What is this country?

Great Debates
21

I tend to agree, but in the 1940s no-one did, and anachronistic ethics are suspect.

You are misunderstanding me.

It is precisely because Dachau was so horrible that war was necessary. But war is war, and war always involves terrible things (such as Dresden) being done on both sides. Sometimes those are in the way of a horrible calculus – if we destroy this city and its civilians the war will end faster – and sometimes it’s just the natural consequence of terror, innocence and firepower all being in the same place at the same time.

Honestly, if naked dogpiling is worst thing that US troops have done, I’d be amazed. I would assume there has been surrendering Iraqis shot, some civilian deaths that could have been avoided, even some rape and looting. I say that with an immense amount of respect for the US troops; but they are only human, and some of them will not prove up to the task. I frankly don’t know what I’d be like at 19, seperated from my freinds and family, afraid, angry and heavily armed.

To repeat, war is a horrific thing; but it is not the most horrific thing. In WWII, and I believe Iraq, the horrors caused by the war are less than the horrors they ended. The difference is that once upon a time we were able to look at the big picture; in the era of 24 hour news that is hampered, and instead the focus is on what the news stations can sell as controversial and exciting.

Are murders and car accidents the defining events in your hometown’s life? They are according to the local news. Similarly, CNN etc. won’t show any degree of proportionality in covering Iraq, because a few dozen prisoners being abused makes, in their eyes, for a better story than hundreds of schools being opened and thousands of jobs being created. Hannity and Colmes couldn’t debate the latter. There are no “tough questions” to be asked of powerful figures (which make the interviewer look “edgy” and antiauthoritarian).

It is in the nature of ratings-and sales-driven news media to seek out controversy and sensationalism, and to manufacture it if necessary. Hence the relentless bias shown by the media toward what goes wrong and away from what goes right, whether we’re talking about local news or foreign affairs.

If anything, I’d argue that US soldiers today are more noble than those in WWII. They are all volunteers, for one, and owing to superior training and a change in the way militaries think about war, they are much more conscious of things like civilian casualties. What’s changed is our willingness to recognize evil and call it by its name, and acknowledge that when you remove the cancer you get blood on your hands.

22

Actually, in the 1940s, many people most certainly DID agree that attacking civilians was wrong. Area bombing was never a terribly popular technique of war; it was always opposed by a fair number of people.

23

Rephrase: “Attacking civilians was seen as necessary by the vast majority of military planners.”

24

Well, regarding the Dachau vs. Dresden argument, my family, while fleeing Hungary, was stuck in Wurzburg when the British bombed it to the ground and we lost several family friends in concentration camps. I have a different perspective than armchair historians. The U.S. and Allies did not get involved in WWII to free the Jews or destroy concentration camps. That’s historical fact. Once the existence of the camps became known, it reinforced the whole Nazis = evil idea. In my opinion, Dauchau and Dresden were both wartime atrocities. One didn’t lead to the other and vice versa. But that’s the nature of war, right? Morally deplorable acts are committed. Why bother feeling bad about it?

AHunter3 - I have made campaign contributions, plan to vote, and am having my own voter registration drive until Nov. Thanks!

XT - my rose colored glasses are colored by my grandmother’s and father’s stories about American soldiers after the war. So, I guess it’s a family tradition to pass down these rosy stories. I don’t understand how you develop your worldview. The world is throwing is throwing our moral superiority in our teeth and enjoying it? Where do you get your news? Do you know a single individual out in “The World” (is “The World” everyone else but the U.S.?) who has demonstrated this behavior? Afghanistan was a mistake? Afghanistan = country that harbored terrorists who attacked the U.S. There is more just cause to invade Afghanistan than Iraq. Your “cutting and running” comment just reminds me of a bully’s parent’s justifications all bluster and false pride. :rolleyes:

25

Um, I actually TRAVEL to other countries, I actually, like, you know, meet other people from other countries, learn their languages and customs and make those friend type things. How about you hun?

Ya…lots. I was chatting with a female friend from Wales about this just last night via IM. How about you?

Was this directed at me?? I never said or implied Afghanistan was a mistake. My feelings on this are pretty well known, and its just the opposite. I definitely DON’T think Afghanistan was a mistake.

Thats nice. As you don’t know me or anything about me, your observations are undoubtedly vastly valuable. :rolleyes:

-XT

26

That’s what I admire in your country (I’m German - which may or may not excuse my almost funny grammar and spelling).
You really seem to care about freedom. I, too am worried about the ways of the current US-administration, but I have great trust in the American people to make the right choices. Don’t let them take away your freedom - the world needs you.
(bolding mine:)

Fighting with the Allies were Jews and communists (and other victims and/or enemies of the Nazis) that knew very well about the Nazi-crimes. The bombing of German cities - as gruesome as it was - helped to destroy the concentration camps.

I don’t want to hijack this thread and turn it into a Nazi/warcrimes discussion and I tried to keep this short. Sorry.
Why fell bad about it? The murder of millions of jews (and homosexuals, Sinty/Roma, kommunists and others) by the Germans is such a horrible crime that not feeling bad about it is not an option for me. Dachau was not a war crime. The Shoa is not in the nature of war and mor than just another morally deplorable act. I don’t think that’s what you ment - just want to clarifiy my position on that. Maybe that because I’m German and I not only have to live with the ancestors of these criminals - I actually am one myself (an ancestor that is - I’m 32).

I don’t want to hijack this thread and turn it into a Nazi/warcrimes discussion and I tried to keep this short. Sorry.

furt: I tend to agree with most of your post. I do watch CNN occasionally and I see your point. The media in Germany are full of anti-American propaganda so you do not hear much about schools being opened in Iraq here as well.
I’m just not so sure about the last part of your post. The soldiers may be volunteers - it’s just that a lot of them did not volunteer for noble reasons but because they did not see any other job options (not that i think getting food on your table is somehow wrong) and I can’t see superior training in the prison guards (which I think partly are not even army personnel but hired contractors). I also fear the directions from Rumsfeld (regarding the way terror suspects may be treated to get answers out of them) are very helpful in preventing incidents like the one in that hellhole prison.

27

Crap, XT I missed the word “from” in your original post about Afghanistan. Sorry! :smack:
I travel to other countries too plus I have family and colleagues in"The World" who I communicate with. Plus if this whole NE secession thing happens, I’ll be part of “The World”. Sweet! :smiley:

P.S. Please don’t call me “hun” because I find it sexist and demeaning. Thanks!

28

I suppose this depends on what part of the country you are from. But I’ll respect your wishes. :slight_smile:

As to the rest, I have a lot of family in Mexico and came to this country when I was 4 years old. But I travel a lot with my job, so I meet and talk to a lot of folks in other countries. I especially travel a lot to England these days, but lived for years in India and have traveled a lot in Asia.

Just background info FWIW.

-XT

29

AmericanMaid, I think I’ll have to sympathize with ya on this one.

War is a pretty gruesome event, and, at least in my mind, only justifed by two things:
1.) Defense of the country. Though Im not enlisted, I know I would if giving my life meant saving the lives of civilians back home.
2.) Ending severe human rights atrocities. Atrocities presumably worse then losing my life on a battlefield.
If both these criteria are fulfilled, with little to no doubt, I think support for a war is going to be fairly high. If *neither *are fulfilled, Im going to have severe doubts about supporting a war.

Looking back on History, WW2 fulfilled both. We intervened, we saved lives, stopped the concentration camps, and history has been very kind to us for doing so. Probably more so then we could have imagined when the war started. That is why its easy to get rosy eyed, as an American, over WW2. Every life lost seems noble - Especially after we learned about places like Auschwitz.

Fast forward to Afghanistan. I don’t have a site to prove it, but I think the majority of Americans supported this (ongoing) invasion. 9/11 had just happened, the mastermind responsible was living in Afghanistan, and the Taliban wasnt exactly a freedom loving society.

Fast forward to Iraq. Its pretty hard to argue, nowadays, that Iraq posed much of a threat to us. Any hopes of finding WMD are just about gone. Since we can’t justify spilling our blood on defense of the Homeland, instead we’ve gotta concentrate on the fact that we are toppling a dictatorship. Doing the Help the oppressed thing. Which seems rather moot now that members of our state sponsored military have beaten to death and forced fellatio on inmates of a prison that were likely to have been in detention by mistake.

Iraq isn’t anywhere near the end, and mayhaps three decades down the road everything will be peachy keen. ( Im skeptical of that, but anything can happen ). But for now, its becoming harder and harder to justify American lives lost. When a soldier comes back in a bodybag, I can’t really buy the idea that he died to save his country, or she died trying to create a democracy that may very well only end up being a pipedream.

In such situations, I think feeling a bit alienated with your countries goals is only natural. Its not to the point that I would pack up and leave ( I would save that until the bill of rights or constitutional amendments start getting tampered with ). But it ~is~ to the point where im going to pay a lot more attention who im voting for this time around.

30 
Just quick note. Most of the World "community" also felt Afghanistan justified too. Not so with Iraq. 

As a former supporter of the US I too felt "betrayed". Even before Bush many of my friends always took the (over here) commonly held view of US being imperialistic. Having lived abroad and having some american education I felt that this wasn't all warranted (only a bit). That my countrymen had a simplistic view of the situation. We even had a nut case politician here espousing that Nukes = Sovereignty. 

 Post-Bush it seems that having nukes does mean being treated like one of the big boys club... and that I was the defending the wrong position.
31

Yes, pull out and whatever comes to be, so be it. If you read the two links I provided in my post, you’ll find ample reasons as to why we should get out sooner rather than later and why we are never going to succeed “imposing” democracy on a land that doesn’t know what it is and may not want it in the first place. Comparing what happened in Germany 60 years ago ti Iraq today isn’t meaningful. The people in both countries were/are radically different in their world views, their religions, their lifestyles, their governments, etc. And as you mention about Iraq, Germany wasn’t composed of various tribes who historically hate each others guts.

Who was it that appointed the USA as world’s policeman and as the final arbiter of what is right and good? We are not suddenly going to erase all the history of religious and ethnic conflict between tribes in the middle east. Being world policeman is expensive, no one chose us to perform this function and we don’t have the money to spend on this function. We have our own problems that we should be dealing with. If the world wants a a world policeforce, then let all the countries in the world fund it and ensure that it contains members from each and every country.

Is genocide bad? Of course it is. But it has been going on throughout history. It has been a regular occurrence in a number of countries in Africa during the last 10 tens. Why haven’t we sent the troops into these countries to stop it? Why haven’t we done anything about North Korea? Why did we choose Iraq instead? Because it was a bigger problem? Or because it has oil? And isn’t it easier to nip a problem in the bud rather than waiting for it to grow into a big problem? You and others may not be aware of how much genocide there is and has been worldwide. Please review this link:

Genocides, Politicides, and Other Mass Murder Since 1945

Again, no one chose or appointed us to the position of world policeman or “parent” as you say. Where does the authority to do so come from? Because we feel morally superior to everyone else in the world? Given our own history (both past and current), I don’t think we are qualified to be parenting anyone.

Fine, but war and killing to achieve your hypothetical greater good is not the answer. It only creates more problems and greater discord. There are times in the world when we may need to react because a situation is getting out of hand and the political stability of the whole world is at risk. WWII was such a situation. What was currently going on in Iraq was not.

32

Yes, BUT the only reason the USA mobilized to attack Afghanistan and the people supported that decision was retaliation/retribution for 9/11 (the old eye for an eye philosophy). Had 9/11 not happened, there was zero chance that we going to mobilize the troops and spend billions to invade that country, simply because the Taliban were a mean, nasty bunch of SOB’s and were harbo

Yes, BUT the only reason the USA mobilized to attack Afghanistan and the people supported that decision was retaliation/retribution for 9/11 (the old eye for an eye philosophy). Had 9/11 not happened, there was zero chance that we going to mobilize the troops and spend billions to invade that country, simply because the Taliban were a mean, nasty bunch of SOB’s and were harboring known terrorists. Let’s not ascribe great motives in the rolls of history to us that we don’t deserve. All we saw with Afghanistan was reaction, not proactiion because of us holding some idealistic view of what is right or wrong.

Unfortunately, sliding down the slippery slope, Bushco got cocky after Afghanistan. They saw the opportunity to use misdirection and poor evidence to manipulate much of the public and Congress into supporting the incursion into Iraq. Now the piper must be paid.ring known terrorists. Let’s not ascribe great motives in the rolls of history to us that we don’t deserve. All we saw with Afghanistan was reaction, not proactivism because of us holding some idealistic view of what is right or wrong.

Unfortunately, sliding down the slippery slope, Bushco got cocky after Afghanistan. They saw the opportunity to use misdirection and poor evidence to manipulate much of the public and Congress into supporting the incursion into Iraq. Now the piper must be paid.

33

Wow, the hamsters really mangled my post #32! If a mod wouldn’t mind, please feel free to delete post #32.

Now let’s try again (luckily, I always keep a copy in my clipboard program before I post here).

Yes, BUT the only reason the USA mobilized to attack Afghanistan and the people supported that decision was retaliation/retribution for 9/11 (the old eye for an eye philosophy). Had 9/11 not happened, there was zero chance that we going to mobilize the troops and spend billions to invade that country, simply because the Taliban were a mean, nasty bunch of SOB’s and were harboring known terrorists. Let’s not ascribe great motives in the rolls of history to us that we don’t deserve. All we saw with Afghanistan was reaction, not proactiion because of us holding some idealistic view of what is right or wrong.

Unfortunately, sliding down the slippery slope, Bushco got cocky after Afghanistan. They saw the opportunity to use misdirection and poor evidence to manipulate much of the public and Congress into supporting the incursion into Iraq. Now the piper must be paid.

34

I agree that there is no comparison between Germany and Iraq due to their differing populations and history. Germany became unified in the late 1800’s and then got their war on. In the early 20th century, Iraq was in a situation that enabled Sunni and Shias to unite against British rule. Once Iraq became a sovereign monarchy, in 1932, political systems collapsed from the disparate demands of different ethnic/religious groups. Coup after coup occured then the Baathists gained power in the late 60’s. If Iraq had been able to unify under a Baathist leader, then they may have gone the way of Germany. Which is basically what Bushco purported Saddam(Hitler) and Iraq (oppressed people) to be.

How can we build a stable democracy in a country that has been in upheaval for the past century (at least)? Has Bushco ever studied Mideast history? For Christ’s sake I got the above succinct version of Iraqi history within ten minutes of reading! It looks like we’ve turned Iraq into a U.S. mandate that Sunnis and Shias can unite against. I simply just can’t figure out how the White House & Kerry could have thought this folly would be successful. I guess this is the policy we get when we have a C average student as president and a flip-flopping senator. Sigh…

iamme99, I would like to believe that pulling out of Iraq is a good idea but a part of me feels that it would be a very bad idea now. Not because of the whole cutting & running male pride B.S. I think a better idea would be to reinstate the draft and/or rationing - even though it kills me to think this way. Get some spawn of the D.C. chickenhawks on the front line and we’ll see how fast funding for armored humvees gets passed through Congress. If a significant number of Americans have family/friends fighting over in Iraq, maybe it will force people to educate themselves and get involved politically or flee the country to draft dodge.

pilzner, thanks for the sympathy man. Wanna come join the Freedonia movement? :smiley:

XT, thanks!

35

Well considering starting enlisted salary is something like $18, 000, it ain’t that good of an option, though there is some truth to what you say. But the idea that they’re all poor minority kids dying out there is something of a myth; people who join for job-training reasons tend to gravitate toward support roles, whereas combat troops tend to be those who joined for patriotic reasons (or, let’s be honest, the chance to blow stuff up).

Well, sure. But as I’ve already pointed out, there were numerous and far worse things done in WWII, by troops whe were basically given two months of basic, a rifle and told to go storm Normandy. The mere fact that something as relatively harmless as making guys walk around naked with bags over their heads (putting aside the more serious charges of actual torture and assualt for now) makes the news indicates how much things have chaged and how much higher the standards are.

36

And there’s the crux of the biscuit. Those who support this war think that the “stable” status quo, in which oppressive regimes in the middle east breed fundamentalism and anti-Americanism, is exactly what we want to destroy. The desire for “stability” uber alles (which made some sense in the Cold War) is what caused the situation. And since we don’t have the time to wait 50-100 years for the social psychology of the middle east to slowly change, we’re stirring shit up.

I’ve linked to this a number of times on this board because summarizes many of my own thoughts.

37

I don’t think that’s fair. You make it sound like everyone should be international travelers, or that by virtue of your extensive travels you somehow have a better handle on the current political trainwreck than anyone else. I think most people around here try to do their best to be well-rounded, but we can’t all be Christopher Columbus!

38

She asked me where I got the impressions I got about what people in other countries think of us. I simply told her I got those impressions by talking to people from other countries (ok, I was being a bit sarcastic as well because I really didn’t see the point in questioning me on WHERE I got my impressions while not talking about the substance of them).

I’m not saying I have a ‘better handle’ than anyone else. I’m giving my opinion and explaining some of the things that helped form them for me. Just because I talk to people from other countries doesnt meant that they are representative of their country, any more than talking to a friend in New York means you are getting an indepth opinion on what the majority of American’s think.

I’m simply fortunate in the jobs that I’ve been able to travel all over the world and meet some really wonderful people…and a few dipsticks too, as they say on the Straight Dope. Doesn’t mean anything though really…I’m not claiming to be an authority by any means.

-XT