This is a very sad truth. Long since gone are the days when two armies met in an open field. Now we get bombs hitting hospitals and schools, explosive-strapped men running into crowds and blowing themselves up, soldiers and terrorists alike abusing prisoners, etc. Isn't the world great?

It is awful that any innocent civilian, regardless of race, religion, or nationality, has to die.

What some people in this thread just refuse to understand, however, is that radical Islam and its terrorist groups will stop at nothing to achieve their hateful goals--regardless of human cost, including to their own people. This isn't "spin" or "opinion" or "American jingoistic nationalism." This is the simple, painful, undesirable truth. Go ahead, keep burying your head in the sand. It isn't going to change this truth.

Do you think that I, or most Americans, want us to be poking around in the Middle East, subjecting our countrymen to carbombs, landmines, and all other manners of hell on earth? Give me a fucking break. Do you think it makes us gleeful to hear about the damage that the current conflicts in the region are causing to civilian populations? Again, give me a break. :rolleyes:

Remember where appeasement at all costs got us the last time the world faced a tangible evil? Yeah, 6 million Jews were shoved into ovens and machine gunned into open pits, not to mention the hundreds of thousands of civilian and military dead of WWII in Europe. That was fabulous. :rolleyes:

Diplomacy and statecraft does not work in some cases. It's an unfortunate truth of the world of realpolitik. Some people need to shake themselves and wake the fuck up. This mess isn't going away if we ignore, appease, or minimize it.