# A Second "Downing Street Memo" **URL:** \ **Category:** The BBQ Pit\ **Created:** [June 12, 2005, 3:38am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/a-second-downing-street-memo/307930 "2005-06-12T03:38:55Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 12\ **Page:** 11
**Author:** ![New\_Iskander](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/n/db5fbb/32.png) [@New\_Iskander](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/New_Iskander)\ **Post date:** [June 21, 2005, 7:37pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/a-second-downing-street-memo/307930/201 "2005-06-21T19:37:40Z")
Well, I guess WWII is perfectly justified, then. ---
**Author:** ![GIGObuster](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/gigobuster/32/421_2.png) [@GIGObuster](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/GIGObuster)\ **Post date:** [June 21, 2005, 7:46pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/a-second-downing-street-memo/307930/202 "2005-06-21T19:46:24Z")
> [@New Iskander](#): > > Well, I guess WWII is perfectly justified, then. Sure it was, the axis powers broke treaties on the way to war, and declared war on us first. The USA avoided (some could say broke) treaties and never declared war to Iraq on the way in, and here we are. With less evidence to justify why we got in, and with an El Salvador plan to pacify the country. ---
**Author:** ![New\_Iskander](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/n/db5fbb/32.png) [@New\_Iskander](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/New_Iskander)\ **Post date:** [June 21, 2005, 8:44pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/a-second-downing-street-memo/307930/203 "2005-06-21T20:44:57Z")
> [@GIGObuster](#): > > Sure it was… Just checking. ---
**Author:** ![FinnAgain](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/finnagain/32/12500_2.png) [@FinnAgain](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/FinnAgain)\ **Post date:** [June 21, 2005, 9:25pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/a-second-downing-street-memo/307930/204 "2005-06-21T21:25:27Z")
> [@New Iskander](#): > > Just checking. Oh pahleeeeeze. Self defense is a perfectly valid reason for violence, even lethal force. The qualifier is that in defending myself against you, I shouldn’t kill your neighbors too. Likewise, at least as far as I’m aware stateside, you have to respond with equal force. If you try to punch me in the face, and I haul out a hand cannon and blow your head off, that’s a bad thing. So, to recap: Defending yourself against a genocidal regime bent on global conquest? Acceptable. Starting an unprovoked war of agression against a defanged dictator who writes romance novels… and starting this war in such a manner that it destabilizes the country and perhaps the entire region and leads to greater death and pain in the future? Not acceptable. See, idealogues (like you) are dangerous, you’re almost always the most dangerous to those who you’re trying to save. See, if you can ignore the human cost of your actions, then you don’t have to try to do what’s right. All you have to do is scream “Evildoers!” and drop some bombs. That’s called “having to destroy the village in order to save it.” Myself… I’d rather take my chances without such kindness. Thanks though. Really, it’s a sweet gesture. ---
**Author:** ![GIGObuster](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/gigobuster/32/421_2.png) [@GIGObuster](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/GIGObuster)\ **Post date:** [June 21, 2005, 11:17pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/a-second-downing-street-memo/307930/205 "2005-06-21T23:17:05Z")
> [@New Iskander](#): > > Just checking. And there was more to check in the last post that you cowardly avoided you viking melon farmer! \* \* [http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showpost.php?p=6282416&postcount=5](http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showpost.php?p=6282416&postcount=5) ---
**Author:** ![New\_Iskander](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/n/db5fbb/32.png) [@New\_Iskander](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/New_Iskander)\ **Post date:** [June 22, 2005, 12:12am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/a-second-downing-street-memo/307930/206 "2005-06-22T00:12:58Z")
> [@FinnAgain](#): > > Oh pahleeeeeze. Well, it looks like a sure thing now but not everybody thought so, as John Dos Passos described in 1946: [We have swept away Hitlerism, but a great many Europeans feel that the cure has been worse than the disease.](http://www.kultursmog.com/Life-Page01.htm) And to be fair, things were not all that clear cut, as described by Allen Dalles: [In our zone we arrested 70,000 people. There was no such thing as a habeas corpus and there was no forum to which one could apply for a hearing, although later on we did set up a tribunal of sorts.](http://www.foreignaffairs.org/20031101facomment82601/allen-w-dulles/that-was-then-allen-w-dulles-on-the-occupation-of-germany.html?mode=print) ---
**Author:** ![Princhester](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/3e96dc/32.png) [@Princhester](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Princhester)\ **Post date:** [June 22, 2005, 2:03am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/a-second-downing-street-memo/307930/207 "2005-06-22T02:03:24Z")
> [@New Iskander](#): > > GODDAMN! Is that a yes, a no, or another attempt to avoid answering? ---
**Author:** ![FinnAgain](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/finnagain/32/12500_2.png) [@FinnAgain](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/FinnAgain)\ **Post date:** [June 22, 2005, 3:20am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/a-second-downing-street-memo/307930/208 "2005-06-22T03:20:44Z")
No, **NI** , things are almost never cut and dry. The only place absolutes exist is in our heads when we draw up maps and try to ram Reality through them. Reality is messy, chaotic, variform. Yes, it was right to stop Hitler. But at the same time, yes, there were things we did wrong. See, having a good goal _does not_ excuse the crimes commited along the way. We are not Medici Princes. This is how one can say that Sadaam should have been taken out, but that we went about it wrong. This is how one can say that Hitler had to be stopped, but maybe we made mistakes during the course of the war. This is life. It’s messy, it doesn’t always make sense, and sometimes it seems downright counter-intuitive. Drink deep. ---
**Author:** ![New\_Iskander](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/n/db5fbb/32.png) [@New\_Iskander](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/New_Iskander)\ **Post date:** [June 22, 2005, 4:08am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/a-second-downing-street-memo/307930/209 "2005-06-22T04:08:11Z")
FinAgain, That’s all I wanted to here. I knew you had it in you. Why didn’t you say that in the first place? ---
**Author:** ![FinnAgain](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/finnagain/32/12500_2.png) [@FinnAgain](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/FinnAgain)\ **Post date:** [June 23, 2005, 6:33am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/a-second-downing-street-memo/307930/210 "2005-06-23T06:33:29Z")
I did. ---
**Author:** ![EddyTeddyFreddy](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/eddyteddyfreddy/32/18796_2.png) [@EddyTeddyFreddy](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/EddyTeddyFreddy)\ **Post date:** [June 23, 2005, 12:18pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/a-second-downing-street-memo/307930/211 "2005-06-23T12:18:23Z")
There are none so deaf as those who will not hear. ---
**Author:** ![New\_Iskander](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/n/db5fbb/32.png) [@New\_Iskander](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/New_Iskander)\ **Post date:** [June 23, 2005, 2:51pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/a-second-downing-street-memo/307930/212 "2005-06-23T14:51:23Z")
Don’t you start that again! [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/a-second-downing-street-memo/307930.md?page=10)