We attacked and destroyed a Japanese midget submarine in Pearl Harbor early Dec 7. Therefore, we fired the first shots.
Of course, the Japanese planes were already on their way.
The planes were going to turn around. They were just cover for the sub which was on a mission to study underwater plants. The were going to use the plants to make a peace offering basket.
Look at all the history we have behind us. Look at how all the wars turned out. Look at how futile some were. Look at all the wasted lives and destroyed resources. Look at all the misery they cause for both sides, even the “just” ones.
How can any president who knows all this be so eager to fight and sacrifice someone else at the drop of a hat? Sure, self-defense – if the unwashed, saber-rattling rabble are at our shores, that’s one thing. But manufacturing a cause (e.g., domino theory) or jumping to poorly-supported conclusions (e.g., Iraq threatens us with WMDs) to justify a war should be something that we have matured away from. Can’t we rise above all this and learn from history?
Those who forget the past are condemmed…
If war is the father of invention then perhaps the current ones are meant to inspire the next great tech boom. As long as silly theories are flying around…
No, no, no. The submarines were there to protect the whales from early American sonar experiments. They failed, the world’s whale population was maddened to a condition now popularly known as “rabies of the sea”, and the Japanese whaling ships, originally intended as floating whale hospitals, have been reluctantly mercy-killing them ever since.
And then mercy-eating them.
- The last slaves free under the 1817 law got their freedom in 1827. And the Dutch had slaves in almost all the colonies they set up, not just New Amsterdam. Somebody’s got to do the work.
SoP - Keeeee-ah-RIST, if I started a thread every time some half-baked noodle-brained numbnut made an idiotic rant, I…well, let’s just say that $7.49 would be an even bigger bargain than it is now. 
What exactly are you arguing here? That some random guy who made a poster got it wrong? Fine. I agree. You’re absolutely right. There are times when war is justifiable. Now, if you have some insight as to how this in ANY way mitigates any aspect of the ungodly cockup that is our current Iraq adventure, from the lies about WMDs and dire terrorist threats to the costs in money and lives to how the Iraqis would receive us to how this wasn’t about giving Halliburton a license to print money to the shamefully underequipped soldiers to the Family Guy-esque farces of the forming of the new government and Saddam’s execution to the unmitigated idiocy of “the next 6 months” to the civil war that’s broken out to how many Iraqis are without clean water or electricity to how billions and billions of dollars and thousands and thousands of lives continue to get poured into this morass, on and on and on, with no end in sight, I’d like to hear it.
You will stop hearing about this Iraq nightmare when it’s over. No sooner. And gazing wistfully into the past won’t do jack.
Yep, that’s us. Totally culpable.
I’m sure you’ll be along to point out the failings of every other nation in the history of humanity that has done the exact same things, right?
I’ll be over here, holding my breath.
We claim to be different. We claim a higher calling. Perhaps they find other justifications,but we sell ourselves a bunch of lies. I guess I am one of the few that really thinks we should try to do the right thing. I can not justify our incursions . I wish you guys would not defend these wars as just state business.
I hate that we went into Iraq. It is our failing completely unrelated to the actions of nations throughout history. We did not have to do it. We could been better than that.
All Hail! The Prophecy of Post #23 has come true!
We do claim a higher calling, and no nation on Earth beats themselves over the head with every single instance of issues involving life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness like we do. Realpolitik aside, it seems we’ve walked the line between Utopia and hypocrisy all our days.
Tell it, Brother!
Bookkeeper U.E.
Our country is now geared to an arms economy which was bred in.war hysteria and nurtured upon incessant propaganda of fear .
gen, Douglas MacArthur
It is not new.