Is it not possible that Anwar al-Awlaki was justified in hating the USA?

[reggie the dog]

President Ali Abdullah Saleh (of Yemen) became the first elected President in reunified Yemen in 1999 (though he had been President of unified Yemen since 1990 and President of North Yemen since 1978). He was re-elected to office in September 2006. Saleh's victory was marked by an election that international observers judged to be "partly free", though the election was accompanied by violence, violations of press freedoms, and allegations of fraud.<16>" from wiki pedia

46% of Yemen lives on less than 2 us dollars a day http://armiesofliberation.com/archives/2008/04/10/46-poverty-rate-in-yemen/

http://www.wired.com/dangerroom/2011/03/u-s-ally-yemen-does-its-best-gadhafi-impression/ US Ally Yemen Does Its Best Gadhafi Impression

dude has corrputly been in power since 1978 supported by the USA as an ally. In this context isnt violence against us in the USA justifiable as we help keep in place a dictator?

Should we be hunting down and killing people and their kids because they are unhappy with conditions in their country due to a brutal, greedy dictator we are allied with and provide material support to?

Seriously how many "terrorists" are just fighting to free themselves and their people from dictators we help keep in place? by allying ourselves with these dictators we are subjegating the people and should not be surprised when they slap back at us.

[MjolnirTime]

1. Take it to the Limit!

[stevenleser]

2. UnRec. The road you are heading down leads to hypocrisy and double standards

If you follow it to its conclusion, you end up in a position where violence and acting to foment violence is wrong except for everyone who hates the US.

If you are anti-war and anti-violence, it cannot just apply to the US.

[reggie the dog]

4. unrec if you want, you still did not answer

We support a brutal dictator in Yemen, do the people suffering under him have a moral justification to target us with their rage like they can the dictator?

I am anti war but not anti self defence. the people in Yemen are being slaughtered for peacefully protesting, violence is all they have left to be free. I am glad non violence worked in Tunisia and glad that the people fought back and won their freedom from Godhafi as well.

[stevenleser]

6. Using your logic, we are all justified in hating Iran and should attack them

Among various other countries probably. I choose not to go down that road.

[reggie the dog]

8. how? Iran does not keep me oppressed in the USA

how is the situation comparable?

Now if you were living in Vietnam and voted for the left wing coalition led by Ho Chi Mihn and then the usa invaded, your hatred of the usa would be justified.

Are you suggesting that our 2 headed one party system in the USA beholdent to capitalism is kept in place by Iran?

[stevenleser]

10. You are suggesting if we have any kind of grievance that violence is justified.

Which is exactly the kind of thing we should be trying to avoid.

[reggie the dog]

13. any kind of grievance? i am talking about helping a dictator

who is massacring people for peacefully protesting against him. Our Ally, our friend we bankroll is a brutal dictator keeping 50% or so of his people in poverty of less than 2 dollars a day. The people tried peacefull protest and were gunned down, dissapeared, executed without trial etc.

This is not a little trifle. If someone in a more powerful country were bankrolling a dictator in the USA wouldnt we be right to hit that bankroller as well as our dictator whilst we were fighting for freedom?

[reggie the dog]

11. Iran is justified in making the USA into a villan

The USA illegally (according to the UN not me) invading the country just to their west, Iraq

and also invaded the country to their east (Afghanistan) by bullshitting and saying that the leaders of the Taliban were allied with "al Quieda" in 2001 which was just not true at all. They had a cease fire with Bin Laden and were actively fighting against 5 or 6 other factions.


Plus the USA is illegally bombing a country just to the east of Afghanistan (Pakistan) so Iran is justified to make the usa into a bad guy.

Do you think they usa would have sat there and done nothing of the Soviet Union had illegally invaded Canada, had bullshit the UN to get permission to invade Mexico and then used Mexico as a base to bomb Belize?

[randome]

12. Well said.

[reggie the dog]

14. well said? the double standard is what then?

that the usa can do as it wants, support any brutal dictator and then act surprised when we get hit for it?

Seriously the USA has historically been a big asshole to many people around the world. Not every country mind you, but lots, the whole economic colonization of Latin and South America and every dictator we bankrolled against the will of the people during the cold war (mostly latin america) and every dictator we keep in place for "easy" access to oil is an example.

Are we better than people in Yemen? Can we oblige them to live under a dictator so we can have cheap gasoline at 4 us dollars a gallon?

[L. Coyote]

3. When is "terrorist" just a "political enemy"? Reagan said Sandinista terrorists would invade TX

any day now :rofl:

[reggie the dog]

5. right, and the Sandinistas were there

because the USA dominated version of capitalism in Latin America resulted in people being treated like shit and rebelling agaist their leaders and the capitalist system.

[malaise]

7. That is the ultimate question

but apparently only one set of people are allowed to attack enemies - good old imperialists.

[TBF]

9. K&R nt

[reggie the dog]

15. You know there is an easy solution to this polemic

just that the usa can stop being an ally with brutal dictators. that would do lots to make it harder for terrorists to recruit fighters to come for us. but then again i think that the MIC, the bankers, the state dept and the politicians want terrorism to exist so that the can "fight the war on terror".....

[TheKentuckian]

16. I can go a step further, how is our financial sector not a legitimate target?

Look at the havoc they cause here and think about how untouchable they seem to us.

I'm not certain we have a forthright opinion of who the worst of the bad guys are and who is the real threat to our freedom and as such our entire threat assessment and response systems are greatly distorted.

At minimum, I am certain we are not looking at the big picture in an honest and even handed way and put too little energy into understanding why certain quarters hate our institutions and distrust our motives.

[FarCenter]

17. Had he limited his actions to Yemen, working as a Yemeni, he'd might still be alive

Given his parents status as citizens of Yemen, he certainly qualified for Yemeni citizenship, and may actually have been a dual citizen.

His activities within Yemen already made him the subject of a kill or capture order by a Yemeni judge.

At any rate, his activities extended far beyond Yemen as a participant in AlQaeda. Those activities made him an enemy of the US.