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08-11-2010, 06:24 AM
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Furthermore your position that "The goal of war is to end it quickly". Well that is true generally speaking... but not at any cost. Speaking of morals. You and Dogsbody have been arguing a relativistic position claiming that the times in which the bombs were dropped were different times with different realities therefore different morals. However, even during the time, Einstein and other scientists petitioned the American government not to continue with the Manhattan project not to mention certain officials were urging the president to negotiate with the Japanese to end the war rather than drop the bomb so to even use relativistic arguments kinda fails ( I have been doing a bit more research since this discussion started that is why I didnt mention it earlier ) Finally... I had to laugh at your "Pax Americana".... you live in a fantasy land. Not only are you trying to sell me your American historical revisionist argument (and people say Japan have history problems  ) you have justified it with further revisionism by making out the Romans as some sort of Peace loving empire.The truth is that if America did that it would get its butt kicked. America is the most powerful country in the world but even it knows that it cant take on the world. Furthermore.... an adoption of "Pax Americana" would isolate America as it would undermine the one thing America has that is more powerful than its military might. Americas "soft power" as we say in International Relations is its ideology of "freedom" "human rights" and "liberty" via its constitution as well as its economy which is RELIANT on the world. It is from this moral platform which America has "supposedly" stood for (I say supposedly because anyone that knows the history of the Cold War knows that it hasnt) that I use to judge that the dropping of the bombs on Hiroshima and Nagasaki were immoral. For America to defend the decision is hypocritical of the "supposed" ideals they stand for. Also according to your argument.. shall we end Iraq and Afghanistan as quickly as possible at any cost? 
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08-11-2010, 01:07 PM
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08-11-2010, 01:27 PM
This is still going on? Either I've got ADHD, or people keep taking the bait to keep this going.
If you want an idea of war, you can either see it first hand, or even second hand. Either way it will change your life, and I trust me on that call. I've spent time on the old battle fields of WW2, that were fought across the pacific. I've even seen the results of cargo, many, many years after the war, after the ship that was carrying was sunk - and then later broke free of its moorings. Especially mustard. Give it a few years to get nasty and a normal jar of mustard can cause some very serious injuries and bad burns to skin. I can't eat mustard these days. Those who want to know where I spent a bit of my life, look to the text books. If you're an Aussie, Yank, Kiwi, Japanese or Fijian, I have stepped a few steps in the footsteps of your forefathers. I've even got my noggin in an old WWII Japanese tank somewhere. Peacekeeping is bad enough, and war would be even worse. As for the university students and graduates who claim to know everything, and think they understand conflict. Well, I could make a comment about this, but it would only make them upset. Additionally, Ryzorian, do not get me started on 'Pax Americana'. Especially when it comes to the MacArthur mentality of thought.
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08-12-2010, 04:06 AM
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Experience is as important as analysis... but it doesnt trump analysis. The argument is a common one. Those that have no experience have no sense of the reality of the conflict which is true to an extent. But it can also work the other way when it comes to discussion of morality in that that those that have experience are TAINTED with the reality of it.
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08-12-2010, 05:28 AM
Nah, it wasn't aimed at you. If it was, I would have made it direct, so I apologise that it came across incorrectly, and reading back over it, it certainly is not well worded at all.
I was actually getting at 'war is a terrible thing, it's not nice and the results hang around for years to come. To sit back and look at pictures is different to seeing the results with your own eyes'. I am quite thankful that I've never had to see anything that terrible. As for the bomb being dropped is good or bad, I actually lean towards that it wasn't needed. Allegations that Japan was close to surrendering before the bomb was dropped comes to mind. From what I have read, is that their Navy and air force were essentially ineffective in 1945. Something that is overlooked, though matches the scale of destruction, is the firebombing of Tokyo in March, 1945. 100,000 casualties, though achieved with a considerable number of aircraft. I do believe that given time, the Japanese would have surrendered on their own. Given the factors that they were effectively blockaded in, combined with dwindling oil supplies and starvation among the population. As well as intercepted reports that there was an intent to surrender. Admiral William D. Leahy had apparently said, 'It is my opinion that the use of this barbarous weapon at Hiroshima and Nagasaki was of no material assistance in our war against Japan. The Japanese were already defeated and ready to surrender because of the effective sea blockade and the successful bombing with conventional weapons.' It is taken from the book, I Was There. Another good quote comes from Herbert Hoover, when addressing President Truman of the United States of America; 'I am convinced that if you, as President, will make a shortwave broadcast to the people of Japan - tell them they can have their Emperor if they surrender, that it will not mean unconditional surrender except for the militarists - you'll get a peace in Japan - you'll have both wars over.' I do have to actually ask, were there more circumstances behind it? I honestly don't know, but as I said earlier in this post, I do strongly believe the bombing was bad and unneeded.
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08-12-2010, 08:48 AM
Oh I see..
Well I am glad that you see things similarly to me.  I will say that the true horror of the bombs was not the initial casualties which, when compared to the firebombings were low (of course it was still a lot of people). It was the horror felt by the radiation and fallout which contributed to babies dying or being birthed with horrendous defects for the decades to come.
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08-13-2010, 02:14 AM
No Rome wasn't "peace loveing", they had peace because everyone else was afraid of them. However, dureing that time period, culture advanced by leaps and bounds. Science, art, music, technology, everything everyone considers" civilizations progress" is achieved through empires. It's a sort of by product of empires, you don't get these massive jumps in culture without empires...you just have dark ages. Empires establish stablity, through that stability comes inovation, art, music, medicine.
I'm not rewriteing history with "Pax Americana"..I'm saying that's what we should be doing now. It's how we should run our diplomatic responses. I'm not relatively speaking persay about the bombs and those being different times. Like I said, to me they are simply tools, to use as required.. Peace through strength doesn't mean your world cop trying to make everyone play nice, it means people play nice because you'll wipe them off the earth if they don't. Peace only survives because of war, it's that threat of all out war, that keeps the peace. What I did mean is that in those days, the US population was not going to except anything other than unconditional surrender. Also there are rumer's that FDR wanted Japan punished severally for Pearl Harbor. True or not I can't say, but the end results speak volumes.
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08-13-2010, 10:49 AM
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America is not in a position where it could employ Pax Americana even if it wanted to. In fact, only the crazies actually believe this... Look at how your last president (George W Bush) not only lowered the image of the US in the world, engaged it in 2 land wars that have WEAKENED it and its allies using a more heavy handed approach. (America would be in a much better position to deal with NK had they not already stretched their forces too thin and had not lost the moral high ground which it gave away with its invasion of Iraq which defied Intl law). Not to mention how he jeapordized its economy while doing so, which is the pillar that holds up the pedestal on which your precious "US military might" rests. Also look at how Obama, despite his best intentions, doesnt seem to be bringing it back anytime soon. Furthermore... the Roman Empire eventually fell. If America tries to maintain its security via overwhelming force it will fall too.
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08-13-2010, 04:58 PM
Interesting that somehow George Bush is again responsible. People think that he is responsible for the collapse of the banking industry, which lead to a worldwide recession. The banking collapse was caused by the burst of the housing bubble, which was fueled by easily obtained credit. Credit was easily obtained due to the Equal Lending Act, which was a product of the Carter administration of the 1970's. Further deregulation of the banks, which occurred before George Bush was elected allowed mortgages to be traded a securities. This recipe for disaster began brewing long before the year 2000.
If you want to go back farther, the present economic crisis is more firmly rooted in Nixon's taking America off the gold standard in 1972, which turned American money into the intrinsically valueless "currency" which the rest of the world used. Currency is easily manipulated by governments and banks (which is why they use it), but "money" (gold or silver) is not. As for the "illegal war", the definition of "legal" is relative, isn't it? Pot is legal in Amsterdam, but not America. America is not a signatory to the World Court, so the World Court has no jurisdiction over any action America takes. America's chief intelligence directors prior to the second gulf war were appointed by Bill Clinton. Bill Clinton and Hillary Clinton both gave speeches prior to the 2000 elections which condemned and harped on the dangers of Saddam Hussein's WMD programs, so GWB doesn't get all the fault here; his choices were made with the information he had available at the time. As for spreading US forces too thin, there are three Ohio class submarines in East Asia right now, each armed with more than 150 Tomahawk missiles. Armed as such, any one of these submarines is the equal of all non-US navies in the world combined, and let us not forget that there is also a US aircraft carrier group sailing between Japan and Korea as I write, and a US carrier group is far more powerful than an Ohio class submarine. And, in case you aren't aware, the US land forces based in Japan and Korea are more or less at the same levels they have always been. Did Einstein really try to stop the Manhattan Project? I haven't seen anything left in writing to that effect. It is said that he expressed regret when the bombs when they were dropped on Japan, but he never said that it was unnecessary. It was Einstein himself who told Roosevelt that building an atomic bomb was possible, and that Germany was pursuing such a bomb. And it was Einstein who recommended to Roosevelt that the US should assemble a team of scientists to explore the possibility of making an atomic bomb. There would have been no Manhattan Project or American atom bombs had it not been for Einstein. This letter to Roosevelt is available on the internet for everyone to see. And the weak US economy which is the pedestal upon which the American military sits is still far and away the largest in the world. The "astronomical" US debt amounts to 60% of the America GDP; the amount exceeds the GDP of most of the world's countries combined, but in reality it amounts to only about 1% of America's net worth. Were the world's economies to crash they way they did in 1929, America would be the country least affected by it. America's image may have diminished over the last decade, but America's power certainly has not. "Pax Americana" is only employed as far as American interests are concerned, but it is more extensive than you might think. American spending on national "defense" is $663 billion. America's annual GDP amounts to about 25% of the world's total. Owning 1/4th of the world's economy would allow America the ability to control much of the world's policies, even if America possessed no military at all.
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