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If you want peace, study war

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Re: If you want peace, study war

#91

Post by arethuza »

mhh__ wrote: post #89
arethuza wrote: post #39

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The Cuban Missile Crisis is another example where if things had been left purely to the militaries of both sides things would probably have escalated very badly.

LeMay wanted to bomb Cuba immediately... One thing that I cannot find a second citation for but really intrigued me is that there is apparently some kind of parallel-narrative around the double agent Oleg Penkovsky - at first glance he gave information to the west about the situation in Cuba, but on closer inspection some of his antics may be too good to be true (he apparently made it in and out of the Soviet Union a…

President Johnson in '67:

"I wouldn't want to be quoted on this.... We've spent $35 or $40 billion on the space program. And if nothing else had come out of it except the knowledge that we gained from space photography, it would be worth ten times what the whole program has cost. Because tonight we know how many missiles the enemy has and, it turned out, our guesses were way off. We were doing things we didn't need to do. We were building things we didn't need to build. We were harboring fears we didn't need to harbor."

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Missile_gap

Re: If you want peace, study war

#92

Post by robin21 »

boomboomsubban wrote: post #66
redis_mlc wrote: post #21

Earlier quoted context omitted.

[flagged]

>If by defensive you mean isolationist, both WW1 and WW2 were started because of US isolationism, and ended when the US became offensive and occupied Europe and Japan This is a truly impressive level of American exceptionalism. Wars only start if we let them, and then stop when we take an interest. >However, the CCP and Islam are ideologies that believe they can win against the West. Xi is doubling their nuclear weap…

> Wars only start if we let them, and then stop when we take an interest.

The US wasn't always a powerful military force. It became this way after WWII.

So no, it wasn't the case then, but yes, it is pretty much the case today. Every country knows that they cannot win a traditional war against the US - so the OPs point is correct here. It's just lucky that the US is not imperialistic. Imagine if China was the most powerful militarily.

> China

As reference: https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/China%E2%80%93United_States_...

There was certainly a cold war between the two nations via other conflicts. If it's a question of who was the initial aggressor, that's hard to say because there was no direct conflict.

Re: If you want peace, study war

#93

Post by goodcanadian »

arethuza wrote: post #39
Danieru wrote: post #28

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> The scary thing for me about wars is that the soldiers aren't the ones making the decisions. Letting Soldiers & Generals control the military is the exact mistake which lead to Japan's military aggression. Keeping the head of the military a civilian/politician is perhaps one of the few ideas everyone should be able to agree is smart.

The Cuban Missile Crisis is another example where if things had been left purely to the militaries of both sides things would probably have escalated very badly.

Well, at least one anecdote to illustrate things are always more complex:

https://www.nationalgeographic.com/news/2016/03/you-and-almo...

Re: If you want peace, study war

#94

Post by mechEpleb »

Danieru wrote: post #28
roenxi wrote: post #14

The scary thing for me about wars is that the soldiers aren't the ones making the decisions. Some group of people in comfortable offices look at a map, says "yeah, I think this option is more favourable to us than peace". Then a war happens. It is all about incentives and capabilities. One of the lessons from being a Stallman watcher for many years - people are profoundly evidence based . If there hasn't been a war i…

> The scary thing for me about wars is that the soldiers aren't the ones making the decisions. Letting Soldiers & Generals control the military is the exact mistake which lead to Japan's military aggression. Keeping the head of the military a civilian/politician is perhaps one of the few ideas everyone should be able to agree is smart.

Just because you wear a uniform doesn't mean you hold the same incentives as the grunts you're sending to die in some far off place.

Re: If you want peace, study war

#95

Post by redis_mlc »

boomboomsubban wrote: post #66
redis_mlc wrote: post #21

Earlier quoted context omitted.

[flagged]

>If by defensive you mean isolationist, both WW1 and WW2 were started because of US isolationism, and ended when the US became offensive and occupied Europe and Japan This is a truly impressive level of American exceptionalism. Wars only start if we let them, and then stop when we take an interest. >However, the CCP and Islam are ideologies that believe they can win against the West. Xi is doubling their nuclear weap…

Actually I study WW2 primarily, but I'm familiar with WW1 and to a lesser extent other wars.

You're very un-informed:

- in WW1, there was trench warfare stalemate until the US entered and used combined arms to route the Germans. The British and French did not have the resources towards the end of WW1 to win, and that's one reason they failed to occupy Germany, leading to WW2.

- in WW2, the US built about half the arms for both Britain and Russia. The US even designed and built many factories for Russia, which is not well-known.

- Pakistan does not have a stable government. They were unable to address the rise of the Taliban for fear their own low-level government and military members would defect from the official leadership if they did. Trusting Pakistan with nuclear technology is foolish with a shaky government.

- Iran is a regional industrial power, as capable as N. Korea. They build their own tanks and fighter clones, and have the capability to build nuclear weapons - unlike any other country in the region.

- Mao didn't care about not being acknowledged by the US - he cared about ruling the world from an ideological perspective. He even asked Russia at least twice to jointly declare war on the US, but Russia laughed him off.

China and Russia to this day are not close because of a 7-month war fought in 1969, and the current threats by Xi to reclaim territory from Russia.

There's a weird attitude in the West that China is some big panda, but the CCP has no problem starting wars.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sino-Soviet_border_conflict

- China has the world's largest navy. That is a sign of global ambitions, not self-defense. Japan did a similar thing pre-WW2. The US has a large nuclear arsenal because most of the Western-aligned nations, including an ungrateful Europe, are under our defense umbrella. (Because of the CCP's ambitions, Japan will likely have to go nuclear shortly.)

You really don't know what you're talking about. Some advice for Europeans: if you want to feel proud, do something to be proud of. Being ingrates to the US and cowering in fear of Germany for the past century is nothing to be proud of, which is historical fact.

You can start by paying for your own self-defense, which means increasing spending from 1.5% of GDP to 2.0 to 3.0%. Until then, stop pretending you're superior in any way to the US - your opinions simply don't count without the means to back them up.

> Other countries do things out of their own self interest, not out of some desire to attack America.

The history of warfare is not about starting wars out of a logical calculus, but primarily a leader with ideological or emotional goals. The US is currently the main target because they're also the most capable (and only superpower) to stop a usurper like the CCP.

Re: If you want peace, study war

#96

Post by lmilcin »

roenxi wrote: post #14

The scary thing for me about wars is that the soldiers aren't the ones making the decisions. Some group of people in comfortable offices look at a map, says "yeah, I think this option is more favourable to us than peace". Then a war happens. It is all about incentives and capabilities. One of the lessons from being a Stallman watcher for many years - people are profoundly evidence based . If there hasn't been a war i…

That's very simplistic view on military.

Think of a corporations that make all decisions at top level vs corporations that at the top level mostly worry about creating correct environment for the individual contributors and low level managers to be able to make right decisions, individually.

US military won the IIWW war because it created that right environment.

Mobilizing people (people who are not interested in achieving goal are almost useless), keeping spirit (for example US military will always do what's necessary to save individual solders vs Japanese that treated soldiers mostly as expendable), ensuring that people are promoted on merit and not birth, ensuring people are trained and are given right tools.

All those things are so that soldiers can make the right decisions, on the spot.

It is naive to think that a general can say whatever he wants and make it happen. It will only happen if all those people want to make it happen and are prepared to make it happen.

Re: If you want peace, study war

#97

Post by onetimemanytime »

roenxi wrote: post #14

The scary thing for me about wars is that the soldiers aren't the ones making the decisions. Some group of people in comfortable offices look at a map, says "yeah, I think this option is more favourable to us than peace". Then a war happens. It is all about incentives and capabilities. One of the lessons from being a Stallman watcher for many years - people are profoundly evidence based . If there hasn't been a war i…

>>people are profoundly evidence based. If there hasn't been a war in 30 years, then they assume there will not be a war next year no matter how the background is changing.

Not just that. Neighbor dies of COVID, people are careful for a few days. Then they forget what the virus can do

Re: If you want peace, study war

#98

Post by mrmonkeyman »

lmilcin wrote: post #96
roenxi wrote: post #14

The scary thing for me about wars is that the soldiers aren't the ones making the decisions. Some group of people in comfortable offices look at a map, says "yeah, I think this option is more favourable to us than peace". Then a war happens. It is all about incentives and capabilities. One of the lessons from being a Stallman watcher for many years - people are profoundly evidence based . If there hasn't been a war i…

That's very simplistic view on military. Think of a corporations that make all decisions at top level vs corporations that at the top level mostly worry about creating correct environment for the individual contributors and low level managers to be able to make right decisions, individually. US military won the IIWW war because it created that right environment. Mobilizing people (people who are not interested in ach…

Generals don't decide shit, politicians do.

Re: If you want peace, study war

#100

Post by Razengan »

wizzwizz4 wrote: post #85
Razengan wrote: post #80

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Whether humans like it or not and whether we want to admit it or not, wars do end up with mostly the fittest (not just in terms of physical ability, but also intelligence, cunning, etc.) surviving.

Wars end up with those best at surviving surviving. The ones best at getting allies to protect them, the ones who keep their children alive even at the cost of thousands of others' lives, the ones who groom an ally to throw themselves on the grenade, the ones who climb the power ladder and then use that power to keep themselves safe from the conflict… War is a terrible selection pressure, if you value the light and g…

> Wars end up with those best at surviving surviving. The ones best at getting allies to protect them, the ones who keep their children alive even at the cost of thousands of others' lives, the ones who groom an ally to throw themselves on the grenade, the ones who climb the power ladder and then use that power to keep themselves safe from the conflict…

Yes, natural selection at the civilization level. Those survivors will be the ones to write history and continue the species’ civilization.

Civilization gave rise to the warring forces and allowed them to come into power, and those forces in turn shape civilization.

> it’s certainly not in the “good” category.

Our sentiments don’t matter to the grand picture, which has been painted by thousands of wars and continues to be.

War is certainly not a natural calamity. It’s caused by millions of humans who willingly want it to happen, so maybe we “deserve” it, to be sentimental.

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