It seems ironic to me that the fifties are often portrayed as a naive and goody-goody time in American history. It was right after a fierce World-War. Compare the fifties to the twenties and thirties. It seems that war is indeed a way to rid the human psyche of negativity and darkness. Wars are often followed by a lighter period, a renewal. War has been so much a part of history, we can’t just gloss over it as not having a very profound role. War gives men a purpose, we have lost all of the initiation rites that were considered important to make boys into men. Today, and I include myself in this category, adolescence just prolongs itself, and we are never quite sure when we are finally adults. It would be nice to find ways to give a higher purpose to our youth today, without resorting to war. The media shows us what happens when all this built-up energy and anger is bottled-up : movies which get progressively more and more violent. The movies from the fifties are not graphically violent, and yet the war in the forties was brutal.
By the way, I come from Belgium, and I am forever grateful to the intervention of the Allies and really enjoyed all those great war movies in the sixties!
Sly noted:
What does this include, Sly? All the victims of the Holocaust? If so, then I guess my question to you would be: What’s your point? I mean, obviously Hitler’s war was not a good thing (I’m goin’ for the “understatement of the year” award). But it’s not like we had any control over him. So we went to war to help stop him.
The Germans were convinced they were fighting a just war. I think it is very hard to understand what happens to a people’s collective mind during a war. Jung talks about psychic epidemics. The Germans really saw the Jews and the growth of Communism as threats (concerning the Jews, they were deninitely wrong, but it turns out that they may have been right about communism, since half of Europe was occupied by the Soviet Union after it). Haven’t the Americans adopted the same attitude during most of the Cold War, intervening in many places where Communism might get the upper hand?
Quote from a Jew: Conspiracy? What conspiracy? Two Jews can’t even agree when they get together…
regarding the OP:
war is a just another branch of diplomacy. it gets what you want. a simple example already noted is WWII. hitler wanted to take over the world. we didn’t want him to. other branches of diplomacy failed (sure, have the sutedenland. sure, have poland. he’ll stop soon…). so we went to war with him, and won (albeit at great cost). still, it’s better than the alternative.
ellis
sly…what are your own thoughts on this? i’m getting the impression that you think it’s good for nothing, which i completely disagree with.
I’m not asking why do we fight. I’m asking what good comes from it. On the surface war is inevitable. We are a quarrelsome lot. Two kids in a sandbox will fight over a toy the same way that two parents in a toy store on christmas eve will fight over the last tickle-me-elmo.
Hitler wanted to control Europe and the Mediterranean. He wanted to exterminate Jews. Why? Was he crazy? Was he not questioned by his Admirals and Generals? Or were they crazy, too? Surely someone should have known he would be defeated.
“East Asia for Japan” proved to be similarly fatal: Allied (American) occupation, the military demobilized, the empire disbanded and prime minister Tojo convicted and hanged.
At a cost of 45,000,000 lives. What is it good for?
I’m not trying to nitpick, Sly, but, IMO all of the above were good things that came out of the war; for Japan and the rest of the World. Japan was definitely a better place 10 years after the war than it was 10 years before the war.
Perhaps the question you wish to ask is: “Is it worth it?”
Without wars, there would be more than 6 billion of us. I don’t mind if folks in distant lands go tribal once in a while.Some of them seem to need this hatred of a neighbor for their identity.
misanthropic maybe
Oh, I bet a lot of his top military brass knew they would eventually lose.
Perhaps it wasn’t in their best interests to say this to Hitler however.
Same for Japan - many of the generals definately knew that attacking the US was a real big mistake in the long term.
Why does it have to be good for something? It’s just one of those things that happens due to the nature of man. It’s not like all of humanity is a single mind sitting around collectively agreeing to optimize its lot in the world. People have different agendas, different beliefs, they sometimes want what other people have, and sometimes they come to blows over it.
peas on earth
sunbear, I have real bad news for you: as of Oct. 12, 1999, there will be over 6 billion of us.
I’m certain that it is: I remember seeing it in video stores. It was produced by the National Film Board of Canada, and a synopsis is available here. You can order copies if you like, but I read the book published later that’s a narrative of the whole series (titled “War”). Actually, look around the NFB site: they’re planning an online jukebox, and you might be able to see streaming versions of the series.
My mistake, BTW: Gwynn Dyer is an historian.
To quote Bart Simpson, all wars are bad with the following exceptions:
WW2
The American Revolution
THe Star Wars Trilogy
A question that has bugged me for a rather long time is the number of dead from WWII. I’ve seen numbers ranging from 20 million up to 60 million. While I’m sure that the exact total will never be known, is there an “offical” breakdown of casualties of combatants and non-combatants? Also, it is kind of scary but ask people you know how many people died during WWII, you will probably get some frighteningly ignorant responses.
Military Deaths for WWII:
Allies: 8,799,041
Axis: 6,069,723
Estamates for civilian deaths usually come in at about 30,000,000; double that of the total military deaths.