Jag, You said "**** I was born in the 1960's, so I guess it depends on how much of the Cold War I would have to have seen to qualify for your approval.However, Neither was i alive during the Civil War, but I still think that slavery was wrong, and worth fighting for. If someone were to tell me I have no right to that opinion because I wasn't alive at the time, I would strongly disagree..**** " If you are studying history, then how can you make such an incorrect assessment of the Civil war. It was not a war about slavery, but about states rights. Lincoln only freed the slaves in 1863 to prevent France and England from entering the war or providing support to the confederacy. Personally, I am getting tired of reading your arguments, you seem to like to talk a lot but not really offer any solutions, so I will ask you point blank. What do you think the USA should do about this attack? I look forward to your response. DaDakota
Originally posted by JAG I'll have to divide my response, so bear with me... **** My posts are reflections of my point of view. If those are in contradiction with others, or are responding to others arguments against my point of view, I will not apologize, nor would I expect them to.**** I wouldn't expect you to do anything else. Any this may be suprising, but unlike most posters I'm not afraid to admit when I've been wrong or made a mistake or bad assumption. ***I have stated, and here re-state, that we cannot justifiably appoint ourselves arbiters of democracy, nor judge whether or not other nations are democratic based on how their governments compare with ours.*** True, but democratic concerns are not the only reason we would intervene, or be justified in intervening in anther country. And the fact that we are not perfect doesn't mean we can't or shouldn't make judgements about intervention based on our best available knowledge nor our own values (what else would we use?). ****I confess that I was entirely unaware that I held such an opinion.I thought that my opinion was that, assuming we are imperfect, we ought to err on the side of caution, and i believe that said caution ought to be even more prevelent when we are considering imposing our opinions on other nations or peoples...**** This is one of those times I'll confess I've stretched. Caution is not a bad idea, but I don't think that inhibits an eventual decision for action based on a lot of criteria. No one is objective, but you can't let your bias paralize decision making any more than you can go off half-cocked (so to speak) without fully considering the implications of your act. **** Not exactly, but to a degree that is a correct representation of my point of view. It's not an absolute, but it certainly applies with regards to our intervening in other countries contrary to their people's wishes in order to further our own interests...**** It depends on whether your criteria or action is increasing democracy or something else, like more strategic concerns... **** Again, yes, to a degree...I do not think that we are able to remove our bias from our analysis of other governments, and therefore we cannot objectively assume them inferior based on their differences with us...**** No but this can be a black hole unless you are willing to make action without being 100% certain you've neutralized your bias, which is impossible to do. ***However, once again, I will state that we have no right to assume that we are the standard by which representative government is measured, nor do we have the right to enforce compliance with that standard on other people...**** I never said anything about us being the standard for representative government, so i'm not sure what your point is. It isn't impossible to make an analysis that we are CLOSER to a true form of representative, and that we can affect other people's movement in that in direction. Not in haste, mind you, as your points are well taken. **** To a degree, yes, I am guilty of that.I do not pretend to hold the answers to this situation, but I do feel confident that I can disagree with the proposition of " carving up " the Middle East without any qualms. Were I to encounter a man having a stroke, I do not pretend that I would know exactly what to do to save him. However, were someone else to suggest remedying the situation by cutting off the man's head, I would also feel fairly confident in disagreeing...**** If you've read any of my posts, you'll notice I never advocate actually 'carving up the Middle East.' That's DaDakota. More to come, I'll get to the rest later, got to run to my daughters play at school.
Originally posted by JAG ****I wholeheartedly admit that i use hindsight to declare that past decisions were made incorrectly.That is, I believe, called learning.I do not isolate decisions based on their outcome, but i do use retrospection. That is the purpose of studying history, to learn from our mistakes. We could hardly do that if we rationalized away mistakes because we don't have the same perspective.I have never heard anyone before suggest that we should ignore retrospection, or hindsight , if you will, in our evaluating and learning process.You are entitled to your view, but I am quite happy with mine. For example, while I didn't know better at the time, I can fairly safely say that my decision to find out what fire smelled like by breathing in a flame when i was an infant was an incorrect one, and having learned that, i doubt I'll ever make that decision again...**** The problem is that when you say you put things in context, you're putting them in context of what we know today, which is an unfair burden on the people who didn't have the hindsight we have now. Of course we want to learn from past mistakes, and we use hindsight to try and not repeat those same mistakes. But to castigate these past actors because they didn't make what you consider the 'correct' decision' is NOT putting thier decision in the context of the time. For example, in Vietnam, we now know that China and Vietnam were not working in concert to expand communism into the rest of Southeast Asia. Eisenhower and Kennedy and Johnson DID NOT know this, so their decisions were based on a false premise. BUT if you look at it from the way the world looked AT THAT TIME, it was not unreasonable to make the assumptions they made. The Soviets were spreading their influence in all parts of the world. China had fallen a decade earlier. North Korea had invaded South Korea until driven back by the UN. The Domino Theory was not looking unrealistic at the time. So now you can say they made some wrong decisions, but I don't think you are putting their actions in context because you are writing as if these conclusions are so obvious that it was only their arrogance that got them into trouble. I don't believe you are giving them leeway based on what their perceptions were at that time. **** Right, which is why I suggest erring on the side of supporting neither rather than risk supporting the oppressors. In an ideal world, we would only support the oppressors ( ok, a semi-ideal world..one which has oppressors) but we are imperfect, and subject to our own interests, and therefore i suggest it is inconsistent with a democratic society to presume that we have the right to enforce our views on others, irrespective of their desires.**** What if the desires of these others presents a strategic threat to the US? In most of these cases they felt there were strategic implications to these situations. In fact, I'll bet you'll admit that the primary motivation in these cases (Vietnam, Kuwait, S. America) was not really the spread of democracy but overall strategic concerns such as the power and influence of the Soviet Union in the (what was then known as) Third World. You've stated before that you agree strategic concerns can outweigh the 'wishes of the people' in other countries, so I'm not sure why you also say we shouldn't interfere. We can only act on what we perceive the situation to be at the time. **** Again, having already ( correctly) stated that I have avoided voicing what I think should be done, I am curious as to how you have already analyzed and rejected my hypothetical foreign policy... And strange as it may sound, you don't have to emulate Teddy Roosevelt to have a foreign policy.There are alternatives to aggression and interference which can still be construed as comprising a foreign policy...*** True, you don't have to be Teddy R. BUT if your foreign policy is all talk and no big stick, you'll find yourself ignored in a lot of cases. For example, China is, in the view of a lot of foreign policy 'experts,' the next big challenger to the US. I think we should engage them as much as possible. I believe in the policy of increaing trade and relations in the hope that some of their hardliner will gradually loose power as more moderate influences take over. However, I also approve of putting the 7th Fleet off of Taiwan when the PRC makes threatening overtures about taking the island back by force. I don't advocate nuking China to keep them out of Taiwan, but I also don't think we should throw our hands up and declare "I do say, sir, we protest most vigorously, but of course we're not going to interfere." **** You are making assumptions again. I find it ironic that someone who is so critical of what he sees as another's " assumptions" is so blythe to his own...I have, for the record, been in the " real world" as you call it, and I disagree with your contention that I am pedantic or simplistic. I would also contend that there is a world of difference between a rigid policy of non-interference and the kind of jingoistic aggression with which I have argued in this post.**** Guilty as charged. I shouldn't have made assumptions about either you age nor your background. In fact, although I disagree with some of your historical analysis, I find some of it most informative. My apologies for whatever personal assumptions about your background, character, or experiences. Maybe others will see we don't all have to correct 100% of the time to get our point across. **** Historians would argue with you on this point. While Hitler's decisions were often deemed unconventional and intuitive rather than reasoned, his early strategic decisions were so spectacularly successfull ( especially in poland, Belgium, the Netherlands, France, and Scandanavia ) that German High Command ( including such experienced veterans as Jodl and von Rundstedt ) began to think Hitler a strategic genious. Ultimatley Hitler would make several strategic blunders, and these were compounded by the fact that, having been proven right time and again in the face of the opposition or reservation of his military commanders, Hitler concluded that his was the only opinion which mattered, and dismissed his Generals as overly cautious and lacking in imagination.However, it is a gross misrepresentation of historical fact to state that Hitler " continually make (sic) poor strategic military decisions." Had this been true, Germany would have never had the early success it did...**** I think you are giving Hitler too much credit in these military moves. He did have a good read on Chamberlain et al. His first moves to rearm and move troops back up to the French borders were bold and proved to be advantageous without drawing the retribution some of his generals feared. Fortune favors the bold, at least for a while, but these decisions were more a product of his own ambitions, not his military strategic prowess. In fact I can point to more blunders than you can good decisions: he let the British escape at Dunkirk, he redirected his airforce away from attacking RAF bases to attacking London and other civilian targets after the RAF bombing of Berlin (this at a crucial time in the Battle of Britain when most admit further concentration would have broken the RAF's back), he attacked Russia, he refused to allow retreat in the Eastern Front, he told Rommel to fight to the end in N Africa (which Rommel ignored and subsequently evacuated the troops anyway), he decided to concentrate development of jet bombers instead of fighters, when the fighters were slaughtering huge numbers of Allied bombers (in proportion to their numbers), he held the Panzer division in reserve waiting for the invasion at Calais even as his generals begged for their release, and on and on. **** Again, too simple. Granted, those were devastating weapons, but irrelevent without the USSR's greatest weapon, virtually unlimited manpower, and the willingness to sacrifice that manpower to achieve victory...Before Stalingrad, and the ravages of Winter and Famine, the USSR had already lost over 5 million casualties...Yes, that's 5 MILLION. Which is more Soviet casualties than there were combined Allied living troops on the Western Front in the entire war... In other words, without the ability and willingness to sustain such heavy losses and keep fighting ( which the Western Allies did not have) the war in Russia is over long before Stalingrad...and Winter...and Famine...**** Well, we were talking about German casualties, not Russian casualties, so I'm not sure what you point is. ***Rather than argue with you based on my own opinion that you are completely wrong, allow me to quote a few people who might know a bit more about the subject than either of us...*** I'll conceed that the use of combined mechanized forces and air forces was a new innovation in coordination of new techology, and so i'm wrong that the Germans were not the first to do this. I do still believe I'm correct to say that the tactical basis for this swift movement and coordinated attack is cavalry doctrineand that you can see it as the mantle passed from cavalry to mechanized tank warfare to airmobile forces (like those first implemented in Vietnam). And I think the Patton quote is a little out of context too. His background as a cavalry officer widely influence his tactics of mobile warfare. (I'll try and find some support for this but will defer to you on the overall point).
Posted by JAG: **** B) ...That is entirely beside the point. The question was how the US would have done in 1941, facing the combined forces of the USSR, Germany, and Great Britain, with all the military and industrial capacity losses that would have entailed, not what the industrial capacity of an untouched America was in 1944 facing an surrounded and war ravaged enemy...**** I think you're losing sight of our original dispute, which is that you minimize the capabilities of the US. No reason to believe even a combined UK, Germany, USSR would be able to reach US industrial capacity (since no one had bombers or missles with that range in '41). And I think my argument that fighting Japan by themselves and committing the resources they did in Europe compares to the Germans fighting one front on land (the Eastern Front), since before they turned East they had taken all of the West, and no longer were fighting on that front except in the sea and air. Especially when you consider that Germany had started rearming and weapons development many years before the US (ie Germany started the war off with the most advanced and strongest military of any of these actors). **** I did not state that it was a small task, I stated that it is not comparable with Germany's situation. The troubles faced by a naval war on two fronts are vastly outweighed by the troubles of facing a land war on two fronts.*** Except that here you are mixed your chronology to suit your argument. They didn't simultaneously attack France et al and Russia. Their was no Western Front where they were engaged in land warfare by the time they initiated their invasion of the USSR. **** Landing craft wasn't that much of a problem. I'm not sure where you get this, possibly you are confusing the situation with those of Louis, Phillip, or Napoleon? The practical problem was air superiority, especially in Area 11, and that, as stated previously and acknowledged by Bomber Harris, was more a result of lack or conviction to the effort on Hitler's part than inferiority. In fact, by the time that Sea Lion was called off, Harris had estimated British ability to maintain the defensive effort as " more a matter of days rather than weeks or months.." Whereas the Lufftwaffe, though suffering in prestige,was still more than capable of maintaining the air campaign indefinately. We are fortunate that Hitler's impatience to realize his real goal turned his eyes Eastward when it did.**** Well, your Hitler comments only reinforce my points on his military prowess above. And you can be sure I'm not confusing the situations, although others did face similar problems with landcraft to transport troops to the Britain. The timetable set for Sea Lion was moved back several times as the supplies (like landing craft) could not be procured in the numbers necessary for the amphibious assault. In fact these delays contributed to Hitler's impatience with the whole idea. **** And maybe one day you'll stop making so many assumptions about other people's assumptions, lives, experiences, age, etc....I certainly hope that is the case...**** Reference the beginning of the post for this. I guess we disagree what 'putting something in context' means, since I think it means you look at decisions based on the information those policymakers had available to them at the time. Not with hindsight. You use your hindsight to correct false assumptions or incorrect conclusions so that we don't make the same mistakes, but you don't judge (normatively) those actors by todays standards, you evaluate (descriptively) the mistakes they've made and try to learn from it.
I can't believe I came back into this thread... but DaDakota, as someone from SC... I think that you should read SC's declaraction of secession. SC seceded b/c of "state's rights"... state's slaveholder rights being infracted upon. It's the only reason why SC says she secedes in the entire document. It's a great read.
Your interpretation of the Civil War is one of those political revisionist mantras which contains both truth and falsehood. The civil war was about two issues, not one, and historically the South has claimed that it was about State's rights, while the North has maintained it was about slavery. These respective positions are not surprising given that each has chosen the issue about which it was in the right. However, to assume that the Civil War was just about state rights and that Lincoln only issued the Emmancipation Declaration due to it's Europen implications is a gross over-simplification. The issue about which the states were contending that raised State rights was slavery, and the geographic breakdown of the Civil War fell exactly along the borders between "slave" states and "free" states. I agree that Lincoln's decision had international motives and implications, but it was not exclusively so. It is even more relevent to day that the soldiers and supporters of the North believed, at the time, that slavery was the primary issue over which they were fighting. The marching song of the Northern infantry was " John Brown's Body Lies A-Rotting In the Grave.", a clear indication of popular sentiment. The South was correct in it's contention that American history and political precepts supported their right to self determination and seperation. While it had been eroded by several years of legislation, the original premise upon which the United States had been founded was that of local popular legislative and political determination. The power of the Federal Government had been increased because the original premise of it's power being exclusive to foreign affairs proved inpractical, not because it had been determined that it held the right to supercede the desires of a state's political desires. In other words, there were two issues, and my statement that I would have seen slavery as a wrong worth fighting to right is completely supportable. Your point, while containing some historical truth, is one-sided and does not refute my statement.
Re: getting tired of reading my arguments....You have all the right in the world not to read them. However, a review of my posts will show that most if not all of my posts have been responses, so are you suggesting that I am not entitled to state my opnion, and that your word ( or someone you agree with) has some intrinsic right to be the last word on the subject? What I do feel the US should do about this attack.... Ok, here goes ( deep breath)...I believe that this is, in fact, not just an attack on the United States. Terrorism, by it's very nature, may select nationally defined hard targets, but it's soft targets are invariably international. I do not support terrorism, however much I appreciate their arguments and/or situation. As such, I believe that the investigation and determination of guilt should be an international one, and the response thereafter should be equal to this. I also believe that it would be a convenient time to attack terrorism ( as determined by international accord) in it's entirety. We are not the standard by which terrorists can be determined, but we are part of the world community who do, I feel, have the right to protect the interests of international peace. Having said that, soft target CAMPAIGNS, not surgical strikes, are the short term answer. If it proves ( again, international accord) that states have, in fact, supported these terrorist attacks,and given actual support, ( not merely being the geographic location in which they reside. I do not hold the Midwest responsible for the Oklahoma bombings, for example, and we ought to stop making that assumption with regards to other countries) I believe we are in a state of war with those states, and would expect us to devote our entire resources to that war. My basic policy is that war should be avoided as much as possible, and all other avenues should be explored first. Also, in this situation, I believe that we need international accord to determine who, exactly, we are at war with. However, I believe that if all these conditions have been met, and it is determined that we are in fact at war with a nation or state, war is not to be entered into with half conviction. I believe that it should be excercised in it's entirety, and that means a prolonged and sustained campaign against our actual, proven, and identified enemy. As much as technology allows, we should differenciate between civilian and military contingents of that enemy state, but war is war. While History and Classics are my general areas of study, it might interest ( and surprise ) you to learn that my specific focus is military history. As such, I am not blind to the fact that war is sometimes necessary. However, as I have studied the faulty causes and premature over-reactions which have lead to so many wastefull and ultimately useless wars, I emphasise the need to make sure the war is necessary, and the enemy is identified ( in this case, as said, the intangible nature of this enemy at this point makes this element of the absolute priority, and not to be determined by the U.S. alone, for both moral and pragmatic reasons.) Therefore, I would rather do nothing than the wrong thing, but I do not believe that will have to be the case. The fact that the international community is rallying to the cause underlines my contention that this is an international issue, and as long as we proceed along those lines, I feel the enemy, be it merely terrorist organizations, or states providing actual support, will be identified. It saddens me, to a degree, because while I don't think I am capable of being a terrorist, were I in their position, I cannot assume that my outrage and sense of being under attack and wronged wouldn't lead me to violence. We should remember that these people, as horrifying and unforgivable as the manner in which they have chosen to fight this war is, believe themselves to be patriots already in a state of war, and with that, at least, I can sympathize. However, there can never be an excuse for making innocent civilians the targets of your "war", no matter how wronged or right you are, and these people are "war criminals" if they do believe themselves at war. If these prove to be merely non-national organizations, I would treat them similarly to how the orchestraters of the Nazi final solution were treated. If they preove to be nation based, we are at war in the conventional sense, and should proceed accordingly. My view that capital punishment is wrong makes the penalty for these "war criminals" a confusing issue for me, but the process should be unaffected by the nature of the sentence. I hope I have stated my point of view clearly, but if not I will appreciate your comments or arguments.
Hayes...In the interests of others, I am beginning to think we should continue this debate via E-Mail....(sort of joking). Also, I am fairly computarily illiterate, so perhaps you can assist me...how do you interspace your own points into another's quotes? I know that there is probably a simple way to find this out, but my general sense of frustration with my technological ignorance makes the avenue to tis solution seem a lot more obstructed than it actually is... Ok, for now...your points...With regards to using our own best judgements as we don't have anything better....I would suggest that that assumes that aggression is a necessary stance. Err on the side of omission rather than commision when it comes to imposing our views on other nations... Strategic concerns... The problem with excusing international intervention under the umbrella of " strategic concerns" is that those concerns are subjective, and ( as evidenced by Dulles, for example) can be used to cover virtually any action. If " strategic concerns" is a mandate for international intervention, where does "right" and "wrong " have any bearing on our decisions?Once again, with this being the case, I suggest that we err on the side of omission when it applies to our nation deciding how other nations should behave. With regards to paralysis. I agree that my point of view can, if stretched, lead to a Hamlet complex. ( ie. using reason to prove how any kind of action is wrong) However, true reason would also reveal how inaction can be wrong, and there you are left with choosing imperatives to dictate your actions. I think that one solution, while imperfect, to the fear of us being rendered inert by doubt, is to convene and acceed to an international accord in a situation like this, wherein the enemy is not clear, and we are at risk of imposing our own bias. The international bias, while still prevelent, is easier to justify and should, by nature, exclude both the perception and reality of us acting as tyrants...Short of that, I would be happier if doubt caused us to do nothing rather than abandon the precepts upon which we were founded in order to avoid innaction. Neither situation is desirable, but I would make that choice if those were my only options... Re: being CLOSER...closer than whom? Everyone? i would suggest that you would have a hard time supporting that argument. However, my persoanl opinion is, yes, North America is among the closest areas in terms of democratic reality. However, that is just my opinion, and I would suggest that i , too, am subject to bias. Once we start using our own measuring stick to say who is closer, we are treading on a slippery slope. Woth regards to " carving up the Middle East", I wasn't saying that you had said that, but was explaining my original position in this thread which has lead to this current debate.
the point about which you and I disagree the most is this question of "context"...My friends and colleagues always state that my sense of historical perspective is among my strongest attributes. I feel that I do, constantly, ( ad nauseam, my friends might add) put things into historical context. The distinctions that I make with regards to your pointare these: Understanding the limitations of a decision makers knowledge as it applies to his decision applies both ways, and if history shows that that knowledge was out there, but either ignored or deemed incorrectly to be faulty, then the decision maker is at fault. This is equally true if said decision maker allows his personal agenda or prejudice to cloud his vision or alter his perception. With regards to the Domino Principle, I would suggest two points: 1) It was not a universally accepted theory, and there were opponents to in both within the United States and the international community. As these opponents have been proven to have been correct in their analysis of the international situation, and our leaders wrong, I would suggest that the blame for VietNam cannot be merely chalked up to ignorance. 2) Whether or not the Domino Principle was accurate at the time, it pre-supposes the right to impose our views on other nations to further our own goals, strategic or otherwise. In other words, whether we were right or wrong in determining what was in our best interests in that region, that regions people right to determine their own fate morally supercedes our interests based upon our own principles. Whether or not other powers were violating this right does not excuse our acting the same.As such, the amount and accuracy of information that was available to our leaders who made the decision they did doesn't excuse their violation of our own principles, of which we maintain we are the best example. A second point about historical perspective. While I myself am often guilty of this, it can be stetched to the point where you can excuse any decision made at any time by anyone. The degree to which this applies comes down to whether or not you believe in any absolute truths, and what those truths may be. For example, is slavery wrong? If so, has it always been wrong? If not always, then when did it become wrong? Because, according to historical context, there have been times when the vast majority of the world practiced slavery, and at those times the social conditioning any individual would have been subject to would have made slavery a non-issue, thus limiting his knowledge on the subject. That is true historical context, understanding not just what knowledgde was present at any given time, but the fact that morality itself has altered over time. If we are going to excuse past decisions based on their lack of knowledge we have, we also have to recognize that they also often differed with us in what was right and wrong, and there are times when a man arguing for the rights of women, for example, would have been viewed as morally in the wrong. As I said, it's a slippery slope... I have to run, but i would enjoy continuing the debate with regards to your points which I have yet to address at a later time...
