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thepeel
Joined: 08 Aug 2004
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 Posted: Sat Nov 24, 2007 2:11 am Post subject: |
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| It's easy for snide Canuck leftwingers |
I'm not on the left.
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| like you to disparage the American military |
Saying that something is what it is is not to disparage it.
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| when you know full well that your CDF seldom has to put itself on the line these days. |
That would be DND/CF, not CDF.
We haven't found it necessary to invade sovereign nations again and again and again. It is true. Panama never inspired us, I suppose.
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| Yes, I know there are troops in Afghanistan but if you actually took the time to contemplate the situation with a level head you would have to admit that we have done much of your dirty work for you |
Examples?
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| But then we've done the same for most of Western Europe too. |
Canada was deeply involved in WW2 before the Americans.
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Funny how the recently liberated Eastern Europeans understand this point implicitly. They obviously haven't forgotten Communist hegemony. |
You mean Poland, and Poland alone. Right? Either way, Canada never had a communist threat to be defended against. |
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blaseblasphemener
Joined: 01 Jun 2006
Location: There's a voice, keeps on calling me, down the road, that's where I'll always be
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| Posted: Sat Nov 24, 2007 2:30 am Post subject: |
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| Joo Rip Gwa Rhhee wrote: |
| mcgeezer wrote: |
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Hmmm... Where are the neo-con Koolaid drinkers to tell us this is all perfectly acceptable?
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Joo, McGarret, and Jinju are cowering in their cubicles because for this subject they don't have a leg to stand on...  |
sorry what ought I say?
It is a seperate issue.
Doesn't mean the war on terror is wrong. |
How can you have a war on an adjective? Talk about your faceless enemy! |
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Dome Vans
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| Posted: Sat Nov 24, 2007 2:58 am Post subject: |
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| blaseblasphemener wrote: |
| Joo Rip Gwa Rhhee wrote: |
| mcgeezer wrote: |
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Hmmm... Where are the neo-con Koolaid drinkers to tell us this is all perfectly acceptable?
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Joo, McGarret, and Jinju are cowering in their cubicles because for this subject they don't have a leg to stand on... |
sorry what ought I say?
It is a seperate issue.
Doesn't mean the war on terror is wrong. |
How can you have a war on an adjective? Talk about your faceless enemy! |
What Joo is having difficulty in coming to terms with even though he feels the war is justified, it is not a war that can be won. Even Bush/Cheney have said as much. It's a war of attrition for any country/ideology that America feels it wants to make an enemy for whatever reason. Usually this reason is some ridiculous idea that America can maintain it's hegemonic status by controlling the middle east, riding the world of islam, overthrowing regimes that it feels doesn't serves it's purposes etc etc etc.
It's status has been slipping for a few decades, they cannot win this war, and they cannot put off the inevitable. Even if this involves have space age weapons that can zap a monkey out of a tree. This kind of unilateral madness is only going to serve their enemies in the long run. Leaving America all on it's "onry". There is something to be said for "policing" the world but now they've lost a.direction and b. the plot. Who in their right minds is going to help them. Hegemonic powers only look out for one thing, themselves. Scr*w everyone else! |
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Ya-ta Boy
Joined: 16 Jan 2003
Location: Established in 1994
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| Posted: Sat Nov 24, 2007 4:42 am Post subject: |
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| Either way, Canada never had a communist threat to be defended against. |
The Nazi invasion of Poland was enough to get Canada deeply involved in World War II, but the Soviet occupation of Poland was nothing to worry about. I see. |
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thepeel
Joined: 08 Aug 2004
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| Posted: Sat Nov 24, 2007 4:54 am Post subject: |
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So, yata, due to the Soviet occupation of Poland the United States had to:
Bay of Pigs
Vietnam War
Dominican Republic
Lebanon
Grenada
Panama
etc etc etc etc .
Yeah. The Canadians should have been more involved like the Americans in defending Europe from the communists. You guys are heroes. |
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stevemcgarrett
Joined: 24 Mar 2006
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| Posted: Sat Nov 24, 2007 5:10 am Post subject: |
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thepeel wrote:
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| We haven't found it necessary to invade sovereign nations again and again and again. It is true. Panama never inspired us, I suppose. |
You're beginning to sound like keane on sedatives.
Maybe Panama was more important to us because WE BUILT THE CANAL there and had a hundred year treaty to administer the zone, ya think?
Bet more than a few Canadian ships passed through that zone. Didn't here of any of their captains refusing to protest American imperialism.
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| Canada was deeply involved in WW2 before the Americans. |
Oh, really? So our merchant marine convoys to Russia who faced U-boats didn't constitute involvement? Or our effort to lend destroyers to England? Or the volunteers who fought in Burma under Stilwell and in the Flying Tigers in China? Hmm....
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| You mean Poland, and Poland alone. Right? Either way, Canada never had a communist threat to be defended against. |
Are you obtuse or just being willful? Had the Soviets won the Cold War, you don't think your precious Canadian sovereignty would have been disturbed? What medical marijuana are you smoking, bruddah?
And how can you conflate the very real presence of Soviet domination in Eastern Europe with Canadian territorial integrity during the Cold War?
Geez Louise. |
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thepeel
Joined: 08 Aug 2004
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| Posted: Sat Nov 24, 2007 5:21 am Post subject: |
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Uh, invading Vietnam etc etc etc isn't what won the cold war. Communism is an unsustainable system, made even more so in the face of vastly more prosperous Western states. The Soviet Union collapsed because it wasn't capitalistic. The various wars, conflicts, meddling and death brought about by the United States at that time had nothing to do with it.
And poor Latin America. Do you have even the slightest clue what your country did and continues to do there? Is that for freedom and Poland too? |
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Dome Vans
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| Posted: Sat Nov 24, 2007 5:31 am Post subject: |
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America did not "win" the cold war. You sat around and waited for the inevitable to happen. There was never any way for the Russians to "win" the cold war, it was impossible. But if you want to, you can sit round thinking that you did win it, that's fine, maybe sing some songs while you're at it and wave those little flags.
"History is written by the victors" You seem to have bought into this idea. Russia did more to win WWII than America, their intervention was more decisive. But you wouldn't have thought it with the "America's what won it" propaganda flying round. U571! Hilarious! |
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Ya-ta Boy
Joined: 16 Jan 2003
Location: Established in 1994
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| Posted: Sat Nov 24, 2007 5:56 am Post subject: |
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So, yata, due to the Soviet occupation of Poland the United States had to:
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You're changing the subject.
You claimed that Canada was under no threat from the Communists. Why then did Canada join NATO? Rightly or wrongly, both the Canadian and British governments perceived a threat back in the 40's and 50's. You can play Monday-morning quarterback and claim the SU was never a threat but that is not how the leaders of your countries saw it at the time. And both were quite happy to let the Americans foot the bill for your defense.
You're letting your knee-jerk anti-Americanism interfere with your understanding of your own history. |
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thepeel
Joined: 08 Aug 2004
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| Posted: Sat Nov 24, 2007 6:04 am Post subject: |
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It is you who has changed the subject, trying to wash away the criminal acts of your criminal imperialist government and instead spread the larger narrative of good/evil cold war nonsense. Canada did not participate in the vast majority of your military adventures because they served the West zero general benefit. If SM and you want to use the whole "Canada didn't play with us" story, we have to discuss why.
Yeah, the Canadian government really concerned itself with the commies under our beds.
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Kuros
Joined: 27 Apr 2004
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| Posted: Sat Nov 24, 2007 12:29 pm Post subject: Re: thepeel |
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| thepeel wrote: |
The American army is an imperial army. There is absolutely no argument against this. |
*smirks*
I'll make the argument.
America is not an Empire. America does not profit from its wars. It loses money from them. Only certain companies profit from the wars. But their money comes through government defense spending.
The mercenaries on the ground in Iraq are to be distinguished from the American soldier. The American soldier dies in Iraq because he was sent there for various reasons. The mercenary soldier dies because he prefers the trade.
There's a huge difference between what the British were doing in the 19th Century and the misadventurism of the Americans in the 20th and 21st Centuries.
Personally, I think you should take a step back from speaking of Empire referencing the American soldiers themselves. Most are opposed to the war in Iraq. Most go back because they feel some sort of genuine duty to the Iraqi people. Or because they feel duty to their fellow comrades. They do not go back because they feel they can get money and booty. There is no money and booty to be had for the American soldier. It is even debatable whether any glory is to be had. Most of these soldiers know that they are infamous in the eyes of the world. |
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Kuros
Joined: 27 Apr 2004
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| Posted: Sat Nov 24, 2007 12:34 pm Post subject: |
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| Dome Vans wrote: |
America did not "win" the cold war. You sat around and waited for the inevitable to happen. There was never any way for the Russians to "win" the cold war, it was impossible. But if you want to, you can sit round thinking that you did win it, that's fine, maybe sing some songs while you're at it and wave those little flags.
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Except that is not how Western Europeans saw it in the late 1970s and early 80s. Many people at that time thought the Soviet Union would prevail. France, certainly, was spreading its bets equally.
Anyway, your argument is kind of pointless:
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| America did not "win" the cold war. |
Ummm, okay. We did not lose. We also didn't lose against Great Britain in the Revolutionary War, nor did we lose against Great Britain in the war of 1812. We also didn't lose against Germany, twice, in the 20th Century.
Please, don't try to pass off your own nationalism-as-anti-Americanism as some sort of free-wheeling detachment from nationalist pride. Nobody is buying it. |
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Ya-ta Boy
Joined: 16 Jan 2003
Location: Established in 1994
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| Posted: Sat Nov 24, 2007 12:52 pm Post subject: |
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| "Canada didn't play with us" story |
You forgot the Korean War on your list of American offenses against humanity. Was that a convenient slip of the mind?
Oh, no. I forgot. Canada was involved in that one.
So let's see here:
German occupation of Poland represents a threat to Canada, so join the war.
Soviet occupation of Poland, no threat so America bad.
Communists threaten to take over far away South Korea, a threat so join the war.
Communists threaten to take over far away Vietnam, no threat so stay out and America bad.
The pattern I see coming from you is Canadian moral superiority. |
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Dome Vans
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| Posted: Sat Nov 24, 2007 5:26 pm Post subject: |
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| We also didn't lose against Germany, twice, in the 20th Century |
The popluar mis-conception by many on this board is that America won WWII. That they had the decisive input that finally finished off the Germans and their allies. But I agree that you didn't LOSE the war. You didn't also single handedly WIN it, which is how it likes to be portrayed, that is the crux of my argument. America is the biggest culprit in this, you only need to see the misplaced Patriotism of the majority of its people to see that it works. I'm not suggesting that others don't do it. Japan and China for an example:
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| Japan should be chastised for skewing its textbooks. But if the omission of several key facts is reason enough for China, and to lesser extent, Korea to defray political relations, then perhaps China should re-examine, with some degree of contrition, their own embellishment of significant events in their nation's history. Even now, the detrimental effects of Mao Zedong's insular policies have yet to be acknowledged, nor had the atrocities committed during the Cultural Revolution and Tiananmen Square been redressed. Their own textbooks conveniently glossed over these historical blemishes, leaving the younger generation in the dark about what really happened. |
America has just made it's historical mis-conceptions into a global business. Films, literature and more recently the internet. So no waonder people take them to task when they get subjected to such historical inaccuracies everyday.
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History, if anything, is unapologetic in its recollection of events past and present. Even the future, as we speak, is constantly shaped and interpreted in a litany of viewpoints, some dissenting, and some accolading. Conceptually truth has no substance. Philosophers liken truth to a cat on a mat - it exists only when one imbues it with meaning. More often than not this definition of truth depends heavily on what we perceive to correspond to the world, and what reconciles with reality. Hence, this makes truth open to subjective |
http://www.funkygrad.com/think/displayarticle.php?artID=489&subcat=shout
The American media and the American roadshow as a whole has created this image as the all conquering, victorious army. You can certainly buy into that, but it would help your opinion if you took a look behind this facade.
But one thing I will agree with, and a few you have written this, is that you may not support Bush et al but when you are attacked on these boards but your patriotism for your country will usually come through. Blindingly somewhat, if you don't trust the present government and their direction then who's to say what you learnt from the past centuries of American history is correct? So you may not trust the guy and the government now, something that you have actual experience of, but when attacked you defend the indefensible, even if it's not true. |
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Kuros
Joined: 27 Apr 2004
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| Posted: Sat Nov 24, 2007 5:46 pm Post subject: |
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| Dome Vans wrote: |
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| We also didn't lose against Germany, twice, in the 20th Century |
The popluar mis-conception by many on this board is that America won WWII. That they had the decisive input that finally finished off the Germans and their allies. But I agree that you didn't LOSE the war. You didn't also single handedly WIN it, which is how it likes to be portrayed, that is the crux of my argument. America is the biggest culprit in this, you only need to see the misplaced Patriotism of the majority of its people to see that it works. |
Yes, there are some Americans under the misperception that America predominately won the war.
However, one can make strong arguments that a) America came off the best of the Allies after the war, b) "but for" America's participation in the war, the war would've been MUCH closer (remember that Japan would be unrestrained here), c) British really need to dump the whole 'you guys were late' attitude, considering how the Americans lost so many sailors merely trying to ferry supplies to Britain.
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| But one thing I will agree with, and a few you have written this, is that you may not support Bush et al but when you are attacked on these boards but your patriotism for your country will usually come through. Blindingly somewhat, if you don't trust the present government and their direction then who's to say what you learnt from the past centuries of American history is correct? So you may not trust the guy and the government now, something that you have actual experience of, but when attacked you defend the indefensible, even if it's not true. |
Defend the indefensible? I'm sorry, that's quite a generalization and I'll need particular examples. |
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