21–30 of 130 posts
If you read German, there are some interesting collections of memories of the other side. Pretty much everyone mentions how terrified they were of Allied white phosphorus.
With good reason. It burns super hot and cant be put out with water.
It just struck me how dominant that memory was among people who served in all sorts of roles.
Earlier quoted context omitted.
A lot of people, including myself, feel similar when looking back at WWII. The roles of good and evil were very clearly defined and that has forged the US foreign policy up to today. Of course, there's a lot of things we know now which show the conflict was a lot more complex, but at its core, the Axis needed to be defeated for our western style of freedom to exist. I don't think we'll ever have something as clear cu…
You should read up a bit more on how people perceived it contemporaneously. It’s too easy to absolve oneself of having to think hard about the current goings on when we can look at WWII and act like the right answer was obvious to everyone.
The right path is never clear when you're in the valley of the moment.
What a shit job, I'm amazed we (well they) were unified enough to do it, even with Pearl Harbor. https://www.nationalww2museum.org/war/articles/american-nazi... https://www.nationalww2museum.org/war/articles/great-debate
Ukraine is about as black and white as it gets.
Amen. I used to be a pacifist before the Ukraine war. Now I feel like a completely different person.
It is like watching a self-playing piano pitting me against another self-playing piano and I am supposed to cheer the whole parade.
I got unexpectedly shook up and a bit weepy reading about some of the goings on yesterday. I'm not much of a 'rah rah' guy, but those people stood up in the face of tyranny and many didn't come home. I thought what it'd be like for my own boy to go off to war. Democracy and freedom are worth defending.
A lot of people, including myself, feel similar when looking back at WWII. The roles of good and evil were very clearly defined and that has forged the US foreign policy up to today. Of course, there's a lot of things we know now which show the conflict was a lot more complex, but at its core, the Axis needed to be defeated for our western style of freedom to exist. I don't think we'll ever have something as clear cu…
The US didn't join the war until they were attacked. Same goes for UK and France - they technically did declare the war when Poland was invaded - as there was a defensive agreement between the 3 countries - but in reality they didn't send any help.
Earlier quoted context omitted.
[flagged]
How are you defining “officially glorified”?
A ambassador is not a private person, but pretty official.
And no, I did not say all of Ukraine glorifies him.
Ukraine is about as black and white as it gets.
[flagged]
That's not anywhere near as bad as the U.S. during WWII when Japanese Americans were sent to actual internment camps.
Now the popular portrayal of WWII seems kind of idealistic, but there's plenty of historical evidence to suggest many Allied troops really did not want to be there, and the scale of desertion [1] was quite high - In addition to corruption, mismanagement, and racketeering [2]. I only really considered this after encountering "Deserter: The Last Untold Story of the Second World War" by Charles Glass in a used bookstore…
Here’s one that estimates 0.22%, which is low historically. https://www.armyheritage.org/wp-content/uploads/ref-bibs/sub...
I’ll certainly check out the book; thanks for the recommendation.