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Title: Idiocy in D.C., Progress in Baghdad
Source:
www.weeklystandard.com
URL Source: http://www.weeklystandard.com/Conte ... icles/000/000/013/416urcoa.asp
Published: Mar 17, 2007
Author: William Kristol
Post Date: 2007-03-17 20:20:21 by BeAChooser
Keywords: None
Views: 3476
Comments: 224
Idiocy in D.C., Progress in Baghdad The surge is working--that's what matters. by William Kristol 03/26/2007, Volume 012, Issue 27 In order to preserve the cosmic harmony, it seems the gods insist that good news in one place be offset by misfortune elsewhere. It may well be that Gen. David Petraeus is going to lead us to victory in Iraq. He is certainly off to a good start. If the karmic price of success in Iraq is utter embarrassment for senior Bush officials in Washington, D.C.--well, in our judgment, the trade-off is worth it. The world will surely note our success or failure in Iraq. It will not long remember the gang that couldn't shoot straight at the Justice Department--or, for that matter, the antics of congressional Democrats--unless either so weakens the administration as to undercut our mission in Iraq. Obviously, it's too early to say anything more definitive than that there are real signs of progress in Baghdad. The cocksure defeatism of war critics of two months ago, when the surge was announced, does seem to have been misplaced. The latest Iraq Update (pdf) by Kimberly Kagan summarizes the early effects of the new strategy backed up by, as yet, just one additional U.S. brigade deployed in theater (with more to be added in the coming weeks): This "rolling surge" focuses forces on a handful of neighborhoods in Baghdad, and attempts to expand security out from those neighborhoods. . . . A big advantage of a "rolling surge" is that the population and the enemy sense the continuous pressure of ever-increasing forces. Iraqis have not seen such a prolonged and continuous planned increase of U.S. forces before. . . . The continued, increasing presence of U.S. forces appears to be having an important psychological, as well as practical, effect on the enemy and the people of Iraq. . . . [Meanwhile] in Ramadi, in the belt south of Baghdad stretching from Yusifiyah to Salman Pak, and northeast in Diyala Province, . . . U.S. and Iraqi forces have deprived al Qaeda of the initiative. This sense of momentum is confirmed by many other reports in the media, and from Americans and Iraqis on the ground. But back in Washington, congressional Democrats are still mired in the fall of 2006 and seem determined to be as irresponsible as ever. They're being beaten back--in part thanks to the fighting spirit of stalwart congressional Republicans. Last week, the Senate defeated a resolution that would have restricted the use of U.S. troops in Iraq and set March 31, 2008, as a target date for removing U.S. forces from combat. On the same day, on a mostly party-line vote, the House Appropriations Committee reported out the Democratic version of a supplemental appropriations bill for the war. It was an odd piece of legislation--an appropriation to fight a war replete with provisions intended to ensure we lose it. Here's what the Democratic legislation does, according to the Washington Post: "Under the House bill, the Iraqi government would have to meet strict benchmarks. . . . If by July 1 the president could not certify any progress, U.S. troops would begin leaving Iraq, to be out before the end of this year. If Bush did certify progress, the Iraqi government would have until Oct. 1 to meet the benchmarks, or troops would begin withdrawing then. In any case, withdrawals would have to begin by March 1, 2008, and conclude by the end of that summer." Got that? Oh yes, in addition to the arbitrary timelines for the removal of troops, there's pork. As the Post explains, "Included in the legislation is a lot of money to help win support. The price tag exceeds the president's war request by $24 billion." Some of the extra money goes to bail out spinach farmers hurt by E. coli, to pay for peanut storage, and to provide additional office space for the lawmakers themselves. So much for an emergency war appropriations bill. The legislation may collapse on the floor of the House this week. It certainly deserves to. Republicans can insist on a clean supplemental--no timelines to reassure the enemy that if they just hang on, we'll be gone before long, and no pork. They can win this fight--and if they do, combined with progress in Iraq, the lasting news from March 2007 will not be Bush administration haplessness; it will be that we are on the way to success in Iraq.
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#178. To: scrapper2 (#177)
Like the BBC and the Christian Science Monitor are not going to check what they print. http://freedom4um.com/cgi-bin/readart.cgi?ArtNum=48191&Disp=112#C112 He is Dr Doug Rokke, a US health physicist who led the DU clean-up in Saudi Arabia, Kuwait and Iraq immediately after the Gulf War. In 1994, Dr Rokke, an Army Reserve captain, was appointed director of the Pentagon's DU project, a job he left in 1997. Kosovo: Special Report He helped develop an education and training programme, and conducted tests on DU explosives in the Nevada desert. The Pentagon has confirmed that A-10 aircraft are using DU rounds in the war with Serbia. They are extremely heavy, and are used for their armour-piercing capability. Veterans from the 1991 conflict believe DU, which is both radioactive and toxic, may help to explain the existence of Gulf War Syndrome. http://freedom4um.com/cgi-bin/readart.cgi?ArtNum=48191&Disp=120#C120 "This [DU] is the Agent Orange of the 1990s - absolutely," says Doug Rokke, a former Army health physicist who was part of the DU assessment team in the Gulf War, and DU project director for the training package.
"For we wrestle not against flesh and blood, but against principalities, against powers, against the rulers of the darkness of this world, against spiritual wickedness in high places." Ephesians 6:12 KJV
I don't believe that. Didn't say it. Didn't suggest it. Just another scrapper strawman. The Soviets defeated the Germans. BUT, in large part thanks to the help of the US. Had the US not provided that help ... Almost three years after the US entered the war. I'm glad you recognize that the Lend/Lease fueled Stalin's war machine. Without it Hitler's Germany would have won. Then what? Well I see you are rooting for their side. Too bad we have folks like you and those in the mainstream media doing everything possible (since almost day one) to weaken OUR will. Given that, whose side are you on?
I've previously linked his own resume. http://www.mindfully.org/Nucs/2003/Rokke-Depleted-Uranium-DU21apr03.htm#1 It states: * Doctor of Philosophy; University of Illinois; 1992. It doesn't specify the field.
No more so than Germany would have been had it beaten the British and Germans. http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/science/nature/4598955.stm "Historians working in Germany and the US claim to have found a 60-year-old diagram showing a Nazi nuclear bomb."
He is NOT named as an expert on DU in that report. DU is not even mentioned in the same sentence as Dr. Rokke in that report. Dr. Rokke was an Assistant Professor in environmental science. He did not gain tenure.
No he is NOT. robin still hasn't figured that out? Well, that's what happens when you listen to only one side of a debate. ROTFLOL!
So do you find U-239 and plutonium to be safe to inhale and ingest BAC?
A physicist or chemist with a doctorate degree holds a Phd, not any other type of doctorate degree. So Doctor of Philosophy could be a Phd in Physics (Doctor of Philosophy in Phyics).
Your propaganda outlets are either deliberately misleading people, or are unaware of the fact that DU is contaminated with transuranic elements. They apparently have never tested any real DU munitions, and are simply using theoretical values and assumptions based on invalid data.
So did you enter that Wikipedia article all by yourself BAC?
People don't get a PhD in Education, they get a Ed.D or D.Ed A PhD is a research degree and applies to a wide range of sciences and humanities. Not in this case. Various sources (that you've previously been linked) clearly indicate Rokke's degree was in Technology Education. http://scholar.lib.vt.edu/ejournals/JTE/supplements/FosterBibliography.html "A Partial Bibliography of Recent Graduate Research in Technology Education and Related Fields ... snip ... This bibliography is a compilation of recent masters theses and doctoral dissertations completed in Technology Education, and related fields such as Industrial Arts, Industrial Technology, Industrial Vocational Education, and Trade & Industrial Education at institutions listed in the NAITTE/CTTE Directory ... snip ... Rokke, D. L. (1992). "Perceived physics concepts needed to teach secondary technology education as general education." Unpublished doctoral dissertation, University of Illinois, Urbana-Champaign."
Really? ********************* http://teched.vt.edu/CTTE/ImagesPDFs/Mono17GradResearchDatabase.pdf The Technology Education Graduate Research Database 1892-2000 Council on Technology Teacher Education ... snip ... Rokke, Douglas Lind. (1992). Perceived physics concepts needed to teach secondary technology education as general education. Unpublished Doctoral Dissertation, University Of Illinois At Urbana-Champaign. Dissertation Abstracts Online Accession No: AAG9236582 *********************** Why do you suppose that Rokke is not a member of any physics organizations? He's a member of the National Association of Industrial Technical Teacher Educators. *********************** http://www.coe.uga.edu/naitte/minutes/naitte_min_12-12-02.pdf "National Association of Industrial Technical Teacher Educators Executive Committee Meeting Las Vegas Hilton – Room 9 – 7:00 AM to 9:00 AM. Las Vegas, NV December 12, 2002" ... snip ... The major work of the past year was planning the NAITTE Program for the 2002 ACTE Convention. We again worked with the Technology Education Division to schedule the program. ... snip ... Checks that have come for the 2002-03 membership year imembers report in October. ... snip ... Marcelle Hardy, University du Quebec Montreal, $60.00 *************
So do you find U-239 and plutonium to be safe to inhale and ingest BAC?
A PhD is a research degree and applies to a wide range of sciences and humanities.
Answer the question, BAC.
If you look carefully at my lips, you'll realize that I'm actually saying something else. I'm not actually telling you about the several ways I'm gradually murdering Joan. - Tom Frost
LOL, I think BAC might be Marie Colvin.
If you look carefully at my lips, you'll realize that I'm actually saying something else. I'm not actually telling you about the several ways I'm gradually murdering Joan. - Tom Frost
Well I see you are rooting for their side. Too bad we have folks like you and those in the mainstream media doing everything possible (since almost day one) to weaken OUR will. Given that, whose side are you on? You are doing that strawman thing to scrapper here, and you are again inciting Aaron of LP to tie up the phone lines at Homeland Security. She simply said the will of the people will overcome technology, and then you call that rooting for their side which is an outrageous accusation and unfair comparison.
* Doctor of Philosophy; University of Illinois; 1992.< * Bachelor of Science; Western Illinois University; It doesn't specify the field. That's a bit odd, normally such information would be available. I'll look for it as it should be easy enough to find.
No strawman here, Diana. Since we ALL agree that "will" is very important to winning, then anything that hurts our will or bolsters our enemy's will is bad. And the media and many 4umers have been posting material from day one that can arguably be said to do that. That is, unless, you don't view our opponents as our enemies. Is that the case, Diana? Huh???
That or Judith Miller.
Have you ever given a dog helium?
If you look carefully at my lips, you'll realize that I'm actually saying something else. I'm not actually telling you about the several ways I'm gradually murdering Joan. - Tom Frost
BAC: Oh please. Have you nothing but strawmen to offer? The ISSUE is whether the Germans would have defeated the Soviets had the US not helped them in WW2. The ISSUE is what would the world look like today had that happened. Keep in mind that the Germans were only a little behind America in the race for the bomb and that race was given urgency here in the US primarly because we were at war with Germany. Had that not been the case, Germany might well have beaten the US to its development. And you may not know this but at the end of 1945, the Germans had a bomber that could fly to the US and return. That bomber could easily have carried nuclear weapons. Like I said to you folks. What then? What's the strawman? You make perfectly clear that you could give 2 hoots about the Eastern Europeans that we doomed to communism. It's only Hitler who is your focus and why is that? In sheer numbers of deaths he caused Hitler was an amateur compared to Stalin. And yet you see no problem with our aiding the worst butcher in modern history. Why is that, BAC? Hitler was no threat to America. Say what you will about Hitler and the bomb - he was several years from that. We had the bomb and we used the bomb. Hitler didn't. So why are you yammering about the dannger of Hitler to the world. Why don't you ask the Japanese about the dangers of a nation having a bomb and using it irresponsibly. And don't bother spamming me with it was the only way to stop the Japanese from fighting any longer. I provided you with a link to US Government documents recently released the showed the opposite to be true. Here's where your worries about Hitler and the bomb belong - in the trash heap of history like where this historian's book went, evidently - your claim and his about Hitler being minutes away from developing the bomb are laughable. http:// www.spiegel.de/international/spiegel/0,1518,346293,00.html March 14, 2005 Berlin historian Rainer Karlsch claims that the Nazis conducted three nuclear weapons tests in 1944 and 1945. But he has no proof to back up his theories. The United States needed 125,000 people, including six future Nobel Prize winners, to develop the atomic bombs that exploded over Hiroshima and Nagasaki in 1945. The uranium enrichment facility alone, including its security zone, was the size of the western German city of Frankfurt. Dubbed the Manhattan project, the quest ultimately cost the equivalent of about $30 billion. In his new book, "Hitler's Bomb," Berlin historian Rainer Karlsch claims Nazi Germany almost achieved similar results with only a handful of physicists and a fraction of the budget. The author writes that German physicists and members of the military conducted three nuclear weapons tests shortly before the end of World War II, one on the German island of Ruegen in the fall of 1944 and two in the eastern German state of Thuringia in March 1945. The tests, writes Karlsch, claimed up to 700 lives. If these theories were accurate, history would have history would have to be rewritten. Ever since the Allies occupied the Third Reich's laboratories and interrogated Germany's top physicists working with wunderkind physicist Werner Heisenberg and his colleague Carl Friedrich von Weizsäcker, it's been considered certain that Hitler's scientists were a long way from completing a nuclear weapon...
"Nazii-fixated folks like BAC" So you would have doomed them to Hitler. And unlike now, you have doomed them permanently. Hitler was only getting started. Well there you have it folks. scrapper assures us that Hitler was no threat. Just like Saddam was no threat. No, many experts think the Germans were perhaps 6 months from the bomb at the end of the war. And that was with US bombing and specific US efforts to take apart and sidetrack Germany's nuclear program. Had we not been in the war ... You trying to tell us that you think he wouldn't have if he had one? Especially if he were the only one with one? That deserves a laugh. ROTFLOL! You think our use of the bomb against Japan was irresponsible? Really? Refresh my memory.
BAC: I don't believe that. Didn't say it. Didn't suggest it. Just another scrapper strawman. The Soviets defeated the Germans. BUT, in large part thanks to the help of the US. Had the US not provided that help ... b. scrapper; Hitler suffered his greatest military setback of the war in the summer of 1944. BAC: Almost three years after the US entered the war. c. I'm glad you recognize that the Lend/Lease fueled Stalin's war machine. Without it Hitler's Germany would have won. Then what? d. d. scrapper: Diana is right - that the "will" of the Iraqi insurgents will ultimately overcome the technology of the foreign occupier. BAC: Well I see you are rooting for their side. Too bad we have folks like you and those in the mainstream media doing everything possible (since almost day one) to weaken OUR will. Given that, whose side are you on? a. Liar. This is what you said in post #169: "Forget the Soviets. They are gone in your alternate world. The Germans defeated them using technology that even the US didn't have at the end of WW2." b. What does one have to do with the other? The Russian army was singlehandedly responsible for the German defeat in the summer of 1944. The US military was not in Russia. In case you were not aware of this, BAC, the Russians had the largest standing army in the world as of 1941. There are historians including Viktor Suvorov who served in the Soviet army and military intel as well as historian Albert Weeks ( whose book you quoted)who believe that Stalin all along had hoped Hitler would challenge the world powers so Stalin could be called in as an ally to "liberate" European nations he had his eye on taking and brutalizing. Stalin had been preparing all along for a WW where he'd be the victor ( and he was right)and Stalin had been using FDR and his lend-lease plan to rebuild his army to expand Soviet domination and you think this was all well and good? Stalin had spies in FDR's Admin. Stalin stole military tech from our nation. FDR enabled a monster to get to be a bigger monster who double-crossed America. So why are we supposed to be proud of that? c. I never denied that the lend lease program fueled Stalin's war machine. What I said and so did your Professor Weeks - whose stats you merrily quoted without reading more about the content - was that FDR's lend lease program also fueled Stalin's oppressive machinery as well. FDR condemned millions upon millions of Eastern Europeans to servitude under communism or to immediate death in the gulags. And to that you say nothing - you don't care, and it's transparently clear why. If we had stayed out of the war, the 2 monster isms would have finished each other off and the Stalinists might have imploded thereafter and we wouldn't have lost 300,000 soldiers. There was zero chance that Hitler would invade Britain after he lost the Battle of Britain. Hitler didn't get his weapons re-armament plans implemeneted by Speer until 1943, for God's sake. Britain was way ahead of Germany in that regard. I'm wondering why are you so eager to jump into wars when you have never served in any? Have you seen anyone die of wounds? Have you ever killed anyone? War is brutal even to the survivors. So grow up and get over your illusions about war being a computer game. d. I support the troops by wanting them to come home asap. There is no mission in Iraq that is relevant to America. By forcing our troops to stay the course or to surge or whatever only benefit's Israel/Haliburton/Exxon. Is that what you support?- all 3 or just 1? Btw, don't you dare bad mouth or raise any cheesy questions my patriotism without knowing what me and my family have contributed over many generations. I don't have dual citizenship - like some, perhaps you? - I have loyalty to only one nation and that's America so keep your cheap punk back stabbing to the classrooms where you take your lessons at the AEI offices. As for will, the Iraqis have it because it's their country. They - the insurgents - or as war mongers like yourself like to label Iraqi citizens "the enemy" are planning to fight the foreign occupier to the last man - get it - they have legitimacy on their side - it's their country, not ours, not Israel's, not Haliburton's, not Exxon's. We were not invited to invade and occupy Iraq by the Iraqis. We invaded for lies generated by the Office of Special Plans. What we need to rely on now is common sense - something that has been in short supply the past 4 years in the White House. Common sense is telling most Americans - who don't have hidden agendas - that we should cut our losses and leave in an orderly fashion by the New Year and leave Iraq to its rightful citizen-owners. Btw, I saw 2 people interviewed on PBS today - representing both left and right schools of thinking - Wade from the Council of Foreign Relations and Mathews from the Carnegie Foundation and BOTH concurred that the Iraq War was a terrible mistake in judgement - both said they believed that if GWB had the chance to do over again, he would not invade Iraq, and that because of the invasion and occupation we have caused great harm to America's future on the int'l stage and that we are definitely more unsafe now because the neocons' Iraq War was such a grevious act that it has radicalized Muslims around the world as a result. I hope the neocons - every last Trotskyite one of them - burn in hell for what their duplitious selves wrought on our fair republic.
It's not just my opinion. http://www.ncesa.org/html/hirosh ima.html "Hiroshima: Historians Reassess" by Gar Alperovitz Foreign Policy (Summer 1995) No. 99: 15-34. Copyright 1995 Carnegie Endowment for International Peace "Careful scholarly treatment of the records and manuscripts opened over the past few years has greatly enhanced our understanding of why the Truman administration used atomic weapons against Japan. Experts continue to disagree on some issues, but critical questions have been answered. The consensus among scholars is that the bomb was not needed to avoid an invasion of Japan and to end the war within a relatively short time. It is clear that alternatives to the bomb existed and that Truman and his advisers knew it." (Emphasis added.) The author of that statement is not a revisionist; he is J. Samuel Walker, chief historian of the U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission. Nor is he alone in that opinion. Walker is summarizing the findings of modern specialists in his literature review in the Winter 1990 issue of Diplomatic History. Another expert review, by University of Illinois historian Robert Messer, concludes that recently discovered documents have been "devastating" to the traditional idea that using the bomb was the only way to avoid an invasion of Japan that might have cost many more lives...
b. You trying to tell us that you think he wouldn't have if he had one? Especially if he were the only one with one? That deserves a laugh. ROTFLOL! a. Hitler was no threat to us. He was loathe to have us come into the war. Hitler wanted continental Europe. If it weren't that he believed Russia was going to attack him, he probably would not have taken on the Eastern front either. But he did and it was his undoing. Saddam was no threat to us. It's been said by the 9/11 Commission and by the Iraq Study Group. Are you deaf and blind? Get with the program. And no one but you believes the prop of Billy Kristol and Normie Podhoretz and Richard Perle. b. Here's what I'm trying to tell you - since you didn't get it the first time round - we had the bomb. Hitler did not have the bomb and he was several years from getting the bomb, regardless of what your sources might say. We were in the driver's seat. And even if Hitler had eventually got the bomb, so what - haven't you heard of the phrase "mutual deterrance"? Duh - Russia had the bomb and we went through a 40 year cold war with them and Russia did not use the bomb. Pakistan has the bomb. N. Korea has the bomb. India has the bomb. There is only one nation that used the bomb. It's us - so get out from under your bed and breathe easier - you don't have to worry about "other" nations.
No, dummy. It took hundreds of thousands of people fighting against the communists in Afghanistan. Now brighter people than you might see some lesson(s) to be learned here.
Just watch one of the many documentaries on tv concerning nazi Germany.
I know someone who had an uncle who designed and drew up a diagram of a helicopter powered by God that he submited to the US patent office. It was very well designed, he had been an engineer. He was crazy though.
Excellent post, explains the situation very well.
Gee, scrapper. Did you fail to understand the word "alternate"? The only reason the Soviets were even capable of resisting the Germans at that point was the massive amounts of US aid (remember? 450,000 trucks. Enough food to feed the entire Soviat army over the course of the war. Railroad equipment. Etc.) they'd received in the intervening years. Plus, they were aided by the diversion of large portions of the German military machine elsewhere to defend against attacks by, primarily, the US. Good. Just as I said. I'm glad you recognize that. And YOU, had you been President and not brought us into the war, would have condemned even greater millions to NAZI servitude or immediate death in NAZI run ovens. That's not what would have happened. The Germans would very likely have won. If for no other reason then that they had most of the rocket and jet fighter scientists. You know that old saying. If at first you don't succeed ... You can't build anything if you don't get the materials. You can't run engines if you don't have the oil. And without us in the war, the Island of Britain would have been starved out of both. It was a near thing as it was. Do you know that in 1940 (before we even entered the war), the British requested and received 50 destroyers? Even before entering the war officially, American warships were escorting Allied convoys as far as Iceland. In January of 1942 five (5) Type IX U boats sailed the shores of the US. In the next 3 weeks they sank 156,000 tons of shipping without losing a single U boat. In six months those few U boats sank 397 ships (2 MILLION tons). And it was US shipping yards that replaced the losses. And it was US ships that defended the convoys. Even with US help it was near thing. In October of 1942 alone, with everything America could do to stop the U boats, they sank 56 ship (258,000 tons). Without US participation, Germany would have starved out Britain in no time as more and more U boats were produced. But won't the WOT still be going on? Won't troops just have to die elsewhere to fight it? Perhaps in locales where they can't exercise as much freedom to use the weapons they have? Do you think bringing our troops home will stop the WOT? Won't instability in Iraq make terrorists groups like al-Qaeda, and terrorist supporting nations like Iran and Syria stronger? Won't instability in Iraq weaken our allies in the WOT in the region? Does a perceived defeat make us weaker in general? What, historically, have islamic countries done when they see weakness? How do the Chinese perceive weakness? But if as you say, WILL is everything, then doesn't anything that harms our will hurt us? Doesn't anything that strengthens our opponents will hurt us? I'm curious what you mean by AEI. So you think the insurgents that have brutally murdered tens of thousand of Iraqi civilians are "patriots". I see. Bet you if they'd had a secret referendum on the matter the "invade us option" would have won hands down.
I'd like to see the names of these scholars. And I'd like to see these alternatives. And by the way, consider this. If we hadn't used the atomic bomb to end WW2, the reality of the consequences of nuclear war would not have been apparent ... not to world leaders or the people of the world. It was a critical event. In that case, the likelihood that nuclear weapons might be used in some future conflict would have increased considerably. The likelihood of war between great powers like the US and Soviets would have increased. Perhaps the Berlin Crisis might have ended in open conflict. And had that happened, that conflict might very well have gone nuclear. And then where would the world be today, scrapper?
I'm a little rusty on all this, but I'll guess John Foster Dulles in the "Who Is BAC Chanelling Tonight" Contest.
If you look carefully at my lips, you'll realize that I'm actually saying something else. I'm not actually telling you about the several ways I'm gradually murdering Joan. - Tom Frost
when I saw that word 'Idiocy' in the title, then I knew that you would be a fountain of knowledge on this thread. Thanks for your expertise. Eating Depleted Uranium dust is fun. BAC is a genius. I read everything he says.
Galatians 3:29 And if ye [be] Christ's, then are ye Abraham's seed, and heirs according to the promise.
Was that really the limit of his ambitions, scrapper? Tapes captured in Iraq show that Saddam still considered himself at war with us. They show him and his aids talking about the use of surrogates to attack the US with WMD. And we know that Saddam was crazy. Crazy enough to use WMD against his own people. Crazy enough to order the use of WMD against Israel in Gulf War 1 (where Israel wasn't even a combatant). Crazy enough to attempt the assassination of an ex-President. Crazy enough to let his country get invaded rather than cooperate in proving his country had no WMD. Crazy enough to wind up in a small hole in the ground rather than prove that. Would we have had the bomb if we hadn't been at war? I think not. The war was the impetus for developing the weapon with such urgency. That's not entirely clear. As I posted early, recent discovers indicate the Nazi actually had a drawing of a nuclear weapon that might have worked. They even knew how much fissionables were required. And even if development had been a few years later, so what? By that time, Germany and Japan would have consolidated its hold on the rest of the world and finally be ready for new conquests. Maybe each other. Or maybe the US. With the bomb. With the means to deliver that bomb to the US mainland. And would America have responded before it was too late? Well that hasn't been our history. I thought this was a debate. Duh, the Soviets got the bomb FROM US. If we hadn't developed it, then the USSR might have faced Germany without the bomb. Only assuming that the USSR was still around at that point in time.
b. And by the way, consider this. If we hadn't used the atomic bomb to end WW2, the reality of the consequences of nuclear war would not have been apparent ... not to world leaders or the people of the world. It was a critical event. a. I gave you the same link 2 times already - it's 4 pages long. Newly released US gov't documents make it quite clear ( except to war mongers like yourself) that nuking 2 cities in Japan constituted war crimes committed by Truman. He had alternatives and he consciously ignored them. http://www.ncesa.org/html/hirosh ima.html "Hiroshima: Historians Reassess" by Gar Alperovitz Foreign Policy (Summer 1995) No. 99: 15-34. Copyright 1995 Carnegie Endowment for International Peace "Careful scholarly treatment of the records and manuscripts opened over the past few years has greatly enhanced our understanding of why the Truman administration used atomic weapons against Japan. Experts continue to disagree on some issues, but critical questions have been answered. The consensus among scholars is that the bomb was not needed to avoid an invasion of Japan and to end the war within a relatively short time. It is clear that alternatives to the bomb existed and that Truman and his advisers knew it." (Emphasis added.) The author of that statement is not a revisionist; he is J. Samuel Walker, chief historian of the U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission. Nor is he alone in that opinion. Walker is summarizing the findings of modern specialists in his literature review in the Winter 1990 issue of Diplomatic History. Another expert review, by University of Illinois historian Robert Messer, concludes that recently discovered documents have been "devastating" to the traditional idea that using the bomb was the only way to avoid an invasion of Japan that might have cost many more lives..." That's cut and past of the first couple of paragraphs. b. You really are certifiable nuts, boozer - before I thought you were merely a paid employee shill for one of the "think" tanks. But after reading your latest observations about the valuable learning experience that came as a result of frying Hiroshima and Nagasaki [ when atomic bombs were not required to get a surrender from the Japanese Emperor] I am now convinced you are an off-the- wall-wacky-bloodthirsty-nutjob. You think Nagaski and Hiroshima were some kind of petri dishes for experimentation on what works for peace and what doesn't? You think we should look at the "up" side of how we fried 2 Japanese cities for nothing? Good God, man, you are heartless. "On 9 August 1945, Nagasaki was the target of the world's second atomic bomb attack at 11:02 a.m., when the north of the city was destroyed and an estimated 39,000 people were killed. According to statistics given at the Nagasaki Peace Park, the dead totaled 73,884, injured 74,909 and diseased 120,820. Most of those who died were civilians." "On August 6, 1945 the nuclear weapon Little Boy was dropped on Hiroshima by the crew of the Enola Gay, directly killing an estimated 80,000 people and completely destroying approximately 68% of the city's buildings.[1] In the following months, an estimated 60,000 more people died from injuries or radiation poisoning. [2][3] Since 1945, several thousand more hibakusha have died of illnesses caused by the bomb."
Like the torture renditions. By ignoring the fact that you have already answered his request for links, he then spams the thread filling it with copy/paste nonsense, making those links more difficult to find. BAC is not here for honest debate, he is not here in good faith. He is here to distract and disrupt any meaningful discourse and exchange of ideas about certain topics.
"The line separating good and evil passes not through states, nor between classes nor between parties either — but right through the human heart." — Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn
yeah, then he wonders why so many here and on LP "bozo themselves!" no one wants to read his spamcrap. it isn't just 4um'ers.
What were those alternatives? And who were the scholars he claimed have reached a consensus. Surely both must be available to you, scrapper. If you want that to be the argument you depend on in this debate, fine with me. I've offered facts and sound logic to prove you are wrong about the outcome of WW2 had we not intervened. And there is by no means a consensus that the dropping of the bombs in Japan was a war crime (http://www.americanheritage.com/articles/web/20050902-hiroshima-nagasaki-japan-atomic.shtml ). But you go ahead and keep repeating that. I suspect that most Americans will simply ignore you if you do. Is it really heartless to believe that by using two nuclear weapons on cities we avoided thousands being used on cities? Or just common sense...
I guess robin, because she's bozo'd herself, doesn't realize that I posted the article starting this thread. And since she can only read half the debate, she has no idea what discourse and exchange of ideas is really taking place. It's rather funny, if you ask me.
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#179. To: scrapper2, ALL (#173)
If you believe that the Germans defeated the Russians in WW II
Hitler suffered his greatest military setback of the war in the summer of 1944.
It did not just fuel Stalin's war machinery to fight Hitler
Diana is right - that the "will" of the Iraqi insurgents will ultimately overcome the technology of the foreign occupier.
#180. To: Diana, ALL (#174)
"Dr Rokke holds a PhD in Philosophy and a Master of Science."
What is his masters in?
* Master of Science; University of Illinois; 1986.
* Bachelor of Science; Western Illinois University;
#181. To: Diana, ALL (#176)
They had help and were in a more secure location and larger geographically than Germany.
Your bomb argument may have some merit, I'm not so sure they were that close to us at the time in development
#182. To: scrapper2, ALL (#177)
but he was indeed at one time viewed as an expert in DU matters, toxic chemicals in the environment. In fact, he is named as a participant in a CDC conference publication from 1999
Dr. Rokke was an Ass't Professor at the Dept. of Physical and Earth Sciences, Jacksonville State U
#183. To: robin, ALL (#178)
Dr Doug Rokke, a US health physicist
#184. To: BeAChooser (#170)
(Edited)
You appear to be a major trouble maker...and I'm getting really pissed. - GoldiLox, 7/27/2006
#185. To: BeAChooser (#180)
Doctor of Philosophy; University of Illinois; 1992.
You appear to be a major trouble maker...and I'm getting really pissed. - GoldiLox, 7/27/2006
#186. To: BeAChooser (#171)
Let's see if you just dismiss or ignore them like you did then.
You appear to be a major trouble maker...and I'm getting really pissed. - GoldiLox, 7/27/2006
#187. To: BeAChooser (#160)
Yes, let's see what Wikipedia has to say about Doug Rokke:
Please see the discussion on the talk page.
You appear to be a major trouble maker...and I'm getting really pissed. - GoldiLox, 7/27/2006
#188. To: Diana, BeAChooser (#174)
That would sound strange for a PhD in education to be an expert on DU
You appear to be a major trouble maker...and I'm getting really pissed. - GoldiLox, 7/27/2006
#189. To: FormerLurker, ALL (#185)
So Doctor of Philosophy could be a Phd in Physics (Doctor of Philosophy in Phyics).
#190. To: FormerLurker, ALL (#188)
People don't get a PhD in Education, they get a Ed.D or D.Ed
Doctor of Education
A PhD is a research degree and applies to a wide range of sciences and humanities.
Doctor of Philosophy
Robert Hoewll, Fort Hays State University, $50.00
Aldo Jackson, Erie County Technical School, $50.00
Edward Mann, The University of Southern Mississippi, $50.00 + $10.00
Connie Munson, Student Membership $15.00
Mabel Okojie, Mississippi State University, 50.00 + $10.00
William Page, Clemson University, $150.00
Greg Petty, The University of Tennessee, $50.00
Ernest Savage, Bowling Green State Univ., $50.00
Jerry Streichler, Bowling Green State Univ., $50.00
Jack Wescott, Ball State University, $150.00
Jamie Harrington, Western Washington University, $50.00
Mark Johnson, Pittsburg State University, $50.00
Gary Lietz, U.S. Department of Energy, $50.00
Edward Mann, Univ. of Southern Mississippi, $150.00
Reynaldo Martinez, Jr., Oklahoma State University $50.00 + $10
Virginia Osgood, University of Central Oklahoma, $50.00
Douglas Rokke, $50.00 + $10.00
Thomas Walker, Temple University, $50.00 + $10.00
Tom Bell, Millersville University, $50.00
#191. To: BeAChooser (#190)
You appear to be a major trouble maker...and I'm getting really pissed. - GoldiLox, 7/27/2006
#192. To: BeAChooser (#190)
You appear to be a major trouble maker...and I'm getting really pissed. - GoldiLox, 7/27/2006
#193. To: FormerLurker, BeAChooser (#184)
So do you find U-239 and plutonium to be safe to inhale and ingest BAC?
#194. To: FormerLurker (#187)
#195. To: BeAChooser, scrapper2 (#179)
Diana is right - that the "will" of the Iraqi insurgents will ultimately overcome the technology of the foreign occupier.
#196. To: BeAChooser (#180)
It states:
#197. To: Diana, ALL (#195)
Well I see you are rooting for their side. Too bad we have folks like you and those in the mainstream media doing everything possible (since almost day one) to weaken OUR will. Given that, whose side are you on?
You are doing that strawman thing to scrapper here,
and you are again inciting Aaron of LP to tie up the phone lines at Homeland Security.
#198. To: Dakmar (#194)
LOL, I think BAC might be Marie Colvin.
You appear to be a major trouble maker...and I'm getting really pissed. - GoldiLox, 7/27/2006
#199. To: BeAChooser (#197)
#200. To: BeAChooser, diana (#167)
scrapper: Nazii-fixated folks like BAC probably view Catholics and Orthodox Christians as being disposable, forgettable, not special so why bother faulting Uncle Joe and the communists?
#201. To: scrapper2, ALL (#200)
What's the strawman?
You make perfectly clear that you could give 2 hoots about the Eastern Europeans that we doomed to communism.
In sheer numbers of deaths he caused Hitler was an amateur compared to Stalin.
Hitler was no threat to America.
Say what you will about Hitler and the bomb - he was several years from that.
We had the bomb and we used the bomb. Hitler didn't.
Why don't you ask the Japanese about the dangers of a nation having a bomb and using it irresponsibly.
I provided you with a link to US Government documents recently released the showed the opposite to be true.
#202. To: BeAChooser, diana (#179)
a. scrapper: If you believe that the Germans defeated the Russians in WW II
#203. To: BeAChooser (#201)
You think our use of the bomb against Japan was irresponsible? Really?
#204. To: BeAChooser (#201)
a. Well there you have it folks. scrapper assures us that Hitler was no threat. Just like Saddam was no threat.
#205. To: BeAChooser, scrapper2 (#165)
It took a Republican President, a Catholic Pope and good ol' Margaret to bring it down.
Just because [Christine] exercises this type of tolerance for the absurd (ie. you)...doesn't mean she has to smell your droppings up close. - Scrapper2 to BeALooser
#206. To: BeAChooser (#168)
No one is now being taught ALL Germans loved Hitler.
#207. To: BeAChooser (#181)
"Historians working in Germany and the US claim to have found a 60-year-old diagram showing a Nazi nuclear bomb."
#208. To: scrapper2, BeAChooser (#202)
As for will, the Iraqis have it because it's their country. They - the insurgents - or as war mongers like yourself like to label Iraqi citizens "the enemy" are planning to fight the foreign occupier to the last man - get it - they have legitimacy on their side - it's their country, not ours, not Israel's, not Haliburton's, not Exxon's. We were not invited to invade and occupy Iraq by the Iraqis. We invaded for lies generated by the Office of Special Plans.
#209. To: scrapper2, ALL (#202)
a. scrapper: If you believe that the Germans defeated the Russians in WW II
BAC: I don't believe that. Didn't say it. Didn't suggest it. Just another scrapper strawman. The Soviets defeated the Germans. BUT, in large part thanks to the help of the US. Had the US not provided that help ...
scrapper: a. Liar. This is what you said in post #169:
BAC: "Forget the Soviets. They are gone in your alternate world. The Germans defeated them using technology that even the US didn't have at the end of WW2."
b. scrapper; Hitler suffered his greatest military setback of the war in the summer of 1944.
BAC: Almost three years after the US entered the war.
scrapper: b. What does one have to do with the other? The Russian army was singlehandedly responsible for the German defeat in the summer of 1944. The US military was not in Russia. In case you were not aware of this, BAC, the Russians had the largest standing army in the world as of 1941.
BAC: c. I'm glad you recognize that the Lend/Lease fueled Stalin's war machine. Without it Hitler's Germany would have won. Then what?
scrapper: c. I never denied that the lend lease program fueled Stalin's war machine.
FDR condemned millions upon millions of Eastern Europeans to servitude under communism or to immediate death in the gulags. And to that you say nothing - you don't care, and it's transparently clear why.
If we had stayed out of the war, the 2 monster isms would have finished each other off
There was zero chance that Hitler would invade Britain after he lost the Battle of Britain.
Hitler didn't get his weapons re-armament plans implemeneted by Speer until 1943, for God's sake. Britain was way ahead of Germany in that regard.
d. d. scrapper: Diana is right - that the "will" of the Iraqi insurgents will ultimately overcome the technology of the foreign occupier.
BAC: Well I see you are rooting for their side. Too bad we have folks like you and those in the mainstream media doing everything possible (since almost day one) to weaken OUR will. Given that, whose side are you on?
scrapper: d. I support the troops by wanting them to come home asap.
Btw, don't you dare bad mouth or raise any cheesy questions my patriotism
AEI
As for will, the Iraqis have it because it's their country. They - the insurgents - or as war mongers like yourself like to label Iraqi citizens "the enemy" are planning to fight the foreign occupier to the last man - get it - they have legitimacy on their side - it's their country, not ours, not Israel's, not Haliburton's, not Exxon's.
We were not invited to invade and occupy Iraq by the Iraqis.
#210. To: scrapper2, ALL (#203)
"You think our use of the bomb against Japan was irresponsible? Really?"
It's not just my opinion.
... snip ...
"The consensus among scholars is that the bomb was not needed to avoid an invasion of Japan and to end the war within a relatively short time. It is clear that alternatives to the bomb existed and that Truman and his advisers knew it."
#211. To: BeAChooser (#210)
#212. To: BeAChooser (#210)
#213. To: scrapper2, ALL (#204)
a. Hitler wanted continental Europe.
Saddam was no threat to us. It's been said by the 9/11 Commission and by the Iraq Study Group. Are you deaf and blind?
b. Here's what I'm trying to tell you - since you didn't get it the first time round - we had the bomb.
Hitler did not have the bomb and he was several years from getting the bomb,
regardless of what your sources might say.
And even if Hitler had eventually got the bomb, so what - haven't you heard of the phrase "mutual deterrance"? Duh - Russia had the bomb
#214. To: BeAChooser, diana, robin, christine, Burkeman1, Brian S. leveller (#210)
(Edited)
a. I'd like to see the names of these scholars. And I'd like to see these alternatives.
#215. To: scrapper2 (#214)
You think Nagaski and Hiroshima were some kind of petri dishes for experimentation on what works for peace and what doesn't?
#216. To: robin (#215)
BAC is not here for honest debate, he is not here in good faith. He is here to distract and disrupt any meaningful discourse and exchange of ideas about certain topics.
#217. To: scrapper2, ALL (#214)
I gave you the same link 2 times already - it's 4 pages long. Newly released US gov't documents make it quite clear ( except to war mongers like yourself) that nuking 2 cities in Japan constituted war crimes committed by Truman. He had alternatives and he consciously ignored them.
b. You really are certifiable nuts, boozer
Good God, man, you are heartless.
#218. To: robin, ALL (#215)
He is here to distract and disrupt any meaningful discourse and exchange of ideas about certain topics.
.
.
.