Iraq by the Numbers - or how to be dumb.

[Aliantha]

Maybe you're right pierce.

Originally Posted by piercehawkeye45

Or maybe because there is no way to stop the Iraqi civil war.

Arm our side with Mr. Potato Head grenades! It will terrify the other side into submission!!!

[xoxoxoBruce]

Originally Posted by Griff

Hmmm... so you're saying our problems with the Arab world began in '83 in Beirut? Do you think those Marines were there on vacation?

Originally Posted by Urbane Guerrilla

Griff, no, I'm not saying that; I'm saying the current phase of the problem, the going after us, really got going about then. Were they or were they not trying to either start a war with us, or win it then?

They were not. They were trying to get the US out of their yard..... and still are.

[Urbane Guerrilla]

I put it to you that that is the same thing -- given our reasons for being there.

[xoxoxoBruce]

I suggest you don't try to usurp my yard with that silly non-logic.

[Urbane Guerrilla]

Originally Posted by Aliantha

Your view on how and why the Vietnam 'occupation' ended is as warped as some of your other views UG.

Which amounts to a confirmation that I'm really in pretty good shape, and arrow-straight.

I rather think it was because public pressure led to the government of the day deciding they'd bitten off more than they could chew and couldn't solve the problems of another nation any better than those of their own.

Which amounts to making an excuse for a most horrendous betrayal to the forces of oppression and injustice. Communism's class-war paradigm creates both, on an industrial scale, everywhere it's been. Remember that in 1954-55 the refugees ran from Communism from the North to the South. Were they wrong? History says they were absolutely right.

Thus, kill communists faster than they can be made, and injustice and one source of oppression is removed from our Earth. This is a good thing. Bloody way to get it, but human goodness and resistance to evil is worth any volume of blood. I've been there, examined it, and that's my conclusion.

You may of course think as you like -- but that doesn't mean your opinion would actually coincide with the reality. I endeavor to keep my opinions grounded in reality and in large measure I succeed.

North Vietnam conquered South Vietnam motivated by and in the name of communism -- nationalism was never more than a convenient cloak. In the end, the Vietnamese had to abandon communism in order to restore the nation to functionality. Marxism's approach to economics doesn't much coincide with how economics really works, and without a good economy, nothing works and life is terrible. Collectivism doesn't work and shouldn't be practiced. Shoot its practitioners before they get around to shooting you, which they will do if you have anything of mankind's true birthright in your mental makeup -- your liberty.

[tw]

Originally Posted by Urbane Guerrilla

Remember that in 1954-55 the refugees ran from Communism from the North to the South.

Wow. I did not know that refugees were fleeing the north and south pole. Having learned that, even I can be arrow-straight.

Amazing how history is so easily understood once it is rewritten.

[Griff]

Originally Posted by Urbane Guerrilla

In the end, the Vietnamese had to abandon communism in order to restore the nation to functionality. Marxism's approach to economics doesn't much coincide with how economics really works, and without a good economy, nothing works and life is terrible. Collectivism doesn't work and shouldn't be practiced.

You got this much right but you fail at being an anti-totalitarian by placing too little faith in a free market to leverage those other freedoms.

[Urbane Guerrilla]

Oh, I dunno. It's true I haven't said much about it. Dictatorship, however, is quite the opposite of free market -- even if it doesn't happen to be Marxist.

Tw, every time I think you couldn't possibly get more idiotic or more delusional you prove me wrong, you mighty misreader of posts. Interesting, but now I'm curious -- just how do you keep it together enough to pee in the pot -- or even draw breath? Surely even one of your mismade mind could see it was North and South Vietnam I had in mind.

Or were you trying to make a joke? There, I think that covers the possibilities.

[Griff]

I should have said market not free market. A dictator claiming complete control over the marketplace is a far different thing than maintaining control. A black market is very good for disolving respect for authority.

[Hippikos]

North Vietnam conquered South Vietnam motivated by and in the name of communism -- nationalism was never more than a convenient cloak. In the end, the Vietnamese had to abandon communism in order to restore the nation to functionality. Marxism's approach to economics doesn't much coincide with how economics really works, and without a good economy, nothing works and life is terrible. Collectivism doesn't work and shouldn't be practiced. Shoot its practitioners before they get around to shooting you, which they will do if you have anything of mankind's true birthright in your mental makeup -- your liberty.

So, Vietnam abandonned communism after all, even without the US. Isn't that a pity of the 2 Mio deaths (plus another 1,5 Mio in Laos and Cambodia) for trying to force it from the outside? Same what´s now happening in Iraq (1000 Iraqi's killed this week alone) and might be happening in Iran?

As usual the only thing the US is learning from history that it's not learning from history.

[Aliantha]

I don't think the US is the only country guilty of not learning from history Hip.

[Hippikos]

Originally Posted by Aliantha

I don't think the US is the only country guilty of not learning from history Hip.

I was referring to Vietnam and Iraq, but you're right, it's a common problem.

[Urbane Guerrilla]

I don't think it's a national thing either; I think it's a human thing. Robert Heinlein said it best in Starship Troopers -- the book, not the maladroit movie of that name; jee-zusss was that a European misreading of an extremely American manner of thought:

"Violence, naked force, has settled more issues in history than has any other factor, and the contrary opinion [that violence never settles anything] is wishful thinking at its worst. Breeds that forget this basic truth have always paid for it with their lives and their freedoms."

Add to it that man is man's own natural enemy on this Earth -- absolutely no other organism capable of eating a human is anywhere nearly as lethal as a human. This is the sort of thing you pick up from what might conveniently be called The Heinlein Lecture.

Either you love Heinlein or you hate him. Seldom is anyone wishy-washy.

[Ibby]

He's fucking awful politically, most of the time, but a great writer nonetheless.