Military Losses for the Past 20 Years

[spot]

Jester;776068 wrote: The only thing that I can honestly say that is justifable right now In Iraq (that I can prove) is the fact that we are staying the course and have committied to finsh the liberation and help them stay secure long enough for them to grow thier own viable security force.On a simple question of fact, how long did that take in Japan and Germany after the end of World War Two?

[LilacDragon]

spot;775975 wrote:

This Commander in Chief uses phrases like "bring'em on" and gets flown out to an aircraft carrier in a pilot's suit just for the photo-op of "mission accomplished". He's a shallow creature, goodness knows why anyone tolerates him, but he's in Iraq because God and a host of fundamentalist preachers told him to go there. Commander in Chiefs have no business thinking good and evil exist, far less that they personally represent one of the poles.


Puleeze - God has absolutely nothing to do with why Bush lied to get us into a war. It is GREED, pure and simple, wrapped up in a pretty little package with the word "God" thrown around liberally to gain the support of the conservative religious contingent. If anyone told him to go into Iraq - it was his Daddy.

I have been trying to figure out for years how it is that anyone tolerates the lying, uneducated little weasel. (But then I always feel bad for weasels.)

[spot]

Daddy Bush, Baker, Scowcroft, Powell, none of them wanted this "liberation" and they made that quite clear in the lead-up. People like Tim laHaye and Jerry Falwell most certainly did though, and Bush-43 was made fully aware of that from them and the other Holy Roller bring-it-on rapture-wannabe Millennialists he talks with. In a rational secular society which wasn't so beholden to fundamentalist Christians he'd be quietly certified.

[Bored_Wombat]

Jester;775771 wrote: Yeah the 'cluster method of interview' and ask how many deaths? Thats accurate


Yes, it is. This is the standard method for epidemiological research whether it be for assessing what diseases exist in a population, or what malnutrition exists, or what mortality has been caused by a war.

Besides there are other supporting studies now.

But feel free to back up your claim that most deaths are caused by Iraqis with some data if you prefer to make your point that way.

Until then, I am still tending strongly to the belief that you are quite wrong. Most violent deaths have been caused by the coalition. They are also responsible for the extra deaths due to the collapse of the health care system and infrastructure, the collapse of the water and sewerage treatment infrastructure and power, and the rise in deaths due to malnutrition.

[spot]

Jester;776164 wrote: Excellent observation, true to form those we help end up wanting us to stay! We shall see hwo long they want us in Iraq, its a different knid of people.


Is this more of that elusive humour I find so hard to recognize? How many newspaper reports would you like me to produce showing demonstrations in Japan and Germany demanding US troop removal over the years?

You're honestly saying that your idea of success in Iraq will be a seventy year deployment of tens of thousands of US troops hidden behind green lines?

I'll tell you how you'll recognize that the US has finally left Iraq, shall I? It'll be a tirade of anti-US sentiment from whatever Iraqi government's left behind to face their public, trying to get off the hook.

[gmc]

Jester;776164 wrote: Excellent observation, true to form those we help end up wanting us to stay! We shall see hwo long they want us in Iraq, its a different knid of people.


Germany and Japan were not liberated by anyone. They were occupied after they were soundly defeated-not just by the US but by the allies (the british, french, poles, canadians, norwegians, dutch, indians, australia etc etc) and the russians and the chinese (Japan invaded China in 1933) in a total all out war that the US only got involved in when it was half way over when it finally dawned on you that there was quite a lot at stake and that america would be affected by it all. Both countries were helped to rebuild after the war because the alternative was to grind them in to nothing and leave a festering sore as arguably happened in germany after ww1. They were not given any choice in the matter. Do they not teach you the history of ww2 in the US?

Part of Germany and eastern europe were occupied by the russians up until fairly recently. US troops stayed in europe because of fears about Russia, germany wasn't asked for it's opinion and it's not just US troops that stayed there british troops have been there ever since as well. Germany was re-armed out of necessity as well as nato being created. It's not just US troops that are involved. Eastern european countries want to join Nato because they are afraid of a resurgent russia.

US troops stayed in Japan and korea for the same reason and also because of fears about china. Of all the nations involved in ww2 the US came out best because they didn't end up bankrupt nor were their cities and countryside in ruins and their economy bankrupt. If Hitler had had the sense not to declare war on germany the odds are you wouldn't have been involved in germany at all. Certainly at the beginning there were plenty in your government cheering germany on.

The one accusation you can't level at US foreign policy in the 20th century (or any other country I suppose) is that of altruism.

Iraq on the other hand has not attacked the united states and the idea that it was any kind of realistic threat (or indeed any country in the middle east ) to mainland America suggests a lack of a grip on reality that beggars belief.

The biggest threat from the middle east is Saudi arabia turning the oil tap off. that would bring you to your knees in months.

Iraq hasn't been liberated, awful as Saddam was he was an Iraqi not the leader of an invading army. The time to have gone for regime change would have been after the first gulf war with occupying troops from the coalition forces. He should have been left to the iraqis to sort themselves, democracy comes from below not at the point of a foreigners gun.

[spot]

You have this completely built-in contradiction in that you seem to think the Germans and Japanese wanted your continued presence all these years. Believe me, not only did they not want it but I can demonstrate that they didn't. The US has retained bases in those countries for two thirds of a century because it chose to stay, not because it was welcome in any sense. Not only did Japan and Germany not want US forces based on their territories for that long, they didn't want you there at all in the first place. The US occupied Japan because it chose to. The US occupied Germany because the US refused to negotiate an earlier end to the war. The US had no business deploying troops to the European theatre in the first place though I concede that you were at least invited as far as England.

How many newspaper reports would you like me to produce showing demonstrations in Japan and Germany demanding US troop removal over the years? Or do you concede that such demonstrations have happened?

[Bored_Wombat]

Jester;776511 wrote: First off, an interview is not the best method for collecting data, the data collected is subjective, not fact., But I read on…


What is the best method of collecting data?

Jester;776511 wrote: …And found that they did ask for death certificates, which is some sort of proof, and low and behold we have a 92% death certificate rate, however there is still no official count since none of them were copied, they were just viewed, were they valid? We have no way of knowing do we? The evidence was not recorded, just counted.


No, they didn't carry around a generator and a flat bed scanner. If you think that the surveyors lied then we have to look for other studies that measure mortality. But the highly esteemed reputation of the survey organisers might count for something.

The Opinion Research Business poll counted over 1,000,000 mortalities.

The Iraqi Health Ministry survey counted about 150,000 mortalities.

The Johns Hopkins university study does hold the middle ground. (And no one seems to have improved upon interviews, despite your opinion that this is not the best method.)

Jester;776511 wrote: This is interesting, ‘who do you blame for the death of your loved one?’ 'oh it was that nasty coalition', 'are you sure?' 'Yep!' 'Ok that’s another one for that despicable coalition!'


There are certainly ways to phrase a question that will create a bias. I think your reconstruction of that question fails to recognise the professionalism of the epidemiologists that designed the survey.

Jester;776511 wrote: And not that I agree with the method of collection...


Feel free. But the methods are impeccable.

Jester;776511 wrote: My point being, its war, the enemy will get killed.


You think that there were 600,000 enemies in Iraq?



A blood-covered girl screams after her parents were fatally shot by soldiers with the 1st Battalion, 5th Infantry Stryker Brigade Combat Team of the 25th Infantry Division after the family failed to stop driving their car.

I think some fatalities were because when Soldiers yell "stop!" people who don't speak English can often keep driving.

Jester;776511 wrote: I’ll accept those deaths as caused by the coalition forces, all justifiable in my opinion.


Are they? I would suspect that the newly orphaned girl pictured above would find the shooting of her parents difficult to understand in terms of justification.

But go ahead ... how do you justify it?

Just quietly, most people wouldn't call the invasion justifiable, and so none of the deaths are justifiable.

Jester;776511 wrote: I also accept responsibility for the collateral damage that results in the deaths of civilians, what I won’t accept responsibility for is the actions of criminal and terror activities that kill the innocent civilians perpetrated by factional or insurgent forces through intimidation to remove us. i.e., the suicide bomber that takes out 90 civilians in the market place to make the US leave.
Oh, what rubbish!

How does killing iraqi civillians pressure the US to leave?

Killing US soldiers might do that, but killing Iraqis is not more sensible than killing East Timorese.

Attacks against civilians are secular, (the conspiracy theory aside), they are designed to sway negotiations internal to Iraq's politics. Shi'ite vs Sunni in the largest case. The breakdown of society is entirely due to the mismanagement of the country and especially the military and the time-bomb of a constitution the former directly due to the CPA, and the seeds of the latter laid down by the CPA. It is entirely the invaders fault. (And in any case, the safety of the people is the responsibility of the invader ... If you don't have enough resources to protect them, then perhaps buying the oil on the market rather than an invasion would be a legal alternative.)



Jester;776511 wrote: ...I also believe that factional fighting would have broken out soon anyway, and the death toll from that and the impact on the same systems and infrastructure would have been far more devastating and there would not have been any help from coalition forces to intervene in the middle of it all. ( I realize that is unprovable and my opinion)
Saddam kept a pretty tight grip, and was well supported by the USA against his people at the end of gulf war I. I doubt that there would have been another uprising for a while.

Nor would it have gone well. America does not want a strong Shi'ite democracy so near to Iran. This is why there is chaos and death in Iraq; this is how it was organized to be.

Jester;776511 wrote: As a total aside to all this, (not that I agree with the numbers) but I find it amazing that ‘…Among the 12,801 persons included in the survey, there were 1,474 births and 629 deaths reported in the period from January 2002 through June 2006…’.


Iraq has few old people compared to the west. The birth rate is unexceptional compared to other countries in the region.

Jester;776511 wrote: A verifyable body count is the only way to accurately determine deaths related to the region during the conflict period.


Given that you haven't produced a methodology for this, standard epidemiological war time mortality studies provide the best estimates that we have.

650,000 is an estimate. The error is wide. But some hundreds of thousands are dead by this invasion, and possibly over a million by now.

Waiting until all the bodies and graves can be found and recorded in a database is just a way out. We know using this methodology that the mortality has been horrifically high.

[gmc]

Jester;776524 wrote: None thank you, I'll accept that. History would be completely different, and not necessarily better, if we'd only have helped england and not gone any further.

To all this I say, isolationism was the best route, and we should have kept it that way since before WW1.

We cant turn back time now can we. But we can remove all troops form all other countries, despite what the impact is. I'll call my representatives immeidiatly and suggest they follow up on that!


Actually you were never really isolationist. You can't really be isolationist because you need the trade with other countries, industry and empire in one form or another have always gome hand in hand. The US had it's dreams of empire as well-manifest destiny is an american version of the white man's burden. 13 states to 50 whatever it is don't happen without an expanionist agenda of some kind. You don't need a emperor to be imperial-the french were a republic as well. It's no accident that the US had it's own battle fleets and carrier force to defend it's overseas possessions at the start of ww2 then again in an imperial age you have to play the game. Morality and international relations are uncomfortable bedfellows.

Times change and in the 21st century the old ways and attitudes perhaps need to change. World war now would be a bit more destructive than those that went before. By all means recall all your troops, mothball the carriers. they are useless against terrorists anyway. Bet you military will object to having a smaller army, navy and air force along with all those involved in the defence industry. The only reason to have them is to be able to project military force and they can only be justified when used. So why do you have them is question to constantly ask yourselves.

Glad you came to help england in ww2. But the english have been helping themselves for years:sneaky::yh_rotfl(at least according to the SNP)

[Galbally]

spot;776519 wrote: You have this completely built-in contradiction in that you seem to think the Germans and Japanese wanted your continued presence all these years. Believe me, not only did they not want it but I can demonstrate that they didn't. The US has retained bases in those countries for two thirds of a century because it chose to stay, not because it was welcome in any sense. Not only did Japan and Germany not want US forces based on their territories for that long, they didn't want you there at all in the first place. The US occupied Japan because it chose to. The US occupied Germany because the US refused to negotiate an earlier end to the war. The US had no business deploying troops to the European theatre in the first place though I concede that you were at least invited as far as England.

How many newspaper reports would you like me to produce showing demonstrations in Japan and Germany demanding US troop removal over the years? Or do you concede that such demonstrations have happened?


Spot what are you on about, what do you mean that the US had no buisness in Eastern Europe? Are you suggesting the Russians did? Britain entered the flippin war because of Poland and then abandoned them to the Russians, if it hadn't been for Patton, southern Germany and Austria would also have been conceded to the Red Army. Thank god Europe wasn't relying on British assurances to keep the red army out after WW II, as the world "rollover" would probably have been the policy. To me its seems that Britain seemed once again to retreat into its self-imposed daydreams about itself almost immeadiately after WWII, disregarding the main fact of its existence as a European nation as soon as the Labour party took office in 1945, and back to trying to convince itself it was still the Centre of this polygot monarchical Empire with a mission to remake the world, and that its relations with India or Kenya were more important than what was happening in Berlin or Paris (and still it continues to this day). Back to the same delusionary mentality that almost allowed a maniac dictator to take over the continent in the first place.

Western Europe entered the US sphere of influence after 1945, but it was a reality that most sensible Europeans enbraced, as the alternatives were not very pleasant. For the fact that Europe destroyed itself in the 20th century, and the Russians and the US picked up the pieces, that's no ones fault other then the Europeans own stupidity themselves, principally the Germans, French and British, not the Americans. The US policy since then has been to promote a free and independent Europe, and that still is the case to this day, Easten European countries have been queuing up to join NATO, not the CIS, and the US continues to maintain a strong alliance with Europe and for that I am (at least) very grateful. Of course the Americans have their own agenda and not all of it is something I would support or be interested in, but still. You seem to have a huge hang up about the US, perhaps this is because you own country has ceded so much of its own domestic soverignty to the Americans, as well as its culture, that it seems to be impossible for British people to realize they are Europeans living in their European homeland any more, and just exist within this bizarre inferiority-superiority/love-hate relationship with the US, and their own long gone empire and its remaining repercussions for Britain.

As for the realities of WWII, the Germans spent a lot of 1945 trying to flee toward the American and British lines and away from the Russians. Sure after the initial period of occupation and the re-development of Europe due to American money, there were calls for the US army to leave both from Germans and Britons, mostly the anti-nucelar anti war brigade, and thankfully no one was stupid enough to listen to them. The treaty of Lisbon in 1952 establishing NATO was signed by willing European nations eager to cement an alliance with the US to keep the Soviets out of Western Europe, of whom they were terrified and did not have the resouces to counter. That NATO also suited the US agenda is undoubted, again, so what? What else would you expect? Enlightened self-interest is a hell of a lot better than the policies adopted by other nations at other periods in history. For Europe at least the Pax-Americana has been an almost universally good experience, and we should thank god we were lucky enough that the Japanese decided to bomb Pearl Harbour, and that the Americans still cared enough about what happened to Europe to get involved at all in WWII and its aftermath.

Japan was occupied after 1945, but what of that? They played a dangerous game and lost. Woe to the vanquished and all that, they got off quite lightly really considering what could have been visited upon them in terms of retribution. Germany also recieved a harsh lesson in the realities of losing a war of such brutality, but they could hardly expect much in the way of mercy or symathy from anyone in 1945, the fact that the Russians only took Easten Prussia and Silesia away from Germany, and that the British and Americans (and the French I suppose) bascially allowed a demilitarized West Germany to regain its statehood and its economic power says a lot about the decency of the occupying powers. The Russians annexed Eastern Europe, and that was the spoils of war, however, I don't think the people's of Poland, Estonia, Hungary, etc etc were very happy about being abandoned by their fellow European's in the West to Stalins hateful totalitarian empire, luckily the Russian grip on Europe eased in 1989 and they managed to free themselves and are now EU members.

[Galbally]

I also think that British or French lectures to Americans about their actions as a global superpower, should always be tempered with at least some acceptance that almost all of the poltical realities of the Middle East, Africa, and South East Asia that the Americans have spent a large amout of the last 50 years dealing with are as a direct result of the past imperial policies of Britain and France, not the US, Russia, or anyone else.

[Sheryl]

Jester;776784 wrote: GM, I'm going back to the isolationist ideology military wise, all US military out of all countries across the globe.

If a business wants to venture out into another country they can set their own business dealings with that country, no gurantees, if they want securuty they can pay for it themselves and hire blackwater or anyoen of a hundred other agencies. When things go bad the US cant be blamed or thanked.

Let private industry run it all.

The second, a country threatens US goegraphical property, we use total force, and we will not consider collateral damage in the process, we will not rebuild, we will not make any effort to repay them. We will not claim any responsibility nor give any comments to the reporters.


I agree with you Jester. Let's pull our troops home and concentrate our attentions on our problems here. But then I have to wonder if we wouldn't be referred to as snobby bastards.

[YZGI]

Sheryl;776876 wrote: I agree with you Jester. Let's pull our troops home and concentrate our attentions on our problems here. But then I have to wonder if we wouldn't be referred to as snobby bastards.
Probably just the Texans..

[Sheryl]

YZGI;776880 wrote: Probably just the Texans..


ya'll are just jealous cause Texas can legally secede from the U.S. when we feel the federal government is an enemy to us. :wah:

[YZGI]

Sheryl;776885 wrote: ya'll are just jealous cause Texas can legally secede from the U.S. when we feel the federal government is an enemy to us. :wah:
Yeah then you will be called Texaco, wait thats what they call your gas stations..:wah:

[Sheryl]

Jester;776903 wrote: who cares, let them eat cake!:wah:


:wah:

Jester;776904 wrote: So how ya feelin then? :wah:


I'm not feeling to bad, but did you know there has been a call for for the red states to secede from the blue states? http://middleburyinstitute.org/



Oh and our new constitution doesn't specifically say we can secede, it was our old constitution with the confederate states. :wah:

[JackR]

I've received e-mail messages that state the military deaths during the Clinton presidency were higher then G.W.Bush's presidency. Your post links a PDF report of military deaths during the many wars we've been in and in Table 5 it lists all military deaths (from all causes) from 1980 through 2006..

If you total all the military deaths from 1993 through 2000, the total is 7,500, NOT the 13,000+ that you've reported. Since the years of Bush's presidency only goes to 2006, the total through those years only amounts to 9,550. That doesn't include 2007 or 2008.

I'm not a Clinton supporter and as a registered Republican I wanted to verify your figures. I believe there are so many untruths, exaggerations and hoax messages that it is important to expose them for what they are. If you can prove me wrong, I would appreciate your source of information that can be verified.

The information above came from the source you recommended. Read table 5...

I tried to include the URL you listed but wasn't allowed to until I've posted 15 times. Maybe this will work.. www(eliminate this) .fas.org/sgp/crs/natsrc/RL32492.pdf

[spot]

Thank you Jack, we'd reached that conclusion ourselves. If you really hope to hammer the carpet flat by chasing all the copies of the original post around the Internet then good luck to you, it's a thankless task.

If you ever meet the lying liar that deliberately hoaxed the table, send him here for a long-overdue conversation.

[gmc]

Galbally;776718 wrote: I also think that British or French lectures to Americans about their actions as a global superpower, should always be tempered with at least some acceptance that almost all of the poltical realities of the Middle East, Africa, and South East Asia that the Americans have spent a large amout of the last 50 years dealing with are as a direct result of the past imperial policies of Britain and France, not the US, Russia, or anyone else.


Very true but the US joined in the great game and actually did little to change the aim of it all and also continued with the one they have been playing for years. You could argue that their part in the overthrow of democratic governments in iran and iraq was the result of british and french manipulation. But the games in south america and south east asia were always of their own making. many commentators in the UK and france are highly critical of their own government and what they do. Hypocrisy, it seems, is a trait of everyone once they get in power.

posted by sheryl

I agree with you Jester. Let's pull our troops home and concentrate our attentions on our problems here. But then I have to wonder if we wouldn't be referred to as snobby bastards.


Not at all. Most of us don't think you have anything to be snobby about. :sneaky:

posted by jester

The second, a country threatens US goegraphical property, we use total force, and we will not consider collateral damage in the process, we will not rebuild, we will not make any effort to repay them. We will not claim any responsibility nor give any comments to the reporters.


Quite right so you should. Just remember a terrorist attack is not the same as an attack by another nation state trying to take over.

What will you do when countries like Venezuela and ecuador with democratically elected governments start nationalising all the oil fields or turf out the companies that exploit the resources? In the past you've always taken steps to overthrow the democracy and replace it with a regime that is pro american. like you tried to do in nicaraqua and actually did in chile. If opec decide to back them things could get interesting. After all it is their natural resource so why shouldn't they nationalise it.

[gmc]

Posted by jester

GM my premise stated that if a coutnry wants to do business in another then they can provide their own security forcees, if they want to hire mercs to fight against them for the oil and take over thier country more power to them, then they can control the oil and business, the whole point was the US government satys out of it.


Don't quite follow you there. Are you suggesting it is acceptable for a company to use hire troops, use force of arms to take control of a country's oil, if necessary overthrow that country's government in the process just so long as the US govt doesn't get involved? I assume you meant company rather than country.

Or are you suggesting it is quite acceptable for a stronger country to invade another to get access to their resources? That used to be the main cause of wars in the past.

So those countries can just go find new markets if they want.
They will china would probably take up the slack.

As to your second issue, I dont give any care to collateral damage anymore, niether in life or structure or resources, if for instance 'flobbergobblerXXT' attacked the USA and he was hiding in the UK, we'd sytematically bomb every location he was found until we got him and never answer to anyone for it. The idea being if you let him live there you are responsible and as far as Im concerned any other coutnry has the same right, just be careful who you mess with you might get nuked, and I realize that goes both ways.


So the UK, in your opinion, would have been entirely justified in attacking the US for sheltering IRA terrorists, refusing to extradite them back to the UK. and also allowing the quite open funding of terrorists organisations?

Actually there have been previous occasions when the British have refrained from attacking the US despite provocation thereby helping to change the course of american history. You weren't always a world superpower.

[Bored_Wombat]

Jester;776576 wrote: I dont want more 'opinion' poll information Bored, Not an acceptable method to track data no matter what the reputation of the pollsters are.
No one has given you opinion poll information, Jester. Just the results of mortality studies conducted by experts.

Jester;776576 wrote: My estimates is that we have killed approx. 78,000 enemy combatants, and as high as 1300 civilians in direct action collataral damage.
How do you estimate that?

(1300 is idiotically low. A 2004 NEJM published study: Combat Duty in Iraq and Afghanistan, Mental Health Problems, and Barriers to Care - found 20% of the US troops surveyed who had been deployed in Iraq reported being responsible for the death of a non-combatant.)

Jester;776576 wrote: There is no news link to your picture, please provide that.
If you want. Now what?

Jester;776576 wrote: You have never been to Iraq between the start of the liberation and today, everybody knows the english word 'stop', and they know it well, and they knew it long prior to the coalition liberation, it comes at the point end of a rifle, its sort of a universal languge and the Iraqi people knew it all too well under saddams regime, it wasn't new.
And here you are also wrong. Saddam's regime spoke Arabic, not English.



Jester;776576 wrote: I agree it is rubbish, suicide bombing is stupid! But they target civilians all the time. You tell me why they do it then?
Not to encourage the USA to leave. It's internal political agitation in an environment of chaos in the wake of the invasion.

Jester;776576 wrote: Holy crap! You seriously said "Shia' democracy" with a straight face! You take phsychotropic drugs too dont you Wombat.
Iran had one in the early fifties, until you guys and the British overthrew it. You don't want another one.

Jester;776576 wrote: Wombat, I made fun of you a bit there, its just that hard for me to take these studies seriously,
Nor the killing of hundreds of thousands of innocents. I guess different people find different things serious. Some Saudis killed about three thousand Americans on 11th September, 2001. Some Americans take that seriously, but not their own killing of about one thousand times that of Iraqis. Why do you think that some Americans don't value human lives equally?

Jester;776576 wrote: There are hundreds of causative factors and over all my impression of war (having been in combat a number of times in sustained campaigns) is that no matter how you slice it or discect it, its never cut and dry and never what it seems, a body count, even of actual bodies tells very lilttle of the story.


The main causative factor was the invasion. Without that these people would be alive today.

You claimed that a cluster sample survey was not the best method for collecting data. Those are big words, because the world's experts in wartime mortality studies say differently. But you haven't said what is the best method. Please supply the best, or at least a better method for estimating mortality in a war zone.

[gmc]

posted by jester

Yes Sir, my new foriegn policy is military isolation. So that leaves corporations to use whatever means necessary to secure thier holdings abroad. If they want to hire mercenaries to fight for them then thats up to them, what they do outside the USA is between them and whatever country they deal in.

Most of US foreiegn policy has been geared up to protecting business interests and trade abroad. Just like every other nation on the planet. It would be a new departure for you, or for any one else come to that. Commercial interests have always manipulated government one way or the other. It would be almost impossible to stop it happening but nice if we could. What would all the armies do?

What is interesting nowadays is that the voters are more conscious of what happens and are less inclined to be conned in to fighting in foreign wars to benefit corporate interests. One of the reasons some would like to police the world wide web. They can't control what can be found out and the thought terrifies them. So they look for a reason to censor it that will get widespread support.

Your economy is dependant on world trade. Anything that disrupts it hits you eventually. The WTO and world bank is perceived by many as being a creature of the United Stated so how will you disengage from that? Arguably you need the rest of the world more than we need you so good luck with that one.

posted by jester

No, I'm saying that if any other coutnry wants to do it to any toher coutnry then the US military will no longer go to help secure any other coutnry until some invader tries to drop us a visit on our land. If that happens we will use whatever means in our arsenal to destroy them and we will follow them all the way back to whatever country they try to hide in and we will invade that country to the point of killing our enemy and then we will leave immediately following that action.


As your economy goes in to decline and you get left behind technologically what will you do when your arsenal becomes inadequate to stand any chance of defending yourselves?

posted by jester

Got it, I understand, I'm glad your country did not attack the US. I did not say in my my policy that I would stop helping other countires. I'd be helpful to any coutnry that asked help and was freindly to us, no favorites and I'd treat them all the same, except if they were treating us badly or harboring an enemy.




Interesting but pointless speculating what would have happened if we had. Possibly the Us would have been so weakened that it would never have become a world super power. Once slavery became an issue it is unlikely that any govt in britain-or europe come to that, would have got the support to pursue a war against the north. (there was a lot of support for the south to begin with) besides were were busy in india and africa.