Israel-Hamas War 2023

[Razgovory]

You're not a child.  It is totally your responsibility to know what you want.  We had this problem in 1945, more or less, the solution was to accept that there would be civilian casualties and push forward.  Nobody said that the Allies should "stop being dicks" or get the fuck out of Germany in the interests of a long term peace.

The Israelis are also not children, and yet their government has not been able to state what they want.  That is why their war cabinet had to be dissolved.

Individual cabinet members know what they want.

[crazy canuck]

With all due respect, seeing the enemy planes overhead, hearing the bombs fall and the air raid sirens and rushing to the shelters can't be described as anything but terrifying. Whether the bombing offensives of the allies could be considering a deliberate terror bombing is debatable. When the objectives were factories, transport hubs and the like, you could argue it was a unfortunate byproduct. It gets murkier with the firebombing of civilian areas though.

But seeing enemy planes overhead, hearing the bombs falling and the air raid sirens and rushing to the shelters is just as true for an army attacking the city.  Warfare is terrifying to everyone experiencing it, but that doesn't mean that warfare is terrorism.

What distinguishes terrorism is that its target isn't its victims, but a third group that is thought to be influenced in the terrorist's favor by instilling the terror that the terrorists will repeat their attack.

Arguably, the German bombing of Rotterdam on May 14, 1940 was a terror-bombing, given that Göring stated in his orders that the plan was to destroy so much of the city center that the Dutch would be forced to capitulate, which they did later that day when a similar ultimatum was received by the Dutch regarding Utrecht.  The counter-argument is that the   Germans had troops in the city and that this justified air support for them.

Intent is what distinguishes terrorism, and there's no evidence that the CBO was targeting some civilians in order to terrorize others.  One can debate whether military necessity justified the resultant civilian casualties, but that's a completely separate argument from whether or not he WAllies were engaging in terrorism.

And to amplify the point, the analysis of whether something is terrorism does not involve the subjective feelings of those who are being attacked.  Rather it is the purpose for which the action is being taken.

If it were otherwise then all legitimate military actions could be called terrorism.  Which is perhaps what Grumbler meant in his first post about what is happening with the meaning of the word.

[Razgovory]

You're not a child.  It is totally your responsibility to know what you want.  We had this problem in 1945, more or less, the solution was to accept that there would be civilian casualties and push forward.  Nobody said that the Allies should "stop being dicks" or get the fuck out of Germany in the interests of a long term peace.

I think this problem was in 1940 and the solution was to get pissed off about Rotterdam and the Blitz and bomb German cities in retaliation.

Nobody said that to the Allies because something like four countries were still neutral by 1945. If the entire world was currently at war with Palestine, I guarantee you nobody would be asking the world wide coalition to stop being dicks. But Israel has not secured a world wide coalition, so there are going to be people unhappy with massive civilian casualties.  Also we haven't had five years of total war to get everybody in a state of mind to accept the concept.

But I don't see most of our terror bombing in World War II getting praised much, even under the circumstances. And here you are just saying that because the Allies committed atrocities in World War II, therefore atrocities are now fine and everybody should be cool. I don't know about that...

I was talking about Allied troops moving through Germany.  The Germans used Volkstrum, they used Hitlerjugend, they fought from towns.  Lots of civilian casualties.  Admittedly they didn't put Allied POWs in civilian homes and even their militia used some identifier.  Imagine that, the Nazis were more honorable than Palestinians.

Israel could not build a coalition.  Too much of the world hates Jews or caters to people to that do hate Jews.  If Hamas fired rockets at Europe, many people would change their tune.  A case in point was ISIS, who decided to attack everyone around them forming a coalition against them.  People generally didn't care that thousands of civilians died in the war against ISIS.

[The Minsky Moment]

I mean, calling it terror bombing is closer to describe the intent, isn't it? And this isn't an accusation, in a total war like that was (or more likely, in any kind of modern war), it is the population's will that needs to be broken to end it.

Except that no one in a position of authority believed by 1941 that a population's will could be broken by bombing (in fact, the evidence of The Blitz was that it was the opposite).  The CBO was aimed at crippling Germany's warmaking by destroying factories and communications lines. 

The British later shifted to firebombing to destroy German housing in the manufacturing cities on the (true) presumption that ill-housed workers were less efficient workers.  They knew, though, that the population was in bomb shelters and so not being killed/terrified, merely inconvenienced.

From https://raf.mod.uk/what-we-do/centre-for-air-and-space-power-studies/aspr/apr-vol16-iss1-4-pdf/

More than a month before the Butt Report
was published the 9 July 1941 directive to AOC-in-C Bomber Command set out a new request:
 'you will direct the main effort of the bomber force, until further instructions, towards
dislocating the German transportation system and to destroying the morale of the civilian
population as a whole and of the industrial workers in particular.36  However, following the
internal circulation of the Butt Report at the highest levels of the military and government in
August 1941, by 14 February 1942 a directive to Acting AOC-in-C Bomber Command, J.E.A.
Baldwin revealed the new strategic priority: 'the primary object of your operations should now
be focussed on the morale of the enemy civilian population and in particular, of the industrial
workers'.37

As Harris embarked on his leadership of Bomber Command, therefore, area bombing –
using incendiaries – was already firmly established as the UK's preferred, and only, method
of striking back at the German aggressor: based on what was considered at the time to be
a sound scientific basis.  Consequently, when we consider the directive to Harris on 5 May
1942 it should be borne in mind that he was merely continuing the previously existing policy,
using equipment and munitions that had previously been procured to pursue it: 'Whilst the
primary aim of your operations must remain the lowering of the morale of the enemy civilian
population and in particular that of the workers in industrial areas vital to the enemy's war
effort, every effort consistent with this aim should be made to reduce the output of aircraft
factories, and particularly those producing fighter aircraft'.47

The article agrees with the overall point that the objective of the campaign was not simply to strike terror into the civilian population; but it confirms that the primary operational objective was to "lower[] the morale of the civilian population."  The broader strategic objective may have been to harm the German war effort by demoralizing and decreasing the efficiency of war production and transport but the chosen mechanism for achieving the result was targeting the civilian population to degrade its capability to do work.  With "degrade" being a euphemism for kill, maim and otherwise cause suffering and demoralization.

[grumbler]

[(snip)

The article agrees with the overall point that the objective of the campaign was not simply to strike terror into the civilian population; but it confirms that the primary operational objective was to "lower[] the morale of the civilian population."  The broader strategic objective may have been to harm the German war effort by demoralizing and decreasing the efficiency of war production and transport but the chosen mechanism for achieving the result was targeting the civilian population to degrade its capability to do work.  With "degrade" being a euphemism for kill, maim and otherwise cause suffering and demoralization.

From your source:

Trenchard pointed out that on the question of legality, it would be entirely lawful 'to bomb military objectives, wherever situated.'  The sole limitation that he would grant as illegitimate was 'the indiscriminate bombing of a city for the sole purpose of terrorising the civilian population', though he accepted that such 'moral effect' might be the consequence 'of a lawful operation of war – the bombing of a military objective.

p.72

and

Terror was not advocated as an end in itself.

p.79

So, not only was the aim of the campaign "not simply to strike terror into the civilian population," as you put it (my emphasis); the aim of the campaign had nothing to do with terrorizing the people.

Did the campaign strive to lower German morale?  Of course - nearly every Allies action in WW2 was designed to include lowering the moral of the enemy where they could.  The British broadcast fake German radio programs to lower the moral of the enemy, and no one would argue that those broadcasts were ""not simply to strike terror into the civilian population!"

Similarly, I do not believe that the IDF's aerial bombing campaign in Gaza can fairly be described as "not simply to strike terror into the civilian population."

[The Minsky Moment]

From your source:

Trenchard pointed out that on the question of legality, it would be entirely lawful 'to bomb military objectives, wherever situated.'  The sole limitation that he would grant as illegitimate was 'the indiscriminate bombing of a city for the sole purpose of terrorising the civilian population', though he accepted that such 'moral effect' might be the consequence 'of a lawful operation of war – the bombing of a military objective.

p.72

and

Terror was not advocated as an end in itself.

p.79

So, not only was the aim of the campaign "not simply to strike terror into the civilian population," as you put it (my emphasis); the aim of the campaign had nothing to do with terrorizing the people.

I don't the conclusion just above follows. Trenchard's statement that bombing for the "sole purpose" of terror implicitly recognizes that terror is permissible as a secondary or instrumental objective.  The same follows from the statement: "Terror was not advocated as an end in itself," with the implication that terror was advocated as a mechanism for achieving other hands or as a potentially useful or at least neutral byproduct.  And the directives I quoted above both pre and post Harris confirm that.  The purpose was not to just to cause the physical result of forcing people to abandoned destroyed urban housing but to "demoralize" them and cause them to feel fear (terror) such that they would flee and disperse to the countryside. Thus, to say that the aim of the campaign had *nothing* to do with terrorizing people is overstated.

[grumbler]

I don't the conclusion just above follows. Trenchard's statement that bombing for the "sole purpose" of terror implicitly recognizes that terror is permissible as a secondary or instrumental objective.  The same follows from the statement: "Terror was not advocated as an end in itself," with the implication that terror was advocated as a mechanism for achieving other hands or as a potentially useful or at least neutral byproduct.  And the directives I quoted above both pre and post Harris confirm that.  The purpose was not to just to cause the physical result of forcing people to abandoned destroyed urban housing but to "demoralize" them and cause them to feel fear (terror) such that they would flee and disperse to the countryside. Thus, to say that the aim of the campaign had *nothing* to do with terrorizing people is overstated.

Maybe the confusion here is that we are not in agreement on what an "objective" is in military terms.  In my experience in naval planning and as a historian, an objective is, as "something that one's efforts or actions are intended to attain or accomplish" (Disctionary.com).  You seem to be using it to mean an effect: that terror, if it isn't a primary or sole objective, must therefor be "permissible as a secondary or instrumental objective."  My definition allows that terror may not be an objective at all, even if some people are subject to terror in the accomplishment of the objective.

I would suggest that you look at your source again, because all of your statements that the "purpose was not to just to cause the physical result of forcing people to abandoned destroyed urban housing but to "demoralize" them and cause them to feel fear (terror) such that they would flee and disperse to the countryside" is not anywhere in it.

I don't believe that any of the decision-makers about the British bombing campaign imagined that they would be able to send the German urban population fleeing into the countryside, let alone that this was their objective.  They had had first-hand experience of what the response of an urban population was to bombing.  Coventry was never abandoned, its "urban population fleeing into the countryside" even though it was extremely hard-hit in November 1940.

In short, I believe that you are grossly exaggerating history here, for reasons unclear to me.  You are too smart to be doing this by accident or in ignorance.

[Razgovory]

I wasn't even talking about the bombing.

[Valmy]

I am fascinated by the way in which the Combined Bomber Offensive has morphed into "terror bombing" as the years have gone by.  The meaning of words has become so much more flexible.

I don't know if I am that fascinating. I may not be the most rigorous when it comes to words. I do not recall ever in my life ever saying the words "Combined Bomber Offensive" though so I don't think there was ever any morphing.

But I will endeavor to use that combination of words if that is better.

[Iormlund]

You both will cheer on as long as Israel is bombing civilians.  Sorry, terrorists, since there's no such thing as a civilian.  You have both been very clear about that, they all support Hamas, they deserve what they got, there is no innocents.

We now know that Gazan civilians - including at least one physician and a journalist - are complicit in detaining and abusing Israeli hostages.  What would you recommend as an appropriate response?

The ability to say that the Israeli killing of civilians is wrong cannot be contingent on also coming up with a comprehensive plan for not killing civilians.

It is if you want to be taken seriously.

That is the responsibility of the Israelis.

It is their responsibility. And clearly the answer they found was that it was an acceptable outcome of a necessary invasion.

And it is hard to refute their assessment (that an invasion was required) when nobody has managed to come with a workable alternative to dethrone Hamas in Gaza.
And I'm not just talking about you or Josq here. Policy makers, diplomats, generals, thinkers ... nobody has provided a different approach.
It's been 8 months and I've yet to read a "plan" that doesn't boil to 'just take it on the chin' (usually accompanied by a 'they had it coming anyway').

[grumbler]

I don't know if I am that fascinating. I may not be the most rigorous when it comes to words. I do not recall ever in my life ever saying the words "Combined Bomber Offensive" though so I don't think there was ever any morphing.

But I will endeavor to use that combination of words if that is better.

I think that "Combined Bomber Offensive" is a more precise use of words than "our terror bombing in World War II" while having the advantage of lacking the "terror" dog whistle.

YMMV.

[The Minsky Moment]

Maybe the confusion here is that we are not in agreement on what an "objective" is in military terms.

That's possible - I'm using the word in its plain English language sense of purpose or the object of some action, not as a term of art.

In my experience in naval planning and as a historian, an objective is, as "something that one's efforts or actions are intended to attain or accomplish" (Disctionary.com).

I agree with that.  But efforts or actions can be directed at attaining or accomplishing more than one thing at the same time.  Enrolling in a college can have as its objective increasing one's knowledge, obtaining a useful credential, making useful social connections etc.  A military operation on land can have more than one objective at once such as capturing a useful geographic position, imposing attrition on an enemy force, liberating civilians under enemy control and so on.  One of those objectives may be primary but it doesn't mean the other exists.

It also seems like the definition leaves open the possibility of instrumental objectives. The ultimate objective in any military conflict is to "win the war" or achieve some ultimate political result. But it wouldn't be right to say the sole objective to every military operation is simply to win the war.

I would suggest that you look at your source again, because all of your statements that the "purpose was not to just to cause the physical result of forcing people to abandoned destroyed urban housing but to "demoralize" them and cause them to feel fear (terror) such that they would flee and disperse to the countryside" is not anywhere in it.

I see statements such as "the primary object of your operations should now be focused on the morale of the enemy civilian population."  That seems like a straightforward statement of objective under any definition.

In addition, one of the key point of the article is defend Harris from sole responsibility for the Dreden attack and demonstrate responsibility of many other elements of British command, including Churchill.  The article assumes (without explicitly stating) that Dresden could not justified using any of the other purported military rationales.

I don't believe that any of the decision-makers about the British bombing campaign imagined that they would be able to send the German urban population fleeing into the countryside, let alone that this was their objective.  They had had first-hand experience of what the response of an urban population was to bombing.  Coventry was never abandoned, its "urban population fleeing into the countryside" even though it was extremely hard-hit in November 1940.

I agree with this point, but draw the implications broader. The decision-makers either knew or should have known that the area bombing campaigns would not have been effective use of military resources for their stated purposes full stop. German military production peaked in late 44 in the midst of the peak of the bombing offensive.  And yet despite many signs at the time that the bombing offensive was a questionable - and extremely heavy - use of resources, it continued.

[grumbler]

It is if you want to be taken seriously.

That is the responsibility of the Israelis.

It is their responsibility. And clearly the answer they found was that it was an acceptable outcome of a necessary invasion.

And it is hard to refute their assessment (that an invasion was required) when nobody has managed to come with a workable alternative to dethrone Hamas in Gaza.
And I'm not just talking about you or Josq here. Policy makers, diplomats, generals, thinkers ... nobody has provided a different approach.
It's been 8 months and I've yet to read a "plan" that doesn't boil to 'just take it on the chin' (usually accompanied by a 'they had it coming anyway').

I don't think that Israel has had an "approach" to the problem, which is the problem.  Starting out with moronic statements like "there are no innocent civilians" as a counter to outcry about the deaths of civilians doesn't play well with anyone to the left of Atilla the Hun.

I'll be interested to see, when this all is over and journalists have a chance to talk to the decision-makers involved, if the international outcry over the utter callousness of the Israeli cabinet's position had an impact on their ROE regarding civilians.  I'm hoping it did, but fear that all it did was force the right-wing zealots to take that talk behind closed doors.

But it is Israel's responsibility to ensure that their military follows the Law of Armed Conflict.  I suspect that the members of the IDF have tried to do so as individuals, but I'm not sure that the result was an operation that did so.  I'm a supporter of Israel but not of its current government. 

The options do not at all reduce themselves, as you imply, to 'just take it on the chin' or "just let the Israelis do whatever they please."  No right of self-defense permits the vocal abandonment of the LoAC on Israel's part.  There's a path that allows vigorous self-defense, including chasing Hamas fighters to wherever they hide, that doesn't include either "take it on the chin" or "there are no innocent civilians."

[grumbler]

I agree with that.  But efforts or actions can be directed at attaining or accomplishing more than one thing at the same time.  Enrolling in a college can have as its objective increasing one's knowledge, obtaining a useful credential, making useful social connections etc.  A military operation on land can have more than one objective at once such as capturing a useful geographic position, imposing attrition on an enemy force, liberating civilians under enemy control and so on.  One of those objectives may be primary but it doesn't mean the other exists.

I'm not sure what a series of truisms contributes to the discussion.

It also seems like the definition leaves open the possibility of instrumental objectives. The ultimate objective in any military conflict is to "win the war" or achieve some ultimate political result. But it wouldn't be right to say the sole objective to every military operation is simply to win the war.

I'm not sure what a series of truisms contributes to the discussion.

I see statements such as "the primary object of your operations should now be focused on the morale of the enemy civilian population."  That seems like a straightforward statement of objective under any definition.

And lacks the words "terror" and "terrorism," so does not advance your case at all.

In addition, one of the key point of the article is defend Harris from sole responsibility for the Dreden attack and demonstrate responsibility of many other elements of British command, including Churchill.  The article assumes (without explicitly stating) that Dresden could not justified using any of the other purported military rationales.

You are reading into it more than the author is saying.  Still nothing about terror or terrorism, though.

I agree with this point, but draw the implications broader. The decision-makers either knew or should have known that the area bombing campaigns would not have been effective use of military resources for their stated purposes full stop. German military production peaked in late 44 in the midst of the peak of the bombing offensive.  And yet despite many signs at the time that the bombing offensive was a questionable - and extremely heavy - use of resources, it continued.

I don't think that you will find many modern military historians who would defend the Combined Bomber Offensive on a purely cost-benefit basis.  Early on, the Brits were strategic bombing as a morale booster at home, the only way to "hit back at the Jerry" where he lived.  Bomber Command knew that it didn't have the planes or numbers to make a decisive difference (but resisted the call by the RN and Coastal Command to make those long-range aircraft available for the Battle of the Atlantic, as that would essentially make the RAF subordinate to the RN in importance).  There was a period in late 1943 to early 1944 where the USAAF and RAF bomber boys actually thought that new technology would make precision bombing possible, but the Germans countered those efforts one by one.  In the end, the CBO did impose high costs on the German war industry (yes, late-war German rationalization of production and massive increases in slave labor did produce a brief German growth spurt, but that pales in comparison to what the Germans could have achieved had their efforts not been hampered by Allied bombing raids).  But the CBO continued more due to organizational inertia than due to military efficiency.

But we have wondered off from the issue of whether or not the WAllies were terror-bombing or not.  I say that they were not, and that even the sources people dredge up to try to prove that they were end up supporting my position and not theirs.

[The Minsky Moment]

And lacks the words "terror" and "terrorism," so does not advance your case at all.

Still nothing about terror or terrorism, though.

Hmm. I think you forgot what I was responding to.  I didn't take issue with your criticism of referring to the Allied bombing campaign as terror bombing.  I actually agree with you on that point.  (I also agree as applied to the current Israeli operations).  Thus, it would not advance my case one bit of there were references to terror or terrorism in those texts.

What I responding to was your broader argument that: (1) "no one in a position of authority believed by 1941 that a population's will could be broken by bombing," (2) that the British "dehousing" effort was based on the "presumption that ill-housed workers were less efficient workers," and (3) that "the population was in bomb shelters and so not being killed/terrified, merely inconvenienced"

(1) is literally true as stated but a more nuanced analysis would concede that plenty of people in authority in 1941 not only believed that bombing could be used to degrade civilian morale, but that the UK command directed that reducing the morale of the enemy civilian population should be the "primary object" of the bombing effort. (2) is incomplete because the bombing campaign was premised on more than just a conclusion about the efficiency impact of poor housing but also broader impacts of civilian demoralization, and (3) is very much overstated as many civilians were far more than inconvenienced by Allied bombing - hundreds of thousands of civilians died and many more were badly injured.  The campaign failed to dent production not because the German population was all able to ride the bombs safely out in shelters but because lack of sufficient workers did not end up being a key bottleneck in the German production efforts, especially given that (as you point out above) the Nazis were quite vigorous in exploiting slave labor from occupied countries.