General / Off-Topic Seventy years on...

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Seventy years ago today! Has the concept of MAD kept the world safe? So far...

It's traditional to play this every August 6th in my household...

[video=youtube;5aDrsd6fLJ4]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5aDrsd6fLJ4[/video]

... and I always follow it with this...

[video=youtube;n1wfoMKd_M4]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=n1wfoMKd_M4[/video]

<wanders thoughtfully away>
 
The point of war is that it allows the various doniment factiosn in each society, challange each other to be overall dominent.

It's basic animal behaviour.

WW1 was simply an extension of that, England, Germany and Russia, fighting it our to be overall dominent. England had been top since the mid 18th century, seeing off the only challanger, France. England's powerbase was its control over enormous overseas resources and and manpower.

That left England as number one, France as number two.

Germany challanged France in the 1870s and destroyed the empire of Napoleon III. Germany then sought to challange England.

WW1 would undoubtedly have dragged on for a few more years until England eventualy won, possibly with Russia backing things up. England would have remains ad number one, with Russia asn number two.

But then America interviened, tipping the balance. England had an easy victory, completey undeserved. Germany was left feeling rather like the boy in the playground who is defeated because his opponent brings on his big brother. Russia was pushed out into the cold.

Then Germany rebuilds its own game and tries again, in WW2 but once again.

Russia and England again unite to challange but America again comes to England's defence, artificially defeating Germany. Once again, Russia is isolated and pushed into the cold.

The priblem is England. It's past it. But like some once powerful, but now old and weak old man, continues to antoganise, knowing it can call upon its big brother US, to back it up.

The cold war may have been a stalemate. It was and is an utterly disgraceful threat upon humanity, not to mention an intolerable drain on world resources. The only solution is for America to dump England.
 
Not only that but I think their grasp of history is rather shaky...

Now, back on topic and think this is a topic that deserves the respect of everyone and no political 'viewpoints' other than the sensible view that Nuclear weapons are not the best things to unleash and have put a strain on the world ever since... Russia vs US in the Cold War, and then India vs Pakistan in their arms race and latterly China to a degree and now Iran and others like North Korea getting in on the act...

MAD is a flawed concept as it only needs one 'side' to snap... So far we've been fortunate enough for this not to happen, but it only takes one party to go bananas for the balloon to go up...

All we can do is ensure that the firestorm of the bombings and the grotesqueness of the aftermath at Hiroshima and Nagasaki is never ever forgotten!
 
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Yeah, pretty much what I expected, response-wise!

All we can do is ensure that the firestorm of the bombings and the grotesqueness of the aftermath at Hiroshima and Nagasaki is never ever forgotten!

<nods sagely>
 
Hiroshima.%20Xiquinho%20Silva%3AFlickr.%20Some%20rights%20reserved.jpg



So many decades later, it’s hard to remember the kind of nuclear thinking top American officials engaged in during the Cold War. In secret National Security Council documents of the early 1950s, for instance, the country’s top strategists descended willingly into the charnel house of futuristic history, imagining life on this planet as an eternal potential holocaust. They wrote in those documents of the possibility that 100 atomic bombs, landing on targets in the United States, might kill or injure 22 million Americans and of a "blow" that might result in the "complete destruction" of the Soviet Union.

https://www.opendemocracy.net/tom-e...erica's-hiroshima-and-nagasaki-70-years-later

Hiroshima 70th anniversary marked
Thu, 06/08/2015 - 09:19

SNP MSP Bill Kidd will today mark the 70th anniversary of the bombing of Hiroshima by calling for the ‘incomparable devastation’ never to be repeated – and for a world free of all nuclear weapons.

Mr Kidd is to speak at the launch of the Exhibition on Nuclear Weapons and Popular Culture today in Edinburgh, and will highlight the popular support in Scotland and internationally for the Scottish Government’s anti-nuclear weapons stance – and call on the UK Government to take the opportunity to set a powerful example on the world stage by getting rid of Tridentweapons of mass destruction.

Speaking ahead of the event, Mr Kidd, who is Co-President of Parliamentarians for Nuclear Non-Proliferation and Disarmament said:

http://www.snp.org/media-centre/news/2015/aug/hiroshima-70th-anniversary-marked
 
My response is you're off topic.

If I understand the OP this is about the futility of war, not the power politics that leads to it.

The opening post is about the use of atomic weapons, 70 years ago, on Japan.

It is indeed strange that any questioning on the orthodoxy of the history of the 19th and 20th centuaries has led to two personal attacks.

We have spent much of the last 70 years under a continuing threat of nuclear attack.

That has happened because the issues which led to the breakdown in communication and WW1 have never been resolved.

Russia is not a huge target, filled with thoughtless, cold people, waiting for their chance to invade and destroy. It is a European society, like Germany, France and England.
 
Its hard to argue against the notion that 'MAD worked'. If it hadn't, we wouldn't be here to discuss it.

It worked to the extent that there hasn't been a nuclear war in Europe.

It's stupid because the argument is between our ruling class and the ruling class of another society.

We, and ordinary Russians, are just the connon fodder. We pay the bills. We run the risks. We are at the front line.

The question is, will we continue to tolerate this?


Addition.

This speach form Corbyn he says:

Security is no necessarily the ability to threaten and destroy your neighbour, Security is when you're able to get on with your neighbour.

https://www.facebook.com/video.php?v=1519227258367152&fref=nf
 
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The problem with someone persistently jumping on a well-worn soapbox is that most people eventually tune them out.
You may be correct in some of what you say, 'jo - but I emphasise the word 'may'. Gotta love self-proclaimed experts.
 
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