in any other police operation in similar situations?

Ironically, they would have also probably done exactly the same thing months before the US finally got around to completely screwing up the operation with a near loss of life to everybody aboard one helicopter, a time period where bin Laden could very well have escaped someplace else. They should have contacted the Pakistani government the moment they suspected bin Laden was there and responded immediately. Doing anything else was sheer incompetence and paranoia on their part.

You're making very broad assumptions there. These assumptions are as follows:

-If Pakistan knew or suspected that OBL was hiding out in his cozy compound they would not have sent a hit squad to come get him or shoot him. Rather they would have surrounded his house and demanded his surrender so that innocents lives would not have been at risk. They also would have done it months earlier and without any risk.

Now please, why do you think Pakistan would have surrounded the house and demanded his surrender when the United States chose to send ST6 in via helicopter? Pakistan has special ops teams, Pakistan has assassinated terrorists, Pakistan has launched deadly military strikes against militants, Pakistan has killed innocent people by accident, and Pakistan is not bloody well perfect so there is no reason for any of the claims in that post to have any validity unless you can further expand upon them with evidence that magically contradicts what I just stated, which you can't.

Your responses have just been a confusing mass of irrelevant questions and responses to other people.

 

[Dirichlet]

One aspect I don't see discussed here is not only did the doctor betray his country, which frankly I don't care much about (though it is stupid to expect a country to react in another way). Much more disturbing is that he violated medical ethics.

Using vaccination as a cover establishes a patient/doctor relationship which should be absolutely sacred. Using doctors as spies endangers the imporant work of organizations like Doctors Without Borders or the Red Cross. Any doctor who uses his profession to spy/gather intelligence should be dealt with harshly.

 

[rugbyLEAGUEfan]

It's not unfeasable that the Pakistani leadership would not want the associated fall out of capturing and/or killing Bin Laden. That would piss off a large number of Pakistanis.

I would imagine that co-operating with the US on the understanding that the required feigned outrage and denial of assistance in the raid from the government was to follow, would be a fairly practical plan.

 

[Leoreth]

Guys, the whole "what would Pakistan have done if we told them" discussion is completely irrelevant. That Pakistan doesn't want to arrest bin Laden still doesn't give you the right to violate their territory!

 

[Ailedhoo]

The issue of the targeting of a terrorist group versus state sovereignty is central to this. On the one hand the doctor helped tracked down a figure whom had commences attacks against civilians. On the other hand the authorities in Pakistan do have an understandable annoyance towards spying by America in their own land, along with the operation of course. Of course we must also measure up tactical secretive security of the operation in order to catch Bin Laden unguarded and of the doctor’s fate but in the end this is a debate of whether the end justifies the violation of sovereignty or not.

The issue of sovereignty is an issue that is rooted on debates on the scientific structure of politics itself.

 

[Ayn Rand]

Guys, the whole "what would Pakistan have done if we told them" discussion is completely irrelevant. That Pakistan doesn't want to arrest bin Laden still doesn't give you the right to violate their territory!

You're right - it actually gives us the right to declare war on them, nuke their cities and listen to the lamentations of their women.

On a different note - which Planet have the Pakistanis been living on the last 10 years? I think they need to get with the program.

 

[Formaldehyde]

-If Pakistan knew or suspected that OBL was hiding out in his cozy compound they would not have sent a hit squad to come get him or shoot him. Rather they would have surrounded his house and demanded his surrender so that innocents lives would not have been at risk. They also would have done it months earlier and without any risk.

Again, and for the last time, there was no reason for them to assume that bin Laden was there at such an early stage - just a suspected courier they would want to interrogate and a bunch of women and children.

Do you have any actual proof that the Pakistani government always acts like a bunch of Rambos in a situation where many women and children might be needlessly exposed to such danger? Or do they act like any other reasonably responsible government under those circumstances? That they even have a "hit team" whose sole purpose is to execute people instead of arrest them?

One aspect I don't see discussed here is not only did the doctor betray his country, which frankly I don't care much about (though it is stupid to expect a country to react in another way). Much more disturbing is that he violated medical ethics.

Using vaccination as a cover establishes a patient/doctor relationship which should be absolutely sacred. Using doctors as spies endangers the imporant work of organizations like Doctors Without Borders or the Red Cross. Any doctor who uses his profession to spy/gather intelligence should be dealt with harshly.

Indeed it does. And it was discussed at length in the other threads about this matter in the past.

 

[strijder20]

You're right - it actually gives us the right to declare war on them, nuke their cities and listen to the lamentations of their women.

And arguably saying that gives me the right to kill you, set your house on fire and hear the lamentation of your woman.

I'm all right with trade blockades and closing of embassies, but declaring war for some deranged old man? Yuck.

 

[Leoreth]

You're right - it actually gives us the right to declare war on them, nuke their cities and listen to the lamentations of their women.

Exercising your national sovereignty not only constitutes a casus belli, but also a justification for war crimes these days?

 

[jtb1127]

/snip

I'm going to simply re-post the later part of the last post and hopefully you won't get distracted again. There's no point responding to anything in your response because I already have. Read again!

"Why do you think Pakistan would have surrounded the house and demanded his surrender when the United States chose to send ST6 in via helicopter? Pakistan has special ops teams, Pakistan has assassinated terrorists, Pakistan has launched deadly military strikes against militants, Pakistan has killed innocent people by accident, and Pakistan is not bloody well perfect so there is no reason for any of the claims in that post to have any validity unless you can further expand upon them with evidence that magically contradicts what I just stated, which you can't. "

I've never been a fan of bolding, but it looks like I have to in order to get the point across.

 

[JollyRoger]

I do, but if an international war criminal was hiding in a secessionist states' territory, I'd still send the assassin in

I believe George W. Bush is currently hiding out in a Confederate state.

 

[Ayn Rand]

Exercising your national sovereignty not only constitutes a casus belli, but also a justification for war crimes these days?

States have gone to war over far less than this [Jenkin's ear?]. Didn't we fight a ten year war in Afghanistan because they gave safe harbour to this man? And then Pakistan has just made its attitude crystal clear with this little demonstration, hasn't it? If a country doesn't want to be treated like an enemy, it shouldn't act like an enemy.

 

[strijder20]

If a country doesn't want to be treated like an enemy, it shouldn't act like an enemy.

Completely agreed, if the US doesn't want to be treated like an enemy, it shouldn't act like an enemy.

 

[woody60707]

So you again have no proof whatsoever that Pakistan was complicit in hiding bin Laden from the obvious incompetence of the US government, which spent untold hundreds of billions of dollars but failed to follow a known courier for years? A government which was so obviously incompetent that they failed to take immediate action so he wouldn't again disappear?

I really don't understand why some people continue to blame Pakistan for the obvious blunders of the US government, which date back even before 9/11.

The only real answer that seems to make any sense why the US government didn't want to involve Pakistan appears to be that the US government decided to assassinate bin Laden and all the males present. They couldn't very well do that with so many witnesses present. But the cost of doing so is that they have now lost all credibility with any similar government aiding them in the future. No government is going to be willing to work with a country that deliberately makes them look like terrorists themselves.

And that was no "West Point". It was more like a Citadel. Do you really think that would make any difference to a wanted suspect hiding in the US, even if it was the former?

How exactly was bin Laden going to escape given that he was already surrounded by operatives, and he would have been surrounded by far more if the US had decided to involve the Pakistanis?

So why do you think Obama gave the order to "assassinate bin Laden and all the males present"?

 

[Formaldehyde]

So why do you think Obama gave the order to "assassinate bin Laden and all the males present"?

Because he is almost as authoritarian as any Republican presidential candidate besides Dr. Paul? Because it would have been an embarrassment to the US government for the details of how incompetent the US government had been over the course of over a decade in finding OBL, and he thought this might help cover it up?

 

[Leoreth]

States have gone to war over far less than this [Jenkin's ear?].

I don't see how citing a war that was started under a weak pretense to push an imperialist agenda is going to help your case.

 

[kochman]

I think Deviate's actually right. Once we start admitting exceptions to the rules like that, it becomes very difficult to see where to draw the line. To many people, Osama was a hero, and there are plenty of people out there whom foreign governments see as terrorists - the Dalai Lama, for example - when we rather respect them. If we say what amounts to 'breaking the rules is OK when it's the good guys doing it', before long they start to lose their authority.

There is a difference between murdering thousands and being a philosopher.

 

[Silurian]

As Flying Pig noted some people do think the Dalai Lama is involved in terrorism

From The Sydney Morning Herald

CHINA has taken its offensive against the Dalai Lama to new heights, claiming it has uncovered a Tibetan guerilla ring that not only staged the deadly March 14 riot in Lhasa but is preparing suicide attacks before the Olympic Games at the behest of the exiled Tibetan leader.

http://www.smh.com.au/news/world/dalai-lama-a-terrorist-china/2008/04/02/1206851012042.html