Walsingham

Maybe they were basing it on film evidence. I mean the US and UK are awash with zombies for starters.

Before I emit a piercing shriek, may I politely enquire where you got this idea?

If there's a few good blasterbanquets, then I'm game. I'm more Gen Rupert Smith-ish.

If the results of any competition puts Switzerland at number two then I ain't fething playing.

I understand your reservations. At present I see drugs users in three groups: 1. The 'healthy' who can afford and control their use 2. The fools who can afford their abuse but can't control it 3. The victims who are given drugs as a means of exerting control If I understand you correctly then you're concerned that legalisation will essentially put the State in the third role. But my concern is with a fourth group 4. Those who suffer the effects of the illicit drug industry It is my contention that this fourth group massively outnumbers the other three. We're talking whole nation states sinking beneath into a morass of corruption and violence.

*purring noises*

Um... obviously there's a lot to be gained by comparing WW2 with Waterloo... it's kind of the point in learning about Waterloo at staff college. It's not the similarities which interest me as understanding what precisely has changed, and if it's something we should accept or reject. My central thesis is that while force should not be viewed as a fun part of international relations it is an inescapable part of them. And if the western concept of democracy cannot employ force effectively to protect itself then it is defunct as a political system. Before you object I should say I have met many people who suggest we do not need to worry about force in any terms but wholly defensive, and I would argue this is wishful thinking or pure arrogance. This isn't the 19th century, when our enemies were armed with broadswords and leather shields. Of a coherent antidemocratic movement were able to mobilise in several key areas it would be able to leverage that power to isolate and pick apart the democratic nations one by one just as fascism did in the 1930s. And just as fascism was able to ride roughshod over many nations in the '40s before economic and social mobilisation could occur, we would face the same only ten times faster due to advances in weapons technology.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/health-10990921 As the Daily Mash observes (by proxy) "My comments are nothing more than the sort of off-the-top-of-the-head ramblings one consistently hears from hippy dippy chief constables, members of the government's scientific advisory panel on getting off your **** and silly little people like Sir Nicholas Green QC, the chief druid at the UK Bar Council." "

After massively slating HoMMV on first playing it I'm finding it much better. It's still got some major gui problems, and the visual design is nauseating, but the core gameplay is quite solid, by which I mean you can apply operational and tactical nous to beat superior forces.

Firstly it's very sad that people reject the notion of democracy in Afghanistan. Both the Hazar and Pashtun ethnic groups practice a from of fluid and fascinating local democracy at the village level, and have done for centuries. The problem they have now and they had during the second British administration is that we try to impose democracy at a granularity which has as much meaning at the village level as the EU does to the average British town. It's a source of a quick buck, but attracts no loyalty. To my mind the British strategic aim for the country is eminently consistent with local aspirations. We just don't want the Afghans to be pushed around by a parasitical body like AlQ or the Taliban, and teh locals don't like being pushed around. However, at the national level the greedy snoutmonkeys are pimping themselves out with furious endeavour. The solution, if the above is correct, is to devolve power. The problem is that military science adores the concentration of force not its dissipation. I need to give this more thought. ~~ I feel this angle of the debate is still on topic, because the merits or otherwise of the campaign reflect on the media behaviour. The bigger question is whether journalists can make careers from assisting Afghanistan, or merely by sniping at it.

Wait, what? This sounds interesting...

Speaking as a confirmed overthinker I agree that you need to relax a little bit. Make a list of those questions and knock them down one by one. When you've 'killed' everything on the list you will be majorly sorted.

I always compare this isue with the attitude of my godfather who was a naval officer in WW2 and a BBC foreign correspondent later in life. In his era there was considerable barracking by correspondents, but always oriented on the same purpose - victory. I know that WW2 was the 'good' war, but sometimes I wonder if it would be seen as so good if the media hadn't got behind it. I say this being personally convinced it was. But if there had been a wikileaks at the time we'd have heard of allies shooting prisoners of war, bombing victims, etc etc. Would we have had the stomach to continue fighting through the mincing machine of Cassino, Caen, Nijmegen?

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-south-asia-10983494 More killings. Including a pregnant widow. Because clearly in their world God is more offended by a woman being impregnated than being murdered by thugs without trial.

Cut how? Was it torn out in clumps by a trained albatross?

I agree that we need to recognise there are distinct differences between our respective countries, and also that the 'nation' as such needs to be built before it can be rebuilt . But if I manfully resist the urge to wax on my favourite subject, we were discussing media behaviour... What role do you think the media plays in the campaign? What role do you think they should play? I feel they are torn between the notion of impartiality and an implicit need to defend the values which enable them to exist in the first place. But being workshy bastards they don't make a firm decision on that balance.

It's nice to see what paranoia can achieve in the other direction. Orogun, sorry I snapped at you. I agree that the answer is not just military. But nor is it just economic. It needs a political spark within the country that I don't see. But while that may seem unlikely it is far from impossible.

Fair point INSidious. I can totally understand someone thinking we shouldn't have gone in in the first place. Well, I couldn't agree less, but I can understand it. Coosing a course of masssive bloodshed and civil war because you're a pacifist? That's just mental. Orogun, we've been over this before. It can't be impossible for the region to have peace any more than it was for Wales or Switzerland to have peace.

In a lot of high streets in England one finds groups of well meaning beardies campaigning for an immediate withdrawal of troops in the name of Peace. Every time I see them I am minded to go over and ask what sort of Peace they want if it means surrendering Iraq and Afghan to these bastards (not that this is the worst thing they do). But I fear it would lead to me force-feeding some genuinely inoffensive person three of four kilos of pamphlets.

I can only imagine what that's like, but I'm worried about my friend so much I sometimes think he will do the same. It must really be very sad indeed.

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/programmes/from...ent/8909049.stm I found this story extraordinary. Granted I have the advantage of having several friends who are actually Afghan/worked there since before the invasion, but the notion that killing aid workers is something new is bananas. It's a question I put to them back in 2005, whether post invasion reconstruction was seen as a military thing. They all responded instantly and unequivocally that the Taliban do not see anyone as a civilian. Nor do they see anyone who is not the Taliban/one of their dingbat religous friends as doing anything good. My question really is to what extent we can rely on keeping a free democracy when our information sources seem so cheerfully ignorant of a) Basic facts b) Who the enemies of free democracy are

I can't believe this post hasn't been Steven Segaled yet.

Yeah, and that stuff the parson calls electrickery.

I was once forced to drink a lot of aftershock. I was sick for _two days_.