US congressman: "let us call on israel to stop shooting children.

[dre]

I dunno, you tell me? I think in both situations, the parties involved should be allowed to work it out amongst themselves, without the whole rest of the world giving their unsolicited advice and demands.

Israelis and Palestinians arent gonna work out SHIT. The whole world knows which land belongs to whom and we should enforce the boundaries that we drew.

[DogOnPorch]

Israelis and Palestinians arent gonna work out SHIT. The whole world knows which land belongs to whom and we should enforce the boundaries that we drew.

Well, get your ass on over there and start "enforcing", Clint Eastwood.

[Bonam]

Israelis and Palestinians arent gonna work out SHIT. The whole world knows which land belongs to whom and we should enforce the boundaries that we drew.

Really? Care to draw a map that the whole world agrees on?

[bloodyminded]

Doesn't matter who killed more of who.

It matters to those who make lists of innocent people killed or hurt...so your argument is with scribblett.

What matters are the reasons behind it, the order in which events happened, the history in context of the situation, etc. Americans killed more Germans in WWII than the other way around, but that doesn't mean the Americans were the bad guys or were wrong in doing what they did.

I agree, but the analogy is not apt. The fantasy of Israel always being victimized by Arab oppressors, in every situation, including the extreme terror of 13-year-old Palestinians throwing rocks at a tank....such notions don't belong in serious discussions.

[DogOnPorch]

New 'rocks' now operating in Gaza. Hezbollah has had them for a few years...but now Hamas has managed to aquire them, as well. No doubt a gift from the 'weapon fairy'.

http://www.isracast.com/article.aspx?ID=1257&t=Gaza-'Kornet'-Triggers-Escalation

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/9M133_Kornet

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6r8jgPGdzO0

[bloodyminded]

New 'rocks' now operating in Gaza. Hezbollah has had them for a few years...but now Hamas has managed to aquire them, as well. No doubt a gift from the 'weapon fairy'.

http://www.isracast.com/article.aspx?ID=1257&t=Gaza-'Kornet'-Triggers-Escalation

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/9M133_Kornet

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6r8jgPGdzO0

Ah, I understand your confusion.

You are talking about something completely different. A rookie mistake, for those unaccustomed to reading English. Keep working on it, and I promise you'll improve! Good luck to you in your endeavour.

Edited December 26, 2010 by bloodyminded

[DogOnPorch]

Ah, I understand your confusion.

You are talking about something completely different. A rookie mistake, for those unaccustomed to reading English. Keep working on it, and I promise you'll improve! Good luck to you in your endeavour.

----------

Paulie Gualtieri: Hey Sil, do you remember your first blow job?

Silvio Dante: Oh yeah...

Paulie Gualtieri: How long did it take the guy to come?

Paulie Gualtieri: [laughing and turning to the others]...did you hear that? I asked Sil if he remembered his first blow job and then I said 'How long did it take the guy to come?'

[bloodyminded]

----------

Again...a good try, and I encourage your attempts, but still not relevant to the discussion.

Learning language is difficult, but the rewards can be great.

Edited December 26, 2010 by bloodyminded

[DogOnPorch]

Again...a good try, and I encourage your attempts, but still not relevant to the discussion.

Learning language is difficult, but the rewards can be great.

Keep sucking...

[bloodyminded]

Keep sucking...

I'm flattered, but as your teacher, this would be inappropriate behaviour.

[DogOnPorch]

I'm flattered, but as your teacher, this would be inappropriate behaviour.

E = mc2

Edited December 27, 2010 by DogOnPorch

[Jack Weber]

Doesn't matter who killed more of who. What matters are the reasons behind it, the order in which events happened, the history in context of the situation, etc. Americans killed more Germans in WWII than the other way around, but that doesn't mean the Americans were the bad guys or were wrong in doing what they did.

True...

However,Dresden was'nt necessary...

[Jack Weber]

Keep sucking...

Did'nt you get a vacation for this type of ...ahem...demand?

[Shady]

True...

However,Dresden was'nt necessary...

Any historian will tell you that that's debatable.

[bush_cheney2004]

Any historian will tell you that that's debatable.

Yep...plus it ruins the oft repeated lefty theory of only bombing "brown people".

[Bonam]

True...

However,Dresden was'nt necessary...

Yeah Normandy probably wasn't necessary either. After all we could have simply contained Hitler on the continent and prevented him from expanding elsewhere and waited patiently for his regime to collapse, right?

No, not right. Every single act that led to the fastest and most complete annihilation of Nazi Germany and every individual who provided for its capability to continue fighting the war (including so-called civilian workers), was necessary and justified. It was total war, and if the US or USSR had developed nukes before Germany surrendered and reduced Berlin to a pile of uninhabitable radioactive rubble, it would STILL have been justified.

[bush_cheney2004]

From Inglourius Basterds....

We will be cruel to the Germans, and through our cruelty, they will know who we are.

... And the Germans, will be sickened by us.

And the Germans, will talk about us. And the Germans, will fear us.

...But I got a word of warning to all would be warriors. When you join my command, you take on debit. A debit you owe me, personally.

Every man under my command, owes me, one hundred Nazi scalps.

And I want my scalps. And all y'all will git me, one hundred Nazi scalps, taken from the heads of one hundred Nazi's or you will die trying."

[Shady]

Yep...plus it ruins the oft repeated lefty theory of only bombing "brown people".

Definitely. Which I think is why pathetic monday morning pseudo-generals like Jack play down it's significance and necessity.

[Guest TrueMetis]

Yeah Normandy probably wasn't necessary either. After all we could have simply contained Hitler on the continent and prevented him from expanding elsewhere and waited patiently for his regime to collapse, right?

No, not right. Every single act that led to the fastest and most complete annihilation of Nazi Germany and every individual who provided for its capability to continue fighting the war (including so-called civilian workers), was necessary and justified. It was total war, and if the US or USSR had developed nukes before Germany surrendered and reduced Berlin to a pile of uninhabitable radioactive rubble, it would STILL have been justified.

In Dresden they didn't hit many obvious military and industrial targets. There was a barracks outside of town that was not hit, the autobahn bridge was not hit, railways stations were not hit, the railway bridge spanning the Elbe River was not hit. North of Dresden there are military facilities that are still around and used today. If this was a military raid all these objectives would have been hit.

[DogOnPorch]

Did'nt you get a vacation for this type of ...ahem...demand?

Who frickin' cares? Everyone else is doing it.

[DogOnPorch]

Dresden was Bomber Harris's last attempt to be the guy who ended WW2 in Europe.

[Bonam]

In Dresden they didn't hit many obvious military and industrial targets. There was a barracks outside of town that was not hit, the autobahn bridge was not hit, railways stations were not hit, the railway bridge spanning the Elbe River was not hit. North of Dresden there are military facilities that are still around and used today. If this was a military raid all these objectives would have been hit.

Striking terror into your enemies, demoralizing your enemies, showing your enemies that you will not hesitate to ruthlessly wipe them from the face of the Earth, are all parts of total war.

There are wars where one can afford to restrict one's targets based on ethical sensibilities. We can only hope that any war we ever have to fight again will be such a war. In Iraq, in Afghanistan, we can tie our hands behind our backs and hope to win over the locals with how nice we are while conducting military operations only very selectively, but that was not the case in Nazi Germany. But in a war such as WWII, with the stakes that high, the only moral thing to do is to destroy your enemy any and every way you can, including raids like Dresden.

Edited December 27, 2010 by Bonam

[Guest TrueMetis]

Striking terror into your enemies, demoralizing your enemies, showing your enemies that you will not hesitate to ruthlessly wipe them from the face of the Earth, are all parts of total war.

There are wars where one can afford to restrict one's targets based on ethical sensibilities. We can only hope that any war we ever have to fight again will be such a war. In Iraq, in Afghanistan, we can tie our hands behind our backs and hope to win over the locals with how nice we are while conducting military operations only very selectively, but that was not the case in Nazi Germany. But in a war such as WWII, with the stakes that high, the only moral thing to do is to destroy your enemy any and every way you can, including raids like Dresden.

Bull even back then many thought Dresden was to far. Targeting military facilities, key infrastructure, and factories is one thing. Targeting homes is another.

ETA And you do realize you are effectively advocating genocide right?

Edited December 27, 2010 by TrueMetis

[Bonam]

Bull even back then many thought Dresden was to far. Targeting military facilities, key infrastructure, and factories is one thing. Targeting homes is another.

Yeah well people can think all kinds of things, back then or now.

ETA And you do realize you are effectively advocating genocide right?

No. You need pursue the total war only until the moment when the enemy surrenders or otherwise ceases to be a threat. Genocide, as I see it, is an activity with the ultimate goal of completely destroying a population considered undesirable, whereas total war is an activity with the ultimate goal of destroying an enemy which poses an existential threat. A population is rendered incapable of posing an existential threat long before it is completely destroyed. Total war and genocide do not have the same motivation and do not have the same end goal, and hence are not the same thing.

If anything, total war is the surest the remedy to genocide. Wage total war against the genocidal power until it is no longer capable of carrying out the genocide. That is precisely what happened in WWII of course, which is why it is such an emblematic reference for issues like total war, genocide, and the morality of warfare and of specific types of actions.

And anyway, this policy which you call "genocide" was the basis of the foreign policy of both of the world's superpowers from the 1950s to 1991. The idea was to vaporize most of the enemy country including its civilian population if war broke out. I am hardly taking a radical stance here.

Edited December 27, 2010 by Bonam

[Guest TrueMetis]

Yeah well people can think all kinds of things, back then or now.

Like Churchill, of course maybe it was just for political reasons he wrote,

It seems to me that the moment has come when the question of bombing of German cities simply for the sake of increasing the terror, though under other pretexts, should be reviewed. Otherwise we shall come into control of an utterly ruined land… The destruction of Dresden remains a serious query against the conduct of Allied bombing. I am of the opinion that military objectives must henceforward be more strictly studied in our own interests than that of the enemy.

The Foreign Secretary has spoken to me on this subject, and I feel the need for more precise concentration upon military objectives such as oil and communications behind the immediate battle-zone, rather than on mere acts of terror and wanton destruction, however impressive.

as he was ultimately responsible for Dresden, but it says something that there was enough political will to get Churchill to make a lame attempt at distancing himself from the bombing of Dresden. Of course he withdrew that statement after protest from bomber command and instead went with the much lamer,

It seems to me that the moment has come when the question of the so called 'area-bombing' of German cities should be reviewed from the point of view of our own interests. If we come into control of an entirely ruined land, there will be a great shortage of accommodation for ourselves and our allies… We must see to it that our attacks do no more harm to ourselves in the long run than they do to the enemy's war effort.

Still if Dresden was about hitting important industrial, military and industrial targets, which is what was being used as the primary justification for the attack, then those targets would have been hit. When Colin McKay Grierson suggested part of the bombing raid was to destroy "what is left of German morale" newspapers wrote about allied forces resorting to terror bombing, causing Churchill to write the memo I quoted above.

No. You need pursue the total war only until the moment when the enemy surrenders or otherwise ceases to be a threat. Genocide, as I see it, is an activity with the ultimate goal of completely destroying a population considered undesirable, whereas total war is an activity with the ultimate goal of destroying an enemy which poses an existential threat. A population is rendered incapable of posing an existential threat long before it is completely destroyed. Total war and genocide do not have the same motivation and do not have the same end goal, and hence are not the same thing.

If anything, total war is the surest the remedy to genocide. Wage total war against the genocidal power until it is no longer capable of carrying out the genocide. That is precisely what happened in WWII of course, which is why it is such an emblematic reference for issues like total war, genocide, and the morality of warfare and of specific types of actions.

And anyway, this policy which you call "genocide" was the basis of the foreign policy of both of the world's superpowers from the 1950s to 1991. The idea was to vaporize most of the enemy country including its civilian population if war broke out. I am hardly taking a radical stance here.

Under the current UN definition total war would be genocide. My link