In a discussion with royal I found a commonality of goal that I think is intresting to describe.  It does seem wrothy of a different thred though.

i removed some next with <...> in attempt to capture the 'intresting' things.  

I'd like to have more discussion on. 

 Royal posted:

"My position comes from an intense desire to see that no one is killed in resolving conflict.  <.... >

"Our civilization is too far advanced technologically to remain in our current phase of bloodshed and murder as forms of revenge."

this statement looks on the face to the a major tenent from the heresy of modernism.

We will never advance to the point where violence is not part and parcel of mankinds lot.  Unless you propose we eliminate free willl through the use of technology.  you fail to recongnize that our battle is not between flesh and blood, it is between powers and principalites.  Devils and angles. Until we overcome the affects of orginal sin there will always be murder and cruelty knocking at the heart of man. 

it might be possible to stop every person from killing any other person, but at what price? constant monitoring by machines which have the ability to knock us out with a power source when we contemplate violent actions?

This goal on the face seems utterly inconsetent with Christiantiy.  It is an attempt to bring about the kingdom of God here on earth , in the present time , without the help of God.

"With modern publicly known technology, the weapons we have to tranquilize a person, to my knowledge, is not strong enough to penetrate kevlar or other types of body armor."

Sound.  Intense to the point of excruciating debility.  It's been in the papers.

The other point you and FishMan make is much more to the nub of the matter. 

Once you have them, what do you do with them?

The British used transportation for life (Australia resulted) for a similar problem.  But then they took a continent that wasn't theirs to do it & wound up discontinuing the practice.

There is the moon.  If we only had an inexpensive way to send them there (The Moon is a Harsh Mistress, etc.)

There are probably far fewer rational people than irrational fascistic terrorists hijacking Islam.  So maybe we should move?

Regards,

Old Sigma (Cradle Catholic [Latin rite] & generally inveterate amateur)

We did have a bloodless war. 

It was called the Cold War. 

Diplomacy is better than killing. 

Who was it who said that war is diplomacy fought by different means?

Was it Churchill who said "To jaw-jaw is always better than to war-war"?

God bless,


NoelFitz.
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In necessariis, unitas; in dubiis, libertas; in omnibus, caritas.
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NoelFitz,

The quote you are looking for is from Clausowiz (sp?) in his book titled On War The quote is "War is the extension of politics by others means."

However, I disagree with a lot of your premises.  No, the US Military does not have the means to stun people in the same sense that you use it.  They are developing a huge microwave type non-lethal weapon, but that is also not an individual weapon and it aims more at a large crowd than a specific individual.  Nor does it "stun" the person. 

God Bless,

Matt

Speak the Truth in Love!

saint s,

Yes, tasers are available to the public and may even stun those wearing armor.  It is highly impractical for military to use them as their main weapon.  The maximum range for a taser is 30 feet whereas the most effective range for the M16 is 650 feet or less.  A soldier would never be able to get close enough to use the taser! 

Also, there is armor on the market which claims to disarm tasers.  We've all seen the YouTube videos where the drunk gets tasered but still tries to get up and walk.  Would an enemy have the ability to pull a grenade pin after being tasered?  Would the electricity from the taser cause a grenade, suicide belt, or any other ordinance to explode?  Within the maximum range of 30 feet, the soldier using the taser would be killed as well.

You can try and try to come up with a less-than-lethal way of capturing rather than killing our enemies, but they are quite simply unrealistic, as is what we would do with them once we have captured them. 

Tarheel, on a side note, he Catholic Church does not absolutely condemn the death penalty. 

Noel, I would like to see an end to the war through diplomacy and a handshake of peace.

A royal priesthood, a holy nation, a people set apart.

Delmerjohn

It was good hearing from you. 

You are very welcome here.

I hope we have many more sound Christian post from you.

God bless,


NoelFitz.
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In necessariis, unitas; in dubiis, libertas; in omnibus, caritas.
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Noel, I have arrived today on CE. I hope and pray all my posts will encourage your faith as well as mine in Jesus Holy Name. I welcome you as well to the home where my spirit dwells. May you find rest and comfort in my friendship.

A royal priesthood, a holy nation, a people set apart.

and POR, brother Royal often made the mistake of POR instead of PTR

Remember, the Sun is always shining!

I'd like to get some further opinions on this statement:

"Our civilization is too far advanced technologically to remain in our current phase of bloodshed and murder as forms of revenge.""

Is this the heresy of modernism?

It seems to indicate that we can overcome orginal sin through sufficent education. 

My question is what does advanced technology have to do with bloodshed and muder other then make us more effective at having it and at preventing it?

I am not saying that a bloodless war is impossible, only we are 'not quite there' yet.  I believe that 'urban warfare' would be greatly benefited by a bloodless approach to law enforcement. 

I’m less then convinced that ‘traditional warfare’ would benefit as quickly.

It is one thing to hit a city with nock out gas, and then take out those who are left standing with microwaves and sound weapons.  It is quite another to stop nuclear armed aircraft and tanks with this kind of technology.

I do believe, if it were given a priority, it MIGHT be possible, developed, deploy , and train the army in the use of such technology within a 10 to 50 year timeframe.  I also, believe it would be an initiative not unlike putting a man on the moon.  It would take considerable resources and significant support by the people.

That is the technical side.  It should also, be noted that none of these technologies are actually ‘non-lethal’ they are only minimally lethal, or marginally lethal.  Anything that knocks you out has the ability to trigger heart attacks and strokes even in healthy people.  Anything the causes sufficient pain ‘might’ kill someone with epilepsy or some other weakness, not to mention just falling down can kill you if you happen to fall wrong.

That is the technical side as I see it:  ( I’m enough of a geek to have a be fairly certain I’m right about that too).

The real problem is two fold and requires addressing two issues:

1)      WHY should we do this.  What are the proper moral justifications and how do we explain them to people. Saying ‘we are too advanced for such and such’ doesn’t really cut it.  However, we should only use NESSARY force to defend ourselves and our technology extends our abilities and changes, arguably , how much force is necessary to protect ourselves.  More over in a society where people don’t even care if women kill their own children, how can we expect to convince the populous the killing people who are direct threat to them should be avoided? I really don’t believe you solve the latter without first solving the former and until then your wasting your energy by attack a edge rather then the root of the problem.

2)      What do we do about the consequences.  We currently do a very poor job of telling who will and will not commit a crime a second time.  We have A LOT of repeat offenders in our prison and we let many people go who commit the crime they were accused of later.  At the same time there are more then a few innocent people in prison.  Also, our current prison system is a large drain on our economy, if we had to keep whole armies in jail the strain could easily destroy the nation.

So, assuming we open the can of worms, and use our , advanced technology to capture the enemy, how to we then ,defang, the snake, as it were?

I mean we are currently near to a miserable failure with the problem as is , if we can’t solve the smaller one I have little hope for solving it when it is inflated by 200% or more.

fishman, As I see this question, you and I do not have any impact on the future of bloodless war. The law enforcement industry as well as the military are already pursueing the option full steam ahead.

All we need to do is flip on our tv set to watch the latest stun machine in action in Iraq or New York or LA.

I am certain there will be new Hollywood movies with stun technology as well. Havent you watched Star Trek? Captain Kirk stuns Luitenant O'Hura?

A royal priesthood, a holy nation, a people set apart.

So far. nobody has responded to a few of my points.

1.  What will be done with the massive number POWs once we capture them?

2.  What moral basis dictates that we must fight a bloodless war?  Killing in battle is not necessarily sinful under appropriate Catholic principles. 

3.  Are Less-lethal weapons using sound able to penetrate walls, flat surfaces, around corners, or must the be used in a direct line of view with no obstacles?  What ear protection will the operator need to use, and what will prevent the enemies from using the same ear protection?  Sure the enemies can use body armor to try to protect against rifle fire, but it's not 100% effective.  If there were a 100% effective protection, then guns would be useless.

4.  How will a less-lethal weapon operator get close enough to the enemy to use such a device without being shot?

An easy way to tell the effectiveness of a less-than-lethal weapon is by observing the effect on protestors in the U.S.  The protestors, I would argue, are less determined than a jihadi with a suicide belt, and many protestors brave the tear-gas, rubber bullets, tasers, batons, etc. to get their points across.  I've also never heard of police using the sound producing less-lethal weapon during a protest turned violent. 

Aside from these, the comparison of a military battle vs. Dog the Bounty Hunter is unrealistic at best. 

     Dog the bounty hunter seeks to capture fugitives, whether a murderer, thief, drug dealer, what have you.  These people do not necessarily have the desire to kill or harm anybody.  Also, Dog has the advantage of numbers and training.  His team of 3-4 agents, trained in self defense, firearms, etc., generally aim to apprehend ONE untrained and often unarmed suspect. 

      In battle, any number of militarily trained and armed allies will fight any number of potentially equally trained and armed enemies.  These enemies have every desire to kill opposing forces, and have the added advantage of fighting in cities and neighborhoods which are endlessly familiar to them. 

A major flaw in the arguments of trying to solve problems is this issue of funding.  Many people (especially Democrat politicians) think a problem can be solved simply by throwing money at it.  This simply isn't the case.  Take Adult vs. Embryonic stem cells.  I don't know the numbers, but it seems that embryonic stem cell research, which has no successes, has far more money dumped into it than Adult stem cell research, but adult stem cells have a vast range of success with far less funding.  

"Bloodless war is no less likely than gasoline-less cars which is evidently and rapidly becoming reality." 

 The comparison between bloodless war and gas-less cars is absurd.  Gasoline-less cars are a long way off, and to imply that our success with alternatively fueled cars is somehow directly proportional to our success with bloodless war is less than reliable.