Why Can't We Have Republicans Like This Anymore?

[Ben Kenobi]

dp

[Ben Kenobi]

The Soviets might have demilitarized had it not seemed apparent to them that the West wasn't through with them. The U.S. did threaten to use nuclear weapons against them if they didn't leave Northern Iran, and Patton was running around saying they should attack the USSR. After having been attacked by the U.S. in 1919, and haven just driven off an invasion that was abetted by the West, one can hardly blame the Soviets for staying strong.

Hardly to blame?

Annexations in the Baltics, Bessarabia, Belorussia, not to mention half of Europe?

Did you forget somewhere that the USSR was supposed to withdraw from places like Poland, East Germany, Czechoslovakia, Hungary, Romania, Yugoslavia and Bulgaria?

You are off base Che. If the Soviets wanted detente they would have immediately withdrawn from Eastern Europe.

The only good thing is that these free people have finally been restored. It took 50 years of occupation, but now the borders are almost back to where they were before 1939.

The only occupied territory now is Karelia. Once the Commies hand that back, everything will be restored.

Or are you forgetting the Moscow "Peace treaty" in 1940, where the annexed Finnish Karelia?

Oh, and not to mention Koenigsberg. When is Russia going to withdraw from there?

[Blaupanzer]

I strongly suspect that this speach, like a few others by him late in the Eisenhower administration, were Ike lashing out in frustration. As far as expecting anyone to listen to him and change anything, he was blowing smoke. He detected the outlines of a secret self-perpetuating war machine/shadow government and it alarmed him. He spoke out in the hope that some coalition of "reasonable men" would intervene in this process. However, as long as the Soviets postured aggressively throughout the world, he must have known that anyone with the money and the political clout to successfully intervene was going to stand shy of interfering with the delicate balance that kept us all from dying. The powers that ruled the Soviets backed off a bit in the late eighties but now rule Russia. On our side, no one seems to have backed off an inch.

Eisenhower was not speaking for the Republicans in those speeches. Apparently, he was speaking for history to the future.

[chequita guevara]

He made this speech in 1953. They year is in the speech.

[RGBVideo]

Originally posted by Ben Kenobi
The only occupied territory now is Karelia.

karelia and sakhalin

Once the Commies hand that back

berlin wall came down 19 years ago.

[Agathon]

Originally posted by rmsharpe
Never mind that we spent a proportion on our army almost three times as great as we do now when Eisenhower left.

The Cold War was on then.

Now the US spends 45% of world defence spending, and that doesn't include the money for the two current wars or "black" spending. That should easily push it over 50% (and I suspect much higher).

No matter which way you put it, it is insane.

One example is the missile defence boondoggle. The Russians already have a weapon that renders it obsolete.

[Whoha]

overwhelming the system with targets? they aren't who we're building it against.

[David Floyd]

And the Soviets are hardly alone to blame. The U.S. may have demobilized after WWII, but it really had no choice. The American people demanded demobilization, and when the U.S. tried to send troops to China to aid the Kuomintang, the troops went on strike. My wife's grandfather, still to this day, resents being forced to stay on Wake Island after the war instead of being demobilized.

Yes, but the key difference is that our system of government demanded that the government listen to the will of the people. If Soviet soldiers/civilians had tried that, Stalin would have just had them shot or sent to the gulag. Surely you don't think that the millions of Red Army soldiers WANTED to stay mobilized, do you?

The Soviets might have demilitarized had it not seemed apparent to them that the West wasn't through with them. The U.S. did threaten to use nuclear weapons against them if they didn't leave Northern Iran,

Yes, a threat precipitated by a)the Soviets not leaving Northern Iran, and b)the US having demobilized and the Soviets not having demobilized, leading to the nuclear threat as the only credible one we had. If the Soviets had simply withdrawn, as was agreed upon, and/or if the Soviets had demobilized at a rate analagous to that of the US, this would have been a non-issue.

and Patton was running around saying they should attack the USSR.

And what happened after Patton said this? He was stripped of his command of 3rd Army, and sent to command the 15th Army, which had no combat divisions and was chiefly responsible for documenting the history of the war in Europe. Further, Patton died in a jeep accident in late 1945, and he was the ONLY senior American military officer to even suggest going to war against the Soviet Union.

After having been attacked by the U.S. in 1919,

Sorry, but the US didn't attack the Soviet Union, it intervened, with 19 other countries, in the Russian Civil War, on the side of the White Russians. It's not as if the US simply invaded. Just because the Reds ended up winning the war didn't give them license to perpetually fear future invasion.

and haven just driven off an invasion that was abetted by the West, one can hardly blame the Soviets for staying strong.

Never mind the fact that the Soviets were the ones who supplied the Germans with the natural resources and war material they needed to wage aggressive war against the West, in the face of the Allied blockade, right up until June of 1941. Never mind that the Soviets participated in the invasion of Poland, as well as gobbling up the Baltic States, demanding territorial concessions from Romania, and launching an unprovoked invasion of Finland. Yeah, sure, Hitler's invasion of the Soviet Union was obviously the West's fault It certainly wasn't abetted by the West, unless I missed the part of the war in which the West was supplying Hitler with what he needed to invade the Soviet Union, rather than the other way around.

[Heraclitus]

Originally posted by Ben Kenobi

The only good thing is that these free people have finally been restored. It took 50 years of occupation, but now the borders are almost back to where they were before 1939.

Europe Today


Europe 1939

[Kuciwalker]

Doesn't look that different.

The Czechs and Austrians got their countries back.
Yugoslavia got split up.
Moldova, Ukraine, and Belarus became countries.
And yeah, some lines moved a little, mostly to the detriment of the Germans.

Shrug.

[Ben Kenobi]

Karelia and Koenigsberg should be returned.

After all if the Russians repudiated the communists, why are they hanging onto commie territories?

[Ben Kenobi]

Karelia has about 400k people, including Viipuri, and Kaliningrad oblast another 400k, including Koenigsberg.

Why does Russia hold onto these cold war relics?

[Heraclitus]

Originally posted by Kuciwalker
Doesn't look that different.

The Czechs and Austrians got their countries back.
Yugoslavia got split up.
Moldova, Ukraine, and Belarus became countries.
And yeah, some lines moved a little, mostly to the detriment of the Germans.

Shrug.

You don't consider the formation of new countries to be a significant change?

Also a big part of Slovenia was under the tyranny of the Italians in 1939.

Believe me if borders went back to 1939 Eastern Europe would be a very repressive place to live.

[Heraclitus]

Originally posted by Ben Kenobi
Karelia has about 400k people, including Viipuri, and Kaliningrad oblast another 400k, including Koenigsberg.

Why does Russia hold onto these cold war relics?

I'm sure that Russians would be more than happy to go back to the European borders they had back in 1939 Ben.

[Heraclitus]

To answer your question:

Why does USA hold on to Puerto Rico?

On July 25, 1898, during the Spanish-American War, Puerto Rico was invaded by the United States with a landing at Guánica. As an outcome of the war, Spain ceded Puerto Rico, along with Cuba, the Philippines, and Guam to the U.S. under the Treaty of Paris.[14]

I fail to see how that invasion was different from the soviet one.