Congratulations on your International Law education. I'm studying Engineering. That must mean that anybody who disagrees with me on a topic concerning engineering--combat, civil, mechanical, or otherwise--is wrong. Because I know engineering.

The "abuses" (that was humiliation, not torture) of prisoners in Iraq may be a good example. No "grunt" (they're "lower enlisted", by the way, not "grunts") was under direct supervision from the Commanding Officer. There was no Officer that said, "Private, I order you to strip these prisoners naked and pose for pictures with them!" The NCOs (those are NonCommissioned Officers... Enlisted.) were in control of the situation, and the NCOs are being held responsible. I by no means condone such behavior, but, A) it's nothing compared to the real torture Saddam put people through; and B) those responsible are being, have been, or will be dealt with accordingly.

In all honesty, personally, I think the hooded "electrocution" thing looked pretty funny. C'mon, you can't say that wouldn't be funny. ... Or I guess you can. Maybe I'm just a bastard like that.

As for the "suspects" in Gitmo, they are not being held as enemy combatants, they are being held as terrorists, and are thus exempt from Geneva Code and Due Process laws concerning enemy Prisoners of War. Some have been released, proving that it is an issue, but there should be no "time limit" or Statute of Limitations on terrorism. As for "the most basic of human rights", unless you're talking about the "rights", or lack thereof, concerning law and punishment, they are being cared for with normal, basic human rights. It's far from a concentration camp. It's not even a POW camp.

Ah. I apologize, I didn't know that the United States must answer to Nicaragua. The U.S. supported the Contras, which fought against the government of Nicaragua. The government of Nicarague hated the Contras, and hated the United States, even moreso when the United States supported the Contras. This is equivalent to an Aryan claiming that he was beat up by black police officers. A reliable source? Did the Contras use brutal tactics, and did the U.S. support the Contras, yes. Were they targeting civilians for the sake of targeting civilians? Or were they targeting logistics? The Nicaraguan government used tactics that would have made the Contras look like Boy Scouts.

I wasn't in the country at the time of the U.S. Presidential Elections, or most of the campaigns, but I did try to keep up reasonable well with the news, and I never heard of any church refusing to admit, or attempting to refuse to admit, supporters of any specific candidate. I could understand doing so with supporters of certain political stances and views--don't agree with it, of course, but understand it--but never heard of either. Of course, I didn't have consistent or scheduled periodical opportunities to check the news, so I may have missed it, if it did indeed happen.

I don't know much about the IRA or the ANC beyond their existence, so it's not my place to comment on them. However, if the IRA specifically targeted civilians for the sake of targeting civilians, and attempted to disguise themselves as civilians while carrying out their attacks on other civilians, then yes, they are a terrorist organization. I understand the quote you posted, and I know of another quote along the lines of "history is written by the victors"--both would go along the same lines. However, there is still quite a difference between "freedom fighter" and "terrorist".

To be fair, the United States's use of nuclear weapons on Hiroshima and Nagasaki in August of 1945 was somewhat of a terrorist act. It was the targeting of civilians in order to influence the government and society. Whether or not it was necessary is another topic entirely, and I won't comment more on it, but I was just pointing out that "terrorism" covers a lot of ground.

Few Kamikaze attacks were because the aircraft was out of munitions. If an aircraft was on its way down, I wouldn't doubt a bit that the pilot would try to aim it towards a target, but that wouldn't be a Kamikaze. There were specific missions designed to be Kamikaze missions, and specific weaponry designed to be used as a Kamikaze attack. If a Japanese pilot returned alive from a Kamikaze mission, he was thought of as a disgrace. (There's a resident Japan scholar around here somewhere, I'm sure they would have more light to shed on the topic.) I respect the Kamikaze concept, but I feel, as would most soldiers, that I would better serve my country in life than in death. In most cases, anyway...if I was piloting a plane that was going down, you bet I'd steer it towards a military target, but I doubt I would intentionally fly a well-equipped, mission-capable vehicle into a suicide run. And I sure as hell wouldn't try to take it into the middle of a shopping mall or crowded street. There is a big difference between a Kamikaze pilot and a suicide bomber.