Clement Attlee was not a good Prime Minister. Discuss.

[kentonio]

@ the idea of the Free French standing against the 1945 Red Army.

Alone of course not, but as against Germany the allies were a coalition of many nations and armies. Without America we wouldn't have won, but the Red Army was not in any state to conquer Europe at that point. By the 50's sure, but then again who knows what the European nations would have done if they hadn't had the shield of America. About the only thing you could say for certain is that they would not have sat and waited patiently for their inevitable demise.

[Kuciwalker]

Alone of course not, but as against Germany the allies were a coalition of many nations and armies. Without America we wouldn't have won, but the Red Army was not in any state to conquer Europe at that point.

No.

[OneFootInTheGrave]

Don't be deliberately obtuse.

that's his speciality... I think he may have a masters degree in it.

[Hauldren Collider]

http://www.jstor.org/stable/1894674?seq=2

As scholars have long been aware, the American military was deeply concerned about the power of Soviet conventional forces in the 1945-1950 period.

From 1945 on, the realization that the United States was unprepared to counter soviet conventional forces shaped military strategy.

Basically the article points out that US forces were the only thing stopping the Soviets from rolling in, but because of our demobilization, if we hadn't had nukes, they might have tried it anyway.

[Tupac Shakur]

About the only thing you could say for certain is that they would not have sat and waited patiently for their inevitable demise.

No waiting would've been needed. The Soviets in eleven days in August 1945 conquered an area in Northeast Asia the size of Western Europe. They were fully capable of doing the same to the combined non-American allies in Europe.

[kentonio]

No waiting would've been needed. The Soviets in eleven days in August 1945 conquered an area in Northeast Asia the size of Western Europe. They were fully capable of doing the same to the combined non-American allies in Europe.

In Northeast Asia they were fighting an enemy who was beset on both sides. Same with their conquest of Germany. Sure the war against Japan was still going on, but the allies facing a Russian threat at home could have concentrated pretty much entirely on their defense. The resistance forces who had formed to combat German oppression would have reactivated wherever the Russians occupied, and thats an awful lot of hostile territory for a poorly equipped conscript army to try and hold. Fighting to the death for the Motherland is one thing, but Russians have morale and mental limits like anyone else.

[Dauphin]

@kentonio. The key to winning this debate is to shift weight, not address issues with logic and reason. You'll lose that assymetric warfare. See the Canadian approach of saying "War of 1812" whenever they can.

[Dauphin]

Yes! In fact, the United States leads the world in foreign aid and international charity. We've (kinda) figured out that global prosperity correlates to American prosperity.

[C0ckney]

i missed that one.

[Dauphin]

Some of the comments in this thread remind of a comment by Henning Wehn. Why do those from Allied nations who weren't even alive during the Second World War say "we" when they refer to who won the war.

It applies as much to Brits who say "Two world wars and one world cup" as it does to Americans.

Everyone in Britain takes personal credit for winning the war. Even if you're in your seventies now, how old were you at the end of World War II? Maybe ten years old? How did you help win the war? When you were just ten years old, you did not help win the war. You were nothing but a drain on British resources! Effectively every 70-year-old Brit, effectively fought on the side of Nazi Germany! And lost the war every little bit as much as we did!

[Bugs ****ing Bunny]

See how many times you can write "The British (of which I am one, albeit of a different generation and therefore took no part in the proceedings)...." before you realise "we" is a great way of avoiding subjecting yourself and everyone else to crushing tedium.

[KrazyHorse]

Plus it's just so much less fun to troll like that. I've taken direct credit for burning the white house down on numerous occasions.

[Dauphin]

See how many times you can write "The British (of which I am one, albeit of a different generation and therefore took no part in the proceedings)...." before you realise "we" is a great way of avoiding subjecting yourself and everyone else to crushing tedium.

Why the need for parenthesis?

[Dauphin]

Plus it's just so much less fun to troll like that. I've taken direct credit for burning the white house down on numerous occasions.

Taken credit on numerous occasions, or burnt it down on numerous occasions?

[The Mad Monk]

Well...he has lived in Baltimore...