When is war justified?

[Heresson]

Re: When is war justified?

When is war justified?

when it's again Germans or Russians

[Heresson]

.
what happened was that areas that had a predominant German population were given to both Poland and Czechoslovakia and one part of Germany was left isolated from another.

as it used to be since the origins of that other part of Germany, with short pauses.
poland was not given ANY majorly German territory. Name some, please. Of course, some cities in Upper Silesia had a german majority, but ironically upper silesian voivodship had the highest percentage of polish nationality of all.

[Barnabas]

Re: Re: When is war justified?

Originally posted by Heresson


when it's against Germans or Russians

corrected

[Heresson]

Re: Re: Re: When is war justified?

Originally posted by Brachy-Pride



corrected

thank You, it was a typo.

She formed new nations, such as Yugoslavia, Poland and Czechoslovakia from the ruins, and, in the process, laid the groundwork for WWII.

Freeing opressed nations
Britain was pro-german when it came to polish-german boarders, btw

[Ned]

Originally posted by notyoueither


Better, Ned.

But what is to be said of Ms Ortel's essay? Well, it appears that one of her major sources for British perfidy was a book I have not read. Can't say much about it.

I read this review though.

http://findarticles.com/p/articles/mi_m1316/is_7-8_35/ai_106096930

Here is a part of it.

"The Illusion of Victory is hyperbolic and so hostile to Wilson that it borders on the cartoonish. Fleming's Wilson was a coward, bull-headed and abusive, a mean-spirited commander-in-chief who was obsessed with keeping his grip on power. Fleming reports that Wilson's top aides concealed facts, put their enemies in jail, and encouraged "super-patriots" to assault anti-war protesters. He seems determined to assail the Allies for acting like immoral powers and to blame them for the war's greatest atrocities. He cites Britain's naval blockade in the Atlantic Ocean that left millions of German civilians malnourished. He also attacks the tactics of British propaganda organs such as Wellington House, which depicted the Germans as murderous Huns during the war. Like many students of the Great War, Fleming concludes that the Allies sought a vindictive treaty that ultimately led to the outbreak of WWII.

Yet, when Wilson returned from Europe after negotiating his "peace without victory," the U.S. Senate rejected his proposal for a League of Nations. Fleming's reflection on Wilson's post-war failures sounds like a taunt. "What electorate," he writes, "would not have become disillusioned with a president like Wilson? From the time he asked Congress to declare war under the illusion that he would not have to send more than a token force to Europe to the time he agreed to peace with Germany on the basis of the Fourteen Points, his conduct of public affairs was calamitously incompetent."

The book, unfortunately, misses the chance to reconsider the war's causes and consequences and address the prevailing view that World War I was a debacle from start to finish. Chock full of hyperbole and ham-handed efforts to popularize a subject of serious historical inquiry, this book includes odd chapter titles ("Politics is Adjourned, Ha Ha Ha") and bald counterfactual assertions that the majority of readers will find unconvincing. Wilson, perhaps, was a poor politician, but his idealism resonated with millions of people at home and around the world. He argued that the United States had a moral obligation to participate in global affairs. He opposed imperialism as a force for evil. He articulated the view that people from Africa to Asia had the inalienable right to democratic self-rule and a peaceful coexistence with other citizens. Such themes have defined America's foreign policy over the course of the last century. A more sympathetic account that challenged the conventional wisdom could have shed light on World War I's lasting impact."

It seems Ms. Ortel isn't too picky about sources. I'm sure you can sympathise.

And then she veers into somewhat questionable conclutions when she suggests that British (and Empire) posters urging people to enlist were part of the British programme of programming America.

The next anti-German propaganda bonanza for the WPB came with the sinking of British passenger liner the Lusitania on May 7, 1915. Of 2,000 passengers on board, 1,198 died including 128 Americans. Americans were outraged, and the British propagandists seized the opportunity to distribute more anti-German materials. Posters were released featuring a drowning woman and child with the message “ENLIST” (Appendix 2.1). Another poster depicted a sinking ship with hands grasping the water fronted by the goddess of war Minerva urging men to “TAKE UP THE SWORD OF JUSTICE” (Appendix 2.2). Propaganda materials following the Lusitania disaster further distorted the image of Germans into justifiable “Huns.” However, most never realized that the Lusitania had been carrying a wide array of contraband, and few acknowledged that Germany had posted notices in New York City warning that the Lusitania was a targeted ship. (Appendix 2.3).13

This is ****, Ned.

Here's one now. I can see where the appeal led Nebraskans to join the marines immediately.

I think Wilson was a flawed figure. My opinion of him began to change dramatically when I learned, from this forum mind you, and not from history class, that he was a racist.

Just because a book is hostile to Wilson for reasons stated does not necessarily mean the facts, such as the secret Belgium-Britain-France alliance were not real. The actions of the participants at the time were very consistent with the existence of such an alliance.

Moveover, prior to the actual breakout of war, Germans were openly attacked in Belgium while the French were lauded. Clealy the people of Belgium viewed Germany as the enemy and were not neutral.

As to your posters, very consistent with the pro-Brit view that seemed to prevail at the time. The Brits were openly courting us as "sons," almost as if we should play our role as a card-carrying member of the empire.

[Ned]

Re: Re: Re: Re: When is war justified?

Originally posted by Heresson


thank You, it was a typo.



Freeing opressed nations
Britain was pro-german when it came to polish-german boarders, btw

The real problem was giving land occuppied by Germans to other nations, and separating one part of Germany from another. Danzig was neutered, but effectively under Polish control.

(All Germany's foreign possession were confiscated without compensation.)

My God, if France was spoiling for a fight to restore Alsaice and Lorraine, you had to expect the same from Germany after this. It was forseeable.

[Ned]

Molly, pehaps my views are clouded because Nazism and fascism are destroyed while communism persists. I take the view that all were evil doctrines, not just the two.

We clearly took sides in the contest between Hitler and Stalin well before the war started. While I don't have a full explanation for this, it is true that at this time, organs like the NY Times were lying to the American people about Stalin while exaggerating the evils of Nazism. This may have had an effect on US policy.

But I also think that FDR was "kind" to Stalin as he, like Churchill, saw them as a necessary ally despite their police state. FDR was most concerned in stopping the war in China and getting the Japanese out. He needed Stalin to help.

[notyoueither]

Originally posted by Ned

I think Wilson was a flawed figure. My opinion of him began to change dramatically when I learned, from this forum mind you, and not from history class, that he was a racist.

Just because a book is hostile to Wilson for reasons stated does not necessarily mean the facts, such as the secret Belgium-Britain-France alliance were not real. The actions of the participants at the time were very consistent with the existence of such an alliance.

The book is a rant. It was written by a novelist/amateur historian with an axe to grind. He grinds it, and anybody who is a friend or ally of the target gets a whack or three too.

Meanwhile, on your rant goes. The words 'in reality, Belgium had secret agreements with Britain and France, and therefore maintained a covert pro-Ally stance' from an essay that is little more than repeating blatherings from rants, with no discussion of the statements being made, become 'the secret Belgium-Britain-France alliance.'

Here's a clue, simply repeating ****, and making it larger and more foul with each retelling, does not establish a fact. Try finding someone who has written something other than a review of books written by the deranged and incompetent before you hang your hat on a source.

Moveover, prior to the actual breakout of war, Germans were openly attacked in Belgium while the French were lauded. Clealy the people of Belgium viewed Germany as the enemy and were not neutral.

Uh-huh. And what neo-Nazi site does this come from?

As to your posters, very consistent with the pro-Brit view that seemed to prevail at the time. The Brits were openly courting us as "sons," almost as if we should play our role as a card-carrying member of the empire.

Ned. They were recruiting posters for Britain and the Empire. Do you understand that?

Where in the United States were they displayed? Is that a question you can answer? Were they nailed to trees by infiltrators from Canada? How many Yanks joined up?

Incidently, maybe you'll pay some heed to an archivist of these posters from the United States.

http://www.library.georgetown.edu/dept/speccoll/britpost/intro.htm

The Roger N. Mohovich Collection contains, counting duplicates, rather more than 400 posters created during the First World War or very shortly afterwards. Well over 300 of the posters are American, as is only to be expected; of the remainder, some 50 are of British origin. These British posters are by no means so well known in this country as many of the American ones, and it is hoped that awareness of them will be increased by means of this exhibition--and particularly its installation as part of the library's web site. The 25 examples selected, although they include examples by neither of the best-known British war poster artists, Frank Brangwyn and G. Spencer Pryse, display most, if not all, of the stylistic and thematic ideas which typify British poster art during the war.

There is little need here to repeat in miniature the history of First World War posters; interested readers or viewers are urged to consult the texts by Martin Hardie and Arthur K. Sabin (War Posters, London: A. & C. Black, 1920) and Maurice Rickards (Posters of the First World War, New York: Walker, c1968). The roughly chronological arrangement of the posters in the exhibition reveals the initial concern with recruiting, followed as the war dragged on by no less necessary demands on the civilian economy and a need to blacken utterly the character of "the Hun." The single post-war example shown demonstrates a far different approach to recruiting, if perhaps one that relies overly on the continued viability of a horse-drawn economy. Posters illustrated in the books by Hardie/Sabin and Rickards are so noted in the brief descriptive entries for each work.

So, Ned, how were posters that were not well known in the US supposed to sway opinion towards entry into the war?

Furthermore, why should Britain have been so concerned about American entry on her side in 1915? Is it possible that posters aimed at recruiting British and Empire citizens are just that?

Finally, who the hell put these up all over America in an attempt to gain an as then unneeded ally, and where were they displayed?

[molly bloom]

Originally posted by Ned
Molly, pehaps my views are clouded because Nazism and fascism are destroyed while communism persists. I take the view that all were evil doctrines, not just the two.

Odd then that denazification didn't get rid of all the Fascists or Neo-Nazis in Europe then, or elsewhere in the world..

Presumably you've never heard of Alessandra Mussolini and the M.S.I. in Italy, for instance.

You keep going on about Stalin and the numbers you say he killed, but you don't refer directly to the death toll attributed to the forces of Nazi Germany and its allies.

I find that quite significant.

We clearly took sides in the contest between Hitler and Stalin well before the war started.

'We' who ?

And what are your sources for this ?

While I don't have a full explanation for this,

How unlike you...

it is true that at this time, organs like the NY Times were lying to the American people about Stalin while exaggerating the evils of Nazism

Really ? Where ?

Be specific when you make allegations like these.

FDR was most concerned in stopping the war in China and getting the Japanese out. He needed Stalin to help.

And ? Are you suggesting that the U.S. collaborated with Stalin pre-Pearl Harbour against the Japanese in China ?

Do try to be more specific.

[molly bloom]

Originally posted by Ned


The Nazis and the commies are well known propagandists. You have know anything they tell you is either a boldfaced lie or only half true.

The same is not true of the Brits who are very, very skilled at manipulating other countries' public opinion to serve their interests. The Brits manuevered us into supporting them in WWI

Oddly enough, I think that the German resumption of unrestricted submarine warfare in 1917 and the Zimmermann Telegram helped ever so slightly.

So did President Wilson:

On the 3rd of February last, I officially laid before you the extraordinary announcement of the Imperial German government that on and after the 1st day of February it was its purpose to put aside all restraints of law or of humanity and use its submarines to sink every vessel that sought to approach either the ports of Great Britain and Ireland or the western coasts of Europe or any of the ports controlled by the enemies of Germany within the Mediterranean.

That had seemed to be the object of the German submarine warfare earlier in the war, but since April of last year the Imperial government had somewhat restrained the commanders of its undersea craft in conformity with its promise then given to us that passenger boats should not be sunk and that due warning would be given to all other vessels which its submarines might seek to destroy, when no resistance was offered or escape attempted, and care taken that their crews were given at least a fair chance to save their lives in their open boats. The precautions taken were meager and haphazard enough, as was proved in distressing instance after instance in the progress of the cruel and unmanly business, but a certain degree of restraint was observed.

The new policy has swept every restriction aside. Vessels of every kind, whatever their flag, their character, their cargo, their destination, their errand, have been ruthlessly sent to the bottom without warning and without thought of help or mercy for those on board, the vessels of friendly neutrals along with those of belligerents. Even hospital ships and ships carrying relief to the sorely bereaved and stricken people of Belgium, though the latter were provided with safe conduct through the proscribed areas by the German government itself and were distinguished by unmistakable marks of identity, have been sunk with the same reckless lack of compassion or of principle.

February 1st 1917


The Zimmermann Telegram:

I instructed the Minister to Mexico, in the event of war with the United States, to propose a German alliance to Mexico, and simultaneously to suggest that Japan join the alliance.

I declared expressly that, despite the submarine war, we hoped that America would maintain neutrality.

My instructions were to be carried out only after the United States declared war and a state of war supervened. I believe the instructions were absolutely loyal as regards the United States.

Arthur Zimmermann's speech concerning the authenticity of the Zimmermann Telegram March 29th 1917

Just saw a bit on the Military Channel last night called Warlords.

Jolly good. Another of your 'historical sources'- a television programme that none of us may have seen, whose sources of info. we know nothing about.

You really don't get this whole 'source' and 'cite' thing do you ?

Exactly what I've been contending all along in these threads.

Well, you were trying to tell us that Stalin was about to attack Nazi Germany and Nazi-occupied Poland earlier.

Try to keep your story straight Ned. By the way- the British could decipher and read Nazi codes, so they knew about preparations for Barbarossa.

That's not propaganda, but information.

So much for neo-Nazi propaganda. The Brit propaganda is just as much a pack of lies.

You just keep digging yourself a hole and getting more and more offensive.

Below is a link to a scholarly paper

'Scholarly papers' tend not to confuse 'its' with 'it's' in their titles. I believe the author is a high school student in Florida.

http://www.flheritage.com/museum/programs/historyfair/papers.cfm

[Heresson]

Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: When is war justified?

Originally posted by Ned


The real problem was giving land occuppied by Germans to other nations, and separating one part of Germany from another. Danzig was neutered, but effectively under Polish control.

again: Prussia was conquered (originally as a polish fief) 1226+ by Teutonic Knights already as a german exclave, separated from other German states by polish eastern Pomerania, still polish by ruling family and population but german-vassalised western Pomerania, and still majorly lechite Meklemburg. It remained completely exclaved until beginning of XIV century, when TK occupied eastern Pomerania (its legal status was disputed) and got temporary boarder with Brandenburg, and a longer-lasting one with polish, but vassalised by Empire Western Pomerania; since 1466 it was an exclave again, and remained so until 1773; it's not like the "corridor" was something new. Germans complaining they have no land route to it would be like if they were complaining that they have no land route to Volga German Autonomous Socialistic Republic or whatever.

Land occupied by Germans? If You mean "occupied" in military or administrative sense, what's wrong in it? If You mean by that "lands inhabited by Germans", please name a region in interwar Poland that was majorly german or at least had a big (over 20%) german minority... Germany, on the other hand, retained lands with large polish minority, or even majority.

[ElTigre]

Meh. Looks like molly bloom and notyoueither already took care of Ms. Oertel's paper and the Fleming book Ned mentioned in the WW1 thread.

Anyway, I repeat what I wrote in the other thread here:

--------
Ned, this story about an Anglo-French-Belgian Alliance is bull****. In Guns of August, p. 62 (German version), Barbara Tuchman mentions that the future commander of the BEF, Sir John French, visited Belgium in 1912 in order to obtain the permission to land British troops in Belgium immediately after a German violation of Belgium's borders. The Belgian reply was that even if German troops would violate her borders, the British government would have to wait until asked by the Belgian government to send troops. If British troops would land earlier, they would be shot at.

The Belgian government vehemently insisted on its neutrality, and made it perfectly clear that its army would fight against anyone violating its territory - including France and Great Britain. For another reference, see THE LONG FUSE: An Interpretation of the Origin of World War I by Laurence Lafore, second edition, p. 198.
--------

Furthermore, I would like to ask Ned why the German government didn't mention this 'secret Belgian-British-French Alliance' in their note to the Belgian government? Why did they miss this perfect opportunity to justify their invasion? I guess your reply will be that it was a secret Alliance. But then your argument becomes entirely irrelevant as it fails to explain why Germany was justified invading Belgium, and does nothing to alleviate the fact that the German invasion was a war of aggression.

[Straybow]

Why, why, why did I open this thread?

It is nice to know Molly and I can agree on some things.

[Ned]

Originally posted by notyoueither



Uh-huh. And what neo-Nazi site does this come from? [Refering to the pre-war hatred of Germans in Belgium]

Try reading that link I posted from the diary of the American diplomate in Belgium at the time.

But, of course, anyone who disagrees with your theory of the world is a NAZI it seems. Even this diplomat from 1914.

Here's the link again.

http://www.greatwardifferent.com/Great_War/Belgium/Diary_01.htm

[Ned]

Originally posted by molly bloom


Odd then that denazification didn't get rid of all the Fascists or Neo-Nazis in Europe then, or elsewhere in the world..

Presumably you've never heard of Alessandra Mussolini and the M.S.I. in Italy, for instance.

You keep going on about Stalin and the numbers you say he killed, but you don't refer directly to the death toll attributed to the forces of Nazi Germany and its allies.

I find that quite significant.



'We' who ?

And what are your sources for this ?



How unlike you...



Really ? Where ?

Be specific when you make allegations like these.



And ? Are you suggesting that the U.S. collaborated with Stalin pre-Pearl Harbour against the Japanese in China ?

Do try to be more specific.

We were among the first countries to recognize Stalin's USSR in 1936, I believe, and we refused to join the anti-comintern pact.

I put this down to long-range thinking by FDR who wanted Stalin as his ally in the Far East against Japan and perhaps in Europe against Hitler. Even this were not the only reason for FDR's moves, they make sense in that context.

As to the death toll BEFORE the war started, clearly Stalin was WAY, WAY ahead. He had killed tens of millions before Hitler had killed ten.