Leading the People to War
 

"...people don't want to go to war... But, after all, it's the leaders of the country who determine the policy and it's always a simple matter to drag the people along whether it's a democracy or a facist dictatorship or a parliament or a communistdictatorship... Voice or no voice, the people can
always be brought to the bidding of the leaders. That is easy. All you have to do is tell them they are being attacked and denounce the pacifists for lack of patriotism and exposing the country to greater danger. It works the same way in any country."

-- Karl Rove




(actually it was Hermann Goering at the Nuremberg Trials)

Re: Leading the People to War
 

"No protracted war can fail to endanger the freedom of a democratic country. Not indeed that after every victory it is to be apprehended that the victorious generals will possess themselves by force of the supreme power, after the manner of Sulla and Caesar; the danger is of another kind. War does not always give over democratic communities to government, but it must invariably and immeasurably increase the powers of civil government; it must compulsorily concentrate the direction of all men and the management of all things in the hands of the administration. If it does not lead to despotism by sudden violence, it prepares men for it more gently by their habits. All those who seek to destroy the liberties of a democratic nation ought to know that war is the surest and shortest means to accomplish it."

--- Tocqueville (1840)

Re: Leading the People to War
 

" <font color="white">...................... </font> "

-- anti-war activists, 2004


(What they would be saying if America did not fight against evil in the past or the present)

Re: Leading the People to War
 

Since this is a gambling forum GWB I'll wager you $10,000 we don't win the war on terror. What do you say?

Re: Leading the People to War
 

"Battle doesn't need a purpose; the battle is it's own purpose. You don't ask why a plague spreads or a field burns. Don't ask why I fight."

-- Black Knight

Re: Leading the People to War
 

GWB-
blindly stating that because some wars have to be fought, that somehow we owe something to those who start wars is pretty disgusting.

Re: Leading the People to War
 

[ QUOTE ]
Since this is a gambling forum GWB I'll wager you $10,000 we don't win the war on terror. What do you say?

[/ QUOTE ]

The war on terror is like the war on cancer, or the war on crime, or the war on rats in a big city. You do well by minimizing the cancer deaths, the crime, or the rats, but you never can eliminate them completely.

But to throw up our hands and say, "we can't eliminate all of the terrorists" is still a worse option than doing the hard work to minimize terrorism knowing that we will never wipe it out completely.

Re: Leading the People to War
 

[ QUOTE ]
GWB-
blindly stating that because some wars have to be fought, that somehow we owe something to those who start wars is pretty disgusting.

[/ QUOTE ]

When did I say that?

America didn't start the war on terror, they attacked us.

Re: Leading the People to War
 

" ...................... "

-- anti-war activists, 2004


(What they would be saying if America did not fight against evil in the past or the present)


Sorry- the implication that i took from this statement was that the protestors owe their freedom of speech to those who fought any war in the past. Please explain how you intended this to be interpreted.


Also-

"America didn't start the war on terror, they attacked us."

How many Iraqi's have been linked to terroist acts agianst the US prior to the invasion?

Re: Leading the People to War
 

I didn't realize we were at war with cancer. In fact, I didnt even realize cancer had formed itself into an army. Jeez, scary stuff. Thank God you're our commander in chief.

So you don't expect to win the war then? But we won't lose because we're just going to keep fighting forever? Forgive me, but doesn't that seem even worse than losing?

Re: Leading the People to War
 

Then i am very glad we are taking troops away from such stable, non threatening places such as North Korea.

Aslo- The military action in the "war on drugs" thing worked really well, and the education programs did nothing at all.

More violence!!!

Re: Leading the People to War
 

pokerjo: [ QUOTE ]
So you don't expect to win the war then? But we won't lose because we're just going to keep fighting forever? Forgive me, but doesn't that seem even worse than losing?

[/ QUOTE ]


GWB [ QUOTE ]
The war on terror is like the war on cancer, or the war on crime, or the war on rats in a big city. You do well by minimizing the cancer deaths, the crime, or the rats, but you never can eliminate them completely.

[/ QUOTE ]

I rarely agree with GWB, but what he said here is right on, however unfortunate that answer may see.

Re: Leading the People to War
 

Other countries have had terrorists for many years, have not fought a war against them, and have gone on with their lives in a relatively unhindered way. Why are we different?

Re: Leading the People to War
 

[ QUOTE ]
Other countries have had terrorists for many years, have not fought a war against them, and have gone on with their lives in a relatively unhindered way. Why are we different?

[/ QUOTE ] uhh... like Russia? or Saudia Arabia? Or Egypt? You are dellusional.

Re: Leading the People to War
 

Actually Russia has activly fought their war for years, and it just seems to get worse.

Re: Leading the People to War
 

Uhh, like Europe.

Or did England invade Ireland and I just missed the news?

Re: Leading the People to War
 

[ QUOTE ]
Actually Russia has activly fought their war for years, and it just seems to get worse.

[/ QUOTE ] This is an entirely different topic which I will not get into, but many people would say their failed policy torwards Chechnya has lead them to their new "war" on terrorism.

Re: Leading the People to War
 

[ QUOTE ]
Uhh, like Europe.

[/ QUOTE ] First of all Europe is a continent, not a country.

Their has been a constant "war" between Irish Catholics and Protestants in Northern Ireland which has at times spilled over into England, but this war, and it is one, has been ongoing for a while with both miltary and diplomatic action.

Re: Leading the People to War
 

This is an entirely different topic which I will not get into, but many people would say their failed policy torwards Chechnya has lead them to their new "war" on terrorism.


Yes, but Pokerjo's fiorst statement was that some countries have been able to exist relatively well without declaring all out war on terror, and your resonse denying this included russia. My point was that russia is basically in the middle of a war on terror, and would not be a country that Pokerjo would use as an example.

Re: Leading the People to War
 

"We are resolved that the method of consultation shall be the method adopted to deal with any other questions that may concern our two countries, and we are determined to continue our efforts to remove possible sources of difference, and thus to contribute to assure the peace of Europe."

Neville Chamberlain, 1938.


"France is not pacifist. We are not anti-American either. We are not just going to use our veto to nag and annoy the US. But we just feel that there is another option, another way, another more normal way, a less dramatic way than war, and that we have to go through that path. And we should pursue it until we’ve come [to] a dead end, but that isn’t the case."

Jacques Chirac, 2003

Re: Leading the People to War
 

While i appreciate the quote from my cousin, Neville isn't exactly a guy i want defending the process i have chosen. He was pretty blind (retrospectively) to what Hitler was doing, and it could have saved a lot of lives by being more assertive in that situation.

GWB is wrong, as usual
 

GWB &gt; : "The war on terror is like the war on cancer, or the war on crime, or the war on rats in a big city. You do well by minimizing the cancer deaths, the crime, or the rats, but you never can eliminate them completely."

ThaSaltCracka &gt; : "I rarely agree with GWB, but what he said here is right on, however unfortunate that answer may see."

No, GWB is wrong.

1. Comparing terrorism to natural disasters or illnesses dehumanizes the problem (when it is quite obviously a human problem and not something between, say, Zeus and Athena) and places its solution outside human capabilities. Note that the first step in getting irrational about a situation is to assess its players in abstract or fantastical terms.

2. "Wars Against Terror" have existed before -- and almost all of them had an "ending", quite unlike how GWB described things, in his facile manner. The terror unleashed by the IRA was ultimately not like "cancer" or the "plague", as GWB would have it (and as the British authorities at the time were claiming). The terror unleashed by ETA on the people of Spain is not like some crazy rats infesting a building: the very terrorism of the ETA defeated their objective (the independence of the Basque country) since so many Basques turned away in disgust from the concept of independence. The terror os the Russian original nihilists was defeated. The terror of the Jewish paramilitary organisations during the 1940s has ended (because it was vindicated!) while the terror of the Palestinian suicide bombers will end when the (very real) grievances of the Palestinians are addressed - finally - even in a manner that is distant from what the terrorists envisage (eg annihilation of Israel).

...Let me go deep to what GWB is saying : he is saying that the war against terror will be endless. Which neatly coincides with the time period through which GWB and his ilk want to see their ideology and methods ruling over America.

(They may get four more years pretty soon, at the very least. [img]/images/graemlins/cool.gif[/img])

Re: Leading the People to War
 

[/ QUOTE ]
"France is not pacifist. We are not anti-American either. We are not just going to use our veto to nag and annoy the US. But we just feel that there is another option, another way, another more normal way, a less dramatic way than war, and that we have to go through that path. And we should pursue it until we’ve come [to] a dead end, but that isn’t the case."

Jacques Chirac, 2003

[/ QUOTE ]

Until then, we will sell them weapons, violate the UN resolution we voted for, corrupt the oil for food program, and continue to defend Iraq as long as they owe us money.

Re: GWB is wrong, as usual
 

Cyrus there is one thing you are forgetting. The ETA and IRA had/have concrete objectives which could ostensibly be solved through negotiation etc. The Palestinian problem, to some degree, the same (hopefully)

Jihad Warriors however have no meetable goals or objectives. Nothing will satisfy them but expulsion of all infidels from Arab lands and purification of their holy soil and institution of Sharia and restoration of the Caliphate and the spread and pre-eminence of Islamic Theocracy. In keeping with all of this is their burning desire to DESTROY the West, the land of the Infidels and the source of the corruption of Islamic virtues and Islamic women (not to mention the source of the ideas which give Islamic women to consider that maybe they oughtn't to be so oppressed in their native lands--which itself is strong heresy of another important sort to many Arab men of those lands).

So yes, Cyrus, GWB is right: this war will be endless as long as there are Islamic Jihadist Kooks running loose over the face of the Earth who believe that killing infidels and forcing the world to be subjugated to Islam is Allah's will.

Re: Leading the People to War
 

[ QUOTE ]
Aslo- The military action in the "war on drugs" thing worked really well, and the education programs did nothing at all.


[/ QUOTE ]

If we had executed them on the spot, bulldozed their families homes and bombed their neighborhoods then the result might have been different. Let's first kill a few hundred thousand more Arab terrorists and see how things turn out.

Jimbo

Re: Leading the People to War
 

[ QUOTE ]
Uhh, like Europe.

Or did England invade Ireland and I just missed the news?

[/ QUOTE ]

You are too young to have read the news in the prime of that battle. Many IRA terrorists were executed in a military manner. Not dubbing a military action an official war does not make it any less like a war. Just query a few vets who served in Vietnam or Korea.


Jimbo

Re: GWB is wrong, as usual
 

So yes, Cyrus, GWB is right: this war will be endless as long as there are Islamic Jihadist Kooks running loose over the face of the Earth who believe that killing infidels and forcing the world to be subjugated to Islam is Allah's will.


But GWB is wrong in the idea that killing each and every last one is the fastest and best way to end this.

Re: Leading the People to War
 

Jimbo-
I read this, and reread it, and i am not sure so i will just ask-
Sarcasitic post (mine was)- is yours sarcastic, yes or no?

Re: Leading the People to War
 

I guess my point was that what brought it to an end was dialogue, not war.

Re: Leading the People to War
 

[ QUOTE ]
I guess my point was that what brought it to an end was dialogue, not war.

[/ QUOTE ]

This is a good point but without the many years of killing on both sides would dialogue have worked? Obviously not or else the sensible thing would have been to never begin killing each other in the first place.

For dialogue to be successful you must compromise. How do you suggest we compromise with religious zealots who believe all infidels should die?

Jimbo

Re: Leading the People to War
 

How do you suggest we compromise with religious zealots who believe all infidels should die?

we compromise by removing the situations that lead to the rise of the religious zeolots. The two main contributors in many opinions- poverty and the lack of self determination by their country' people.

Re: Leading the People to War
 

Hi Chuck:

Check your Civil War history. Exactly the opposite happened.

Both sides couldn't wait to start fighting. Of course this might have had something to do with the fact that Northern troops were stationed in the South before hostilities broke out.

Best wishes,
Mason

Re: Leading the People to War
 

We started the war on terror.

Re: Leading the People to War
 

Define Win. [img]/images/graemlins/frown.gif[/img]

Re: Leading the People to War
 

Name one.

Re: Leading the People to War
 

[ QUOTE ]
How do you suggest we compromise with religious zealots who believe all infidels should die?

we compromise by removing the situations that lead to the rise of the religious zeolots. The two main contributors in many opinions- poverty and the lack of self determination by their country' people.

[/ QUOTE ]


We cannot alleviate their economic woes for them--they have to do that for themselves. Yet they cannot do so as long as they remain mired in narrow-based commodity economies and archaic, non-free political systems. They are trapped in a vicious circle and will only emerge with political/ideological reform, which in turn will permit and encourage economic innovation and growth. Their current unfree societies stifle economic innovation and growth. When ideas are stifled, so too is the economy. H

The GNP of all the combined Arab countries is less than, which Scandinavian country is it?--Sweden or Norway (I forget)? The Arab countries cannot have more self-determination without massive reforms: political, ideological, economic.

Also, economic/self-determination matters are only part of the problem. Jihad warriors are also produced by heavy formal indoctrination, as in Saudi Arabia and in the madrassas of Pakistan. The effect of this should not be underestimated.

\"Name one\" ?!
 

"Other countries have had terrorists for many years, have not fought a war against them, and have gone on with their lives in a relatively unhindered way." ---Name one.

You doubt such situations exist or have existed?!

Great Britain (the provisional IRA); Spain (ETA); France (The National Liberation Movement for Corsica); Italy (The Black Order -- fascist terrorists were the only political faction that targeted civilians in Italy, e.g. the Bolonia train station bombing, in accordance to the stupid "chaos theory"); Greece (New Order; ELA); Turkey (The Grey Wolves, various self-proclaimed Marxist-Leninist groups, Islamic extremists); Sri Lanka (Tamil Tigers); Egypt, Syria, Libya (The Muslim Brotherhood).

Enough?

(And I have not gone into Latin America yet.)

Re: Leading the People to War
 

"lack of self determination by their country' people."

This was the last line of my post- correcting this problem is a time consuming, resouce draining task, and i do not think the way to do so is to invade a country, demolish its infrastructure/governing body and the set up a fragile government. This is what i feel we are doing in Iraq, again i think that we are giving more reasons to more people to attack the us and our interests. I agree that a capitalistic democratic society is less likely to produce terroists, but i cannont think of one example where an outside invasion led to the toppling of a dictatorship, and then resultedin a stable democratic country.

Re: Leading the People to War
 

"...but i cannont think of one example where an outside invasion led to the toppling of a dictatorship, and then resulted in a stable democratic country."

Germany, post WWII. Hitler was eliminated and Germany is now a self-sufficient and fairly stable country. Sound familiar? Funny thing is, Germany was blown all to hell after this war, but with time and cooperation between governments afterward, I think they turned out alright.

-Edge

Re: Leading the People to War
 

Dont confuse MMMMMM with facts.