re: A question about the ISIS beheadings

There are a lot of Americans working in the Middle East. From my perspective, they are primarily mercenaries. I'm not talking about Xe, Triple Canopy, et al security contractors, who are, of course, actual mercenaries. But most others, with the exception of career foreign service officers and most humanitarian aid groups, are just there for the higher pay.

If you're there for the money, you should also be willing to accept the intrinsic risks that accompany your larger paycheck and tax advantages. In that neck of the woods, those risks include political instability, religious xenophobia, random bombings and the occasional beheading.

I don't claim to know what the answer is, but my feeling is that we can't JDAM our way out of this problem. Unless a new Hitler comes to power with Muslims as his/her scapegoat, we can't "kill 'em all".

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I could not fathom being in that situation, but I have no idea how I would sit still. Would rather be killed on the run then having my head cut off. I guess they threaten a worse death, torture and prolonged over hours/days. Don't even like thinking about it

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I'm sure some have tried to run

they may "punish" people who run and promise a painless death to those who don't.

Also, you have to remember that many of the people in that area beheaded are extremely religious and accept their fate

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If so, how are they so calm? I would be a mess.

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You don't know that, because you've never been that close to certain death.
Fight or flight is out of the picture by that point. They are just trying to find peace.

Protocol for executions in the United States is to give the condemned valium. Presumably something similar is happening with these unfortunate people (and I am not equating the two scenarios, except that people figure out what works and what doesn't.) Also, I think when the string runs out and you know it's hopeless, your mind sort of detaches as a defense mechanism. People just rarely seem to fight in these situations, regardless of who's being executed, why, or by whom.

The real question is why we haven't destroyed the entire area. We are not going to meet their demands because they don't have a solution and will always have a reason to claim persecution. Kill an American and we will make your little shite hole glow in the dark is the only solution. Anyone remember the video clip of the small kid punching the big kid then all the sudden the little kid gets dropped? I'm guessing the other little shite heads saw that and reconsidered fricking with the big kid. This is what we need to do to crush this group and act as a deterrent to future cowards.

I watched the very first video of Nick Berg back I guess about 10 years now. Most gruesome thing I have ever seen and said I would never watch anything like that again.

I assume that they are given some kind of drugs that is the only way you would ever get me to sit still.