We will never forget

LarreeMP3 · Joined: 12 Apr 2002 Posts: 1935

Ya know?

MIKE BURN · Posted: Mon Jul 21, 2003 4:44 pm Post subject: We will never forget

Quote:
60th. Anniversary coming up...

In 1943, from July 27 to August 3, 1943, in "Operation Gomorrha," thousands of British bombers dropped incendiary and explosive bombs on Hamburg, Germany.

US planes attacked during the day and shot on survivors.

The attacks were continuous and designed to kill and disrupt firefighters and prevent them from controlling fires.

Perhaps the world's first fire storm was induced, where individual fires joined into one huge blaze that sucked in winds at hurricane force, suffocating and baking those in air raid shelters, killing over 30,000 men women and children, destroying 45,000 homes, 277 schools, 24 hospitals and clinics, 12 churches and making perhaps 1,000,000 homeless.

LarreeMP3 · Joined: 12 Apr 2002 Posts: 1935

Now that is something I have never heard before! You think Americans need to admilt "guilt" for our role in WWII? You are truly high. Damned right we were right!

Rev9Volts · Joined: 10 Jul 2003 Posts: 1327

germany started it japan started. if the allies can end it sooner killing civilians themn i am all for it. not to nice but any commanding officer has 2 responsibilities.

1 to win war/battle

2.to prevent as many losses to the soldiers under him.

if that takes killing civilians so be it. it it takes nuking a couple cities in japan so be it. harry truman decided to nuke japan because a study suggested over 350 thousand american soldiers would be killed trying to win war in japan.

take w.t.sherman. burned all the farms from jackson ms to atlanta. lots of southern losses, but it helped end war sooner and kept the casualties of hi s men down. aqnother examle was after the "war between the states" aka american civil war he was sent out west to fight indians. what did he do? killed all the buffalo he could find. so the indians starved iincluding women and children. kept his casualties to a minimum. not a nice man, but great general...

Edited by: Rev9Volts at: 7/21/03 6:15 pm

MIKE BURN

Quote:
You think Americans need to admilt "guilt" for our role in WWII?

Exactly.

The British did this already. That's why we have rather good relations nowadays with the Islands.

Rev9Volts · Joined: 10 Jul 2003 Posts: 1327

everyone knows wars are ultimately won on the ground. collateral damage breaks the spirit of the people. war crinmes or not it as well as the gen. doolitle bombing raid on tokyo helped break their will to fight.

The organized city bombings were the biggest warcrimes ever

i do not think so hitler killed 6 million jews.

and even increased Hitler's desire to kill more innocents

not my responsibility you never ADMIT the fact if hitler had not started the war if he had not none of this would have happened

on the other sides. It is written in the statistics of WWII, that more people died after the bombing of Hamburg (1943) as a result, than in the 4 years of war before.

so? hitler started it. don't blame

why do you never admit it was germany/hitler's fault. he and your country started it. why don't you apologise for what your country did?

LarreeMP3 · Joined: 12 Apr 2002 Posts: 1935

I personally believe that Mike wishes that the outcome would have been different. That is why he never admits his own country's fault. IMHO.

MIKE BURN

The mass executions and destructions of civilists and cities did change NOTHING (at least for the German part).

All it caused was more jewish prisoners suffering and dying in helping to rebuilt the cities, care about non-exploded bombs and so on.

The battle was won on the ground, not by bombers in the air.

The organized city bombings were the biggest warcrimes ever and even increased Hitler's desire to kill more innocents on the other sides. It is written in the statistics of WWII, that more people died after the bombing of Hamburg (1943) as a result, than in the 4 years of war before.

That's written by history in the books and it is time to admit YOUR guilt!

The British are way further with that than the Americans, who still think they did something "right" or related to "heroism".

Edited by: MIKE BURN at: 7/21/03 7:06 pm

DreamTone7 · Joined: 20 Sep 2002 Posts: 2571

One thing Mike fails to point out is that the Germans did it to Britain first......not just with bombers, but with V-1 and V-2 missiles. You have a very selective view on some things, Mike.

Personally, I don't think it's right for either side to bomb civilians UNLESS this will decrease the overall loss of lives. This was definitely the case for Japan. The two H-bombs dropped there killed, overall, about 1 million people. The invasion of Japan would have cost about 5 million lives. (For those of you weak in math, that's 4 million LESS lives lost due to the dropping of the two H-bombs.) The correct decision in this case is clear to me!

AQUARIAN AGE · Austrian Peacekeeper Joined: 22 Dec 2001 Posts: 612

I said something about it in this thread!

RonOnGuitar · Joined: 08 Jan 2003 Posts: 1916

Quote:
Now that is something I have never heard before! You think Americans need to admilt "guilt" for our role in WWII?

Actually, that makes sense, Larree. America pleads guilty to saving the world from the horrors of European and Japanese tyranny of WWII. We should also cop a guilty plea to saving most of the same people a generation earlier!

Europe hasn't learned (as a culture and civilization) to accept responsibility for it's terrible judgement and even worse actions. If it wants to mature and be relevant, that would be a big step. Another realization that there are consequences for doing the wrong thing would also help to that end.

Ron

RonOnGuitar · Joined: 08 Jan 2003 Posts: 1916

Quote:
We will never forget

Errr....that's really the whole idea of teaching people a lesson, Mike!

There is a saying that applies if Germany does forget the consequences of it's shameful(by anyone's admission) history:

"Those Who Forget the Lessons of History Are Doomed To Repeat It"

Ron

Jake Cepheus · Joined: 30 Jun 2002 Posts: 155

Wars are for soldiers. Deliberately targeting civilians is never justified and constitutes a crime against humanity.

www.1sound.com/jakecepheus

www.mp3.com/jakecepheus

RonOnGuitar · Joined: 08 Jan 2003 Posts: 1916

Quote:
Deliberately targeting civilians is never justified and constitutes a crime against humanity.

I agree - the bombing of London, blitzkriegs, the death camps - the lives of millions of innocents snuffed out was wrong and needed to be stopped - and fortunately, for the world, it was.

massacre of innocents, London Bombing

massacre of innocents, Poland - 1st of many "Blitzkriegs"

I suppose the world will never forget - and it shouldn't.

NRKofOver · Joined: 07 Sep 2002 Posts: 505

I think from a historical perspective Mike's post has relevance. Although I'll never cede that Hitler and his German army are due some kind of slack because of bad decisions on the part of their enemies, it's important that everyone thinks about their own actions in response to other's horrible actions. For instance, I can't imagine anyone suggesting that German/Americans should've been treated the way the German power structure treated Jews. That kind of behavior is wrong no matter what.

Dreamtone mentioned the saving of lives through the destruction of lives and that's always a subjective argument. Maybe a ground invasion of Japan would have cost 5 million lives, but maybe a complete military blockade would've forced a surrender a year later. There's no way to know which is the best possible approach once one is taken. Sure a blockade is expensive, but human life to me is very precious and killing civilians should be the last goal of any military action. Even with Iraq, we now can never know if letting the UN handle it would've been better than a US invasion because we did in fact invade Iraq. But with that being said, I can't change the past, no one can, I can only accept the actions that have occurred and hopefully have a voice in the future decisions of my country. With Hiroshima and Nagasaki, I think it's a horrible thing, but it happened and ultimately the results have been good for Japan. I still believe something else could have been done and in the future if such a situation arises again, I can voice my concerns in context with the history I know.

Obviously in the 40's war was very different than it is now and I think that's because most nations have learned that war should be fought as 'clean' as possible. Focus on military targets, focus on military units dug in for a long fight. Arbitrary bombing of cities is just inappropriate in today's age.

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