# Why so Little Hate for the US Soldiers? **URL:** \ **Category:** Great Debates\ **Created:** [July 3, 2011, 4:47pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-so-little-hate-for-the-us-soldiers/587727 "2011-07-03T16:47:13Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 12
**Author:** ![devilsknew](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/4da419/32.png) [@devilsknew](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/devilsknew)\ **Post date:** [July 9, 2011, 4:04am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-so-little-hate-for-the-us-soldiers/587727/221 "2011-07-09T04:04:55Z")
> [@Qin\_Shi\_Huangdi](#): > > Indeed the people we are fighting in the Middle East are more accurately fascists. No It’s a war of Theocrats vs. neo-fascist- theocrats fighting against the same God. More accurately it is fanaticist vs. fanaticist. Don’t seem that many just participants… they are all left hand black…against only the most biased of dogmas each way… it seems like we have almost emboggened us to that insane feud that has been going on in the mid-east for most of recorded history. ---
**Author:** ![Qin\_Shi\_Huangdi](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/q/f04885/32.png) [@Qin\_Shi\_Huangdi](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Qin_Shi_Huangdi)\ **Post date:** [July 9, 2011, 4:07am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-so-little-hate-for-the-us-soldiers/587727/222 "2011-07-09T04:07:58Z")
> [@devilsknew](#): > > No It’s a war of Theocrats vs. neo-fascist- theocrats fighting against the same God. More accurately it is fanaticist vs. fanaticist. Don’t seem that many just participants… they are all left hand black…against only the most biased of dogmas each way… it seems like we have almost emboggened us to that insane feud that has been going on in the mid-east for most of recorded history. Yes because we throw acid in the face of girls who go to school and stone adulterers. :rolleyes: ---
**Author:** ![devilsknew](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/4da419/32.png) [@devilsknew](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/devilsknew)\ **Post date:** [July 9, 2011, 4:11am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-so-little-hate-for-the-us-soldiers/587727/223 "2011-07-09T04:11:42Z")
What? I should bring up puppy killers and waterboards?! In my best Gleason. ---
**Author:** ![devilsknew](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/4da419/32.png) [@devilsknew](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/devilsknew)\ **Post date:** [July 9, 2011, 4:13am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-so-little-hate-for-the-us-soldiers/587727/224 "2011-07-09T04:13:04Z")
Meh… fanaticists in every sect. As I commented on. ---
**Author:** ![Qin\_Shi\_Huangdi](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/q/f04885/32.png) [@Qin\_Shi\_Huangdi](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Qin_Shi_Huangdi)\ **Post date:** [July 9, 2011, 4:13am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-so-little-hate-for-the-us-soldiers/587727/225 "2011-07-09T04:13:13Z")
> [@devilsknew](#): > > What? I should bring up puppy killers and waterboards?! In my best Gleason. Yes because waterboarding is so comparable to indiscrimnate mass murder of civilians. :rolleyes: ---
**Author:** ![devilsknew](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/4da419/32.png) [@devilsknew](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/devilsknew)\ **Post date:** [July 9, 2011, 4:14am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-so-little-hate-for-the-us-soldiers/587727/226 "2011-07-09T04:14:27Z")
Is one stoning worth a B-2 squadron silent bombing? What are you willing to trade? How much death will satisfy your venegence? ---
**Author:** ![tomndebb](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/b9e5f3/32.png) [@tomndebb](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/tomndebb)\ **Post date:** [July 9, 2011, 4:19am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-so-little-hate-for-the-us-soldiers/587727/227 "2011-07-09T04:19:08Z")
> [@Qin\_Shi\_Huangdi](#): > > Indeed the people we are fighting in the Middle East are more accurately fascists. Not really. There are autocrats and theocrats and old fashioned despots in that region, but none of the countries or political movements against whom we are fighting, (or for whom we are fighting), actually match any serious definition of fascism. I’m really not sure what devilsknew and you are rambling on about, but neither of you are actually much on topic for this thread, at this point, so much as just hurling barbs at each others’ opinions. ---
**Author:** ![Qin\_Shi\_Huangdi](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/q/f04885/32.png) [@Qin\_Shi\_Huangdi](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Qin_Shi_Huangdi)\ **Post date:** [July 9, 2011, 4:19am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-so-little-hate-for-the-us-soldiers/587727/228 "2011-07-09T04:19:20Z")
> [@devilsknew](#): > > Is one stoning worth a B-2 squadron silent bombing? What are you willing to trade? How much death will satisfy your venegence? The US does not bomb for vengence, it does so carefully to root out terrorists and those of that ilk. ---
**Author:** ![devilsknew](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/4da419/32.png) [@devilsknew](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/devilsknew)\ **Post date:** [July 9, 2011, 4:20am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-so-little-hate-for-the-us-soldiers/587727/229 "2011-07-09T04:20:52Z")
> [@Qin\_Shi\_Huangdi](#): > > The US does not bomb for vengence, it does so carefully to root out terrorists and those of that ilk. So you claim, untruthfully, that the U.S. incurs no “collateral” damage? ---
**Author:** ![Qin\_Shi\_Huangdi](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/q/f04885/32.png) [@Qin\_Shi\_Huangdi](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Qin_Shi_Huangdi)\ **Post date:** [July 9, 2011, 4:22am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-so-little-hate-for-the-us-soldiers/587727/230 "2011-07-09T04:22:45Z")
> [@devilsknew](#): > > So you claim, untruthfully, that the U.S. incurs no “collateral” damage? So we shouldn’t wage war because there might be collateral damage? ---
**Author:** ![devilsknew](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/4da419/32.png) [@devilsknew](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/devilsknew)\ **Post date:** [July 9, 2011, 4:29am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-so-little-hate-for-the-us-soldiers/587727/231 "2011-07-09T04:29:39Z")
We shouldn’t wage war on bullshit terms. Period. ---
**Author:** ![Dissonance](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/85f322/32.png) [@Dissonance](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Dissonance)\ **Post date:** [July 9, 2011, 4:55am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-so-little-hate-for-the-us-soldiers/587727/232 "2011-07-09T04:55:16Z")
> [@Qin\_Shi\_Huangdi](#): > > The US did not as a matter of official policy sponser mass murder of civilians. (BTW Hiroshima was the headquarters of the 2nd Army) This is as much of an absurdity as **gonzo’s** attempt to make the Allies and the Axis moral equals. Possibly more so since you used to call yourself Curtis LeMay, so you can’t possibly be ignorant about the aims and effects of Allied strategic bombing during WW2. What do you imagine the actual Curtis LeMay’s goal was in shifting from high altitude HE day bombing of Japanese cities to low level night incendiary raids was? It was to set fire to all of those paper and wood houses in Japan, and the civilians inside them. As you are no doubt already aware, it was [quite effective](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bombing_of_Tokyo) > [@](#): > > The first raid using low-flying B-29s carrying incendiary bombs to drop on Tokyo was in February 1945 when 174 B-29s destroyed around one square mile (3 km²) of the city.[citation needed] Changing their tactics to expand the coverage and increase the damage, 335 B-29s took off[3] to raid on the night of 9–10 March, with 279 of them[3] dropping around 1,700 tons of bombs. Fourteen B-29s were lost.[3] Approximately 16 square miles (41 km²) of the city were destroyed and some 100,000 people are estimated to have died in the resulting firestorm, more than the immediate deaths of either the Hiroshima or Nagasaki atomic bombs.[4][5] The US Strategic Bombing Survey later estimated that nearly 88,000 people died in this one raid, 41,000 were injured, and over a million residents lost their homes. The Tokyo Fire Department estimated a higher toll: 97,000 killed and 125,000 wounded. The Tokyo Metropolitan Police Department established a figure of 124,711 casualties including both killed and wounded and 286,358 buildings and homes destroyed. Richard Rhodes, historian, put deaths at over 100,000, injuries at a million and homeless residents at a million.[6] You do no favor to the nobility of the Allies vis a vis the Axis by lying about how horrible the war was, or trying to deny that the mass murder of civilians is a goal in total war. ---
**Author:** ![Kobal2](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/kobal2/32/20_2.png) [@Kobal2](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Kobal2)\ **Post date:** [July 9, 2011, 7:07am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-so-little-hate-for-the-us-soldiers/587727/233 "2011-07-09T07:07:45Z")
> [@Qin\_Shi\_Huangdi](#): > > The US did not as a matter of official policy sponser mass murder of civilians. (BTW Hiroshima was the headquarters of the 2nd Army) Dresden and Hamburg would like a word with you. ---
**Author:** ![Ibn\_Warraq](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/i/e19b73/32.png) [@Ibn\_Warraq](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ibn_Warraq)\ **Post date:** [July 9, 2011, 3:09pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-so-little-hate-for-the-us-soldiers/587727/234 "2011-07-09T15:09:15Z")
> [@tomndebb](#): > > Not really. There are autocrats and theocrats and old fashioned despots in that region, but none of the countries or political movements against whom we are fighting, (or for whom we are fighting), actually match any serious definition of fascism. > > I’m really not sure what devilsknew and you are rambling on about, but neither of you are actually much on topic for this thread, at this point, so much as just hurling barbs at each others’ opinions. While I think most of the political movements in the Middle East defy the Left-Right paradigm, I don’t think it’s unfair to compare the Ba’athists of Syria or Saddam’s Iraq to fascists, though they always insisted they were “radical socialist republics”. Admittedly, we’re not really fighting Syria. ---
**Author:** ![Qin\_Shi\_Huangdi](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/q/f04885/32.png) [@Qin\_Shi\_Huangdi](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Qin_Shi_Huangdi)\ **Post date:** [July 9, 2011, 3:24pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-so-little-hate-for-the-us-soldiers/587727/235 "2011-07-09T15:24:42Z")
> [@Dissonance](#): > > This is as much of an absurdity as **gonzo’s** attempt to make the Allies and the Axis moral equals. Possibly more so since you used to call yourself Curtis LeMay, so you can’t possibly be ignorant about the aims and effects of Allied strategic bombing during WW2. What do you imagine the actual Curtis LeMay’s goal was in shifting from high altitude HE day bombing of Japanese cities to low level night incendiary raids was? It was to set fire to all of those paper and wood houses in Japan, and the civilians inside them. As you are no doubt already aware, it was [quite effective](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bombing_of_Tokyo) > > You do no favor to the nobility of the Allies vis a vis the Axis by lying about how horrible the war was, or trying to deny that the mass murder of civilians is a goal in total war. In Japan, the factories and other manufacturing centres were spread out, thus any attempt to hit them resulted in destruction of the whole city. ---
**Author:** ![Kobal2](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/kobal2/32/20_2.png) [@Kobal2](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Kobal2)\ **Post date:** [July 9, 2011, 3:44pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-so-little-hate-for-the-us-soldiers/587727/236 "2011-07-09T15:44:35Z")
Yeah, I mean, it’s not like they could stop dropping bombs when they weren’t above factories. Makes sense. BTW, bombing war factories ? _That’s still blowing up civilians_. ---
**Author:** ![RaleighRally](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/ed655f/32.png) [@RaleighRally](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/RaleighRally)\ **Post date:** [July 9, 2011, 4:26pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-so-little-hate-for-the-us-soldiers/587727/237 "2011-07-09T16:26:26Z")
> [@Musicat](#): > > There is some truth to Commissar’s post. > > I was in the military during the Vietnam era, and while I was never spat on or derided as a baby-killer, I wasn’t going to walk unescorted and unarmed thru Berkeley or Haight-Ashbury in uniform, either. > > However, I did walk there in mufti. The only time I ever dressed in uniform in public was when I wanted to save 50% on a plane ticket and that was a requirement (a mil ID wasn’t sufficient). Are you really a Vietnam-vet? There are no other veterans that I respect as much as the Vietnam veterans. You did an amazing job in preventing the spread of Communism throughout Asia and maybe as far as Australia/NZ. It is not like the fools of WW2 who paved the way for economic Marxism in half of Europe and [cultural Marxism](http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showthread.php?t=611132) in the other half. - ‘This isn’t the Britain we fought for,’ say the ‘unknown warriors’ of WWII\* ['This isn't the Britain we fought for,' say the 'unknown warriors' of WWII | Daily Mail Online](http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-1229643/This-isnt-Britain-fought-say-unknown-warriors-WWII.html) ---
**Author:** ![Dissonance](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/85f322/32.png) [@Dissonance](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Dissonance)\ **Post date:** [July 9, 2011, 7:47pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-so-little-hate-for-the-us-soldiers/587727/238 "2011-07-09T19:47:21Z")
> [@Qin\_Shi\_Huangdi](#): > > In Japan, the factories and other manufacturing centres were spread out, thus any attempt to hit them resulted in destruction of the whole city. Oh really? Any attempt resulted in the destruction of the whole city? You do know how ridiculous that sounds, right? What I imagine you are trying to get at is that ~ half of the light industry in Japan was interspersed in residential areas, and that lighting them, their workers, their workers families, the guy who makes the worker’s lunch, the guy who makes the worker’s lunch’s family, etc. on fire would hurt the heavy industries they fed. That is total war, where the targeting of civilians is done. You don’t get to light 100,000 people on fire and burn half of a city to the ground and claim collateral damage. I don’t even get why you are trying to deny the reality of what was done. Those who did it were under no illusions about what they were doing. Here’s a bit from the [Strategic Bombing Survey](http://www.anesi.com/ussbs01.htm#taaatjhi), note the bolded bits: > [@](#): > > On 9 March 1945, a basic revision in the method of B-29 attack was instituted. It was decided to bomb the four principal Japanese cities at night from altitudes averaging 7,000 feet. Japanese weakness in night fighters and antiaircraft made this program feasible. Incendiaries were used instead of high-explosive bombs and the lower altitude permitted a substantial increase in bomb load per plane. One thousand six hundred and sixty-seven tons of bombs were dropped on Tokyo in the first attack. The chosen areas were saturated. Fifteen square miles of Tokyo’s most densely populated area were burned to the ground. The weight and intensity of this attack caught the Japanese by surprise. **No subsequent urban area attack was equally destructive.** Two days later, an attack of similar magnitude on Nagoya destroyed 2 square miles. In a period of 10 days starting 9 March, a total of 1,595 sorties delivered 9,373 tons of bombs against Tokyo, Nagoya, Osake, and Kobe destroying 31 square miles of those cities at a cost of 22 airplanes. \*\*The generally destructive effect of incendiary attacks against Japanese cities had been demonstrated. \*\* > > **Thereafter, urban area attacks alternated with visual and radar attacks against selected industrial or military targets.** Urban area attacks, and destructive effect against Japanese cities. Not factories, not industries, the target of the attacks were the cities, the urban parts specifically. ---
**Author:** ![Musicat](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/musicat/32/20189_2.png) [@Musicat](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Musicat)\ **Post date:** [July 9, 2011, 8:13pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-so-little-hate-for-the-us-soldiers/587727/239 "2011-07-09T20:13:37Z")
> [@RaleighRally](#): > > Are you really a Vietnam-vet? There are no other veterans that I respect as much as the Vietnam veterans. You did an amazing job in preventing the spread of Communism throughout Asia and maybe as far as Australia/NZ. It is not like the fools of WW2 who paved the way for economic Marxism in half of Europe and [cultural Marxism](http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showthread.php?t=611132) in the other half. Yeah, I can take credit for all that. It worked exactly as planned. ---
**Author:** ![gonzomax](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/g/e8c25b/32.png) [@gonzomax](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/gonzomax)\ **Post date:** [July 9, 2011, 8:45pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-so-little-hate-for-the-us-soldiers/587727/240 "2011-07-09T20:45:44Z")
> [@Qin\_Shi\_Huangdi](#): > > It would be a kangaroo court obviously. The US did not as a matter of official policy sponser mass murder of civilians. (BTW Hiroshima was the headquarters of the 2nd Army) The winner makes the rules. We tortured and killed plenty of captured enemies. In Nam we wiped out villages and burned down farm land . Ever hear of Naphalm? [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-so-little-hate-for-the-us-soldiers/587727.md?page=11) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-so-little-hate-for-the-us-soldiers/587727.md?page=13)