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Subject: Addendum


Author:
Dave (UK)
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Date Posted: 20:25:04 11/15/04 Mon
In reply to: Dave (UK) 's message, "Lessons" on 20:16:18 11/15/04 Mon

If we want to debate political lessons, what would be the best one to learn from WW2?

Personally, I think it would have been that appeasement does not save lives, and that we should have invaded Germany in 1933.

I wonder how many people would agree with that statement, while being vehemently opposed to the Iraq war.

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Replies:
[> [> [> [> Subject: Possibly


Author:
Ed Harris (venezia)
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Date Posted: 20:55:59 11/15/04 Mon

But in 1933 Germany had no weapons and it would have been hard to second-guess how closely Nazi foreign policy would live upto Nazi rhetoric.

If we are going to roll up our sleeves and play the hind-sight game, I would say that we should have declared war on Japan when WWII really started in 1936, with their invasion of Manchuria (our identification of Sept 1939 as the start of the war is as ignorant as the Americans' attempt to date the start of WWII as the bombing of Pearl Harbour). Had we done that, as opposed to letting them have their way, then Hitler would have thought twice about invading Czechoslovakia and Poland; without military expansion and the theft of raw materials and the acquisition of slave labour, Nazi Germany's economy would have been unsustainable, and his regime would eventually have crumbled under internal pressures, as in all dictatorships. Sic semper tyrannis.

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[> [> [> [> [> Subject: War in China


Author:
Nick (UK)
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Date Posted: 13:32:11 11/16/04 Tue

But if we had declared war on Japan in 1936, how much of the world would have followed us? The British Empire only began to re-arm half-heartedly in 1936 having idealistically and under American pressure scrapped most of its military capability in the 1920s. We probably couldn't have won a war against Japan, and with the only obvious non-fascist superpower engaged in a futile war in China, there would have been nothing to stop Hitler invading eastern Europe.

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[> [> [> [> Subject: Yep


Author:
Dave (UK)
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Date Posted: 22:31:45 11/15/04 Mon

"But in 1933 Germany had no weapons and it would have been hard to second-guess how closely Nazi foreign policy would live upto Nazi rhetoric."

Exactly, this is why I drew the comparison with Iraq...

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[> [> [> [> [> Subject: I could easily apply a similar comparison to half the countries in the world.


Author:
Roberdin
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Date Posted: 22:46:21 11/15/04 Mon


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[> [> [> [> [> [> Subject: I'm sure you can...


Author:
Dave (UK)
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Date Posted: 23:23:59 11/15/04 Mon

And we'll probably be at war with one of them in years to come...

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[> [> [> [> [> [> [> Subject: Probably several.


Author:
Ed Harris (Venezia)
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Date Posted: 03:43:43 11/16/04 Tue


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[> [> [> [> Subject: we learned that air power is crucial


Author:
Ian (Australia)
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Date Posted: 23:42:56 11/15/04 Mon

and that it is apparently acceptable to test new weapons on your enemies after they are defeated, as long as they have not formally surrendered.

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