How was Nero's anger going to save Romulus?

[Ryan8bit]

My definition hasn't changed since I learned it in Political Science eight years ago.

Whatever, it's changed several times in this thread alone.

First it was causing violence by avoiding direct confrontation, using sabotage/surprise. Many historical incidents have followed in this pattern yet have not been called terrorism, so you went on to redefine it. Apparently it also had to be done during a time of declared war, despite that again, history shows a wide variety of such attacks that were done before any such declaration. Backpedaling seriously, you went on to say that Pearl Harbor is a direct attack, despite that there was no resistance. Even the most recent of terrorist attacks like 9/11 didn't fit this definition. Again, the definition had to be modified because the planes were hijacked. This ignores all the times in history that an enemy's weapons or resources were used against them. It also ignores the fact that even if it were their own planes that did the work, it would still be labeled terrorism.

I hope your Political Science class wasn't this bad.

Stealing five thousand dollars worth of candy is still grand theft.

That actually doesn't change anything. Even people who steal one piece of candy probably wouldn't go so far to steal 5,000 pieces all at once. The reason is because of fear of reprisal. You can get away with smaller amounts, but anything larger has an exponential chance of screwing you over.

Which has what to do with anything? Humans are NOT absolutely logical, nor are any of us trained in strict mental disciplines to control our emotions. More to the point, we're not from the planet Vulcan: we don't have green blood or pointed ears, we can't perform mind-melds by touching each other, we don't have lifespans of over two hundred years and we haven't as a race been exploring the galaxy for centuries. Specific to Spock, no human being alive has ever been a biracial person with an extra-terrestrial for a father or has had family members living on a totally different planet before.

There is nothing in Spock's experience that is in any way relatable.

In his case it doesn't have to be literal for it to work. His situation is allegorical, much like the people from Cheron. These allegories are pretty straight forward and easy to relate to. Nero's situation is not allegorical for anything. You can guess it's allegorical for terrorism, but that's stretching most definitions of what terrorism is, including yours.

But it DOESN'T have greater effect, at least not in any way that could be connected with their political agenda. Terrorism is almost always counter-productive towards whatever end it seeks to achieve and political reform always happens IN SPITE of terrorist operations, not because of them.

The greater effect you speak of is the suffering, fear and death of those against whom the terrorists are directing their hatred. If helplessness is a factor at all, it's the desire to strike back against those who have MADE them helpless and prove that they are still relevant as a force. The political agenda attached to those actions is a post-hoc justification for it.

But terrorists DON'T have a greater chance of that. This is the difference between a terrorist and a revolutionary (as an example: between the Libyan Rebels and the Iraqi Insurgency), and the two terms are NOT interchangeable.

Nero is many things, but he is NOT a revolutionary.

I agree he is not a revolutionary. But I disagree that terrorism has less effect than being proactive within the law of a community. It may not be the intended effect the terrorists set out to achieve, but I never specified as much.

He does. THE FEDERATION MUST BE DESTROYED. That's perfectly clear.

And his reasoning is the flimsiest we've yet seen for such an endeavor, with the exception of Shinzon. At that point, it's less of an ideology or reason than it is a plot device.

You're going for the "one man's terrorist is another man's freedom fighter" defense

Nope, but keep putting up those straw men.

Sisko came to the exact same conclusion, if you'll recall. He agreed with Hudson that the situation was bad, and that the Cardassians were very much in the wrong, and that the Federation was just as much in the wrong and needed to be rebuked for it.

But Sisko didn't take his runabouts and start blowing up Cardassian supply depots on the sly. Clearly, the political agenda alone wasn't sufficient for that.

Yet he really didn't do anything about it at all. Hudson and the Maquis were far more effective in causing change, even though that change bit them in the ass.

And that's before we take into account that Nero is no longer IN his past, nor can he travel back to the 24th century and pick up where he left off. As it stands now, with the destruction of the Kelvin and the new timeline brought into effect he has no way of knowing whether or not his wife will even be born in the new timeline.

Good point. Except Star Trek, especially this version, has hardly ever been so deterministic.

Indeed. Much like real-world terrorists invariably do.

No, terrorists take the easy route. Making significant political change that is beneficial to one is a lot harder to accomplish than to blow up some buildings. Nero's case is reversed.

Yes, POWERFUL. Much like a truckload of nitroglycerine will produce a fairly powerful explosion. But since a man with enough time on his hands can produce nitroglycerine in his basement, it doesn't qualify as "remarkable technology."

Nope. Just that greater firepower automatically implies greater technology. It doesn't. Narada has powerful weapons on board, but this alone does not suggest it is a "remarkable piece of technology." It is a simple mining vessel with a huge number of simple but powerful explosive devices.

Just because a vessel is armed with a lot of simple weapons does not mean it can take on fleets made up of dozens of ships. That requires technology to be able to deploy so many weapons.

Let me put it this way: Five men with two pistols a piece have to fight off a horde of soldiers with muskets from 100 yards. If each side is competent, you couldn't realistically expect all of the five men to survive, if any at all. If the five men did survive, it would be purely because of the technology of their weapons. They are much faster to fire and reload which is an element of technology.

This is quite analogous to Nero's situation. The Narada is a tank by all means, and it probably shouldn't be.

Didn't enjoy The Dark Knight then?

Plenty of reasoning and elaboration was given to the Joker. To even compare the Joker and the excellent writing for him to Nero is laughable.

They took the time with Alfred to express that some people are insane and just want to watch the world burn. In this case, we are meant to be reasoning with Bruce Wayne. We all wonder, "Why is this guy doing this?" just like Bruce does. And Alfred goes so far to explain it in a very wonderful way. Nero has... nothing?

On top of that, the writers even play off of the viewers' curiosity by having the Joker tell various stories about how he got his scars. It's an acknowledgement that people are curious about such things, and it's very effective.

STXI wasn't Nero's movie, and he isn't worthy of that kind of focus.

He simply shouldn't have been placed in the movie then. I don't think it was necessary to have another Shinzon just to make Nero seem like he was a big deal. If Nero was meant to be mere cardboard, he could have not had a name or not had such lofty yet strange goals. In a movie where your protagonists are supposed to shine, you don't want the villain completely destroying one of their home planets. Such major events do draw away any such focus.

If you mean World War II, that was hardly the effort of a group of individuals.

Never said it was.

In the 20th century a group of individuals with exactly that mindset found themselves in command

 

[Crazy Eddie]

My definition hasn't changed since I learned it in Political Science eight years ago.

Whatever, it's changed several times in this thread alone.

Incorrect. This is based on the LEGAL definition (the one that occurs most commonly internationally and in the U.S. and U.K.) which means the unlawful use of force, violence, or the threat of violence in order to bring about political change. The key distinction here is UNLAWFUL, which means the use of non-uniformed combatants or use of criminal operations prohibited by the laws of the country in which those acts are committed. A military operation fails to meet this definition because it is carried out by lawful combatants. A lawful combatant cannot be held PERSONALLY responsible for actions that violate domestic laws because he is performing a combative action as a member of his government's armed forces as required by the laws of HIS country; responsibility, in that case, falls on the shoulders of his government. An UNLAWFUL combatant acts (theoretically) on his own accord and is performing not as a soldier, but as a perpetrator in a crime directed against an entire government, community or society. It is fundamentally similar to the definition of "hate crime," with the key difference that terrorism is characterized by broader political goals where hate crimes are characterized by racial/social goals.

You mentioned only a single historical "incident" that followed this pattern and wrongly claimed it was an act of terrorism. It wasn't, because as I said, it was a direct assault using Japan's recognized armed forces as sanctioned by their government. They did not send un-uniformed operatives to sneak those bombs onto the ships, and they did not misappropriate civilian hardware to do so. And they didn't NEED to, because they had six aircraft carriers and five hundred planes to do the job.

Apparently it also had to be done during a time of declared war, despite that again, history shows a wide variety of such attacks that were done before any such declaration.

"Military operation in peacetime" is not a definition of terrorism that anyone here has used. I gave you the LEGAL definition above--the Indian definition is more concise, BTW, as it basically describes terrorism as an act equivalent to a war crime, but carried out by civilians. The expanded definition--as defined by people who have been doing this alot longer than either of us--is as I described it: terrorists avoid direct confrontation, and they use unconventional weapons and tactics to conduct their operations.

Backpedaling seriously, you went on to say that Pearl Harbor is a direct attack, despite that there was no resistance.

What the hell does resistance have to do with anything? (there was quite a bit of resistance, by the way, and I don't know where the hell you got the impression there wasn't). You send your military to bomb someone else's fleet, that is BY DEFINITION a direct assault. You hire civilians to sneak bombs into the enemy harbor on your behalf, that is BY DEFINITION an indirect assault.

It's no wonder you can't nail down a coherent definition of terrorism when you can't even come up with a coherent definition of WAR.

Even the most recent of terrorist attacks like 9/11 didn't fit this definition. Again, the definition had to be modified because the planes were hijacked.

There's nothing to modify here. If Al Qaida had used its own planes it would have been an act of war, not an act of terrorism.

This ignores all the times in history that an enemy's weapons or resources were used against them.

Not at all. When civilians steal military hardware and use it against the original army, that is called terrorism. When a military does this to another military, it is a war crime. Although you can avoid committing a war crime if you take clear steps to mark the captured equipment as your own using your own insignia and/or IFF codes.

It also ignores the fact that even if it were their own planes that did the work, it would still be labeled terrorism.

But it would not fit the legal definition unless the Taliban disavowed Al Qaida as a criminal organization and acted accordingly. If they did not, then it would not have been an act of terrorism, but a face-value act of WAR, which wouldn't have made much difference in the overall handling of the aftermath.

Stealing five thousand dollars worth of candy is still grand theft.

That actually doesn't change anything. Even people who steal one piece of candy probably wouldn't go so far to steal 5,000 pieces all at once.

And most of the people who murder one person wouldn't go so far as to murder 5,000 people at once. Yet mass murderers do exist, and so does the grand theft of candy.

Nero's situation is not allegorical for anything. You can guess it's allegorical for terrorism

It's not a guess. Nero's basic motivation, actions, practices, priorities, even his basic motivations all directly follow the pattern of international terrorism. They do not fit YOUR definition, I'm sure, but that's mainly because your definition is asinine that ANY terrorist is also a revolutionary from a suitable point of view.

Spock calls Nero a war criminal, but since Nero is a civilian, then by conventional LEGAL definitions Nero is a terrorist. This is doubly so in looking at his actions, his background, his practices and his objectives.

I agree he is not a revolutionary. But I disagree that terrorism has less effect than being proactive within the law of a community. It may not be the intended effect the terrorists set out to achieve, but I never specified as much.

You actually DID specify as much. You said that terrorists resort to illegal means believing that those means will be more effective than the legal ones. You used this as an example of why Nero isn't a terrorist because blowing up the Federation isn't a very effective way of saving Romulus.

Now you're saying it doesn't matter if their actions achieve the effect the terrorists set out to achieve... that's one highly mobile goalpost you've got there!

Yet he really didn't do anything about it at all. Hudson and the Maquis were far more effective in causing change

Only they DIDN'T cause any change. They caused a lot of destruction and misery for the Cardassians, alot of strife for the Federation, and a lot of political unrest. In the end, it was the Klingons that liberated them by knocking off the Cardassian military. The Maquis' struggle was ultimately counter-productive and they probably would have more effectively secured their position by aligning themselves with one of Cardassia's enemies in exchange for independence.

Primarily, this is because they used the tactics of terrorism instead of organizing themselves into a coherent military force with a fledgling government and a plan for what to do once they went independent. There are hints that they had thought about doing this at some point (Eddington talks about it right before he dies) but they never got that far. This alone is why the Maquis are terrorists, and NOT rebels or revolutionaries.

Good point. Except Star Trek, especially this version, has hardly ever been so deterministic.

And Nero--with his extensive scientific background and vast experience in time travel--should be expected to know this, right?

No, terrorists take the easy route. Making significant political change that is beneficial to one is a lot harder to accomplish than to blow up some buildings. Nero's case is reversed.

How is it reversed? Completely changing one hundred years of political evolution in both Romulus and the Federation is a lot harder to do than blowing up a bunch of planets.

Evidently preventing the hobus event is no simple matter either, otherwise the Romulans wouldn't have been depending on Spock the whole time.

Just because a vessel is armed with a lot of simple weapons does not mean it can take on fleets made up of dozens of ships.

Yes it does, as the Italians found out the hard way at Taranto Harbor. The Swordfish biplane was an utterly unremarkable aircraft by WW-II standards, and yet the British accomplished with 20 planes what otherwise would have required a squadron of battleships.

Let me put it this way: Five men with two pistols a piece have to fight off a horde of soldiers with muskets from 100 yards. If each side is competent, you couldn't realistically expect all of the five men to survive, if any at all. If the five men did survive, it would be purely because of the technology of their weapons.

I agree. And this is the part of the analogy you're not getting: Nero isn't give guys with pistols, he's ONE guy with a hundred muskets. It doesn't matter if those five guys have more sophisticated weapons, fire a hundred muzzle loaders on them and they're going down.

Plenty

of reasoning and elaboration was given to the Joker.

Yes, his insanity was given quite a bit of detail and development during the film. That doesn't change the fact that insanity is literally the only consistent trait he possesses in the entire film.

The most you can say is that Eric Bana is no Heath Ledger. On that matter I DO agree.

Never said it was.

In the 20th century a group of individuals with exactly that mindset found themselves in command

So you sit there and reinterpret everything I say to make it easier to disagree with and then you frown when I correct you?

 

[Ryan8bit]

This is based on the LEGAL definition (the one that occurs most commonly internationally and in the U.S. and U.K.) which means the unlawful use of force, violence, or the threat of violence in order to bring about political change. The key distinction here is UNLAWFUL, which means the use of non-uniformed combatants or use of criminal operations prohibited by the laws of the country in which those acts are committed. A military operation fails to meet this definition because it is carried out by lawful combatants. A lawful combatant cannot be held PERSONALLY responsible for actions that violate domestic laws because he is performing a combative action as a member of his government's armed forces as required by the laws of HIS country; responsibility, in that case, falls on the shoulders of his government. An UNLAWFUL combatant acts (theoretically) on his own accord and is performing not as a soldier, but as a perpetrator in a crime directed against an entire government, community or society. It is fundamentally similar to the definition of "hate crime," with the key difference that terrorism is characterized by broader political goals where hate crimes are characterized by racial/social goals.

See? This is yet another definition. You never once mentioned anything about sanctioned soldiers and all that. And it's too bad, because this is the only one that you've laid out that makes any sense, even though it's still an incomplete definition.

"Military operation in peacetime" is not a definition of terrorism that anyone here has used.

You did:

Hiroshima and Nagasaki were direct assaults using WMDs, during the course of a declared war. It WOULD have classified as terrorism if the U.S. Army had smuggled the bombs into those cities during peacetime and THEN demanded Japan's surrender without actually declaring war.

What the hell does resistance have to do with anything?

It had to do with your poor definition of what direct confrontation was.

If Al Qaida had used its own planes it would have been an act of war, not an act of terrorism.

This is splitting hairs, and no one with any realistic sense of what terrorism is would define it by whose equipment was being used. Back to Trek, Sisko in the Jem Hadar fighter ship was carrying out a terrorist action according to that definition. That doesn't make any sense.

And most of the people who murder one person wouldn't go so far as to murder 5,000 people at once. Yet mass murderers do exist, and so does the grand theft of candy.

I'm not saying these things don't exist, I'm just saying that they are far more unlikely. The claim was that terrorism is common, and that most terrorists would go that extra mile. While I can see going from tens to hundreds or thousands, I can't see going from one (or none) to billions. I think that's a logical fallacy.

It's not a guess. Nero's basic motivation, actions, practices, priorities, even his basic motivations all directly follow the pattern of international terrorism. They do not fit YOUR definition, I'm sure, but that's mainly because your definition is asinine that ANY terrorist is also a revolutionary from a suitable point of view.

Spock calls Nero a war criminal, but since Nero is a civilian, then by conventional LEGAL definitions Nero is a terrorist. This is doubly so in looking at his actions, his background, his practices and his objectives.

You act as if my definition is some insular thing only relative to me, but I think you have it backwards. Why don't we take a look as to what some common literature would define it as?

From dictionary.com:

ter·ror·ism
  /ˈtɛrəˌrɪzəm/ Show Spelled[ter-uh-riz-uhm] Show IPA
–noun
1.
the use of violence and threats to intimidate or coerce, especially for political purposes.
2.
the state of fear and submission produced by terrorism or terrorization.
3.
a terroristic method of governing or of resisting a government.


From encyclopedia.com:

Defining terrorism

After noting that more than one hundred definitions have been offered, Laqueur (1999) concludes that the only generally accepted characteristic of terrorism is that it involves violence or the threat of violence. Nonetheless, most observers also include political motivation and some notion of an organization that accepts and fosters violence as a political tactic.



And lastly, from the dreaded wikipedia:


There is no universally agreed, legally binding, criminal law definition of terrorism.[1][2] Common definitions of terrorism refer only to those violent acts which are intended to create fear (terror), are perpetrated for a religious, political or ideological goal, deliberately target or disregard the safety of non-combatants (civilians), and are committed by non-government agencies.

Some definitions also include acts of unlawful violence and war. The use of similar tactics by criminal organizations for protection rackets or to enforce a code of silence is usually not labeled terrorism though these same actions may be labeled terrorism when done by a politically motivated group.




So tell me, how come none of these definitions rely purely on tactics, especially how you define them? How come they all note the intent to spread fear, use coercion, and have a political aim? I'd say my definition falls a lot closer to these more widely accepted sources than your ever-changing definition does.

By these widely accepted definitions, Nero is not a terrorist because he lacks several of these qualities.

You actually DID specify as much. You said that terrorists resort to illegal means believing that those means will be more effective than the legal ones. You used this as an example of why Nero isn't a terrorist because blowing up the Federation isn't a very effective way of saving Romulus.

Now you're saying it doesn't matter if their actions achieve the effect the terrorists set out to achieve... that's one highly mobile goalpost you've got there!

All I said was that the chances for goals to be achieved was greater by using force than by legal means, especially given the circumstances of many terrorists. That doesn't mean that they always are, or that the changes that they do make don't come back to bite them harder. But in general, gaining any kind of success, even if you get killed in retaliation, is much more easy than just voting or running for office. Al Qaeda has had many successes, even though they are probably outweighed by their failures.

Only they DIDN'T cause any change.

Sorry, but that's total baloney. They stirred a great uprising amongst Starfleet officers, Bajorans, and other aliens alike. And destruction and misery is change.

And Nero--with his extensive scientific background and vast experience in time travel--should be expected to know this, right?

Nero only knows what the writers told him that he should know. If he needed to know exactly where Spock would appear and when, then he knows. If he doesn't know anything about forward time travel, then he doesn't. None of it makes logical sense, nor should I really expect it to I guess.

How is it reversed?

Because Nero had an easy solution through time travel. Blowing up a bunch of planets and fighting a bunch of fleets should be the harder route, especially by Trek mythology.

Yes it does, as the Italians found out the hard way at Taranto Harbor. The Swordfish biplane was an utterly unremarkable aircraft by WW-II standards, and yet the British accomplished with 20 planes what otherwise would have required a squadron of battleships.

I don't think any of that had anything to do with the weaponry itself, but the method of delivery. Lots of fast, maneuverable ships that the battleships weren't meant to target, and can form tactical formations will naturally win. That's a tactical thing and has nothing to do with the weapons. If anything, I bet that the Klingon ships were far more maneuverable and basically capable of what the British fleet did, especially since the Narada was basically a dreadnought.

this is the part of the analogy you're not getting: Nero isn't give guys with pistols, he's ONE guy with a hundred muskets. It doesn't matter if those five guys have more sophisticated weapons, fire a hundred muzzle loaders on them and they're going down.

I wouldn't ever use the analogy of a person holding a hundred muskets... that just doesn't make sense. In fact, it enforces the idea that just having a bunch of weapons doesn't necessarily mean the ability to deploy them.

Also, if Nero has a hundred muskets, then the Klingons would have what? I mean, shouldn't the Klingons have formidable armaments? I'm pretty sure it came down to the technology of the Narada's weapons and shields. It is the tank vs. a bunch of horseback soldiers.

So you sit there and reinterpret everything I say to make it easier to disagree with and then you frown when I correct you?

I don't know, if you say one thing and later say that you didn't say it, it's confusing. It doesn't really require any interpretation to see that.

 

[Crazy Eddie]

This is based on the LEGAL definition (the one that occurs most commonly internationally and in the U.S. and U.K.) which means the unlawful use of force, violence, or the threat of violence in order to bring about political change. The key distinction here is UNLAWFUL, which means the use of non-uniformed combatants or use of criminal operations prohibited by the laws of the country in which those acts are committed. A military operation fails to meet this definition because it is carried out by lawful combatants. A lawful combatant cannot be held PERSONALLY responsible for actions that violate domestic laws because he is performing a combative action as a member of his government's armed forces as required by the laws of HIS country; responsibility, in that case, falls on the shoulders of his government. An UNLAWFUL combatant acts (theoretically) on his own accord and is performing not as a soldier, but as a perpetrator in a crime directed against an entire government, community or society. It is fundamentally similar to the definition of "hate crime," with the key difference that terrorism is characterized by broader political goals where hate crimes are characterized by racial/social goals.

See? This is yet another definition.

IT'S THE SAME FUCKING DEFINITION!! I mean, really?

I guess have only myself to blame for not recognizing your reading comprehension issues, so I'll try to make this as simple as possible in the future.

You never once mentioned anything about sanctioned soldiers and all that.

I assumed you knew the difference between "civilian" and "solider."

- noun 1. a person who is not on active duty with a military, naval, police, or fire fighting organization.

"Military operation in peacetime" is not a definition of terrorism that anyone here has used.

You did:

Smuggling of bombs is not a military operation.

It had to do with your poor definition of what direct confrontation was.

I assumed you already knew the definition of the word "direct" in this context.

–adjective 14. proceeding in a straight line or by the shortest course; straight; undeviating; not oblique: a direct route.

In this case, meaning the immediate delivery of ordinance from one party to another without the involvement or participation (willing or unwilling, knowing or unknowing) if a third party.

This is splitting hairs, and no one with any realistic sense of what terrorism is would define it by whose equipment was being used.

The LAW makes such a distinction, actually. I'm tempted to explain this in detail, but I promised I would keep it simple;

Al Qaida = non-military --> therefore "terrorist."
Al Qaida =/= military --> therefore "terrorist."

"War crime" = "Bad"
"Terrorism" = "bad"
"Terrorism" =/= "war crime.'

Any questions?

Back to Trek, Sisko in the Jem Hadar fighter ship was carrying out a terrorist action according to that definition.

No, just a war crime. The Federation actually committed a dizzying number of those during the Dominion War.

Now, if the Federation had hired Garack and Rom and six civilian volunteers for the mission, that would have been terrorism.

I'm not saying these things don't exist, I'm just saying that they are far more unlikely. The claim was that terrorism is common, and that most terrorists would go that extra mile.

Most terrorists WOULD if they had the opportunity. The reason they DON'T is -- wait for it -- the LACK OF OPPORTUNITY.

A weapon of mass destruction provides maximum opportunity for minimum effort. That most terrorists would happily seize that opportunity if they obtained it is a foregone conclusion.

While I can see going from tens to hundreds or thousands, I can't see going from one (or none) to billions. I think that's a logical fallacy.

On your part, yes: "argument from ignorance."

Besides, it's not as if Nero is going to INDIVIDUALLY hunt down and kill billions of Vulcans a few at a time. All it takes a drop of red matter and a single torpedo. He can essentially wipe out entire civilizations as easily as you or I might microwave a bag of popcorn. If he's already internalized the desire to kill, then pushing that button isn't going to bother him at all.

To simplify: "Push that button, and someone will die." Once you've made up your mind to push that button, you're a killer.

So tell me, how come none of these definitions rely purely on tactics

Because terrorism IS a tactic, it isn't DEFINED by tactics. You might as well be asking "How come nobody defines carrier-based warfare purely on tactics?"

How come they all note the intent to spread fear, use coercion, and have a political aim?

Because "terrorism" is a word with political as well as legal connotations, and people who like to use the word as a pejorative tend to apply it to people who are not terrorists simply because they don't like them, or refrain from calling them terrorists because they do.

I repeat: the idea of "One man's freedom fighter is another man's terrorist" is bullshit. Political rhetoric notwithstanding, there is virtually no debate internationally about the LEGAL definition of terrorism. Law enforcement knows EXACTLY what terrorism is, and they keep a very close eye on anyone associated with it.

By these widely accepted definitions, Nero is not a terrorist because he lacks several of these qualities.

Does Nero spread fear?

"Spock, there is something I would like you to see. Captain Pike, your transporter has been disabled. As you can see by the rest of your Armada, you have no choice. You will man a shuttle, come aboard the Narada for negotiations. That is all."

Using the threat of violence and intimidation, and intentionally leaves witnesses to spread the word... that's one.

Does Nero use coercion?

"Centaurian slugs. They latch onto your brainstem and release a toxin that will force you to answer."

That's two.

Does Nero have a political goal?

"My goal is to create a Romulus that exists FREE of the Federation!"

Sounds like a political goal to me. So he's three for three on the rhetoric front, so he fits your dictionary definition of a terrorist.

Now what?

All I said was that the chances for goals to be achieved was greater by using force than by legal means

And I repeat: they're NOT greater, they're actually far smaller. Terrorists do accomplish the goals they SET OUT to accomplish, namely to cause damage, death and chaos. But they do not accomplish their political goals that way, in fact it usually makes things worse for them in the short term and delays more constructive efforts from succeeding in the long run.

You are confusing "success" with "gratification." Terrorists often achieve satisfaction of their hateful grudges. What they almost NEVER achieve, is fulfillment of their political goals.

And destruction and misery is change.

But it is not the POLITICAL change they set out to achieve. To wit, inflicting destruction and misery on the Cardassians is exactly the sort of change most of the Maquis could be satisfied with, whatever their larger pie-in-the-sky political ideals. And this goes back to what I said earlier, that the primary difference between a terrorist and an actual freedom fighter is that the former is motivated by rage, the latter by the genuine desire to become free. Their actions follow from their motivations, and ultimately, so do their results.

Because Nero had an easy solution through time travel.

Nero doesn't know how to time travel. He got here by ACCIDENT, remember?

I don't think any of that had anything to do with the weaponry itself, but the method of delivery. Lots of fast, maneuverable ships that the battleships weren't meant to target

Hmmm.. lots of fast, highly maneuverable targets that capital ships weren't meant to target. The Narada wasn't equipped with anything like that, right?

I agree, that's a tactical thing, although I disagree it has "nothing to do with the weapons." You can only do that with certain types of weapons... the Narada's clusterbomb torpedoes, for instance.

especially since the Narada was basically a dreadnought.

In this analogy, the Narada was basically a CARRIER. Not a carrier of aircraft, but a carrier of missiles. Look at the kinds of enemies the Klingons are used to fighting against: the Romulans and the Federation use single-shot torpedo launchers and lots and lots of directed energy weapons. NOBODY in the Trekiverse has ever used missile swarms, and the Enterprise--at the very end of the film--might be the first ship in Trek history to ever successfully defend against that sort of attack.

I wouldn't ever use the analogy of a person holding a hundred muskets... that just doesn't make sense.

Lack of imagination is not a rebuttal.

Picture this.
Add 80 more barrels.
Replace the barrels with muskets.
Do you get it yet?

Also, if Nero has a hundred muskets, then the Klingons would have what?

5 guys, each with a revolver.

I mean, shouldn't the Klingons have formidable armaments? I'm pretty sure it came down to the technology of the Narada's weapons and shields. It is the tank vs. a bunch of horseback soldiers.

Actually, it's more like a bulldozer vs. a bunch of horseback soldiers (Nero's driving the bulldozer).

To make the analogy more complete, it would be more like one of those giant mining machines... which, by the way, gives you a nice solid chassis on which to mount those hundred muskets.

 

[Ryan8bit]

IT'S THE SAME FUCKING DEFINITION!! I mean, really?

I guess have only myself to blame for not recognizing your reading comprehension issues, so I'll try to make this as simple as possible in the future.

Whatever, dude. You never said anything like this at all. Your definition totally came up short, just like I showed you before. You'd say something meager, I'd come back with an instance that fit your definition, yet wasn't considered terrorism. You'd come back and revise it. This has nothing to do with my reading comprehension skills, and everything to do with the fact that you can't articulate a point well the first time. And you have a great pattern of doing this.

Smuggling of bombs is not a military operation.

Despite that you said, "U.S. Army had smuggled the bombs into those cities." Whatever.

The LAW makes such a distinction

Whose law?

No, just a war crime.

How exactly was it a war crime?

Most terrorists WOULD if they had the opportunity.

I disagree. I think few would. Especially those in Nero's circumstances.

On your part, yes: "argument from ignorance."

So are you saying that you're not certain about what would happen despite no proof?

The only thing I ever said is that without any example throughout our history, such an instance happening would be truly rare, not that it is impossible. I never said it can't happen because it's never happened.

I'm not surprised that you don't understand that, since you didn't even know what a straw man was. For the record, your argument was a slippery slope.

Besides, it's not as if Nero is going to INDIVIDUALLY hunt down and kill billions of Vulcans a few at a time. All it takes a drop of red matter and a single torpedo. He can essentially wipe out entire civilizations as easily as you or I might microwave a bag of popcorn.

Maybe if you have to fight your way through a crowd of 50 people with a knife to make that popcorn. There is a lot associated with the kind of destruction he set out to do, and it's not as simple as just pushing a button.

Because terrorism IS a tactic, it isn't DEFINED by tactics.

Then how come every attempt you made at defining it purely came down to tactics while denying the other components?

Because "terrorism" is a word with political as well as legal connotations, and people who like to use the word as a pejorative tend to apply it to people who are not terrorists simply because they don't like them, or refrain from calling them terrorists because they do.

But it can be defined using those descriptions without still being a pejorative term. All of those terms represent the 9/11 attacks. But if you just pick and choose one aspect of the definition, you're taking away what terrorism embodies. It's more complex than simply tactics, which is why almost every source you look at will say as much.

Does Nero spread fear?

He does, but only as an unintended consequence, and it's very short-lived. If his primary goal is to obliterate his enemies, none can be left to even maintain that fear. He only let the Enterprise survive because Spock was on it. He only wanted to cause Spock pain. He didn't care at all about spreading fear.

Does Nero use coercion?

You're taking this out of context. The coercion part of terrorism is saying, "I'm going to do X if you don't do Y" or "Doing X will make you do Y" where X is usually something destructive or lethal. Extracting information from one individual does not fall under this context.

Does Nero have a political goal?

Sort of. We don't really know much about his goal because he doesn't have any motives. So on the surface it would seem he has a goal, but we have no idea why. His reasoning is basically like that of Shinzon: Because the writers wanted him to, not because it makes sense.

His goals are more largely defined as a single vendetta, which then balloons into something more.

So he doesn't really fit the definition that well at all.

What they almost NEVER achieve, is fulfillment of their political goals.

Fulfillment? No. But I think they can achieve minor goals, which is still greater than what they can do by activism.

But it is not the POLITICAL change they set out to achieve. To wit, inflicting destruction and misery on the Cardassians is exactly the sort of change most of the Maquis could be satisfied with, whatever their larger pie-in-the-sky political ideals. And this goes back to what I said earlier, that the primary difference between a terrorist and an actual freedom fighter is that the former is motivated by rage, the latter by the genuine desire to become free. Their actions follow from their motivations, and ultimately, so do their results.

I think there are many that did set out to make a political change, and there were many doing it just out of hatred. If it were portrayed simply as hate, they wouldn't have had as many good conflicts in episodes about it. The Maquis were not meant to be a straight up bad guy. There was meant to be a level of ambiguity there, which wouldn't exist if there were zero political goals.

Nero doesn't know how to time travel. He got here by ACCIDENT, remember?

This is mostly a precedent set by earlier Trek. Every single instance we see of accidental time travel, everybody works to get back to the future or restore what went wrong. And they never seem to have too much trouble figuring out how to reverse their time travel. Hell, even in STIV they purposely go back in time fairly easily. It should probably be noted that right now we know how to time travel into the future, but that we don't have the means.

When time travel is involved in any story, it usually brings up these kinds of logical problems. I'm glad they won't be focusing on it in the next movie.

Hmmm.. lots of fast, highly maneuverable targets that capital ships weren't meant to target. The Narada wasn't equipped with anything like that, right?

Wait, isn't this an argument for his weapons being highly technological?

Lack of imagination is not a rebuttal.

Picture this.
Add 80 more barrels.
Replace the barrels with muskets.
Do you get it yet?

I had considered making an analogy using rapid fire weapons, but it made the analogy not work. For it to even remotely work, it would have to be one man with an automatic weapon vs. 50 guys with a single phaser. It should be pretty obvious who would win that fight.

5 guys, each with a revolver.

That's hardly representative of the situation.

 

[Crazy Eddie]

The only thing I ever said is that without any example throughout our history, such an instance happening would be truly rare

Uh huh... except what you ACTUALLY said was "I could see going from a hundred to a thousand, but not from one to a billion." Which is argument from ignorance: "I don't know how it could happen, so it couldn't happen."

I never said it can't happen because it's never happened.

Then you're really not saying much.

I'm not surprised that you don't understand that, since you didn't even know what a straw man was. For the record, your argument was a slippery slope.

Slippery slope is only a fallacy when it's false. Stanley Milgram's famous behavioral experiments proved in the 1960s that, in this case, it isn't.

Maybe if you have to fight your way through a crowd of 50 people with a knife to make that popcorn.

Except that Nero didn't have to fight his way through fifty Vulcans with a knife. In fact, he didn't even have to push the button himself, all he had to do was give the orders.

Fail analogy is fail.

Then how come every attempt you made at defining it purely came down to tactics while denying the other components?

So according to you, when I said:
- That terrorists' baseline motivations being more emotional than rational, and that their actions reflect this
- That terrorism is resorted to by people who cannot afford conventional warfare
- That because of this, terrorists seek to avoid direct confrontation while causing as much damage as possible
- That terrorism is different from revolutionary/guerilla warfare in that it intentionally disregards the rights of civilians
- That terrorist leaders compose political ideologies that the rank-and-file barely understand and that the leadership themselves only use as an excuse to lash out at their enemies

I was actually DENYING all these things?

But it can be defined using those descriptions without still being a pejorative term.

Yes, much like the terms "murder" or "murderer" which are descriptive in a legal context and pejorative in almost every other context. So when someone calls you a murderer because you're eating a pork sandwich, chances are he's probably using the word rhetorically because he doesn't approve of the slaughter of pigs for food. If he calls you a murderer because you have been convicted of a felony homicide, then he's probably using it descriptively (possibly as a pejorative too, but the description is accurate).

The LEGAL definition of terrorism is not up for debate, there's widespread agreement among the international courts, among interpol, and among the law enforcement agencies of different countries what constitutes terrorism. Law enforcement and jurists DO NOT use the term pejoratively in professional literature; it's only the POLITICAL use that causes confusion.

He does, but only as an unintended consequence...

He intentionally left an entire starship intact and intentionally left Spock(s) alive to witness Vulcan's destruction. So, that's one.

If his primary goal is to obliterate his enemies

But he doesn't want to obliterate their enemies, just their planets, their government, and their whole way of life. Which, again, is why he intentionally left survivors to witness the cataclysm on Vulcan.

You're taking this out of context. The coercion part of terrorism is saying, "I'm going to do X if you don't do Y" or "Doing X will make you do Y" where X is usually something destructive or lethal.

"As you can see by the rest of your armada, you have no choice..."

"My commander requests the presence of your captain... your refusal would be unwise."

Broadly: "I'm going to [destroy your ship] if you don't [come aboard to talk]."

So that's two.

Sort of. We don't really know much about his goal because he doesn't have any motives.

"My goal is not only to prevent the destruction of the home that I love, but to create a Romulus that exists free of the Federation."

Those are his motives.

So he doesn't really fit the definition that well at all.

He's three for three so far. I understand you don't WANT him to, because then you can't pretend to have a rational reason to keep grinding that axe. But he fits your simplistic dictionary definition even better than he fits my expanded one.

I think there are many that did set out to make a political change

I never said there weren't. I said NONE OF THEM EVER ACCOMPLISHED IT.

But let me walk that back for a minute: no terrorist movement, individual or organization ever achieved political change THROUGH TERRORISM. A few of them did manage to achieve change, only once they abandoned the use of terrorism and resorted to more effective techniques. The Civil Rights Movement, for example, had most of its major successes once Martin Luther King got the SNCC and most of the movement's sympathizers to renounce violence and employ methods of passive resistance and non-destructive civil disobedience. They successfully marginalized more militant groups like, say, the Black Panthers, whose (largely fictional) reputation for terrorist tactics had done much to de-legitimize the movement. There's also the example of Bill Ayers and the Weather Underground, who accomplished nothing whatsoever during through their terrorist operations but managed to shake up the FBI by luring COINTELPRO into violating their civil rights; they could have done that just as well--if not better--WITHOUT being terrorists.

The Black Panthers and the Nation of Islam had the same political goals as SNCC and Martin Luther King. What they DIDN'T have was the willingness to delay gratification and seek progress rather than retribution. Same again with the Weathermen, who took the prevailing anti-war sentiment of the time and wrapped it in anti-establishment rage. In both cases, these were organizations pursuing political goals that were actually quite popular in the street, but they infused their own personal vendettas into those goals and then used the politics as a justification FOR the vendetta. That, as a specific example, was the difference between Malcolm X and Martin Luther King. And if you remember your history, you will recall that Malcolm X was murdered by his own people after he attempted to put the vendetta aside and seek a more constructive solution to his political goals.

Of course NoI never made it all the way to being a terrorist organization, but at the height of the civil rights movement they came perilously close.

If it were portrayed simply as hate, they wouldn't have had as many good conflicts in episodes about it. The Maquis were not meant to be a straight up bad guy. There was meant to be a level of ambiguity there, which wouldn't exist if there were zero political goals.

The thing is, EMOTIONAL conflict resonates with people alot more than political conflicts. Everyone understands "We're fighting those bastards to take back our homes," which--in the end--was the Maquis' rallying cry. But what, other than "Drive the Cardassians out of the DMZ" was their broader POLITICAL goal? None is ever stated, except for Eddington alluding to some vague desire for the colonies to form an independent state, and it is never made clear whether this is some pipe dream of his or an actual item on their agenda.

This is mostly a precedent set by earlier Trek. Every single instance we see of accidental time travel, everybody works to get back to the future or restore what went wrong.

Again: Is Nero a Star Trek fan? How the hell is he supposed to know that?

Wait, isn't this an argument for his weapons being highly technological?

No, because the swordfish torpedo planes--to which you were referring in your quote--were obsolete by more than a decade when they took part in the attack on Taranto. By precise analogy, Nero's torpedoes could just as well have been re-purposed 23rd century equipment; their ability to evade Klingon and also Starfleet defenses would be similar to the ability of a squad of 20 year old torpedo planes to cripple the Bismark.

I had considered making an analogy using rapid fire weapons...

And thus utterly avoided the question, I noticed. And I think we both know why.

5 guys, each with a revolver.

That's hardly representative of the situation.

We don't know the situation, we only know the results. The Klingons have a saying "A thousand throats may be slit in a single night by a running man." You don't suppose that saying is a reference to the remarkable technology of Klingon knives?

 

[Captrek]

I think there are many that did set out to make a political change

I never said there weren't. I said NONE OF THEM EVER ACCOMPLISHED IT.

Algeria?

 

[Ryan8bit]

Uh huh... except what you ACTUALLY said was "I could see going from a hundred to a thousand, but not from one to a billion." Which is argument from ignorance: "I don't know how it could happen, so it couldn't happen."

Do you not understand that this is not an absolute? I never said it wasn't possible, just that in my opinion it's highly unlikely to. And the logic is absolutely turned if you say, I know how it could happen, so it could happen. That's the exact same thing, only the burden of proof lies on proving a positive, not a negative.

Slippery slope is only a fallacy when it's false.

I know that, but I believe your statements to be false, and that the Milgram experiments have nothing to do with this.

Except that Nero didn't have to fight his way through fifty Vulcans with a knife. In fact, he didn't even have to push the button himself, all he had to do was give the orders.

Fail analogy is fail.

The only thing that is failing here is you, in that you didn't understand that the 50 refers to the Klingon armada, not Vulcans.

So according to you, when I said:
- That terrorists' baseline motivations being more emotional than rational, and that their actions reflect this
- That terrorism is resorted to by people who cannot afford conventional warfare
- That because of this, terrorists seek to avoid direct confrontation while causing as much damage as possible
- That terrorism is different from revolutionary/guerilla warfare in that it intentionally disregards the rights of civilians
- That terrorist leaders compose political ideologies that the rank-and-file barely understand and that the leadership themselves only use as an excuse to lash out at their enemies

I was actually DENYING all these things?

Yep. All that you've displayed here is tactics and a base emotion. There is nothing about the intent to cause terror, and nothing about their political goals except for that last point, which you have not yet mentioned.

He intentionally left an entire starship intact and intentionally left Spock(s) alive to witness Vulcan's destruction. So, that's one.

It's not fear that he's giving to Spock though, and even if it were, I doubt that many would define terrorism as only targeting one individual.

But he doesn't want to obliterate their enemies, just their planets, their government, and their whole way of life. Which, again, is why he intentionally left survivors to witness the cataclysm on Vulcan.

Then why didn't he let more people go? The reason is that he doesn't care about them. The only person he really wanted to see the destruction was Spock. He killed everybody else in his path. He didn't care about keeping them alive.

Besides, even if a handful of people were left, his stated goal is achieved. He's not looking to cause fear in the remaining survivors, he's just trying to annihilate the Federation.

"As you can see by the rest of your armada, you have no choice..."

"My commander requests the presence of your captain... your refusal would be unwise."

Broadly: "I'm going to [destroy your ship] if you don't [come aboard to talk]."

You are again confusing the issue here. Yes, those things are destructive and lethal, but X is meant to be a terrorist action in itself. Destroying a military warship is not even terrorism by your definition.

These qualities are indivisible.

"My goal is not only to prevent the destruction of the home that I love, but to create a Romulus that exists free of the Federation."

Those are his motives.

That's not a motive, it's a goal. I realize that some definitions of the words can be linked, but by motives I mean what causes people to do things, and the goals are what they set out to accomplish. Nero has no known motives for his hatred of the Federation, just the goal that he wants it gone.

no terrorist movement, individual or organization ever achieved political change THROUGH TERRORISM.

How about the 2004 railway bombings in Madrid?

I think many political changes happen as the result of terrorism. They may not always be the intended effects, but they certainly happen quite a great deal.

Again: Is Nero a Star Trek fan? How the hell is he supposed to know that?

He doesn't have to be to realize the basic concept of being somewhere that you don't belong and trying to get home.

We don't know the situation, we only know the results. The Klingons have a saying "A thousand throats may be slit in a single night by a running man." You don't suppose that saying is a reference to the remarkable technology of Klingon knives?

I suppose you're right that they don't throw the circumstances in your face, but we can infer a great deal by what we do see. One shot nearly takes out the Enterprise, while two is said to be enough to kill. Sulu even says that their weapons are powerful, not that there's just a lot of them. The ship is meant to be shown as technologically superior, and I think any line of debate against that is daft. It's almost as if you were arguing for the sake of arguing or proving some sort of point, when there really wasn't any to be made.

 

[F. King Daniel]

tl;dr

You guys do know that, between you, you've written a whole freaking book about Nero?

 

[BillJ]

tl;dr

You guys do know that, between you, you've written a whole freaking book about Nero?

 

[Ryan8bit]

tl;dr

Agreed. Personally I find the big walls of quotes tiring, and does anybody else actually read that? I know that the last time newtype and UFO (I think?) went off forever, I had absolutely zero interest in reading it, so I wouldn't blame anybody here. I was a bit more interested in discussing it simply with captrek rather than nitpicking the tiniest of details.

 

[UFO]

tl;dr

Agreed. Personally I find the big walls of quotes tiring, and does anybody else actually read that? I know that the last time newtype and UFO (I think?) went off forever, I had absolutely zero interest in reading it, so I wouldn't blame anybody here. I was a bit more interested in discussing it simply with captrek rather than nitpicking the tiniest of details.

Yeah. Déjà vu man. Good times.

 

[Captrek]

tl;dr

You guys do know that, between you, you've written a whole freaking book about Nero?

In 1999, the US government commissioned a study on the behaviors and motives of terrorists. I posted a link to that report and excerpts from it. Now newtype_alpha and Ryan8bit are arguing passionately over that very subject. I must ask the two of them: has either of you actually read that report?

 

[Ryan8bit]

I only just read the excerpts you posted. I wasn't going to read hundreds of pages just to frame a nerdy internet debate about Star Trek that essentially amounts to nothing.

 

[Crazy Eddie]

tl;dr

You guys do know that, between you, you've written a whole freaking book about Nero?

In 1999, the US government commissioned a study on the behaviors and motives of terrorists. I posted a link to that report and excerpts from it. Now newtype_alpha and Ryan8bit are arguing passionately over that very subject. I must ask the two of them: has either of you actually read that report?

It appears to be the same report I read in Poli-Sci a few years ago. It was one of sources I used for the midterm essay analyzing techniques of asymmetric warfare and the fundamental differences between them and the people who undertake them. Still, the conclusions in that report is one of the things that sprang to mind thinking about Nero's characterization. The only difference being that 25 years is a bit long to hold on to that kind of grudge... but maybe not by Romulan standards.

I admit I did kinda skip over Algeria at the time, mainly because the only concise source I could find about it on short notice was the movie "The Battle of Algiers."