[CanadianJeff]

Prestwick wrote:

One thing is for sure. All of those people who went onto the streets to support the monks, those who came out with nothing to defend themselves with, those who simply want the freedom to elect whoever they want to power and say what they want, when they want, those people exhibit levels of bravery, courage and selflessness which puts us all to shame.

If we 'cannot' help them, the very least we could do is remember them.

All too true. I can't believe that people would follow orders to beat such people that had no weapons and to imprisson monks who do nothing more then walk and pray in the streets.

[Prestwick]

CanadianJeff wrote:

There is more then one way to war. The methods we are using don't follow the process of Catharsis they follow the process of murder. Like dropping the Bombs on Japan for example was considered an act of mercy since it would stop the Japanesse from continuing further war and causing more death. What wasn't taken into account was the farther reaching damage caused by radiation and how it was civilans dying instead of soldiers. Civilans who may not have even been enemies of the American people.

I have an interesting thing I have to deal with. My Grandfather on my father's side was in the 1st Parachute Division, by that time in 1945 being reformed (post Arnhem) and being shipped to the Far East. The reason? They were going to be dropped on Japan.

Japan was going to be the biggest drop of Airborne forces of the entire war. Something that would eclipse even Arnhem. And as there were predictions of something between 80 and 90% casualties in the first fortnight of invading Japan alone meant that there was a terrifying prospect of Grandad not coming back alive.

So essentially, I am always thinking to myself "what if Hiroshima and Nagasaki had not happened? What if the Allies did invade Japan? Would I still be here if they did?" I am looking at it from the perspective that if Grandad did die, my Dad would not have been born which means in turn that I would not have been born.

With the fact that hundreds of thousands of people had to suffer just so I could be alive today is something I will have to live with. I've dealt with it, but it still raises the hairs on the back of your neck.

In the case of Japan, while Nagasaki was wholely uneccessary, the bombs did prevent a bloodbath, and an invasion of Japan from the North by the Soviet Union. At that time, Stalin demanded (and got) a place in planning an invasion with the United States and the UK, Soviet Troops were poised to invade Hokkaido and then enter Honshu (the main island) from the North and advance southwards.

If the bombs had not have gone off, Japan would have been ripped apart by a war which might have ended in 1946 with a partitioned Japan. Communist Japanese anyone?

[Murray_Smith]

CanadianJeff wrote:

There are the wars they put in the history books and the real deal. Some of the acts of war commited by the allies and the axis both during world war ii for example will never be recorded in history offically. Yet the tales that some veterans of these wars will tell those who listen is beyond horror. Boiling enemys alive on both ends for example to lower the enemies morale. Nothing like hearing one of your men screaming as he's slowly boiled alive over hours and hours during the night. As an example.

I'm aware that not too long ago, the U.S. had a policy of eugenics in place (In some states, it is still legal to castrate retarded people). And this was during peacetime. This, in particular, hits me hard because I could have been a candidate: I have a form of high-functioning autism called Asperger Syndrome, and a close observer might consider me unfit to breed.

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I've never seen a War were the war didn't cause greater hurt in the end using current methods.

If you're being literal, I'll let that slide, as I assume you weren't born before 1945.

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Sun Tzu has always been quick is his writing to point out the value of a good general losing as little life as possible and taking as little life as possible. The man's accomplsihments in China during the wars in that ear speak for themselves. He often got his enemies to surrender with little or no bloodshed and was highly efficent at doing so. Why becuase he followed a diffrent set of the rules of war. What he refers to as his art of war.

There are many different sets of rules of war. Sun Tzu apparently used a set that highly discouraged bloodshed.

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There is more then one way to war. The methods we are using don't follow the process of Catharsis they follow the process of murder. Like dropping the Bombs on Japan for example was considered an act of mercy since it would stop the Japanesse from continuing further war and causing more death. What wasn't taken into account was the farther reaching damage caused by radiation and how it was civilans dying instead of soldiers. Civilans who may not have even been enemies of the American people.

The alternative could have been to literally extinguish the Japanese race and culture— literally genocide.

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That is what I'm trying to put across here. Iraq in itself is not wrong nor right but what is absolutly inhuman and wrong is the motives and the way the war in Iraq is being fought. That is what makes that particular war so murderous.

Examples plz.

[Psudo]

My problem with your analysis, CanadianJeff, is your standard for judging a war. "I've never seen a War where the war didn't cause greater hurt in the end". If no modern war is just, then is your standard of justice even achievable? If it's not, why apply it?

The horrors of the atomic bombs dropped on Japan are a good example of your mental disconnect. The full horrors of war were already in full swing. The bombing of the Japanese mainland included bombs full of diesel fuel which spread the fuel over huge areas before lighting it, burning entire neighborhoods (and their civilian occupants) to the ground. The horrors of Okinawa killed hundreds of thousands, causalities comparable to the atomic bombs. The alternative offensive strategy to the atomic bombs was a similar invasion of the Japanese mainland called Operation Downfall, which would likely have killed as many people again as WW2 in it's entirety up to that point; Wikipedia says millions of Americans and tens of millions of Japanese. That's two orders of magnitude more (about 100 times as many) casualties as the atomic bombs, including deaths from increased cancer rates and the like.

I suppose a nuclear attack on Kyūshū would have destroyed Japan's defense and allowed all the casualties to be almost exclusively on Japan's side, saving the millions of American lives but not the tens of millions of Japanese lives. Hardly preferable.

The Hiroshima/Nagasaki bombing was the preferable military strategy. As great a horror as it was, it was barely a fraction of the horror of the alternate mainland offensive. If there was a preferable military tactic, I've never heard of it.

There's also the diplomatic strategy. If a US/Japanese treaty had been decided sooner, neither military offensive would have been necessary. That same argument may have prevented Okinawa, Normandy, and the German invasion of Poland. If people were more willing to get along, war itself would be obsolete. Horribly, they aren't and it's not, so wars are fought until treaties are established, and they weren't established in time. Blame who you like, but it didn't happen.

Your example of the unnecessary horror of war is, in fact, a dramatic and clear example of catharsis. Two cities destroyed instead of an entire culture. Japan is healthier and stronger decades after the war than decades before.

Coincidentally, Japan foresees "a bright future in Iraq" [1] and is a member of the Coalition. They're still not allowed to have an offensive military, but they contribute billions of dollars to the reconstruction effort. There's no evidence that they derive the same view of war from their history that you do.

[sasquatch2]

CanadianJeff

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All too true. I can't believe that people would follow orders to beat such people that had no weapons and to imprisson monks who do nothing more then walk and pray in the streets.

That's because thanks to sorry SOB's like myself and Bart, you were spared the exposure to just that.
The truth about Burma is that it is but a cultural extension of the PRC.

[Quantum_Wizard]

CanadianJeff wrote:

I can't believe that people would follow orders to beat such people that had no weapons and to imprisson monks who do nothing more then walk and pray in the streets.

It seems that not all of them do:

Rangoon: ‘army mutiny’ reported

[Scape]

Human Rights Watch to Business: Keeping quiet while monks & other peaceful protesters are murdered & jailed is not constructive engagement.

[sasquatch2]

Quantum_Wizard

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CanadianJeff wrote:

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I can't believe that people would follow orders to beat such people that had no weapons and to imprisson monks who do nothing more then walk and pray in the streets.

It seems that not all of them do:

Rangoon: ‘army mutiny’ reported

If this grows at all, the current regime will collapse.