It all depends where you sit. <br /><br />There's millions of people in South America who would apply the same principle to the US Army School of the Americas if they were in a position to avenge the wrongs that have been done to them by people trained there. <br /><br />The choices are either kill out of hand people you have decided are your enemy or determine who deserves punishment through the rule of law. I prefer the latter. At least it distinguishes me from terrorists
That makes perfect sense to me. Many in this country think that we should follow a "world" set of rules administered by a "world court.<br /><br />Not me. Especially considering the despots and nut cases that would sit as judges on the world court. Also, considering that many would probably come from the so called leadership at the UN.<br /><br />I'm not willing to give up my/our soveriegnty that easy. Our system is not perfect but at least we have a say in it. That "say" is excersized every time I go to the ballot box. A priveledge that many in this country do not excersize, to their own peril.<br /><br />As far as underhanded dealings by the CIA or other clandestine gov't agencies, that's nothing new. When one needs to deal with brutal animals one needs to do it two ways. 1. Overwhelmiing force or 2. cloak and dagger style.<br /><br />It's always been that way and as long we're human, it always will be.
Those who ignore history are doomed to repeat it.<br /><br />Be a good idea to look back 70 to 80 years when the West through various cartels and market manipulation practices had Japan over a barrel, selling it raw materials at relatively high prices that the West dictated and then buying Japan's manufactured goods at the depressed prices the West dictated. <br /><br />It has to be remembered that the US through Commodore Perry in the mid-19th century had forced Japan by gunboat diplomacy to open trade with the West. This didn't exactly endear the West in general and the US in particular to nationalist and military elements of a proud race. An insult that certainly hadn't been forgotten in some powerful quarters by 1941.<br /><br />These economic injustices and memory of a national insult were major contributors to Japan's justifiable sense of oppression by the West. In part it led to and in Japanese minds justified its military expansion to capture sources of supply of raw materials in Asia and South East Asia in WWII. <br /><br />Focusing on Japanese military attacks and atrocities in WWII and earlier in China obscures the fact that less selfish and exploitative economic policies by the West might have (not necessarily would have because there were other factors contributing to Japan's military expansion) averted war with Japan. <br /><br />It would also have averted the ironic post-war exercise where the West, predominantly the US, having learnt from the crushing terms of the Versailles treaty which ultimately produced the Eurpoean component of WWII, pumped squillions into Japan and Germany to rebuild their economies and countries.<br /><br />So the Japanese fought a war to improve their terms of trade with the West; caused untold destruction, suffering, death and misery in the process;lost the war; and were rewarded with improved terms of trade and an economic miracle. Just like Germany. <br /><br />Be a real pity to make the same mistake with China. It mightn't turn out the same way for the West.
I'd say that the Japanese through their WWII invasions actually did more for the liberation of European colonies in Asia and S.E Asia and opening up those markets than anything that happened later.<br /><br />They showed locals that their English, French and Dutch colonial masters could be trounced by a small Asian nation.<br /><br />After the war the vacuum left by the departing Japanese was contested by the former colonial powers, their local supporters, and the local nationalist movements. <br /><br />One of the most enduring ironies is that in the '50's an obscure Vietnamese bloke who'd returned from exile kept writing to the US seeking support for the Vietnamese seeking independence from the French, in the belief that the US supported peoples striving for independence from colonial rule as the US had in 1776. Poor old Ho Chi Minh's entreaties for support from the beacon of freedom got lost on State Department desks. The rest we know. Another lost opportunity resulting in immeasurable unnecessary and futile deaths, suffering and misery which 30 years on sees only trade with Vietnam as being the West's great objective. <br /><br />Why do I despair?
Maybe.<br /><br />The fact that is not appreciated by many in the West is that in China the Army and the Communist Party and their various officials are the ultimate owners and beneficiaries of a system of patronage and privilege which delivers the major dollars into their pockets. <br /><br />The workers get ripped off in pursuit of maximum dollars for the owners of capital.<br /><br />The further up the banana tree you are, the more bananas you get.<br /><br />Also the more power you have in determining who gets the banana skins, and who is allowed to climb the banana tree.<br /><br />Sounds a lot like the US or any other capitalist economy, except the people who run Halliburton etc ain't wearing caps with little red stars. But the result is the same.
We did.<br /><br />Rounded up people of German descent in WWI and took their property.<br /><br />Did the same with those of Italian and Japanese descent in WWII.<br /><br />Never apolgised to or compensated any of them. Serves them right. Live here for a few generations and think they're one of us. What cheek!<br /><br />Funny thing is that in WWI the Japanese and Italians were allies of the Allies, but barely 20 years later they'd all gone over to the other side. <br /><br />Even stranger is that while we were busily interning those of Italian descent we were spreading Italian POW's around our farms to replace sons who'd gone off to war (part of which as I recall was fighting Italians as the original fascists). Lots of farmers loved them. Hard workers. Understood farming. Lots of them were sponsored as migrants after the war by the farmers they'd been assigned to during the war.<br /><br />Yep, this all makes sense. Shoot, bayonet, bludgeon, blow up, burn, and generally do all you can to damage the enemy; then use him to replace the soldiers who are shooting, bayonetting etc etc the enemy; then sponsor the enemy to join us after the war because they're actually good blokes that'll fit right in, notwithstanding wartime propaganda that they're inhuman monsters.<br /><br />I'm so glad the world is a rational and fair place run by governments which are the same.
