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This is not the first thread where you have overlooked the historically repeatedly proven fact that far off countries can pose very real threats. We have to have infantries. Without American infantries, you would not be on the internet bad mouthing your country's infantries. Your country would not be the United States, and you would not even be speaking English.Quote:
Originally Posted by Alric
Well I don't want to be rude to someone, who honestly thinks they are helping their country. Because generally they are good people. Even if they are extremely naive.
And yes, we would still have the internet and we would still be speaking English even if we didn't have an army at all. You have a habit of overestimating the threat of everything. If you want to look at it from a historical point of view, you would see most wars we have been were for political reasons. Very few wars were fought for our direct protection, from any sort of invasion or attack on US soil.
Do you know about all of the invasions that have happened in world history? It is absolutely outrageous how many there have been. If a movie about human history were made, Invasions or Take Overs would make a great title for the movie. What makes you think we are somehow magically above it? Our superpowerful military is what stops it from happening here, and our armed citizenry provides an additional deterrent. There are lots and lots of powerful people in the world who would love nothing in life more than to take over the United States. What do you think stops them?Quote:
Originally Posted by Alric
Tell me why you think we would be immune to this without a military...
Quote:
Originally Posted by Alric
Who's naive? The one who wants to serve their country or the one who thinks their country doesn't need an army?
The ones who think they are defending freedom, when they are fighting political wars. The ones who thinks its a good idea to go to foreign countries and get shot at all day long, when it really helps nothing. The ones who think the government will support them if they get injured in combat, when they are very difficult to deal with and often without medical support for vets.
Besides, I never said we didn't need an army. I am saying its ridiculous to volunteer to get shot at for a living when the army is off fighting political wars. Joining an army that defends your country is good, joining an army and fighting in pointless wars isn't as good. You basically just a mercenary if you join the US army. If you want to be a mercenary, then by all means, go ahead. Don't act like your defending freedom though, because your not.
As for the US being invading, its unlikely for many reasons. For starters our only neighbors are Mexico and Canada, neither of which are invading us any time soon.
Technology has advanced a great deal but we still lack the ability to teleport troops around the world. Anyone invading the US would have to sail great distances to reach the US. Sailing troops to the US rules out a vast majority of the countries in the world who would want to invade us.
Which brings up the logistics needed, to support an army and navy to sail that distance and to supply a war effort far away from whatever home land they come from. It would be a huge effort just to attack the coast line of the US.
Even if a country attacked the US coast line, they would never get very far inwards. It would be a logistical nightmare and nearly impossible for an army to sail across the ocean then march across the entire continent.
Geography and natural borders helps us a great deal. Next as you mentioned, there are tons of guns in the US. Which means heavy resistances even without a military. And with the logistical problems and spreading out a force over a very large area, that resistance would cause serious problems.
So no, the US isn't going to be invaded any time soon. Besides, if you kept the navy and air force(both of which has its own ground forces), then you really don't need the army. They are more than capable of defending us.
Uh... it's called minimum wage for a reason.Quote:
Originally Posted by Xyn
Alric, most of the reasons you gave for why we would not be invaded without a military involve the fact that we have a military. I know we are not going to be invaded any time soon. It's because we have such a great military and because our allies have militaries, some of which are great. Our armed citizenry is icing on the cake.
Quote:
Originally Posted by Alric
You really are clueless aren't you? Has there ever been a war that wasn't political? Just because the Soviet army isn't knocking at our door, does not mean our country does not need to be defended. Besides, haven't you ever heard that the best defense is a good offense? That's a popular saying because it's the honest to god truth. You may have to do a little abrstract thinking if you want to understand what good can come from this war. Nobody thinks Iraq is going to invade America, don't be ridiculous. Soldiers don't like politicians, soldiers hate war, and soldiers don't always agree with the wars they fight in. It doesn't make a bit of difference. That's not why they join. The quicker you understand that, the better off you will be. You'll piss a lot of people off if you go around spouting this nonsense in real life. It makes me sick to my stomach to see how many people lack a sense of honor nowadays. Not only do they not possess it themselves, but they can't even comprehend how another individual can have it. It just doesn't compute. "Go get shot at? Huh? Why? Are you stupid?"
As for why America hasn't been invaded, Canada and Mexico have nothing to do with it. We have boats and airplanes nowadays. Trans-oceanic travel is not what it used to be, meaning it is not a logistical nightmare. We did it in WWII, over both oceans. Japan almost did it and Germany was planning to do it. WWII could have easily gone the other way. The job of the American military is to disuade anybody from trying, and they're good at that.
Our army would be just as great without us invading people, would it not? Which was my entire point. No one is going to invade us, regardless of if we go to war with countries like iraq or not. Hence the reason I said they were political wars.
You said we would still have the United States and our freedom of speech on the internet even if we didn't have a military. I am still trying to understand that. What would make us immune to invasion if we didn't have a military, considering history's proof of the tendency of rulers to invade and take over?Quote:
Originally Posted by Alric
Of course we don't get invaded with a personal military.
But we also do the invading.
Humans are war-making creatures. A very primitive characteristic that can be observed in chimpanzees.
1) Anyone who loves conquest would want to take over the most powerfulQuote:
There are lots and lots of powerful people in the world who would love nothing in life more than to take over the United States.
country in the world. That goes without saying.
2) Other people who don't love conquest that wish to accomplish American
domination likely do so out of resentment for our "not so friendly" military
conduct. You know this happens. Nuclear weapons use on civilians is still the
crown jewel example. Rape and pillage in modern warfare is the other.
Not just a personal military. A damn powerful personal military. That is what it takes.Quote:
Originally Posted by Invader
When there are really good reasons for it. If we were just greedy conquerors, Western Europe would contain the other 50 or more U.S. states. We had Western Europe to do with as we wished after World War II. Look at what we did with it. Then look at what the Soviet Union did with Eastern Europe. See the difference? I could go on about this for a while, but I will leave this part of the discussion for now with a question. Why don't we own Canada right now? Imagine what the Soviet Union, imperial Japan, or the Roman Empire would have done in our situation. We, on the other hand, would seriously fuck up anybody who ever tries it.Quote:
Originally Posted by Invader
Even superadvanced space aliens would make arrangements to defend themselves and other aliens from those chimpanzees. But yes, those chimpanzees and humans like them are primitive idiots. There was a time when the United States was like that, but it has been a very long time.Quote:
Originally Posted by Invader
Anyone who loves conquest would want to take over any land he can get away with taking over. With the United States on this planet, there isn't much land on Earth people can get away with taking over. Isn't that great?Quote:
Originally Posted by Invader
Nobody we protect truly wants us to be suppressed except crazy religious fanatics and stuff. It would be their worst nightmare.Quote:
Originally Posted by Invader
We should have kept the war going like it was so we could have fought all over the Japanese mainland for a matter of years and killed tens of millions of Japanese civilians instead of a few hundred thousand?Quote:
Originally Posted by Invader
That stuff is unwarranted and is against U.S. policy.Quote:
Originally Posted by Invader
We do own it!Quote:
Originally Posted by Universal Mind
That's because we own all that land, too! No one can get away with stealing from us becauseQuote:
Anyone who loves conquest would want to take over any land he can get away with taking over. With the United States on this planet, there isn't much land on Earth people can get away with taking over. Isn't that great?
we're BEASTS. Ain't no one want a piece of this.
Crazy religious fanatics are crazy, and crazy people do tend to perceive the logical as nightmarish.Quote:
Nobody we protect truly wants us to be suppressed except crazy religious fanatics and stuff. It would be their worst nightmare.
My point was that we shouldn't have killed civilians at all, actually.Quote:
We should have kept the war going like it was so we could have fought all over the Japanese mainland for a matter of years and killed tens of millions of Japanese civilians instead of a few hundred thousand?
We could have settled with handling their military.
Surely, even in light of our bloodthirst, we can agree on this.
But it happens nontheless, and I think it was adressed in Switch's post.Quote:
That stuff is unwarranted and is against U.S. policy.
Their prime minister obeys orders from our president? They are independent and democratic.Quote:
Originally Posted by Invader
I think we disagree on the definition of "own". Countries might need us, but they are free to do their own things, unless they are terrorists or such.Quote:
Originally Posted by Invader
It looks like I made an antecedent foul up. I was trying to say that the end of the United States is the worst nightmare of sane people. Well, I'm using hyperbole with "worst nightmare", but I think our presence on this planet makes billions of people feel a lot more safe and secure than they would otherwise. They might have fun wearing tie dyes and bitching about us at coffee shops, but deep down, they know they like the security we provide.Quote:
Originally Posted by Invader
I hate the fact that civilians were killed at all in World War II and all other wars. I just don't know how else we could have handled the Japanese conquest once we dominated the Pacific. Their fighters were all over the place, and Japan ruled an outrageous chunk of Asia by then. Should we have gone everywhere their military was and fought them? Civilians would have been getting killed in the crossfire all over Asia and no telling where else. Don't you think the least horrific option we had was to blow up two cities and end the war right away? I know the idea of blowing up two cities is horrific beyond mere imagination, but you have to compare it to what the alternatives were. There was no easy answer. All of the options were terrible. There was no Kumbaya option. It wasn't on the table.Quote:
Originally Posted by Invader
Those who do it should be punished the way we punish other rapists and murderers.Quote:
Originally Posted by Invader
Well, yes, I do. If their strategy is to spread out, I think it's lazy to assumeQuote:
Originally Posted by Universal Mind
there's no other option than to just use super-weapons to kill civilians and
terrorize them into surrender. You understand that that was the point.
Nukes are the most intimidating, frightening weapon we have just short of
the hydrogen bomb, and to use them on non-military targets is to create
mass fear (and to kill many, but that's obvious).
If more civilians than enemy military personnel got killed as a result of ourQuote:
Civilians would have been getting killed in the crossfire all over Asia and no telling where else.
typical strategy, it would do no more than to prove that we'd be terribly
inefficient as a military. Being that that is not the case, I don't think it can
be argued that anywhere near the number of civilians would have died than
were killed in the Hiroshima/Nagasaki bombings.
The alternative to killing civilians would have been the loss of both enemyQuote:
Don't you think the least horrific option we had was to blow up two cities and end the war right away?
soldiers and our own soldiers. This alternative would have been less horrific.
Soldiers exist to fight and die if necessary. Civilians are noncombatants,
unarmed. I think it is more horrific to stoop bellow what can be considered
honorable, and I believe it is dishonorable to attack unarmed noncombatants
always. This may be where our disagreement lies.
Honor in modern warfare may very well be dead. It probably never existed
but in those few individuals that lived by it anyways. The most horrific option
is to behave dishonorably. Better to fight and die face to face than shoot
someone's mother and win.
The easy answer was to use nuclear weapons. =|Quote:
There was no easy answer.
Otherwise, I'm not sure what you mean by this. Feel free to explain more, I
am listening.
Woah... this whole thread really blew outta proportions. @.@;
Invader, I don't understand what you are proposing we should have done. I know what you think we should not have done, but what do you think we should have done?
Fighting Japan all over Asia would have resulted in something like the Vietnam War. That emperor would have never surrendered, and civilians would have been getting killed the whole way. Years of fighting all over a continent inevitably gets masses of civilians killed even when they are not targeted. The added civilian casualties would have been in the millions, especially considering the difficulty of fighting a military that can wear regular clothes and blend in with civilian populations.
Nuking was not an easy option. Americans at the time thought it was awful for the same reasons you think it was awful. It was awful. That made it not an easy option. I just don't know what the alternative was. What do you suggest?
the military is an obsolete institution used to perpetuate the monetary system.
don't join the military.
you'll start throwing puppies off cliffs, or lighting ur friends ass on fire for youtube.
getting killed for ur country, is dieing needlessly for your world.
better off getting a real job and actually contributing, be a cook or something.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=z6dENb73Tc8 <<< watch that then go join the military(Video phone beyonce/ladygaga)
Quote:
Originally Posted by Invader
Are you really suggesting that our decision to drop atomic bombs on Japan was based off laziness? That's a lazy analysis. It would be foolish to think such little thought went into the decision. We dropped atomic bombs because had we invaded Japan, every man, woman, and child would have pick up arms against us. Even if that meant throwing rocks. It would be a repeat of what we saw during the island hopping campaign except on a much much larger scale. The Marines new it, they experienced the Japanese tenacity first hand all throughout the Pacific (civilian tenacity as well.) They were completely fanatical. Millions of Japanese would have died, civilian and military. It is almost certain that more civilians would have died during a long, drawn-out invasion than during a nuclear attack. That's why we dropped the atomic bombs, it was absolutely the right decision.
Nobody condones targeting civilians. Collateral damage is an uncontrollable part of war, especially when dropping bombs. No matter how careful you are, civilians will inevitably get caught in the crossfire. You can't let it deter you from your main objective. If you look at the history of warfare, this has always been true and not until recently with the advent of smart bombs have civilian casulties become unacceptable. Back in WWII everybody carpet bombed, it was the only way.
Its true that joining the army messes people up. Between the stress of killing people, and being shot at constantly, people change. Especially with people finding them self taking 3 or 4 tours of duty in iraq, and spending years there. Everyone has heard of that shooting at the military base recently, but a lot of people don't know that there is a shooting a military base every couple of months, because people crack from all the stress.Quote:
Originally Posted by Reconsul
Even Universal Mind has said he thinks we should be leaving Iraq by now, though if you join you may find yourself there, fighting and acting like the police for some other country. How is that protecting our freedom?
Anyway it doesn't matter. Lets assume for a second that we need an army, and that we need physical troops in Iraq and Afghanistan. And if we didn't have a large force in iraq and afghanistan we would be invaded and lose all of our freedoms. Obviously that isn't true, but lets assume that, so we can say that the army protects our freedom.
Now assuming that, we need someone to be a meatbag that we stick on the road, patroling. Someone who goal is to give us a presence in the area, someone who doesn't do anything but get shot at constantly. Who people try to blow up constantly. The first line of defense, who is expendable, and who we do not care if they die or not. You get the worst equipment, you are payed the least, you are the first in and the last out. They suffer the most, have mental break downs come back permanently crippled.
Someone has to do it. Though do you really want to? I fail to see why any idvidual would volunteer for that job. Even if you honestly believe our freedoms are at stake unless we constantly invade forign countries to keep down our enemies, why would anyone want to be a meatbag in the US army, and take up the worst job there is?
Nazi Germany began to suffer because they were fighting a 2 front war.Quote:
Originally Posted by Universal Mind
They were surrounded and payed for that through supply-line cuts. Now,
Japan obviously did not have the same set-back, but that did not make them
exempt from having key components of their industry cut off. We understand
that Japan had factories on the mainland, and although they were pulling a
relatively small amount of resources from the same place, they had to import
much of the materials used in the fabrication of their weaponry from offshore.
With a widely spread out military they actually suffered from long supply
lines. What I propose as the solution would have been longer to accomplish
(of course), but it would have been to bleed them dry, so to speak. To rid
them of oil sources coming from beyond their explicit control would have
been a start. That's one reason we have special forces. The only reason we
don't think of this intuitively today is because we're not fighting a true
national military in Iraq that depends heavily on the use of petroleum for war
machines.
If we did wish to use the nuke, the alternative would have been to drop
them directly onto moving fleets in the Pacific. All I'm really saying in the end
is that, were the war to have been fought conventionally, and assuming we
made a point of hitting the right places, many times fewer civilians
should have perished than in the bombing of the cities alone.
A lazy action is independent of how much thought goes into it.Quote:
Originally Posted by Caprisun
False Dilemma. You are proposing that a nuclear attack and a direct mainlandQuote:
Originally Posted by Caprisun
invasion were the only two options. Please bear in mind that we were
successfully bombing factories within the Japanese borders. We had the full
capability of freezing their industry given enough time without explicitly
choosing civilian targets for the sake of civilian losses.
You have to condone it in order to make that kind of attack. You haveQuote:
Originally Posted by Caprisun
to condone attacking civilians in order to support the decision, too. You
admit that there is some level of war wherein in becomes OK to target and
killed unarmed civilians.
Who carpet bombed in order to kill only civilians? Cross-fire is quite besidesQuote:
Originally Posted by Caprisun
the point. We are not discussing cross-fire casualties.
There was a simple alternative to both invading japan and dropping the bombs. The US only needed to negotiate the terms of surrender with Japan. However the US wanted Japans unconditional surrender. Its the all or nothing approach that made nukes the only valid answer.
You obviously failed history class when you were in high school. Or maybe you are still in high school, and you are about to fail it.Quote:
Originally Posted by Alric
Says the person who clearly knows nothing about history. Or perhaps you read far to much war propaganda. Maybe you even still believe that Hiroshima was a military base
Quote:
Originally Posted by Invader
What do you think the targets were for bombing raids? It wasn't people. It was industry. Japans military was no longer spread thin on account of they no longer occupied any Pacific islands. Their oil resources came from us, and we imposed an oil embargo on Japan before the attack on Peral Harbor. This may have been one of the main motivators for the attack. Obviously it didn't stop them, and only god knows how long and how many lives it would take to completely deplete Japan of it resources. In war, the plan that prolongs the war is by default the worse plan. Everyday the war goes on, more peole die. No if, ands, or buts about it. So your plan is nonsense. It may make sense in your head, but in reality there was never any consideration given to a plan that even remotely resembled what you described.
"A lazy action is independent of how much thought goes into it"
Completely irrelevant. Honestly I don't see how someone could truly believe that America dropped atomic bombs on account of them being too "lazy" to launch an invasion. It makes no sense.
"False Dilemma. You are proposing that a nuclear attack and a direct mainland
invasion were the only two options. Please bear in mind that we were
successfully bombing factories within the Japanese borders. We had the full
capability of freezing their industry given enough time without explicitly
choosing civilian targets for the sake of civilian losses."
There were two decisions that were considered. Had anybody proposed your plan in Washington D.C., they would have been thrown out of the room and probably fired. Both plans required a significant amount of casulties, American and Japanese, military and civilian. Compared to the two, your plan would have a much higher casulty rate since your plan involves prolonging the war indefinitely.
"You have to condone it in order to make that kind of attack. You have
to condone attacking civilians in order to support the decision, too. You
admit that there is some level of war wherein in becomes OK to target and
killed unarmed civilians."
Nobody has the crosshairs on civilians. Japan is so densely populated that if you drop an atomic bomb anywhere in that country, you will kill a lot of civilians. Hiroshima and Nagasaki were economic centers, that's why they were targeted. If they wanted to kill the most people, they would have dropped one on Tokyo. Just because you know beforehand that civilians will die, it does not mean you want to kill civilians and it doesn't mean you condone it. I assure you the casulty rate from an atomic explosion was carefully calculated beforehand. They knew it would kill a lot of people and they decided that it was for the greater good. They decided that in the end, it would save more lives than it took. I along with most historians agree that it did just that. That is not condoning the killing of civilians. We did not shoot civilians dead in the street, that would be condoning civilians deaths.
"Who carpet bombed in order to kill only civilians? Cross-fire is quite besides
the point. We are not discussing cross-fire casualties.[/"
Nobody carpet bombed to kill civilians, but everybody carpet bombed. It was what technology permitted at the time. If you want to talk about civilians casulties, it is important to talk about carpet bombing since it accounted for most of the civilian deaths in WWII.