Caledonian2 comments on When None Dare Urge Restraint - Less Wrong

41 Post author: Eliezer_Yudkowsky 08 December 2007 11:09PM

You are viewing a comment permalink. View the original post to see all comments and the full post content.

Comments (118)

Sort By: Old

You are viewing a single comment's thread.

Comment author: Caledonian2 09 December 2007 02:12:21AM 3 points [-]

America has one of the largest and best-equipped armed forces in the world. Only an idiot would attempt to confront it directly and according to the "rules of war".

Reality check: when openly declaring war and restraining one's tactics will inevitably lead to defeat, breaking the conventions is not only canny but necessary. There is simply no branch of the contingency tree where playing by the rules leads to a benefit in such a scenario.