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| Thread: Please explain... |  This thread is pages long: 1 2 3 4 5 6 · «PREV / NEXT» |
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blizzardboy
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posted July 07, 2009 02:16 AM |
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Quote:
World War 2 suited the USA pretty much in the long run. It got to play the good guys for the next 50 years to come, it came to have half (even more) of Europe under its wing, it suffered relatively small human losses compared to other great powers involved, it got to show the world all the powers of their nuclear devastation, it created NATO, and the list goes on. The only downside for them was the Cold War, but it had to happen this way or another.
Also note that, in World War 2, Germany didn't show any pretension to attack America. It was Japan that did it - a country completely previously unrelated to the USA.
Umm? Except over 100 million people died from it?
So the U.S. got to use nukes? How's that an advantage? The Allies killed more civilians firebombing western Germany, but you rarely hear about that, probably because it's convenient to ignore it. You don't need to actually use a weapon to know it's devastation.
And NATO blows.
You seem to confuse my ideology to be solely based on U.S. interests. I don't believe any country should involve itself in outside bloodbaths. If I knew with 100% certainty that the U.S. wouldn't have become a superpower if WWII never happened, I would still prevent WWII from happening.
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baklava
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posted July 07, 2009 02:22 AM |
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Never mind how many people died apart from the USA, I'm talking American interests here.
And using a weapon is not necessary to know its devastation, but it helps. A lot. Especially with the common man; and it was the common men that fought wars back then.
NATO blows and with that I full-heartedly agree but it outlived the Warsaw pact.
My ideology states that no country should involve itself in any bloodbath at all, but at some periods in history (well ALL periods in history) it just doesn't work that way. A country attacks another country and a mind-numbingly complex set of wheels, strings, calculations, threats, pacts, secret deals and God knows what else is set in motion. Sometimes, if a nation does not involve itself in a war raging everywhere around it, it's in even greater danger than if it picked a side.
I'm no supporter of war or any country playing world police. I just realize that countries tend to their own interests first and foremost. And that wars are led because of interest.
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blizzardboy
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posted July 07, 2009 02:23 AM |
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Quote:
Ok, let's play it this way.
Please propose a rational scenario which would bring peace, satisfy both the Allies' territorial holdings and the Central Powers' expansionist ambitions, and prevent any subsequent outburst of war spreading like wildfire in the context of that age. Bear in mind that your scenario has to happen after Austria attacked Serbia, Russia attacked Austria, Germany attacked Russia, and France is preparing to attack Germany.
Alright, I'll make it a bit easier - pretend that, in the scenario, one side wants peace very, very much.
No, I'm not playing. That scenario is far far far too complicated to simulate on an online forum, and while I know my history, I'm not a scholar of WWI, and I doubt you are either.
It's irrelevant to my position if they came to a peace solution or not. It's not an outsider's duty to intervene. The war would have ended eventually; there's not an infinite number of people the governments can send off to die in vain, and I somehow doubt they would have just kept murdering each other until there was nobody left.
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baklava
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posted July 07, 2009 02:28 AM |
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Edited by baklava at 02:31, 07 Jul 2009.
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You're oversimplifying it. I just wanted to show you a glimpse of how complicated it really is.
We're not scholars of WW1, but I'm pretty sure that rulers of that time were. They did what they thought suited their countries and interests best. If I had to point a finger, I'd point it at the central powers, but they too believed they were doing what they had to do. The American government of that time knew the situation far better than the two of us - it gave its best shot to avoid intervention, but then decided that it'd be for the best of the USA. So it intervened.
If it hadn't, the world map would probably be far different now, and probably for the USA's worse. That's at least what its government thought when it declared the war.
And as for your final sentence, I somehow doubt they wouldn't. People somehow doubted that Europe would do such a thing to itself. Some doubted that trench warfare, gas, tanks etc. were real. That people could do such a thing to themselves.
But surprise surprise.
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blizzardboy
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posted July 07, 2009 02:39 AM |
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Quote:
You're oversimplifying it. I just wanted to show you a glimpse of how complicated it really is.
We're not scholars of WW1, but I'm pretty sure that rulers of that time were. They did what they thought suited their countries and interests best. If I had to point a finger, I'd point it at the central powers, but they too believed they were doing what they had to do. The American government of that time knew the situation far better than the two of us - it gave its best shot to avoid intervention, but then decided that it'd be for the best of the USA. So it intervened.
If it hadn't, the world map would probably be far different now, and probably for the USA's worse. That's at least what its government thought when it declared the war.
Do we even know if it was ultimately for the U.S.'s benefit? What if the dollar crashes into oblivion a few years from now as a result of it's over-zealous actions? And has the U.S.'s superpower status benefited the American people? The U.S. was a modern country before it became a military superpower, and it probably would still be a modern country if it never became one. The American people would be just as well cared for; probably better cared for.
Sure, all the leaders almost assuredly thought they were doing what was best. Hitler thought he was doing what was best. But intentions do not change reality. Actions change reality.
Quote:
And as for your final sentence, I somehow doubt they wouldn't. People somehow doubted that Europe would do such a thing to itself. Some doubted that trench warfare, gas, tanks etc. were real. That people could do such a thing to themselves.
But surprise surprise.
Oh well. That sucks, but it still wasn't the U.S.'s job to clean up the vomit.
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DagothGares
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posted July 07, 2009 02:45 AM |
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Well, actually, maybe it would've been better for the USA if they sticked with their Monroe-principle (or was it doctrine?)
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baklava
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posted July 07, 2009 02:50 AM |
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If the dollar crashes tomorrow it'll hardly be cause of World War 2 but never mind.
Maybe you're right. Maybe it shouldn't have entered the war. But I for one don't mind that they did.
Had the central powers won, my country would not just be ran over, split and destroyed, but the Germans would lay all blame for the war on it. Besides, Austrians killed off quite a part of my family back then. God knows if they would've finished the job if they hung around for a while longer.
No matter how screwed up the situation's now, at least I don't have to learn freaking German.  My life motto.
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DagothGares
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posted July 07, 2009 02:51 AM |
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Hmm, I do...
EDIT: in hindsight, I'm still glad France exists and that I can speak French to a certain degree.
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blizzardboy
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posted July 07, 2009 02:59 AM |
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Quote:
If the dollar crashes tomorrow it'll hardly be cause of World War 2 but never mind.
Maybe you're right. Maybe it shouldn't have entered the war. But I for one don't mind that they did.
Had the central powers won, my country would not just be ran over, split and destroyed, but the Germans would lay all blame for the war on it. Besides, Austrians killed off quite a part of my family back then. God knows if they would've finished the job if they hung around for a while longer.
No matter how screwed up the situation's now, at least I don't have to learn freaking German. My life motto.
I suppose I can hardly blame you for supporting U.S. intervention. It's cool and hip to complain about American intervention, but when it involves your own back yard, it suddenly becomes perfectly okay. Very convenient, but not very consistent.
There's only 2 wars in U.S. history I support, and WWI easily isn't one of them.
Ultimately, I don't pretend to know what would have happened if WWI went differently. But I believe by probability that both the U.S. and the world would be better off, and WWII wouldn't have happened.
And I really like the German langauge, and cuisine
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DagothGares
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posted July 07, 2009 03:07 AM |
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well, there's a difference between the WWI interference by US and the intereference by US-troops in Irag and Vietnam...
So we're not that hypocrytical.
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mvassilev
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posted July 07, 2009 03:13 AM |
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blizzardboy:
Wait, I was referring to WWII in that post.
Bak:
Quote:
If the dollar crashes tomorrow it'll hardly be cause of World War 2 but never mind.
It could lead to a worldwide economic collapse. The last major economic collapse led to the Great Depression, Hitler, WWII, and the Cold War. Millions of people died and even more were oppressed because of the idiocy of the gold standard! (As an econ major, this makes me really mad.)
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blizzardboy
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posted July 07, 2009 03:21 AM |
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well, there's a difference between the WWI interference by US and the intereference by US-troops in Irag and Vietnam...
So we're not that hypocrytical.
The difference is that Iraq wasn't in Europe, and WWI was. That's the only significant difference. Both of them were cases where the U.S. went in as some kind of white knight, only to unintentionally screw things up more in the long run. It's like when Lancelot went charging into the wedding ceremony in Monty Python:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=l61JVSFhrKY
And at the end of the quest, Lancelot didn't even get a hot girl. Nobody wins.
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blizzardboy
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posted July 07, 2009 03:27 AM |
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Quote:
blizzardboy:
Wait, I was referring to WWII in that post.
Well that fixes my confusion about the "bombing" comment. I thought maybe some naval bombing went on that I didn't know about.
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DagothGares
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posted July 07, 2009 03:44 PM |
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Quote:
The difference is that Iraq wasn't in Europe, and WWI was. That's the only significant difference.
And Americza didn't occupy a developping nation, then.
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angelito
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posted July 07, 2009 03:54 PM |
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And where was Saddam Hussein during WW2?
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JollyJoker
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posted July 07, 2009 04:19 PM |
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Right.
Saddam was a bad guy because we was a Dictator who ruled with hard and absolute hand and is directly and indirectly resposnsible for the death of thousands of people.
Big bad guys usually don't die because they are big bad guys, though. They die because they manage to bully themselves on the wrong side of a bigger guy, bad or not.
http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2008/01/24/60minutes/main3749494.shtml
Pretty interesting read, for more than one reason.
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Darkshadow
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posted July 07, 2009 04:52 PM |
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Please explain...
Why is the original track of thread in 5000 km to south?
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mvassilev
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posted July 07, 2009 05:48 PM |
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Very interesting, JJ. Quote:
It is an accomplishment made possible by Piro’s language skills, Persichini says, noting that out of 10,000 FBI agents, only about 50 speak Arabic.
Wow. (Although I suppose that's more the CIA's job.)
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xerdux
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posted July 07, 2009 09:05 PM |
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In the swedish city of Södertälje (60,000 people) there are more Iraqi immigrants then in the ENTIRE United States.
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Doomforge
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posted July 07, 2009 10:15 PM |
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Sure Xerox. And in the Polish village of Malichy (4000 inhabiants), there are more Chinese guys than in China.
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