that japan should set such a precedent since the end of their shameful Imperial past -- for a cause like Iraq -- is not making me feel all warm and fuzzy inside. kosovo was 10x the cause. This just makes the japanese look like sycophants.
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that japan should set such a precedent since the end of their shameful Imperial past -- for a cause like Iraq -- is not making me feel all warm and fuzzy inside. kosovo was 10x the cause. This just makes the japanese look like sycophants.
i think there are domestic reasons for japan changing it's constitutional stance on the role it's defence force can play
[ie. the fact that their big buddy across the pacific is poking the hornets nest that is north korea with greater and greater intent]
the choice of deployments made by all of the meddling western powers and their allies have far more to do with domestic political opinion and the potential gains to vested interests than with the neediness of any 'cause'
the action in kosovo was a political stunt which accelerated the commission of crimes by milosevic aligned forces
the use solely of air power allowed this in order to keep the english speaking troops at least 35,000 feet out of harms way
bill didn't want any unpleasant body bags coming home on his watch
if your nation had been the only one to have suffered from two US atom bomb tests/warcrimes on populous cities, i imagine your aversion to sycophantism may not be as strong
I think that the US in particular, and the world in general, has shown remarkable restraint in dealing with a clearly dysfunctional, obviously psychopathic regime. Maybe if we just ignore him, Kim Jong Il will start to play nice and go away?Quote:
i think there are domestic reasons for japan changing it's constitutional stance on the role it's defence force can play
[ie. the fact that their big buddy across the pacific is poking the hornets nest that is north korea with greater and greater intent]
Hasn't this always been the case? Please provide an example of your idealized, altuistic nation. P.S.- the Woodstock Nation doesn't count.Quote:
the choice of deployments made by all of the meddling western powers and their allies have far more to do with domestic political opinion and the potential gains to vested interests than with the neediness of any 'cause'
Your characterization of Hiroshima and Nagasaki as "US atom bomb tests/warcrimes" is a luxury afforded you by the remove of 60 years. I personally don't know of a single participant of WW2 who would use those terms. Perhaps you had to be there. Your self-righteous moral superiority is a gift from those who were.Quote:
if your nation had been the only one to have suffered from two US atom bomb tests/warcrimes on populous cities, i imagine your aversion to sycophantism may not be as strong
anyone over the age of 12 has nagasaki and hiroshima etched into their memory for life, and associate the Japanese, along with the Jews, as the ubervictims of world history. I encourage you to dig deeper, start with the "Rape of Nanking" by iris chang. Its hard to equate the suffering of the jews with that of the japanese given the context.Quote:
Originally posted by echidna@26 July 2003 - 08:40
if your nation had been the only one to have suffered from two US atom bomb tests/warcrimes on populous cities, i imagine your aversion to sycophantism may not be as strong
Japan has never had to account for their atrocities the way Germany did, i've heard anecdotes from friends who lived there that the schools' history books are still not telling the whole story. anyway, I trust Germany far more than Japan --regardless of how far I could throw a citizen from either.
I thought i'd use red to go with the blue, since we've already got some white, i thought it would look festive or something. I like the toad clocker. :PQuote:
Originally posted by clocker@26 July 2003 - 22:04
I think that the US in particular, and the world in general, has shown remarkable restraint in dealing with a clearly dysfunctional, obviously psychopathic regime. Maybe if we just ignore him, Kim Jong Il will start to play nice and go away?Quote:
i think there are domestic reasons for japan changing it's constitutional stance on the role it's defence force can play
[ie. the fact that their big buddy across the pacific is poking the hornets nest that is north korea with greater and greater intent]
This is a different kind of restraint to that which is being shown in regard to liberia's civil war at the moment. Also toward the situation which has festered all but unmentioned in angola for over a decade. A few other examples of this different kind of restraint are;
The excesses of horror exhibited by pinochet in chile where all but directly encouraged when he ruled chile.
Saddam's use of gas weapons against the kurds was hardly mentioned at the times when he did it, he was still friends with the CIA then. Only when he became an official enemy was the issue raised by the USA.
The USA has also been active in supplying turkey in it's repression of kurds for a long time and once again little complaint about this has emerged in the first world media.
The support for suharto during and following his rise to power [slaughtering an estimate 600,000 people] was a stunning example of US wilful blindness or complicity.
Not to mention the almost complete lack of critique of israels excessive repression of palestine since the fifties.
The victims of these murderous regimes just have to wait and hope that the evil men would go away or play nice as you put it, for me it's an issue of inconsistency
The point at hand is that japan is clearly at much greater risk from Nkorea than the USA is, and they know what an atomic attack does
Hasn't this always been the case? Please provide an example of your idealized, altuistic nation. P.S.- the Woodstock Nation doesn't count.Quote:
the choice of deployments made by all of the meddling western powers and their allies have far more to do with domestic political opinion and the potential gains to vested interests than with the neediness of any 'cause'
I think this has generally been the case, that's why i wrote it. i don't have an example of a nation willing to commit troops without reasons to do so on the home front :: i just mean that the 'cause' named as the reason for deployment is rarely congruent to the motivations of the decision makers
Your characterization of Hiroshima and Nagasaki as "US atom bomb tests/warcrimes" is a luxury afforded you by the remove of 60 years. I personally don't know of a single participant of WW2 who would use those terms. Perhaps you had to be there. Your self-righteous moral superiority is a gift from those who were.Quote:
if your nation had been the only one to have suffered from two US atom bomb tests/warcrimes on populous cities, i imagine your aversion to sycophantism may not be as strong
The labelling of war crimes or crimes against humanity seems to be particularly dependent upon the political influence of the perpetrating regime, for example i find it difficult to look beyond the USAs extensive use of military means which it would never tolerate upon it's own troops or populations. ie. the use of napalm and chemical agents in vietnam, laos and cambodia during the sixties and seventies & the deployment of what the US now calls weapons of mass destruction in the closing days of WWII. If any other nation used what is now called WMD, the USA would crush them simply on principle i would imagine.
I would also characterise the fire bombing of dresden as a warcrime and the actions of the english when colonising australia is a fine example of first rate genocide, though it was some time later before we in the west became squeamish enough to winge about such things.
Victors get to write histories :: that doessn't always make them right
All righty then, Echidna,
Point 1) You implied that Japan's decision to deploy troops was a direct result of the US treatment of North Korea. Throwing up Liberia,Turkey, Pinochet and Suharto to support this statement don't cut it. So...how has the US response (so far) to N.Korea incited Japan?
Point 2) Your original post used the term "meddling Western powers" as though they (whoever they might be) were the exception to some historical trend. As far as I can see, the West and the East practice precisely the same tactics re: reasons/justification for foreign policy. So, of what relevance is "meddling western powers" to your point outside of a rather cheap shot at the US?
Point 3)While I will agree that history is written by the victors, that does not automatically make their version wrong. Did the use of atomic weapons shorten a war that may well have ended soon anyway? I don't know, I've read informed opinion pieces that fall on both sides of that question. Was the use of said bombs a "test/warcrime"? I think not.
Thanks. I wish I was as skilled with Xara 3-D as you obviously are.Quote:
I thought i'd use red to go with the blue, since we've already got some white, i thought it would look festive or something. I like the toad clocker.
Just thought I'd keep the color thing going a little longer btw. Didn't see the point in making it red, white and blue, however.
clocker ::
@Point 1) i think that japans decision has been coming for a long time due to threats that have been festering for decades namely the taiwan vs. china quarrel and the north korea situation. i wanted to also note that i feel that this decision being taken now is precipitated by the increased tension between Pyongyang and washington [DC that is]
@Point 2) i used meddle because i though it was accurate [if a little bit emotive] dictionary.reference.com defines meddle;i figure bombing serbia qualifies as intrusive
- To intrude into other people's affairs or business; interfere. See Synonyms at interfere.
- To handle something idly or ignorantly; tamper.
The US are far from alone in this but the USA does set itself up as a prime example simple due to it's repeated use of military force on foreign soil and the fact that it is western. china can get pretty intrusive too
@Point 3) i feel that the US use of the A bomb on two cities it had specifically kept out of conventional bombing runs, after the imploring of the bombs daddy oppenheimer to use it on the tokyo harbour rather than on populated areas, then followed by extensive surveys and medical assessments of the post bomb effects give one reasonable latitude to conclude that the weapon was being assessed in it's function through these two deployments
The most obvious question is why the second bomb, which makes perfect sense if the bombs are being tested since the second bomb was a different design to the first
as we have both pointed out history is a story told in a subjective way, might doesn't make it right, and as you write, it doesn't make it wrong either
in the end we have to make our own assessments, in this case our assessments are divergent. You think not, I think so.
do you think that any US administration would tolerate any other nation deploying nukes?
Your welcome, it's just practise mate, so just jump in if you want to learn you can't hurt pixels [i use macromedia fireworks a lot as well, xara only for some animations]Quote:
Originally posted by clocker
Thanks. I wish I was as skilled with Xara 3-D as you obviously are.
what happened to you picture posts i really liked some of them?
PicStore was down for a while and I inadvertantly deleted a bunch of my pics. As you say, you can't hurt pixels, but you sure can lose em. As the opportunity arises I hope to become more visual again, but many of our topics don't lend themselves to that approach. I was receiving chiding messages for not being serious enough.Quote:
what happened to you picture posts i really liked some of them?
Japan is USA's ally? :huh:
Japan sees the imminent inevitability of having to live an armed existence in their little corner of the world due to events such as are occurring these days; anything with the potential to give N. Korea and Kim Jong Il pause is fine with me.
It would also be facetious to state Japan's re-arming makes Asia, or the rest of the world for that matter, a more dangerous place; our concern with N. Korea is not so much as a potential aggressor (at the moment) as it is they would willingly supply any arms (nukes) to the highest bidder, be they terrorists (very likely) or whomever.
The more "cops" in the area, the better, as such conditions might be conducive to Kim Jong Il's making the first logical decisions of his adult life, rather than indulging his propensity for continuing belligerence.
And, as an added bonus, U.S. involvement is minimized, hopefully resulting in happy faces in this forum.
Or, at least, less to complain about.