This is the reality of what Israel is doing (part 4)

And not even like that
a boxer kicks a heavy weight boxer. The boxer replies back but instead of hitting the boxer hits those that have gone to see the match , and those in the nearby streets , and nearby towns and kills 5% of them regardless if they were boxers or not. And also tortures some of them and rapes some others , kills them directly to their heads and then apologises because that was a mistake. And in the meantime denies any aid to any of these people that had nothing to do with the match but because they had the same nationality as the boxer they deserve punishment

So to repeat an earlier example, if I feebly punched a professional boxer in the face with the intent to hurt but then knocked out in return, then am I a victim or am I simply getting just desserts?

What about the heavy weight boxer getting into a rage, putting iron weights in his gloves and then beating you to a pulp, and in fact killing you?

And when he had never been very nice to you or your family either in the first place.

I am not agreeing with you. MAD isn’t fear of a disproportionate response such that you lose and the enemy wins and takes all.

It is fear of a nuclear apocalypse that will end all civilisation, kill all humans on the planet, most animals and collapse the environment under a centuries long nuclear winter worse than any Ice Age.

I don’t agree with your logic at all that believing you’d get a proportionate response makes you more likely to send off a nuke.

If anything, the fear of disproportionate response makes you go in hard and do a pre-emptive strike- as in attack them first and with all you got so the enemy is on the back foot and the war is on his ground from the start.

Thank you for agreeing with my post.

MAD is based on a disproportionate response or as you put it "everyone with nukes has sworn if even one is launched, all nukes are launched before the first one even lands".

As a result no one wants to risk using just one nuke because of the fear of a disproportionate response of multiple nukes.

However if a country genuinely believed there would be a proportionate response whereby if they used just one nuke then the worst they would receive is just one nuke in return then i genuinely believe that there would be a greater chance of this happening.

In this way the fear of a disproportionate response reduces the likelihood of such an attack.

What stops nuclear war is MAD- Mutual Assured Destruction. It isn’t fear of a disproportionate counter attack that keeps anyone from using nukes again, it is the fact that everyone can detect when one of those is launched and everyone with nukes has sworn if even one is launched, all nukes are launched before the first one even lands and that is the end of the human species. Armageddon.

Your example is no example at all.

@ScrollingLeaves

"What you say is very logical but to me unbearable.

It makes me think that on that basis there is the inevitability that there will be the next atomic bomb, where the same perfectly logical principles ( or possibly the same apparent excuse) will apply again."

I totally agree it's a horrible concept to examine - the heart says in a perfect world no lives should be lost at all, whereas the head says it's not a perfect world so it's better to lose ten lives than lose a hundred.

On your point of the inevitability of another atomic bomb I think that brings us back to the concept of disproportionate retaliation. For example I genuinely think that if Putin knew he could drop one small nuclear bomb on Kiev and only receive one proportionate small nuclear bomb in retaliation then I think he would definitely take that option.

However what is stopping him is the strong possibility that the retaliation would be disproportionate and be 100 nuclear bombs. So in this example the belief in a disproportionate response actually helps avoid such an attack.

The problem in Gaza is that Hamas actually want a disproportionate retaliation and are quite willing to accept a high civilian death toll because they can then play the victim .

Unfortunately there are many in the west including the western media who's metric of good guys or bad guys is based on which side is the stronger- with the stronger side always being the bad side regardless of the cause of the conflict.

Of course the who loses out most here is always the innocent civilians.

What you say is very logical but to me unbearable.

It makes me think that on that basis there is the inevitability that there will be the next atomic bomb, where the same perfectly logical principles ( or possibly the same apparent excuse) will apply again.

You didn't have to put in a goady post yourself you know?

Israel have fired more missiles into Beirut city tonight. Should it be shrugged off.

Except of course many Lebanese civilians have been killed. You seem to shrug this off.

There have been more deaths in Gaza. You shrug this off.

No deaths should be shrugged off.

Hezbollah have fired more missiles into Israel's biggest northern city tonight. Should it be shrugged off.

@Daftasabroom

"There was an element of that but it was way more complex."

I read a great theory that the end of the troubles was in part due to petrol prices and Tesco's. Bear with me...

The theory goes that numbers of people from the north would head south for cheaper petrol and numbers from the south headed north for cheaper groceries. This meant that regular people began to realise that those from the other side were pretty much the same as them and that the conflict didn't benefit anyone and what was more important than lofty political ideals was cheaper petrol and cheaper groceries.

Why - could you expand on this?

@ScrollingLeaves

"Regarding the dropping of atomic bombs on Japan what would you prefer to have happened?

Now that we know what happened, there is no way it would be ok to prefer it to have happened than not have happened."

I don't see your logic . Yes we know that the number of deaths from the two atomic bombs were between 200k and 250k - because the bombs were dropped.

What we don't know is how many deaths would have happened if there was a ground invasion of Japan or if the Allies had tried to starve Japan into surrender or if they had used conventional bombings on a larger scale etc etc.

So it is entirely possible that the deaths from these alternative actions may have resulted in many more deaths than from the atomic bombs. In which case it could be argued that the atomic bombs were the lesser evil.

Either way we will never know for sure because the war ended largely because of the two atomic bombs.

@1dayatatime the Falklands, troubles and boxing analogies don't work.

There was an element of that but it was way more complex.

Development of the EU kind of bypassed some of the Republican dogma. It became more of a stalemate, a gradual de escalation, quite the opposite to recent events in the ME.

@Daftasabroom

"The WW2 examples are much closer but those were deliberate bombing of civilians.

Your analogies don't work as they are combatant v combatant. The vast majority of casualties inflicted by both the Israelis and Hamas are non-combatants."

I don't see how the analogies don't work. Just as in WW2 there are combatants namely Israel vs Hamas et al and just as in WW2 the majority of casualties are civilians.

It is somewhat difficult to determine civilian casualties in Gaza as Hamas in their casualty figures from their health ministry do not distinguish between civilian deaths and Hamas deaths.

@Daftasabroom

"The British Army didn't defeat the IRA"

That is fair comment.

A more accurate description would be that both sides knew that they could never win and that from the Republican viewpoint more progress could be made for their cause politically than through violence.

@1dayatatime I'm guessing English isn't your first language but either way I think your examples don't really match they're all non sequiturs.

The British Army didn't defeat the IRA.

The WW2 examples are much closer but those were deliberate bombing of civilians.

Your analogies don't work as they are combatant v combatant. The vast majority of casualties inflicted by both the Israelis and Hamas are non-combatants.

Regarding the dropping of atomic bombs on Japan what would you prefer to have happened?

Now that we know what happened, there is no way it would be ok to prefer it to have happened than not have happened.

Defining disproportionate is simple- you drop one 500kg bomb and in return I drop ten 500kg bombs or I suffer 100 casualties and my retaliation results in 1000 casualties.

The question is what place proportionality has in conflict if any and what is the relevance if any the relative strength of the two parties.

So to repeat an earlier example, if I feebly punched a professional boxer in the face with the intent to hurt but then knocked out in return, then am I a victim or am I simply getting just desserts?

How would you define disproportionate?

@Daftasabroom

"Are you claiming that the British forces conflicts with the IRA and Argentina are comparable with Israeli response to the Hamas attacks, initially in Gaza now in Lebanon?"

Not at all and sorry for any confusion I have caused you.

I was having an intellectual discussion with @ToBeDetermined which might not have understood on whether or not disproportionate response is or ever has been acceptable in a war.

Are you claiming that the British forces conflicts with the IRA and Argentina are comparable with Israeli response to the Hamas attacks, initially in Gaza now in Lebanon?