"it was done on command of the President, no less."
Nice propaganda try, but the units concerned weren't deployed under Presidential orders. Governors deployed them.
Do take a look at how this works, as it's intended to limit Federal power over State National Guard units. These are different from Army Reserve units.
Much as North and South differ, they hate each other less than they dislike foreigners, and are extremely proud for no logical reason except a reaction to being Japan's historic doormat.
What most South Koreans who preach appeasement really want is surrender. There are a considerable number who pretty much grovel before the North, which North Korean leadership exploits brilliantly.
The North Koreans aren't crazy by a longshot, but convincing others that they are nuts pays off. As long as the outside world maintains Nork leadership, they get to stay comfortably in power. A penis-wave now and then convinces the South they are serious, such as the Blue House raid or plinking a ship now and then.
We shouldn't underestimate Iran, nor should we compare ourselves to the wonderfully brave but horribly under-equipped British.
In actual war with Iran, for example, those pre-positioned bases we built to defend the region against it might be used for their intended purpose.
They were built years before they were used in the Gulf War, with prepositioned equipment enough for a serious effort. They still exist, they are unsinkable, and (literally) generations of airmen and sailors have deployed to and fought from them.
The number of Patriot batteries is finite. At one Patriot per cheap UAV, swarming makes very good sense. Even actual V-1s could get through if enough were built.
"Tactically in a moving / shooting war I doubt these are useful as they are easily destroyed on the ground after satellites and enemy surveillance drones pick them out of the other targets."
Didn't work with Scuds, and these little things would fit in an ISO container if the wings fold.
"The US could bomb the shit out of the whole world if they really wanted to, and *everyone* knows that."
No. BTW, the B-1s don't carry nukes, nor do we have enough strategic bombers to level any major city with conventional weapons unless given months to do it, extreme force concentration, vast amounts of munitions, and few/no other missions. The days of darkening the skies with SAC are ancient history.
You are utterly ignorant, and unless you are some idiot teenager whose youthful frothing is stupid but somewhat understandable, please remove yourself from the gene pool by suicide.
That's the way to go, and beats suicidal gestures by conventional forces.
The US is sufficiently beholden to modern laws of war (whose goal is to outlaw effective war and whose outcome is frequently PROTRACTED war) that it can't fight unconventional wars without spending too much money. The US can reduce own-side casualties to historically trivial levels, and can stay as long as it will spend money, but it can't fight economically.
This wouldn't work against a genuinely unconstrained opponent (who could cheerfully destroy the whole country) but genuinely unconstrained nation-state forces haven't existed since WWII.
There IS a conventional bomb suitable for fighting urban warfare. The FOAB ensures Russia has a much nicer option than fighting in cities, which didn't work out so well. The best way to fight in urban areas is to destroy them and kill everyone in them, which until recently required inconvenient and embarrassing nukes. The US can't ever use such a thing, but it is impressive:
"That said, under what moral or legal right do we get to say that they can't have one, other than that we don't like them?"
'Rights' of enemies are legal constructs. Issues of power and national survival trump such trifles. Concern for the "rights" of ones mortal enemies is a bit misplaced, however delicious sweet martyrdom over abstract ideals may seem.
"Fine, please disarm the only country in history of mankind to have used the nuclear bomb on civilian population, and actually considered using it again during the Korean war."
That was a distinction without a difference, because WWII was Total War where the civilian population was also completely engaged in war production and sustainment.
The initiation of total war BY Japan made it completely justifiable and just (in the sense of justice) to destroy Japan and Japanese until they broke and stopped fighting. Japan wasn't the quaint vision currently beloved of weaboos. It was completely vicious, had behaved monstrously with recreational sadism aforethought (Nanking, anyone?) and is fortunate we didn't have more nuke on hand to hose the place.
It cost enough G.I.s to roll up the Greater East Asia Co-Prosperity Sphere without holding back nuclear weapons. Japan required beating into utter submission, and it got what it asked for.
As for Korea, keep in mind that tactical nukes were a reasonable counter to massed enemy forces. Lest we forget, atmospheric testing had proven their use to be quite PRACTICAL. Not wanting to open that can of worms was a good reason to refrain, but the Korean War turned cold right around the time the US developed convenient tactical nukes. Nukes kept the Norks in their box, exemplified by the aircraft that sat Zulu Alert for decades. Had the mob of North Koreans tried to crash into the South, they'd have been rightly incinerated.
"Bullshit. Defending yourself is a completely different scenario."
Better take a closer look at why we went to war.
US intervention by petroleum and scrap iron embargo in behalf of the Kuomintang (our public, especially missionaries, were Sinophiles at the time) forced the Japs to choose between fight or caving in. The attack at Pearl was "provoked" by the standards of the time, but failure to get the declaration of war delivered in time backfired on Hirohito. The US had been helping kill Japanese (Flying Tigers ring a bell? Great unit, but it bears reminding that they were mercs!) in substantial numbers well before December 7th.
The US was shipping war materiel to England and taking part as a belligerent. We were killing front-line German naval personnel while shipping ordnance and food to their opponents.
Don't get me wrong, I'm fine with all that. It's Big Boy politics, not effeminate hand-wringing. that gets shit done. I do take exception to pretending the truth never happened. If we can get comfortable with truth, we can act without Politically Correct pretense.
As to Russia, the US tried to overthrow the Bolsheviks and established itself as a threat to them at the start of their revolution.
"It may never heppen, but it is quite possible for all nations to band together and guarantee welfare for all human beings"
That's utter babble, not insight. It is theoretically possible for winged monkeys to fly out my arse, but it isn't likely.
What you are proposing is Communism, which has the minor drawback of containing the seeds of its own destruction in the power structures it must have to be made government.
It makes no sense for everyone that has anything to sacrifice themselves for their less-accomplished, less-competent, culturally-self-destructive fellow humans who will just drink the well dry. Why should I want to live in a mud hut so everyone else can live in mud hut?
Do-gooder humans have an interesting tendency to ignore likely outcomes of implementing their ideas.
What the US needs is to not be in such a desperate rush to put humans in space with such very early supporting tech.
We could develop many of the robotic and remote-manned systems we (require) to function usefully in space without sending humans. Humans in space are sent to performs tasks. We should work to not needing that, then send humans for its own sake after other tech matures.
There is _zero_ reason to rush. Manned vehicles are doomed to glacially slow development cycles at our primitive level of supporting technology. Astronauts _explore_ nothing, they are along for the ride. Robots and remote-manned systems are already highly effective for dangerous jobs on Earth. We can develop new ones and throw away the old ones. This is perfect for space exploration where sending anything valuable is silly.
Exploration of Earth proceeded quickly because ships and men were expendable. Now, men are not expendable, and the cost to protect them is more than their participation is worth.
Modern man wants a Welfare State (even USians, who either want a Welfare State or a Welfare Military Industrial Complex).
The only way to make that sustainable is (shock, horror!) _exclusivity_, because we don't have the tech to be a zero-cost goods and services cornucopia for everyone who wants to enter our countries for economic reasons.
We won't have police states to fend off crime, but we will require them to protect ourselves from invasion by people whose countries and cultures fail to provide the Welfare that is our Birthright.:-)
That, kids, is a real, no-shit, us-or-them scenario, Freedom isn't expensive, we can offer that to all comers. However, no ideologue, from the Left or Right, can reasonably claim we can house and feed the rest of the world as it decides to show up on our doorstep.
It isn't reasonable to expect modern Germans to do that. World War II and the Shoah are ancient history, and that their predecessors dealt with ethnic and cultural competition in one way doesn't mean such competition doesn't exist or that it is thoughtcrime to point that out. To maintain exclusivity one must be able to sort people.
Canada has absolutely no need for combat forces of any type whatsoever. Its situation is unique. It has no important international relationships and is completely protected by the US due to its location.
Canada's military exists so it can pretend it matters to the United Nations. Not a bad thing, but hardly necessary.
"How do you explain decreasing crime rates in most of the western world? How do you explain the extremely low crime rate of Sweden compared to the US?"
Age, culture, and demographics. The US is far too diverse to have very low crime rates through all demographic and cultural strata. "Americans" really have very little in common, the melting pot theory was pure pap.
Sweden isn't Africa. If it becomes Africa, it will have African outcomes.
Strongly agree. I've examined Apple products, don't need any of them, so I don't buy them.
I don't care, at all, what Apple does to their customers. Most of them appear happy, the company is doing well, and its survival is good for diversity.
There are going to be _many_ interesting games afoot as people begin to see their value.
It would be useful for Assange to stage failed attacks for his own benefit just as attacking him would be useful. There is no particular reason both these things couldn't happen at the same time.
People tend to believe what suits their ideology instead of seeking objective truth, especially when no source can be trusted.
Slashdot Mirror
"Do nerds only go to private schools?"
Only those whose parents care about them.
What portable firewall app are you using?
"it was done on command of the President, no less."
Nice propaganda try, but the units concerned weren't deployed under Presidential orders. Governors deployed them.
Do take a look at how this works, as it's intended to limit Federal power over State National Guard units. These are different from Army Reserve units.
Nice choice of words, considering the deal was a figleaf so the Brits essentially got free ships. :)
No, not former Britbases. I'm referring to AIR bases in KSA and the Gulf states.
Korean psychology is interesting.
Much as North and South differ, they hate each other less than they dislike foreigners, and are extremely proud for no logical reason except a reaction to being Japan's historic doormat.
What most South Koreans who preach appeasement really want is surrender. There are a considerable number who pretty much grovel before the North, which North Korean leadership exploits brilliantly.
The North Koreans aren't crazy by a longshot, but convincing others that they are nuts pays off. As long as the outside world maintains Nork leadership, they get to stay comfortably in power. A penis-wave now and then convinces the South they are serious, such as the Blue House raid or plinking a ship now and then.
We shouldn't underestimate Iran, nor should we compare ourselves to the wonderfully brave but horribly under-equipped British.
In actual war with Iran, for example, those pre-positioned bases we built to defend the region against it might be used for their intended purpose.
They were built years before they were used in the Gulf War, with prepositioned equipment enough for a serious effort. They still exist, they are unsinkable, and (literally) generations of airmen and sailors have deployed to and fought from them.
The number of Patriot batteries is finite. At one Patriot per cheap UAV, swarming makes very good sense. Even actual V-1s could get through if enough were built.
"Tactically in a moving / shooting war I doubt these are useful as they are easily destroyed on the ground after satellites and enemy surveillance drones pick them out of the other targets."
Didn't work with Scuds, and these little things would fit in an ISO container if the wings fold.
Decoys are easy enough to do:
http://www.dw-world.de/dw/article/0,,5796289,00.html
"The US could bomb the shit out of the whole world if they really wanted to, and *everyone* knows that."
No. BTW, the B-1s don't carry nukes, nor do we have enough strategic bombers to level any major city with conventional weapons unless given months to do it, extreme force concentration, vast amounts of munitions, and few/no other missions. The days of darkening the skies with SAC are ancient history.
http://www.boeing.com/defense-space/military/b1-lancer/index.html
You are utterly ignorant, and unless you are some idiot teenager whose youthful frothing is stupid but somewhat understandable, please remove yourself from the gene pool by suicide.
That's the way to go, and beats suicidal gestures by conventional forces.
The US is sufficiently beholden to modern laws of war (whose goal is to outlaw effective war and whose outcome is frequently PROTRACTED war) that it can't fight unconventional wars without spending too much money. The US can reduce own-side casualties to historically trivial levels, and can stay as long as it will spend money, but it can't fight economically.
This wouldn't work against a genuinely unconstrained opponent (who could cheerfully destroy the whole country) but genuinely unconstrained nation-state forces haven't existed since WWII.
There IS a conventional bomb suitable for fighting urban warfare. The FOAB ensures Russia has a much nicer option than fighting in cities, which didn't work out so well. The best way to fight in urban areas is to destroy them and kill everyone in them, which until recently required inconvenient and embarrassing nukes. The US can't ever use such a thing, but it is impressive:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=t3Cpnq4wFx0&feature=related
"It must lose something in translation..."
The expectation that it does so is revealing...
"Unfortunately, they will also make perfect bomb triggers, when the target walks by."
Plinking Alfred Herrhausen (to use a German example) was quite the coup. RFID-triggered ordnance could be smaller and even more precise.
"That said, under what moral or legal right do we get to say that they can't have one, other than that we don't like them?"
'Rights' of enemies are legal constructs. Issues of power and national survival trump such trifles. Concern for the "rights" of ones mortal enemies is a bit misplaced, however delicious sweet martyrdom over abstract ideals may seem.
"Fine, please disarm the only country in history of mankind to have used the nuclear bomb on civilian population, and actually considered using it again during the Korean war."
That was a distinction without a difference, because WWII was Total War where the civilian population was also completely engaged in war production and sustainment.
The initiation of total war BY Japan made it completely justifiable and just (in the sense of justice) to destroy Japan and Japanese until they broke and stopped fighting. Japan wasn't the quaint vision currently beloved of weaboos. It was completely vicious, had behaved monstrously with recreational sadism aforethought (Nanking, anyone?) and is fortunate we didn't have more nuke on hand to hose the place.
http://www.google.com/images?um=1&hl=en&tbs=isch:1&&sa=X&ei=rmZxTLz4NYX7lweD2LyrDQ&ved=0CCMQBSgA&q=rape+of+nanking&spell=1&biw=1280&bih=626
It cost enough G.I.s to roll up the Greater East Asia Co-Prosperity Sphere without holding back nuclear weapons. Japan required beating into utter submission, and it got what it asked for.
As for Korea, keep in mind that tactical nukes were a reasonable counter to massed enemy forces. Lest we forget, atmospheric testing had proven their use to be quite PRACTICAL. Not wanting to open that can of worms was a good reason to refrain, but the Korean War turned cold right around the time the US developed convenient tactical nukes. Nukes kept the Norks in their box, exemplified by the aircraft that sat Zulu Alert for decades. Had the mob of North Koreans tried to crash into the South, they'd have been rightly incinerated.
"Bullshit. Defending yourself is a completely different scenario."
Better take a closer look at why we went to war.
US intervention by petroleum and scrap iron embargo in behalf of the Kuomintang (our public, especially missionaries, were Sinophiles at the time) forced the Japs to choose between fight or caving in. The attack at Pearl was "provoked" by the standards of the time, but failure to get the declaration of war delivered in time backfired on Hirohito. The US had been helping kill Japanese (Flying Tigers ring a bell? Great unit, but it bears reminding that they were mercs!) in substantial numbers well before December 7th.
The US was shipping war materiel to England and taking part as a belligerent. We were killing front-line German naval personnel while shipping ordnance and food to their opponents.
Don't get me wrong, I'm fine with all that. It's Big Boy politics, not effeminate hand-wringing. that gets shit done. I do take exception to pretending the truth never happened. If we can get comfortable with truth, we can act without Politically Correct pretense.
As to Russia, the US tried to overthrow the Bolsheviks and established itself as a threat to them at the start of their revolution.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Entente_intervention_in_the_Russian_Civil_War
"It may never heppen, but it is quite possible for all nations to band together and guarantee welfare for all human beings"
That's utter babble, not insight. It is theoretically possible for winged monkeys to fly out my arse, but it isn't likely.
What you are proposing is Communism, which has the minor drawback of containing the seeds of its own destruction in the power structures it must have to be made government.
It makes no sense for everyone that has anything to sacrifice themselves for their less-accomplished, less-competent, culturally-self-destructive fellow humans who will just drink the well dry. Why should I want to live in a mud hut so everyone else can live in mud hut?
Do-gooder humans have an interesting tendency to ignore likely outcomes of implementing their ideas.
What the US needs is to not be in such a desperate rush to put humans in space with such very early supporting tech.
We could develop many of the robotic and remote-manned systems we (require) to function usefully in space without sending humans. Humans in space are sent to performs tasks. We should work to not needing that, then send humans for its own sake after other tech matures.
There is _zero_ reason to rush. Manned vehicles are doomed to glacially slow development cycles at our primitive level of supporting technology.
Astronauts _explore_ nothing, they are along for the ride. Robots and remote-manned systems are already highly effective for dangerous jobs on Earth. We can develop new ones and throw away the old ones. This is perfect for space exploration where sending anything valuable is silly.
Exploration of Earth proceeded quickly because ships and men were expendable. Now, men are not expendable, and the cost to protect them is more than their participation is worth.
"(Bye bye karma...)"
I'll wave goodbye to some too!
Modern man wants a Welfare State (even USians, who either want a Welfare State or a Welfare Military Industrial Complex).
The only way to make that sustainable is (shock, horror!) _exclusivity_, because we don't have the tech to be a zero-cost goods and services cornucopia for everyone who wants to enter our countries for economic reasons.
We won't have police states to fend off crime, but we will require them to protect ourselves from invasion by people whose countries and cultures fail to provide the Welfare that is our Birthright. :-)
That, kids, is a real, no-shit, us-or-them scenario, Freedom isn't expensive, we can offer that to all comers. However, no ideologue, from the Left or Right, can reasonably claim we can house and feed the rest of the world as it decides to show up on our doorstep.
It isn't reasonable to expect modern Germans to do that. World War II and the Shoah are ancient history, and that their predecessors dealt with ethnic and cultural competition in one way doesn't mean such competition doesn't exist or that it is thoughtcrime to point that out. To maintain exclusivity one must be able to sort people.
"Canada doesn't have nuclear weapons,"
Canada has absolutely no need for combat forces of any type whatsoever. Its situation is unique. It has no important international relationships and is completely protected by the US due to its location.
Canada's military exists so it can pretend it matters to the United Nations. Not a bad thing, but hardly necessary.
"How do you explain decreasing crime rates in most of the western world? How do you explain the extremely low crime rate of Sweden compared to the US?"
Age, culture, and demographics. The US is far too diverse to have very low crime rates through all demographic and cultural strata.
"Americans" really have very little in common, the melting pot theory was pure pap.
Sweden isn't Africa. If it becomes Africa, it will have African outcomes.
Strongly agree. I've examined Apple products, don't need any of them, so I don't buy them.
I don't care, at all, what Apple does to their customers. Most of them appear happy, the company is doing well, and its survival is good for diversity.
That's a vanishingly small market. A PDA with a phone is more useful than a PDA, so PDAs died off.
Buy a used smartphone, use as PDA, problem solved. When constrained by lack of money, don't buy new stuff.
There are going to be _many_ interesting games afoot as people begin to see their value.
It would be useful for Assange to stage failed attacks for his own benefit just as attacking him would be useful. There is no particular reason both these things couldn't happen at the same time.
People tend to believe what suits their ideology instead of seeking objective truth, especially when no source can be trusted.
+5 "No Shit!" ;)
"It must suck to have Steve Jobs break into your house, smash your netbook, and force you at gunpoint to buy an iPad."
I for one find the idea vaguely arousing.