Which US Wars Were Justified?

[Imran Siddiqui]

Che, your economic reduction of all wars, while ideologically consistant, sometimes doesn't make you look too good.

WWI was about colonies. It was an attempt by Germany to get a bigger slice of Africa and Austria to get a bigger slice of the Balkans. Italy joined to get a chuck of the Ottoman Empire. Britain and France and Japan all wanted Germany's colonies (and got them).

Bull****! How much have you studied WW1? The war was simply about power (consistant with the beliefs of the day). Colonies didn't factor into it at all, except as barometers for power, NOT economic gains. There were some areas with great economic gain (and Imperialism was about that), but in the end run, colonies were to improve the power standings. France was scrambling to keep its worthless Sahara possessions. Why? Because, land... any land improved power status.

Why did Britain, France, and Japan want Germany's colonies? Because it would have increased their power, not because they actually were rich areas.

The war was fought over witch would be the most powerful nation in Europe. Russia backed the Orthodox Balkan, because it wanted to be seen as protector of the Slavs, and thus try to cause rebellion by the Slavs in the AH Empire. Germany wanted to prevent the Franco-Russian alliance from gaining power, etc, etc.

Colonies themselves were more important for POWER than economics. Why did Germany expand? Because the powerful nations did it... not because they needed any more money. That is ridiculous.

Both sets of wars were over control of vital trade routes from the East. They merely took religious form.

Once again, Bull****! You simply don't understand religion, and that is clear. To say Islamic conquest was for control of trade routes and the Crusades were the same displays a striking ignorance.

[Adam Smith]

Japan had no choice but to attack the US? They were able to gain essential raw materials through trade after the war.
Economic justification for the Korean Conflict? There may be a very inderect one.
Economic justification for Vietnam? Hard to see what it would be.

[General Ludd]

Originally posted by Imran Siddiqui
Once again, Bull****! You simply don't understand religion, and that is clear. To say Islamic conquest was for control of trade routes and the Crusades were the same displays a striking ignorance.

Wars aren't started because of religon, religon is just a tool used to get the war going, much like nationalism these days. Most "religous" wars have economic or political backgrounds.

[chequita guevara]

I tried to post this last night, but there was an error and I lost the whole thing.

Originally posted by Hoek
Bah, you never get the complete picture with economic reductivism.

I addressed this in my first post. I don't do that, but since you have denied any economic factors involved in these wars, I have had to concentrate on them to show you that they existed. You then counter by saying I'm reducing it, when you asked the question setting the parameters in the first place.

I know you communists think that nationalism is just a veiled attempt at supressing the working class,

Not so veiled at times.

your connecting our support of Israel to the war in Afghanistan is just wrong. Israel has no oil, and it does not serve our financial purposes anymore to subsidize them. How you connect fighting ass-backward Afghans to our supposed (yet nonexistent) financial interest in Israel is silly.

Is it so hard to connect the dots? The US wants to control the ME because of its oil resources. The US supports Israel in order to help suppress Arab nationalism, which might interfere with US goals. The US also supports despotic, corrupt regimes like Egypt and Saudi Arabia to further these ends. Osama bin Laden wants to lead an Islamic insurgency against US domination of the ME, hence this war. Thus, this war has economic factors. Does this reduce the whole war to economics? Did I ever say it did? Again, no.

And while you're bringing it up, Israel is a perfect example of a country that engaged in armed conflict for survival. It was a country born in fire, and it never sought to engage in military action for financial gain.

You think control of the land is unrelated to economics? Countries, despite Imran's assertion, don't hold land for the heck of it. It either has a direct economic purpose or it helps defend such land. The war over Palestine has consistantly been related to economics, who would own and work the land, the waters, the seas, the trade routes (the Suez Canal). And don't think that Isreal's destruction of its rival banking center in Lebanon was accidental.

As for World War I, you still ignore nationalist factors.

No, I just don't give it primacy. While the spark may have been due to nationalistic aspartions of the Serbs, the war had been brewing for many years. Capitalist imperialism was about control of resources, labor, and markets. France and Britain had them, Germany, despite its burdgeoning economy didn't. Germany had no outlet for its surplus capital and needed to take colonies from the Western powers. Germany and Britain and France nearly came to blows several times about who was to get what colonies. The war aims of all the countries (excepting the US) was to take or make colonies of the other countries. Nationalism just made it easier to go to war.

And you fail to explain how nations are formed in the first place.

Because that wasn't part ofthe discussion in the first place. You fail to explain how industrialization lead to the war. See I can introduce non-germain topics and criticize you also.

They are not based on economics,

The hell they aren't.

they are quite unique in that their goal is either the establishment or maintainence of state institutions.

States exist for what reason? To guarantee the economic rights of the ruling class. Nationalism is an expression of a particular class at a particluar time in history, specifically the rising bourgeoisie in multi-ethnic (or splintered) linguistic groups. On the one hand, nationalism represents a unity of the group, as opposed to the feudal class system which strictly divided people. This unity then logical demands that all of the people (by which was meant the rising middle class) be involved in the governence of society. On the other, nations were a way for the bourgeoisie of a particular linguistic group to claim exclusive poltical and economic rights to a particular piece of land.

How can you explain various ethnic conflicts, such as Yugoslavia? Land conflicts are not necessarily economic conflicts.

The nacent bourgeoisies of the various republics wanted exclusive economic control of their republics. The break away republics of the North controled 75% of the industry of Yugoslavia, while having significantly less than half of the population. Is it any wonder Seriba fought so hard to hold on and the others fought hard to break away? The break away republics didn't want to share the wealth with their poorer cosuins. Does this mean there weren't other factors? Absolutely not. But don't ignore them.

The civil war: there is considerable evidence that slavery was not actually economically beneficial at the time of the Civil War in some states, such as Virginia. Nobody can deny the ideological, particularly racial differences between the north and the south.

The fact that a particular economic system is not viable doesn't mean that the conflict is not economic in character. The French Revolution was about capitalism overthrowing feudalism. Feudalism was on its last legs and was in now way a viable syste, Even when the monarchy was restored in France, capitalism remained the economic system.

The fact that slavery was on the way out and was no longer a viable system doesn't argue against the conflict being economic in character. In fact, it only deepens the explanation, since economic systems are not overthrown when they are healthy, but when they are sick and old and still hanging on past their useful time. It was because slavery was still hanging on, despite the economic power of the capitalist North that necessitated the Civil War. The North had to break the political power of a weak economic system that was standing in its way.

The fact that economic factors exist in a conflict in no way means that the actors are conscious of them. Does a little boy who hits a little girl know that he did it because he likes her and is confused about his feelings? No. Humans beings, and their governments and societies can be in the dark about what motivates them. You seem to think that economic factors of conflict mean that some greedy bastards are sitting in a smoke filled room deciding to start wars in order to fill their pockets. They (speaking meatphorically) have many complex reasons why a war needs to be started, but you can be sure that it happens to coincide with their economic interests. Societies which fight wars against their economic interests have a tendency to collapse.

I'd also like to turn this back on you (and Imran who piped in). Your understanding of the economic factors is just as one dimensional as you accuse me of being. It's true, there are communists (sadly quite many) who reduce everything to economic factors. I should think I've proved myself more intelligent than that and have a rather nuanced view of the world and events. I'm aruging for an economic view of why things happened, not because its the only factor in war, but because youwant to leave it out altogether. Sometimes economics are the direct cause of war, such as WWI. Sometimes its indirect, such as the current war. But it's always there, along with many other factors.

And Imran, you need to step back from the view point of a believer (or former believer) and look at the rise of Islam historically. Is it merely coincidental that Islam spread along the major trade routes of the old world and not into areas removed from those trade routes? Islam is intricately tied up in economics. It's a much more trade-friendly religion than Christianity, which is why it displaced that religion nearly everywhere it went. Christianity only was resurrected in Spain, Portugal, and Russia because of repression. Does this mean that the religious fervor of the Beduin or the Janissaries wasn't genuine? Heck no. But faith doesn't mean that economic factors didn't exist.

[Adam Smith]

Chegitz:

As you no doubt know, many in the US see US support of Israel as a political / ethnic issue, rather than economic. At the time of its founding Israel was the only country in the region even remotely resembling a democracy. You have said in the past that US policy should be much more oriented toward promoting democratic regiemes, and I agree with you. Why does that not apply here?

Any comment on Vietnam and Korea in my previous post?

Is it merely coincidental that Islam spread along the major trade routes of the old world and not into areas removed from those trade routes?

Islam spread along major trade routes since that is where the movement of people (and hence ideas at that time) was easiest. Christianity spread along major trade routes (eg., Paul's voyages) for the same reason. The Black Plague spread along trade routes for the same reason.

[Chris 62]

I suppose I should clarify a bit....

I used to beleive, as many do here, that other factors besides economics were the route causes of wars, but, for the most part, all wars come down to this:

One side wants something the other has, and they try to take it.

This is normally expressed as economics.

Why did the French attack Northern Italy in 1790s?
Because it had money France desparatlely needed.

Why did the sultan want Vienna so badly in the 1500s?
Because it controlled trade routes alomg the danube

Why did Germany want the Polish corridor and Danzig back in 1939?
Because it was the land route to Prussia, and Danzig was a major port, an economic interest.

Why did Japan want the Dutch east indies?
To get oil for their fleet and industries, an economic reason, not a nationalist one. "Asia for asiaians" was an added factor, not the primary factor.

I could list hundreds more, but these surfice.

Of course there were other factors at work, but all war boils down to one side wanting something the other has, and we measure that as economics.

Simple as that.

[Joe R. Golowka]

Originally posted by Hoek
If there was any country that we have no financial interest in, it's Afghanistan.

Not according to Unocal:

ONE HUNDRED FIFTH CONGRESS SECOND SESSION
FEBRUARY 12, 1998

Next we would like to hear from Mr. John J. Maresca, vice president of international relations, Unocal Corporation. You may proceed as you wish.

STATEMENT OF JOHN J. MARESCA, VICE
PRESIDENT OF INTERNATIONAL RELATIONS, UNOCAL CORPORATION

Mr. Maresca. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. It's nice to see you again. I am John Maresca, vice president for international relations of the Unocal Corporation. Unocal, as you know, is one of the world's leading energy resource and project development companies. I appreciate your invitation to speak here today. I believe these hearings are important and timely. I congratulate you for focusing on Central Asia oil and gas reserves and the role they play in shaping U.S. policy.

I would like to focus today on three issues. First, the need for multiple pipeline routes for Central Asian oil and gas resources. Second, the need for U.S. support for international and regional efforts to achieve balanced and lasting political settlements to the conflicts in the region, including Afghanistan. Third, the need for structured assistance to encourage economic reforms and the development of appropriate investment climates in the region. In this regard, we specifically support repeal or removal of section 907 of the Freedom Support Act.

Mr. Chairman, the Caspian region contains tremendous untapped hydrocarbon reserves. Just to give an idea of the scale, proven natural gas reserves equal more than 236 trillion cubic feet. The region's total oil reserves may well reach more than 60 billion barrels of oil. Some estimates are as high as 200 billion barrels. In 1995, the region was producing only 870,000 barrels per day. By 2010, western companies could increase production to about 4.5 million barrels a day, an increase of more than 500 percent in only 15 years. If this occurs, the region would represent about 5 percent of the world's total oil production.

One major problem has yet to be resolved: how to get the region's vast energy resources to the markets where they are needed. Central Asia is isolated. Their natural resources are land locked, both geographically and politically. Each of the countries in the Caucasus and Central Asia faces difficult political challenges. Some have unsettled wars or latent conflicts. Others have evolving systems where the laws and even the courts are dynamic and changing. In addition, a chief technical obstacle which we in the industry face in transporting oil is the region's existing pipeline infrastructure.

Because the region's pipelines were constructed during the Moscow-centered Soviet period, they tend to head north and west toward Russia. There are no connections to the south and east. But Russia is currently unlikely to absorb large new quantities of foreign oil. It's unlikely to be a significant market for new energy in the next decade. It lacks the capacity to deliver it to other markets.

Two major infrastructure projects are seeking to meet the need for additional export capacity. One, under the aegis of the Caspian Pipeline Consortium, plans to build a pipeline west from the northern Caspian to the Russian Black Sea port of Novorossiysk. Oil would then go by tanker through the Bosporus to the Mediterranean and world markets.

The other project is sponsored by the Azerbaijan International Operating Company, a consortium of 11 foreign oil companies, including four American companies, Unocal, Amoco, Exxon and Pennzoil. This consortium conceives of two possible routes, one line would angle north and cross the north Caucasus to Novorossiysk. The other route would cross Georgia to a shipping terminal on the Black Sea. This second route could be extended west and south across Turkey to the Mediterranean port of Ceyhan.

But even if both pipelines were built, they would not have enough total capacity to transport all the oil expected to flow from the region in the future. Nor would they have the capability to move it to the right markets. Other export pipelines must be built.

At Unocal, we believe that the central factor in planning these pipelines should be the location of the future energy markets that are most likely to need these new supplies. Western Europe, Central and Eastern Europe, and the Newly Independent States of the former Soviet Union are all slow growth markets where demand will grow at only a half a percent to perhaps 1.2 percent per year during the period 1995 to 2010.

Asia is a different story all together. It will have a rapidly increasing energy consumption need. Prior to the recent turbulence in the Asian Pacific economies, we at Unocal anticipated that this region's demand for oil would almost double by 2010. Although the short-term increase in demand will probably not meet these expectations, we stand behind our long-term estimates.

I should note that it is in everyone's interest that there be adequate supplies for Asia's increasing energy requirements. If Asia's energy needs are not satisfied, they will simply put pressure on all world markets, driving prices upwards everywhere.

The key question then is how the energy resources of Central Asia can be made available to nearby Asian markets. There are two possible solutions, with several variations. One option is to go east across China, but this would mean constructing a pipeline of more than 3,000 kilometers just to reach Central China. In addition, there would have to be a 2,000-kilometer connection to reach the main population centers along the coast. The question then is what will be the cost of transporting oil through this pipeline, and what would be the netback which the producers would receive.

For those who are not familiar with the terminology, the netback is the price which the producer receives for his oil or gas at the well head after all the transportation costs have been deducted. So it's the price he receives for the oil he produces at the well head.

The second option is to build a pipeline south from Central Asia to the Indian Ocean. One obvious route south would cross Iran, but this is foreclosed for American companies because of U.S. sanctions legislation. The only other possible route is across Afghanistan, which has of course its own unique challenges. The country has been involved in bitter warfare for almost two decades, and is still divided by civil war. From the outset, we have made it clear that construction of the pipeline we have proposed across Afghanistan could not begin until a recognized government is in place that has the confidence of governments, lenders, and our company.

Mr. Chairman, as you know, we have worked very closely with the University of Nebraska at Omaha in developing a training program for Afghanistan which will be open to both men and women, and which will operate in both parts of the country, the north and south.

Unocal foresees a pipeline which would become part of a regional system that will gather oil from existing pipeline infrastructure in Turkmenistan, Uzbekistan, Kazakhstan and Russia. The 1,040-mile long oil pipeline would extend south through Afghanistan to an export terminal that would be constructed on the Pakistan coast. This 42-inch diameter pipeline will have a shipping capacity of one million barrels of oil per day. The estimated cost of the project, which is similar in scope to the trans-Alaska pipeline, is about $2.5 billion.

Given the plentiful natural gas supplies of Central Asia, our aim is to link gas resources with the nearest viable markets. This is basic for the commercial viability of any gas project. But these projects also face geopolitical challenges. Unocal and the Turkish company Koc Holding are interested in bringing competitive gas supplies to Turkey. The proposed Eurasia natural gas pipeline would transport gas from Turkmenistan directly across the Caspian Sea through Azerbaijan and Georgia to Turkey. Of course the demarcation of the Caspian remains an issue.

Last October, the Central Asia Gas Pipeline Consortium, called CentGas, in which Unocal holds an interest, was formed to develop a gas pipeline which will link Turkmenistan's vast Dauletabad gas field with markets in Pakistan and possibly India. The proposed 790-mile pipeline will open up new markets for this gas, traveling from Turkmenistan through Afghanistan to Multan in Pakistan. The proposed extension would move gas on to New Delhi, where it would connect with an existing pipeline. As with the proposed Central Asia oil pipeline, CentGas can not begin construction until an internationally recognized Afghanistan Government is in place.

The Central Asia and Caspian region is blessed with abundant oil and gas that can enhance the lives of the region's residents, and provide energy for growth in both Europe and Asia. The impact of these resources on U.S. commercial interests and U.S. foreign policy is also significant. Without peaceful settlement of the conflicts in the region, cross-border oil and gas pipelines are not likely to be built. We urge the Administration and the Congress to give strong support to the U.N.-led peace process in Afghanistan. The U.S. Government should use its influence to help find solutions to all of the region's conflicts.

U.S. assistance in developing these new economies will be crucial to business success. We thus also encourage strong technical assistance programs throughout the region. Specifically, we urge repeal or removal of section 907 of the Freedom Support Act. This section unfairly restricts U.S. Government assistance to the government of Azerbaijan and limits U.S. influence in the region.

Developing cost-effective export routes for Central Asian resources is a formidable task, but not an impossible one. Unocal and other American companies like it are fully prepared to undertake the job and to make Central Asia once again into the crossroads it has been in the past. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.

JOHN J. MARESCA, VICE PRESIDENT OF INTERNATIONAL RELATIONS, UNOCAL CORPORATION, SPEAKING BEFORE THE COMMITTEE ON INTERNATIONAL RELATIONS, HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES FEBRUARY 12, 1998

[chequita guevara]

Well dang, black flag.

[Joe R. Golowka]

Originally posted by faded glory
The 'pipe under design' you speak of goes through Russia!

Actually there are multiple pipelines going from the Caspian sea. About 10% of the world's oil is there, your'e gunna need multiple pipelines. One of the proposed pipelines goes through Afghanistan. Ones in Russia have already been built.

[DinoDoc]

Re our oil interest in Afghanistan: If anyone has any info that wasn't already presented and/or refuted here, I'd really like to see it.

[Hoek]

Even if one oil company proposed an oil pipeline, that deosn't mean a) that Congress or the president support such a pipeling (we have enough trouble getting the Azerbejian-Georgia-Turkey line), or b) that the pipeline figures into our equations for chosing Afghanistan. You fail to show how this statement proves that our war in Afghanistan is over oil.

Che: You don't have to "turn it on me," since I don't deny that economics is sometimes a factor (often a factor) in war. Prior to your last statement, you had not shown that you were willing to accept that economics is not the be-all and end-all cause of everything. You are indeed correct, that communists are not the only ones to say this, and yes, extreme capitalists like economic reductivism too. What we are talking about is the degree of economic invovlement. Saying that the U.S. went to war in Afghanistan primarily (or even remotely) to promote economic goals is quite a stretch at best. I think we can agree that the economic factor in this military action is nonexistent (which I think...seeing as we pay a billion dollars a day for the war) or minimal. Saying that Britian went to war against China in the 1800's for economic goals is not a stetch at all...in fact, it's the only reason. Indeed, now it seems you have a more nuanced view than I had previously thought. Chris, however, is pushing the idea of ecomic reductivism quite hard. Trying to develop such a generalized notion of why nations (or anyone else) engage in armed combat is a dangerous oversimplification.

When we talk about land, I was saying that land DOES NOT ALWAYS equal economy. Think the Indians, think Israel. They were not seeking to gain economically from the land. They were much more interested in defending their people from those who would kill them and maintaining a way of life. Often, there is very little economic cause for fighting over a piece of land. Look at conflicts in Kashmir, Ethiopia, the Phillipines. These conflicts, when a cost-benefit analysis is applied, shows that it costs far more to fight over the land than any economic benefit that could be extracted.

Let me ask you this: what is the true financial benefit for OBL to carry out these terrorist acts? It is apparent that his true goals are not even to get the U.S. out of Saudi Arabia. His true goal, it seems, is just to terrorize Americans. You should read Samuel Huntington sometime. While there is alot I don't agree with him he makes some very important arguments against the rational-actor theories that are so prevelant in political science today. He argues that very irrational emotions play a huge part in politics, and to ignore this is to miss alot of important realities in political science.

If you look at armed conflict on a micro-scale, on an individual instead of a state level, you can perhaps better distinguish the root causes of state-level violence. Why does a man who is having his house broken into shoot the intruder? Because the intruder poses a definite threat to the man and his family's lives. Why would the intruder shoot the man whose house he's breaking into? In order to get material wealth from the house. Why does an anti-abortionist zealot blow up an abortion clinic? In order to instill fear in a segment of the population to promote an ideology. Why would a KKK member lynch a black man? Because of a superiority complex. These and other micro-level causes of armed conflict can be expanded to the state level (albeit with a great deal more complexity), but it does explain the behavior of states. Any given state-level armed conflict is going to have a multiplicity of causes, but some are going to be more important than others. Indeed, there are always a number of calculations that go into a war, and states always have to consider the costs of conflict before engaging in it, but what we are talking about is what are the primary causes. The only thing that could have stopped us from going into Afghanistan is if there was no way that we could afford it. We did not go into afghanistan to promote economic goals, however. We did it because someone intruded in our country and killed our people (equivilent to a burglar shooting a family member), and now we have to protect our own lives. People who call it a racist war, or suggest that we did this to build a pipeline are sorely mistaken. They are injecting their own causes into the conflict instead of actually analyzing the reality of it.

[chequita guevara]

Well, I had said in my very first post in this thread that economics were not the be all and end all of armed conflict. Your failure to read it is not a fault of mine.

You still have too flat a view of economics. Economic factors do not have to be direct or causal. That the US is involved in this war in terrorism has something to do with economics, because of 50 years of US policy regarding the ME and the control of its oil. Bin Laden's war against us is a reaction to that policy, and our war against him is because of this. This war is because we have a policy of promoting governments which are evil simply to protect "our" oil.

Thus, this war can be reduced to economics, but only if one wants to forego a complete (or even good) understanding of it. Does this mean that the US is fighting this war to promote the acquisition of oil? No. But at the same time, the destruction of the people who attacked us also means were are destroying the enemies of the regimes our government supports. Thus "our" oil is secured. Again, economics.

BTW, if we really wanted to (and apparently I do), we could go back to the begining of this conflict, 26 years ago (1975) when the first Mujehedeen revolted against the Doud government's land redistribution plans (which were never implimented). Again, that's economics.

By the way, terrorists do not do acts of terrorism for no reason. People do not hate the US for no reason. The terrorists are rational actors (though they sorely underestimated us and overestimated themselves). Every Islamic terrorist attack on the US in the last 20 years has been in response to:

The shooting down of two Libyan planes in 1981; the bombardment of Beirut in 1983 and 1984; the furnishing of military aid and intelligence to both sides of the Iran-Iraq War of 1980-88 so as to maximize the damage each side would inflict upon the other; the bombing of Libya in 1986; the bombing and sinking of an Iranian ship in 1987; the shooting down of an Iranian passenger plane in 1988; the shooting down of two more Libyan planes in 1989; the massive bombing of the Iraqi people in 1991; the continuing bombings and sanctions against Iraq; the bombing of Afghanistan and Sudan in 1998, the latter destroying a pharmaceutical plant which provided for half the impoverished nation's medicines; the habitual support of Israel despite the devastation and routine torture it inflicts upon the Palestinian people; the condemnation of Arab resistance to this; the continued persecution of Libya, now nearing the end of its second decade; the abduction of wanted men from Muslim countries, such as Malaysia, Pakistan, Lebanon and Albania; the large military and hi-tech presence in Islam's holiest land, Saudi Arabia, and elsewhere in the Persian Gulf region; the support of anti-democratic Middle East governments, from the Shah to the Saudis ...

From Why Do Terrorists Keep Picking on the United States?

Land is always about economy. Again, this shows your limited understanding of economics. Without land, how could the Indians hunt or farm? That was their economy. The US-Indian wars were conflicts between two competing economies, capitalism and primitive communism. Capitalism won. . . . I'm not going to get into it with you over Israel, I have enough headaches without getting Natan, Eli, and others on my case as well.

BTW, do you think that the KKK has nothing to do with economics? The damn thing was founded to keep Black people in bondage, and later to keep them subservient to Jim Crow and thus remain a cheap and docile supply of labor. Do you think that white supremacy today has nothing to do with economic insecurity that these losers feel?

Do anti-abortion clinic terrorists have nothing to do with economics? Isn't one of their goals to drive women from the work place? Is that not economic?

You raise what might be considered a valid point (the cost of wars) if the costs were borne equally throughout society and the benefits of victory were shared equally. This has never been the case. The economist (Hobson, IIRC, early 20th centuy) who made the first systematic study of capitalist imperialism also noted the seeming descrepency you point out. Colonialism was a net loss for the nation as a whole. What he failed to realize is that in a class society, the costs are borne more heavily by some and the benefits accured only to a few. Wars invariably benefit the ruling class of society (unless they lose badly). It was the oil companies that benefitted (quite well too) from the Persian Gulf War, thought the overall cost was carried by every American.

. . .

I could go on, but I want to go home from work. C'ya!

[Hoek]

That's because I guess I limit my definition of economic conflict. You failed to explain, for instance, what the economic benefit of any ruling class in Ethiopia or Eritreia would be to controlling a tiny triangle of disputed desert.

Not everyone is rational. The fact that the Sept 11 terrorists were willing to die smacks of irrational behavior. Neither their goals nor our goals in the immediate conflict are economic. There are 3 layers of conflict between our economic interests and the current conflict. The top layer is the U.S. trying to root out terrorism in Afghanistan. The next layer is terrorists trying to get U.S. soldiers out of the "Holy Lands." The next layer is the Persian Gulf conflict. The next layer is U.S. defending oil interests in the region. The point is that you could continue to do this with anything, but paths of causation are long and complicated, and economics often plays a role, but often indirectly.

When you come down to it, it is as much of a matter of perception as anything else. Some Americans viewed the Indians as an impediment to economic expansion, others viewed them as inferior human beings, others viewed them as heathens, and so on. You, being a communist, are more likely to analyzed conflicts through an economic prism. I, for one, would be more likely to view conflicts through a humanist prism. The difficulty in this conversation, then, is more a matter of perception than anything else.

I'm a little tired of typing, so I'll wait for a response.

[Ramo]

Think the Indians, think Israel.

che has already addressed the Amerindians, but the Israel's conflict is most definitely affected by economics. In particular, the conflict is largely driven by the security of water resources.

but a telegraph intercept from Germany to Mexico, trying to convince Mexico to open up a new theatre in North America to keep the U.S. occupied.

Most likely, the telegraph was manufactured by England to draw the US into a war.

As for the claims that the US "provoked the first shot", it's a matter of conjecture, as the border to the USA was different to what it was to Mexico.

Before the incident, Col. Hitchcock (one of the officers in the area) wrote:

"I have said from the first that the United States are the aggressors[....] We have not one particle of right to be here[....] It looks as if the government sent a small force on purpose to bring on a war, so as to have a pretext for taking California and as much of the country as it chooses, for, whatever becomes of this army, there is no doubt of a war between the United States and mexico[...]."

In the cabinet meeting on May 9 (before news of any skirmishes) Polk wrote about what he said at the meeting in his diary:

"I stated[...] that up to this time, as we knew, we had heard of no open act of aggression by the Mexican army, but that the danger was imminent that such acts would be committed. I said that in my opinion we had ample cause of war, and that it was impossible[...] that I could remain silent much longer[...] that the country was impatient on the subject."

He suggested using tenuous money claims and the rejection of the offer (in fact, the negotiator) to buy California as a pretense for war against Mexico.

Also, those "attrocites" are WAY exagerated, "thousands' is laughable. Revisionist historians are the bane of history, putting up bloatted numbers and other nonsense.

As I wrote earlier, I was referring to civilian casualties, which were enourmous. Even if you only consider military casualties, the number is still atrocious.

There were no "concentration camps", the first case of this is the Boer war in south africa in 1900, not in the Phillipennes.

Actually, the Spanish war in Cuba was the first instance of concentration camps, IIRC. In fact, that's where we learned about how to use 'em in the Philippines.

This insurrection was fought as a conventional military campagin for the most part, not a "Vietnam" style guerrilla war, so spare us this bull.

A conventional Mongol campaign, maybe.

A captain wrote, "Caloocan was supposed to contain 17000 inhabitants. The Twentieth Kansas swept through it, and now Caloocan contains not one living native."

A general said, "One sixth of the natives of Luzon have either been killed or have died of dengue fever in teh last few years. The loss of life by killing alone has been very great, but I think not one man has been slain excpet where his death has served the legitimate purposes of war. It has been necessary to adopt what in other countries would probably be thought harsh measures."

A solder said, "The major said that General Smith instructed him to kill and burn, and said that the more he killed and burned the better pleased he would be; that it was no time to take prisoners, and that he was to make Smar a howling wilderness. Major Waller asked General Smith to define the age limit for killing, and he replied "Everything over ten.""

Sorry, this simply isn't the case, careful study of this campagin bares this out through at least a dozen sources, Aguinaldo's rebels at their height NEVER exceded 40,000 men.

To quote Gen. MacArthur (commander in the region during the war):
"[...] I believed that Aguinaldo's troops represented only a faction." He also said that the tactics of the rebels "depended upon almost complete unity of action of the entire native population."

What was perfectly acceptable 100 years ago may not be now, but may again be 100 years from now. It is dangerous to apply current morality to historical situations.

Hitler and Stalin, for instance, undoubtedly had different standards of morality from me or you. Does that rationalize their atrocities?

There were people that knew mass-murderering defenseless women and children wasn't justified 10 or 100 or 1000 years ago.

What, the New Orleans Grays don't count?
What about the over 50 people from the British Isles at the Alamo?
Next time yer in SA, look at the Alamo and tell me what the signifigance of all those flags are.

Oh come on. Obviously I meant soldiers acting in a professional, not civilian capacity.

Most quotes have been taken out of Howard Zinn's excellent history book A People's History of the United States, BTW.

[Hoek]

Why was the state of Israel created? Not to give Jews an economic power base, but to give Jews a government of their own, a place they could call their home. Most of the wars there have been fought to protect the state, and therefore the ideal. I don't know if you realize that Israeli military spending outpaces every other state in the world in terms of percentage of GDP. You should keep in mind the fact that until 1967, pretty much the only thing that occupied Israel's government was self-defense.