RANGER AGAINST WAR: Veterans day 2012: Frenemies <

Sunday, November 11, 2012

Veterans day 2012: Frenemies

--Grief, Dmitri Baltermants
___________________

A former Marine of "Edson's Raiders" fame recently told Ranger, "If we lost Guadalcanal, we'd be speaking Japanese now."

It seemed like a stretch, but it got me thinking about the war fought by the Greatest Generation (men for whom Ranger holds the highest respect and admiration) and asking the question: Was the entry of the United States into World War II valid and legitimate?  (It was that war which predicated later U.S. involvement in Korea and Vietnam.)

History must tell its tale, but let us look at the precipitating war in Europe.  While both Hitler and Stalin invaded Poland, the U.S. held Hitler responsible, embracing Stalin as an ally.  At war's end, Poland was left worse by becoming a Soviet satellite state.

The British and French were saved through U.S. largess, but it was French colonialism that led the U.S.into a neo-Colonial war in Southeast Asia.  The European continent was left disastrously divided after the war; the concert of Europe was destroyed.

While the U.S. was attacked by the Japanese in the Pacific theatre, we do not ask why.   Why did the U.S. have a fleet in the Pacific?  Why did the U.S. forebear the depredations of French and English Colonial policy, but deny the same objectives to the Japs?  Did we find white European Colonials more palatable than yellows?  How did U.S. policy turn hostile towards Japan in less than a 50-year span?

Why did the U.S. fight to preserve China from Jap occupation, then fight China in Korea less than six years later?  Why do we now protect Japan from the Chinese?  Why did the U.S. allow the Brits and especially the French to reestablish colonies in Southeast Asia after they collaborated with the Japanese? Ditto the French in Europe.

--Jew Killings in Ivangorad, Kiev (1942)

How did our Soviet allies morph into enemies virtually overnight?

My point is, U.S. wars are portrayed as something other than the exercises in futility which they are.  On Veterans day we honor the vets but we never ask, "Why did they fight?", and "Do the proffered reasons clash with the reality?"  We are as driven by slogans and propaganda as were the people we fought.

Here is a novel thought:  Why not honor combat veterans by eliminating future wars?

We entered WWII after 2,000+ U.S. servicemen were killed in a surprise  attack, while the ensuing war resulted in 400,000+ U.S. combat deaths, with another 670,000 wounded.  Millions of enemy soldiers and civilians were killed.

What did the U.S. gain from WWII?  Were the results worth the efforts?  Why is our response to violence always more violence?

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3 Comments:

Anonymous Deryle said...


Yessir..

"Why not honor combat veterans by eliminating future wars?"

Deryle

Tuesday, November 13, 2012 at 12:13:00 AM GMT-5  
Anonymous Kevin said...

Re WWII : http://www.antiwar.com/justin/j070401.html
???

Plus, pre-WWII USA weren't exactly univolved with the "rest of the world".
That's a moving post, but on the other hand, you make it sound as if the USA were an isolated player that got drawn into something that it didn't want to be part of, and to its detriment.

AFAIK, US support was crucial in turning Germany into Nazi Germany, reshaping German industries, reshaping German politics, supporting German diplomacy even as war was breaking (embargoing ammunition & war materials destined to France, but letting plane fuel, high tech chemicals,... go through Germany). Nazism was, for all purpose, a joint-venture between Germany's own post-war development, and US/UK Elites, with Stalin helpfully giving the 'how to' manual to his chums.

And apparently, a similar point could be made in regard to Imperial Japan :
http://www.nytimes.com/2009/11/19/books/19book.html

There is a narrative about those deluded Europeans and their appeasement, and the USA, who reluctantly realize they have to come save them from the Ultimate Evil™, with Great Britain (pro-Nazi up until 1938, yet) as a plucky sidekick (no mention that the US purely military involvement in the European theater was both tardy and smaller than the UK's, and insignificant compared to the russian one).

I'm afraid I simply cannot believe it anymore, it's a myth, nothing else. A myth on which the post-WWII was built, and which won't be denied anytime soon in the USA, seeing how it also seems to be the very basis of americans' self-image as a Nation.

Tuesday, November 13, 2012 at 10:33:00 AM GMT-5  
Blogger rangeragainstwar said...

Kevin,
Thanks for your view point.
I have to fight for my viewpoint re;WW1/2 as exercises in futility.
Of course Hitler was even, mean,wicked and nasty, but so were the Soviets, Colonial europeans and most of the players who have been jockeying for power since christ was a corporal.
I am not a Hitler advocate,but how was he worse than Napoleon for example?
History will prevail when correctly interpreting the wars of America, and will be written when we are ashes.
jim

Tuesday, November 13, 2012 at 12:39:00 PM GMT-5  

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