kcdodd wrote:I simply don't pretend things happen in a vacuum. I am not defending throwing rocks or starting fires. Those are your words. I am defending the protesting though. There were protests all over the country at the same time. Like death of innocents seems inevitable in war, protests can become violent. However, at least noone was killed by the protesters, and worse gets done by Yankees fans after a bad (or good) game, so i really am not as horrified by it as you seem to be. Obviously people were very angry about what was happening. The cambodia campaign was like if the dea started carpet bombing mexican border cities to stop the drug trade. Not only that, but they were doing it off the books. Of course it's hard to kill that many people and noone find out that you're doing it. It was completely out of proportion, misdirected, and in no way legal. I would hope any person would be angry about it. But, go ahead and play it off as a normal war, nothing to see here. But look at those rock thowing hippies! Omg!
A question I meant to ask you earlier, is how any of these people knew that any of the things they had been told were the truth? The Socialists and such were constantly spreading rumors of American abuses and mass killings and such. You do get that they were partisans helping/rooting for the Communists?
kcdodd wrote:
And of course Diogenes blames JFK. If that weren't so twisted it'd be funny.
To be fair, JFK only got us into Vietnam. LBJ is the one who screwed it up so massively. This does not leave JFK blameless, just not so big of a screwup as his successor. Johnson killed the nation, I think.
‘What all the wise men promised has not happened, and what all the damned fools said would happen has come to pass.’
— Lord Melbourne —
kcdodd wrote:However, at least noone was killed by the protesters. . .
Oh contraire. . . the protesters won their case and the day we left Vietnam, 80,000 people were murdered. That blood is directly on the hands of those protesters.
Not to mention the Weather Underground.
‘What all the wise men promised has not happened, and what all the damned fools said would happen has come to pass.’
— Lord Melbourne —
kcdodd wrote:The protestors didn't kill anyone. Why do you continue to be the poster child for ironic and self defeating statements.
If the protestors are responsible for 80,000 deaths bc we withdrew, how many would they be responsible for if they didn't do anything and we stayed even longer?
I can see though how I was defending the violence when I implied there is a point where violence is justified. So I take that back. I don't think there is any rational justification for random violence no. But I think there can be a point where violence is justified rationally if directed, and im sure you agree with that. Otherwise you wouldn't be ok with what happened in cambodia at all. Allthough I don't think that was justified.
Just as demonstrating an ability to wipe out two cities saved many millions of lives during World War II, a quick and massive usage of American Military power could have saved many thousands of lives in the Vietnam war. Unfortunately we had some "wunderkinds" trying to send "messages" to the communists in Russia and China with American body counts.
Had we gone in for the Kill right from the beginning, the ugly would have been greatly shortened, and Cambodia would never have happened. Communists respect and understand power and force. They don't respect wimpy-girly responses to provocation. That's why they were frightened of Reagan, and why they were contemptuous of Kennedy and Johnson.
‘What all the wise men promised has not happened, and what all the damned fools said would happen has come to pass.’
— Lord Melbourne —
Historically prior to Vietnam, we, meaning the West, tried a massive surge of military power and it backfired badly and that conflict is still officially going on.
It was probably the main reason you didn't try the same tactic in vietnam.
You won every battle tactically, how could you not, given your resources but strategically you could never win.
Everything is bullshit unless proven otherwise. -A.C. Beddoe
They could have mined Haipong harbour at the beginning of the war, as opposed to '72. Dropped UXB's to deny strategic area's rather than bomb same places repeatedly. Most importantly they could have not financed communist war effort/provided technical assistance to communists.
Stubby wrote:Historically prior to Vietnam, we, meaning the West, tried a massive surge of military power and it backfired badly and that conflict is still officially going on.
I presume you are referring to Korea. If that be the case, then no we didn't. Had we applied the effort we used on Germany and Japan, there would be no "North" Korea.
Stubby wrote:
It was probably the main reason you didn't try the same tactic in vietnam.
You won every battle tactically, how could you not, given your resources but strategically you could never win.
Had we established a battle line, and then started moving it forward till we took Hanoi, we would have won, and we would have won rather quickly. What we did instead was play footsy with the VC for a decade, and then we left. Of course the VC walked right into the vacuum and the Democrat Congress let them. They were too busy trying to trump up charges against Nixon, whom they had hated ever since he prosecuted their Liberal Darling, Alger Hiss.
‘What all the wise men promised has not happened, and what all the damned fools said would happen has come to pass.’
— Lord Melbourne —
Diogenes wrote:I presume you are referring to Korea. If that be the case, then no we didn't. Had we applied the effort we used on Germany and Japan, there would be no "North" Korea.
Stubby wrote:
U.S. warplanes dropped more napalm and bombs on North Korea than they did during the whole Pacific campaign of World War II.
Sounds like they were using kid gloves.
What part of what I said did you not comprehend? And then you falsely imply that the numbers of bombs are somehow a proxy for effectiveness, in regards to how the war was waged against Japan, as compared to Korea.
We dropped 600,000 tons on Korea. We dropped nearly 3 million tons on Europe.
‘What all the wise men promised has not happened, and what all the damned fools said would happen has come to pass.’
— Lord Melbourne —
Diogenes wrote:I presume you are referring to Korea. If that be the case, then no we didn't. Had we applied the effort we used on Germany and Japan, there would be no "North" Korea.
Stubby wrote:
U.S. warplanes dropped more napalm and bombs on North Korea than they did during the whole Pacific campaign of World War II.
Sounds like they were using kid gloves.
What part of what I said did you not comprehend? And then you falsely imply that the numbers of bombs are somehow a proxy for effectiveness, in regards to how the war was waged against Japan, as compared to Korea.
We dropped 600,000 tons on Korea. We dropped nearly 3 million tons on Europe.
On an area basis Korea got plastered.
Engineering is the art of making what you want from what you can get at a profit.
A right wing socialist. Wage and price controls? Really? Really.
And another full scale attempt at Prohibition? Really? Really.
And why was the war fought the way it was? Well the specter of nuclear war was ever present. There was no need to defeat the Communists. Just hold them. Their defeat was intrinsic to their system.
BTW what is the 'net of Prohibition today. Well it finances our enemies for one. It supports a vast criminal empire. And that empire is in cahoots with government because without government most of its sources for funding would dry up. Look up - Mafia green energy Italy - for another example.
BTW look up - North Korea Heroin - Here is a link to get you started:
And of course our Afghanistan problem would be greatly reduced without the heroin black market.
Making war on the severely sexually abused* to support our enemies? Well of course. It makes perfect sense. For a Progressive Christian country. Because government IS the answer. The question? It doesn't matter.
*About 70% of female heroin users were sexually assaulted in childhood. For male users the number is 50%. Proving with out a doubt that drugs are the real problem.
Engineering is the art of making what you want from what you can get at a profit.
MSimon wrote:And why was the war fought the way it was? Well the specter of nuclear war was ever present. There was no need to defeat the Communists. Just hold them. Their defeat was intrinsic to their system.
Oh please someone save us from this douchbag.
You're such a skeething sack of shit, simon.
"Courage is not just a virtue, but the form of every virtue at the testing point." C. S. Lewis
MSimon wrote:And why was the war fought the way it was? Well the specter of nuclear war was ever present. There was no need to defeat the Communists. Just hold them. Their defeat was intrinsic to their system.
Oh please someone save us from this douchbag.
You're such a skeething sack of shit, simon.
Well. You will note that the Communists are mostly gone and the ones left are no positive examples for anyone. Done without a world war. They defeated themselves. We do have the Progressive Right and Left in America still (- government IS the answer -) but even they are being replaced by a more libertarian cohort. I'm sure you have noticed.
Your encouragement is always appreciated. Especially your fondness for getting to the bottom of problems by studying the data. We need more folks like you.
Engineering is the art of making what you want from what you can get at a profit.