Osama Bin Laden : Dead

Majin_Tenshi

The can opener went bye-bye...
Guess they got him.

I assume these are topical. I'm watching the CNN feed.
http://www.foxnews.com/us/2011/05/01/usama-bin-laden-dead-say-sources/
http://www.whitehouse.gov/live/president-obama-delivers-statement

I wonder if they were going for "dead" or "dead or alive"
 

Walter

Administrator
Staff member
Here's what I took away from the press conference: We killed a guy in Pakistan on Sunday. But the war on terror continues.

I really felt disconnected from the people cheering outside the White House. What did this accomplish, exactly? What functionally changed about our circumstances overseas and our two-front war?
 

Majin_Tenshi

The can opener went bye-bye...
This doesn't make a straightforward difference, no. It doesn't solve the dependence on oil or resolve any foreign military actions. I can only assume that the hunt for Bin Laden has made al-Qaeda so impotent that decapitation makes no difference. This makes a difference in people's perceptions.

I'm sure some foes will twist this as he was martyred, killed by an evil American hit squad. I think that this took a decade makes the United States look weak.

On the other hand, this at least gives a sense of closure to 9/11. You don't get to take credit for an act of mass murder on American soil and die of old age. This doesn't make people more safe, but it might make them feel safer. There has been a lot of fear mongering over the last decade. Hopefully, this news will be heartening enough that the country can regain some of its sanity.

I just heard someone say "The death of Bin Laden is the end of the war on terror." Theres no practical reason for that to be the case, but it shows someone is less afraid.
 

Aphasia

ALL MYSTERIES MUST BE SOLVED
Walter said:
Here's what I took away from the press conference: We killed a guy in Pakistan on Sunday. But the war on terror continues.

I really felt disconnected from the people cheering outside the White House. What did this accomplish, exactly? What functionally changed about our circumstances overseas and our two-front war?

Osama was a little more than a guy in Pakistan. He was the leader of a terrorist organization behind the terrible events of 9/11. I think the people cheering are simply happy that someone who caused so much grief in our nation is out of power.

Also, I think your questions will probably be answered in days to come. The president wasn't really addressing the person who wants to know what effects this will have on the war in detail. It was just a simple address to the average American, a re-cap on the progress that has been made.

Edit: Majin made some good points. The effect something like this has on moral is immense.

Majin Tenshi said:
This makes a difference in people's perceptions.

I'm sure some foes will twist this as he was martyred, killed by an evil American hit squad. I think that this took a decade makes the United States look weak.

Yeah, I agree. I wonder how much of a "kicking the hornets nest" effect this will have, or if it will do the opposite.
 

NightCrawler

Aeons gone, vast, mad and deathless
Must... Resist... Trolling...


I'm with Walter on this. In the end what does this mean exactly? After all these years, after all the bad rep the USA has gotten over the wars on the middle east. Does this really have an impact? I think this will be another circus event like with Saddam.
 
Seems like this time, bin Laden has done something to really piss off his buddies in the Pakistani government and/or Taliban into giving him up to the Americans.
 

nomad

"Bring the light of day"
Regardless of what impact this will cause there are only two things in my mind.
a. At least this will bring closure to those affected by the attacks.
b. What will the consequences be in the result. Retaliation? More terrorist attempts?
 

Walter

Administrator
Staff member
Majin Tenshi said:
I just heard someone say "The death of Bin Laden is the end of the war on terror." Theres no practical reason for that to be the case, but it shows someone is less afraid.
It also shows that someone wasn't listening to Obama's speech :void:

Aphasia said:
Osama was a little more than a guy in Pakistan. He was the leader of a terrorist organization behind the terrible events of 9/11. I think the people cheering are simply happy that someone who caused so much grief in our nation is out of power.
I know who bin Laden was, thanks. But we don't know how much power he actually held all these years. He was driven underground, forced to relocate and hide from the largest military force on the planet. He could have simply been a figurehead of the organization, with al-Zawahiri calling the operational shots. As for cheering for his death, I dunno, I just find it a little morbid and premature considering the nature of the wars we're fighting.

When Hitler died, it was cause for celebration because it truly signaled the end of the European Campaign of WWII. bin Laden's death isn't quite the same, because the war isn't the same. This will likely just be a footnote in the history books. But I guess we'll see in the coming months if this will truly change circumstances.

Nomad said:
b. What will the consequences be in the result. Retaliation? More terrorist attempts?
Well, US embassies worldwide were put on "high alert" following the announcement, according to CNN.
 

nomad

"Bring the light of day"
Walter said:
Well, US embassies worldwide were put on "high alert" following the announcement, according to CNN.
And lets hope that is sufficient enough to prevent possible retaliation. Time will truly tell.
 

Viral Harvest

Every Knee Bent Too Shall Break
You know, it's actually refreshing to see this kind of level-headed discussion to be honest because my news feed on facebook is cluttered with celebratory bloodlust and tongue-in-cheek bigotry or are completely disconnected from a rational moral compass from a bunch of yuckos I went to high school with. I'm in no way pardoning the mass-murders in America and beyond. I live only 40 miles from NYC and knew more than a handful of people that died 10 years ago but my grudge dissolved within months. Things are not so absolute or black and white, and I can't help but be disturbed that people are celebrating the brutal execution of another human being, regardless of his crimes. In war it's true that there are always casualties and that generally that's unavoidable, but I'm quite turned off by the attitudes of most of the people I've encountered this evening. You can't stop a clash of cultures in this day and age, and no country's hands are completely clean. It's absurd to make value judgments on a human life. Just my two cents, hope I didn't piss anyone off. It wasn't my intention.
 

NightCrawler

Aeons gone, vast, mad and deathless
Viral Harvest said:
You know, it's actually refreshing to see this kind of level-headed discussion to be honest because my news feed on facebook is cluttered with celebratory bloodlust and tongue-in-cheek bigotry or are completely disconnected from a rational moral compass from a bunch of yuckos I went to high school with. I'm in no way pardoning the mass-murders in America and beyond. I live only 40 miles from NYC and knew more than a handful of people that died 10 years ago but my grudge dissolved within months. Things are not so absolute or black and white, and I can't help but be disturbed that people are celebrating the brutal execution of another human being, regardless of his crimes. In war it's true that there are always casualties and that generally that's unavoidable, but I'm quite turned off by the attitudes of most of the people I've encountered this evening. You can't stop a clash of cultures in this day and age, and no country's hands are completely clean. It's absurd to make value judgments on a human life. Just my two cents, hope I didn't piss anyone off. It wasn't my intention.

Well said.
 
I can only speak for myself, but today was a good day for me. As a vet and one who spent a tour in Iraq, as soon as I heard the news, I had to take a shot for my buddies who paid the ultimate sacrifice in Afghanistan and Iraq. I know that this news does not spell an end to the war on terror, but at least it helps knowing now that my brothers did not die in vain.
 
StinkyTofu said:
I can only speak for myself, but today was a good day for me. As a vet and one who spent a tour in Iraq, as soon as I heard the news, I had to take a shot for my buddies who paid the ultimate sacrifice in Afghanistan and Iraq. I know that this news does not spell an end to the war on terror, but at least it helps knowing now that my brothers did not die in vain.

It was a long time coming wasn't it.

Viral Harvest said:
You know, it's actually refreshing to see this kind of level-headed discussion to be honest because my news feed on facebook is cluttered with celebratory bloodlust and tongue-in-cheek bigotry or are completely disconnected from a rational moral compass from a bunch of yuckos I went to high school with. I'm in no way pardoning the mass-murders in America and beyond. I live only 40 miles from NYC and knew more than a handful of people that died 10 years ago but my grudge dissolved within months. Things are not so absolute or black and white, and I can't help but be disturbed that people are celebrating the brutal execution of another human being, regardless of his crimes. In war it's true that there are always casualties and that generally that's unavoidable, but I'm quite turned off by the attitudes of most of the people I've encountered this evening. You can't stop a clash of cultures in this day and age, and no country's hands are completely clean. It's absurd to make value judgments on a human life. Just my two cents, hope I didn't piss anyone off. It wasn't my intention.

I can respectfully disagree. This man deserved to be brought to justice for his crimes. I can see how people celebrating can be too much for some people. I think if there had to be causalities in retaliation to 9/11, I truly believe that Osama deserved to be among them. Why wouldn't he? He made his own choices, and they brought about this end for him.
 

NightCrawler

Aeons gone, vast, mad and deathless
It's just another person dead. It has no significance in the outcome of all this turmoil with the exception of pissing off the Muslim extremists even more and giving them more recruiting power.
 

Aazealh

Administrator
Staff member
While it won't mark an end to the wars currently being fought, nor is likely to cripple terrorism to a significant extent, it's good to know he finally got what was coming to him. Guy was a piece of shit and deserved to die, just like the people who read Berserk without buying it.

Like some said it'll bring closure in a way, and besides it's not a bad way to "celebrate" 9/11's tenth anniversary.
 
Anyone living in the US (and globally) has felt the ripple effect of 9/11. The media has bombarded with images of "people who want to kill us." Let's be fair, those people are out there and Bin laden was their poster boy. No war will end and no troops will come home, but we should be glad that he won't live another day, proud of snuffing out thousands of innocent lives.

There's a dark side to his death. Retaliation from fundamentalists.

No one should go through life constantly afraid. I commuted into Manhattan for years. "See something? Say something." That's an audio recording I heard EVERYDAY almost. It reminded me that any book bag, brief case or luggage held my demise. It wasn't fun. With time fear subsided, but it wall always there just not as prominent.

I want to hope no violence comes of this, but that would be naive thinking.

This is the world we as Americans live in now. I feel better knowing he's dead, but there's plenty of reason to still keep your guard up.
 
X

Xem

Guest
His death means absolutely nothing to me.

I also want to add that if you ever live in fear or paranoia then you're doing it wrong. Live every day like it's your last. Just my two cents.
 

Griffith

With the streak of a tear, Like morning dew
Deci said:
His death means absolutely nothing to me.

I also want to add that if you ever live in fear or paranoia then you're doing it wrong. Live every day like it's your last. Just my two cents.

Cliché diem, baby.

Rhombaad said:
Well said.

Yeah, it's pretty simple, I don't know what about this historically significant news is causing people to completely lose their perspective one way or another (they probably didn't have any in the first place).

Ramen4ever said:
+1
I didn't care before and I don't care now.

You guys are so cool posting about something you don't care at all about, but not as cool as this guy:

http://twitter.com/elephantant/status/64931612944642048 said:
Whatever, I wanted Bin Laden dead before 9/11, I have it on vinyl.
 

Rhombaad

Video Game Time Traveler
Griffith said:
Yeah, it's pretty simple, I don't know what about this historically significant news is causing people to completely lose their perspective one way or another (they probably didn't have any in the first place).

Exactly. He was a mass murderer responsible for thousands of innocent deaths. Good riddance. Is the war on terror over? No. Will it ever be? Probably not. It's going to be an ongoing struggle no matter what happens. Let's say we wipe out al-Qaeda. Another group will eventually take their place as the bogeyman, and we'll be right back to square one again. Does that mean bin Laden's death doesn't mean anything? Hell no. It's a significant victory in this particular struggle and it's one less madman we have to worry about.

That being said, I didn't find myself in the streets cheering "U-S-A...U-S-A!!!" but I did feel pretty good about what happened when I went to bed last night.
 
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