I am aware of the phrase and I fail to see how you stating it somehow magically means that it applies to this scenario. I'm not sure of the etymology of the word, but I doubt terrorist was widely used in the 18th century, when attacks on civilians were rare and shameful things avoiding by the major powers. Even the Barbary States, who the US fought is first foreign war against weren't labeled terrorists as such, though they resembled them more than anything else I can think of operating at the time. The term partisan didn't come into being until around the Second World War. The term Guerrilla referred to armed men in the hills resisting Napoleon in Spain and Portugal during the Peninsula war. These men were brutal, but they didn't attack non-military targets, which is essentially all proper terrorists (from the 20th and 21st centuries) strike. I think it is juvenile. I think it's gross oversimplification, which children who cannot understand nuance are often guilty of. In other words, you're trying to describe and compare two different eras with vastly different sociologies and methods of military engagement with a single word. It doesn't work. As a rule, the militias did not attack non-military targets and did not try instill fear in the local populace, which they depended on for logistical support. You need to document how the minutemen (and others) did the 18th century equivalent of hijacking airliners and blowing up pizza parlors before I'll take your statements seriously.
I was giving you credit for being able to apply some lateral thinking. Thank you for helping me understand this is not in your remit. The etymology of the word is irrelevant. Are you seriously suggesting we cannot retroactively apply a word that is apposite, simply because it did not exist at the time of the event/concept/object was extant? Hallelujah, I shall alert all palaeontologists and inform them they must abandon all names for all fossils unless they can demonstrate said name was interred along with beastie! Once again you confuse analogy and reality. I am not trying to compare the two eras - I am comparing the two eras. The use of this singular word to unite the common elements of otherwise diverse scenarios was both deliberate and thoughtful. Your continued reference to it as juvenile is beginning to smack of the infantile.
No, contemporary words can be used to describe happenings or items from other areas, but one must be careful when they attempt to do so and avoid the clumsy apples-to-apples comparison you are trying to make. In other words, one cannot accurately describe a chariot as a car simply because they both have wheels and people ride about in them. You called the militia men from the Revolutionary period terrorists. I pointed out that word had little meaning in those times and did not accurately describe what the militia was and how it functioned. You called the militia terroristic because they were "illegal revolutionaries who attacked the individuals representing the legal authorities." Surely you understand that illegal revolutionaries who attack authorities are not terrorists, unless they engage in terrorism. To help with the distinction, I already mentioned partisans and Guerrillas. Both are revolutionaries who were not terrorists, just as the militia men were not terrorists. It is obviously deliberate on your part. But again, I say it's juvenile, because for the same reasons I mentioned above. It's grossly over simplistic. You seem to think anyone who rebels against a government or takes up arms outside a uniform is a terrorist, and that's just not the case. Terrorism is a specific word with a specific definition. Look it up. It does not apply here.
I do not intend to wade back through the earlier posts, however, IIRC in one of those posts I implicitly or explicitly comment on the perceptions created in the average member of the public by the word terrorist. Let me phrase these perceptions in deliberately juvenile terms, so that we can at least agree on something. Terrorists are bad people. Terrorists do bad things. Terrorists are out to overthrow our way of life. The actual acts of terrorism are now secondary to the emotional evocations of the term. It is decidedly in that sense that I claim the American revolutionaries were terrorists.
It depends on what you mean, but "guerrilla" usually suggests an irregular military force engaged in unconventional warfare. In that sense, one could probably say that the initial seige of Boston in 1775 was conducted by guerrillas organized into militias. As the war progressed beyond that, however, the American forces were more and more organized. By 1777, I think it's fair to say that the Americans had a "regular army" with a regular chain of command which would suggest they were not "guerrillas" in the abovementioned sense. That said, the Continental Army continued to use what were for the time unconventional tactics. They usually struck at vulnerable targets, rather than more militarily important (but more heavily defended) ones, and they avoided direct confrontations with the British regular army (or, when they did stand toe to toe, usually did not fare well with a few notable exceptions). One might therefore still think of them as "guerrilla'ish."
The American revolution and the War of 1812 need some perspective from the British side. North America had some value but wasn't that 'big a deal' to the Brits. More sideshows when the real stakes were in Europe and the Spanish and Potuguese possessions. Canada was even less significant. When General Wolfe and the Brits defeated the French in Quebec in the 1750's, Canada came under the British flag. In Europe the French and Brits were at war and eventually signed a treaty. As a show of reconciliation the Brits offered the French their choice of either the island of Martinique or 'Canada' . The French chose Martinique. :shrug: Formal governments beyond the king were not all that powerful at the time. Merchants in Britain would trade for American goods like tobacco and cotton regardless of who won any war. If there was some ban they would just fly a French flag or get around the inconvenience some other way.
I agree with this. And I reiterate: Calling them terrorists is ridiculous. "Unconventional warfare" is not the same thing as terrorism. Not by a long shot. If one is really stretching, I suppose they could call the Boston Tea Party a terrorist act. But the militias? No, by and large, they attacked conventional military forces in unconventional ways...
Miriam-Webster defines terrorism as: "the systematic use of terror especially as a means of coercion " Wikipedia defines terrorism as: "The term Terrorism in modern sense[1] is used to describe violence or other harmful acts committed (or threatened) against civilians for political or other ideological goals.[2] Most definitions of terrorism include only those acts which are intended to create fear or "terror", are perpetrated for an ideological goal (as opposed to a lone attack), and deliberately target or utterly disregard the safety of non-combatants. Many definitions also include only acts of unlawful violence." Those are pretty apt. ~String
The key ingredient to terrorism is that it seeks to deliberately terrorize and attack civilian populations, which is why the definition fails to be applicable in the case of the Colonial militias, with a few notable exceptions aside. If you're confused, buy a newspaper. Turn on the television. Terrorist attacks occur every day, and the media exhaustively covers them...
Of course. The War of 1812 is a mandatory lesson in American History textbooks. At least in the courses here in Jefferson County. Can't speak for the rest of Kentucky, though, let alone the rest of the country. I don't know much about the curricula of the other counties. You don't?Please Register or Log in to view the hidden image!
Should we then re-define organizations from the 1970's and 1980's that didn't seek deliberately to terrorize and attack civilian populations. I don't know how old you are, but in the 1980's when I was in the Army, we kept up to date on terrorist organizations funded by communists. These targeted, almost exclusively, military and political personnel and had nearly always had political goals in mind with their attacks. Civilians were occasionally affected, such as with the hijacking of airliners, but they were rarely the targets. Are the Baader-Meinhof and the Brigate Rosse still considered "terrorists" in the eyes of history?
I'm not sure. My remarks were sort of off-the-cuff and probably aren't a one-size fits all definition. I don't know specifics of the two groups you're describing, but generally speaking I think partisan and guerrilla are better applied to unauthorized groups attacking military targets. The idea that a terrorist has political goals is also difficult to accept in all cases. What, for example, are Al Qaedas political goals? I would suggest that they have no goal beyond the terror itself.
Thank you for your typically thoughtful analysis of my observations and thesis. Very clearly stated. If you are confused just buy a newspaper, or turn on the television. Countzero, my usage of terrorist is defensible. Your usage of terrorist is also defensible. I am descending to your low level of debate by continuing to object to your (infantile) characterisation of my defensible usage as childish (or was it sophomoric, or adolescent?). Your usage is a more precise and scholarly one, but that does not make it the only one. I continue to make the point that the emotional overreaction of the US to the minor terrorist intervention on its own soil justifies using the popular sense of terrorist to focus attention on similarities between the birth of the US and current politically motivated subversive activities. It is your choice to ignore such alternate perspectives as make you uncomfortable.Please Register or Log in to view the hidden image!
and how 'you' - at a bare minimum - also dealt with freedom fighters whose freedom fighting was not a masquerade.
I think it's called irony. It's meant to make you reconsider your opinion. You are one of the posters I thought it might have worked for. Education is an ongoing thing.
