Nuklear bomb

[Splitter]

Friendly,

I would just point out that North Vietnam attacked the South. North Korea attacked the South. Those wars were against Communist expansion and the US was not alone in Korea as it was a UN operation. Later wars have similar causes, but it is a matter of one's perspective. It's is true the issues were not as black and white.

BTW, while we may not lose in Afghanistan, we will not win either. Oh, we have the capability, just not the backbone.

My point was mainly that weakness breeds contempt. Contempt leads to attack. As "we", meaning the former Allies, get weaker and weaker, the tyrants get more bold. They won't attack directly and conventionally, but they will attack our allies and unconventionally. Add their acquisition of nukes to the equation and you see the danger.

The weaknesses our countries are experiencing are not military. The weakness is a degradation of moral fiber, of the willingness to step up and make sacrifices. Instead of defeating an enemy, we put off the fight. We make concessions and worry whether or not we are being too harsh.

Neville Chamberlain should have taught us the lesson, but we have short memories. As I said, what we lack these days is backbone. We don't remember we have a backbone until times are desperate. That applies to all of the western Allies.

We are all repeating the mistakes that lead to WWII.

Splitter

[julian265]

Originally Posted by Splitter

Friendly,

I would just point out that North Vietnam attacked the South. North Korea attacked the South. Those wars were against Communist expansion and the US was not alone in Korea as it was a UN operation. Later wars have similar causes, but it is a matter of one's perspective. It's is true the issues were not as black and white.

BTW, while we may not lose in Afghanistan, we will not win either. Oh, we have the capability, just not the backbone.

My point was mainly that weakness breeds contempt. Contempt leads to attack. As "we", meaning the former Allies, get weaker and weaker, the tyrants get more bold. They won't attack directly and conventionally, but they will attack our allies and unconventionally. Add their acquisition of nukes to the equation and you see the danger.

The weaknesses our countries are experiencing are not military. The weakness is a degradation of moral fiber, of the willingness to step up and make sacrifices. Instead of defeating an enemy, we put off the fight. We make concessions and worry whether or not we are being too harsh.

Neville Chamberlain should have taught us the lesson, but we have short memories. As I said, what we lack these days is backbone. We don't remember we have a backbone until times are desperate. That applies to all of the western Allies.

We are all repeating the mistakes that lead to WWII.

Splitter

Regarding the national willingness to fight, 'moral fiber', and back-bone - these are all things which were used by you-know-who to get the German nation to war. Clearly that nation was so willing to fight that it bought the government's rhetoric, and became the 'bad guy', so I don't think you can say that it's always a good thing... Especially as the information that the government and large parts of the media gives the poplulation, is their version of events.

[WTE_Galway]

Originally Posted by julian265

Regarding the national willingness to fight, 'moral fiber', and back-bone - these are all things which were used by you-know-who to get the German nation to war. Clearly that nation was so willing to fight that it bought the government's rhetoric, and became the 'bad guy', so I don't think you can say that it's always a good thing... Especially as the information that the government and large parts of the media gives the poplulation, is their version of events.

yes well .. this is what Göring had to say on the matter:

Originally Posted by Interview during the Nuremberg War Crimes Trials (18 April 1946)

Göring:
Why, of course, the people don't want war. Why would some poor slob on a farm want to risk his life in a war when the best that he can get out of it is to come back to his farm in one piece. Naturally, the common people don't want war; neither in Russia nor in England nor in America, nor for that matter in Germany. That is understood. But, after all, it is the leaders of the country who determine the policy and it is always a simple matter to drag the people along, whether it is a democracy or a fascist dictatorship or a Parliament or a Communist dictatorship.

Interviewer: There is one difference. In a democracy, the people have some say in the matter through their elected representatives, and in the United States only Congress can declare wars.

Göring: Oh, that is all well and good, but, voice or no voice, the people can always be brought to the bidding of the leaders. That is easy. All you have to do is tell them they are being attacked and denounce the pacifists for lack of patriotism and exposing the country to danger. It works the same way in any country.

In reality this whole thread is totally pointless.

1. There are ALREADY nuclear weapons available in IL2 for anyone who can be bothered to Google around and find the download.

2. As SOW is based around the Battle of Britain its totally the wrong time period for SOW.

[zauii]

Originally Posted by WTE_Galway

yes well .. this is what Göring had to say on the matter:




In reality this whole thread is totally pointless.

1. There are ALREADY nuclear weapons available in IL2 for anyone who can be bothered to Google around and find the download.

2. As SOW is based around the Battle of Britain its totally the wrong time period for SOW.

Its a mod, so why is it relevant to the original product?
Anyway you're correct regarding he 2nd point tho, no need for nukes i BOB.

But the moral debate is just ridiculous , accept it as a game no matter what. I never understood the controversy surrounding MW2 and the Airport scene, the game barley has blood effects... yet that mission blossomed up in media like hell for killing civilians...

[Friendly_flyer]

Originally Posted by Splitter

I would just point out that North Vietnam attacked the South. North Korea attacked the South. Those wars were against Communist expansion and the US was not alone in Korea as it was a UN operation.

...

The weaknesses our countries are experiencing are not military. The weakness is a degradation of moral fiber, of the willingness to step up and make sacrifices. Instead of defeating an enemy, we put off the fight. We make concessions and worry whether or not we are being too harsh.

I quite agree that North Vietnam was the agressors, though anyone knowing a bit of Vietnam history will know why. Did you know that Ho Chi Min wrote a constitution that was almost a blueprint of the US constitution and tried to get the US to back a peaceful resolution of the French colonial rule in the 1950ies? The US asked him to sod off and solve his own problems.

No matter how clearly the South Vietnamese was the victim of aggression, the Vietnam war very quickly turned into a dark jungle hike, shooting at targets you didn't quite see and hope they were the enemy. Vietnam was not a "good war" in any way. The objectives were vague, friends and enemies likewise. And then came the pictures of My Lai. If you compare that to the fight in Europe in 1944/45 it is no wonder the US public was willing to accept high death rates in one war but not in the other.

And no, the coalition do not have the capability to win the Afghan war. The only way the can do that with firepower, is to bomb and bomb and bomb, and for every bomb, the coalition will get more enemies. To win then, they will have to bomb Afghanistan until there's nothing left, not even goats or trees. I don't think you can really call leaving a country a barren wasteland of broken and charred rock a victory. Whatever chance the coalition had at winning the war is gone now. Remember, the Soviet tried for 10 years, and they did not have any qualms about accepting losses. They still had to withdraw in the end. It has nothing to do with "moral fiber".

The "degradation of moral fiber" you talk about is an illusion. If mainland US was attacked today by an enemy capable of taking and holding large parts of the US, Americans would rise as one, and accept losses in their thousands, just like any other nation. That Americans are unwilling to unquestionable support faraway wars with unclear objectives fought for obscure reasons is not a sign of moral degradation. It is a sign of people taking moral standpoints.

There are historians who will tell you the Byzantine Empire fell because of "moral degradation", that the richness somehow made them unable to fight. If so, you would expect the richest of them all, the emperor, to bug off when the Muslim hordes invaded the city. He did not, he donned his armour and fell defending the walls with his soldiers. Do you think your countrymen would do any less?

[Blackdog_kt]

Originally Posted by Splitter

Friendly,

I would just point out that North Vietnam attacked the South. North Korea attacked the South. Those wars were against Communist expansion and the US was not alone in Korea as it was a UN operation. Later wars have similar causes, but it is a matter of one's perspective. It's is true the issues were not as black and white.

BTW, while we may not lose in Afghanistan, we will not win either. Oh, we have the capability, just not the backbone.

My point was mainly that weakness breeds contempt. Contempt leads to attack. As "we", meaning the former Allies, get weaker and weaker, the tyrants get more bold. They won't attack directly and conventionally, but they will attack our allies and unconventionally. Add their acquisition of nukes to the equation and you see the danger.

The weaknesses our countries are experiencing are not military. The weakness is a degradation of moral fiber, of the willingness to step up and make sacrifices. Instead of defeating an enemy, we put off the fight. We make concessions and worry whether or not we are being too harsh.

Neville Chamberlain should have taught us the lesson, but we have short memories. As I said, what we lack these days is backbone. We don't remember we have a backbone until times are desperate. That applies to all of the western Allies.

We are all repeating the mistakes that lead to WWII.

Splitter

I more or less agree, but that goes both ways and as Julian said, it can lead to negative outcomes as much as positive ones.

For example, the same rhetoric can be applied to the population of a middle eastern nation: "The western allies attacked Iraq on the pretext of WMDs, which has been proven false, hence we're suspicious that it was done for other reasons. How long should we sit idly by and watch while they compartmentalize the invasion of neighboring friendly states in easy-to-chew-off chunks and how long before it's our turn? Maybe we should all strike back at once if we want to have a chance at overwhelming them and stopping it?"

Of course, this is usually presented with videos featuring traditional music, civilian victims and kamikaze attacks supposedly punishing those responsible for the aforementioned civilian deaths, but that is just the propaganda topping on the plate. It has to carry the local flavor to attract willing participants, just like the western equivalent features the allure of continuing the good guy tradition standing up against tyranny since the two world wars. Colonialist opression and post-WWII violence from the "good guys" against much of Africa and Asia is conveniently brushed aside, just like the middle eastern guys do with their own wrong-doings against others. However, the underlying theme in both cases is the above example part in quotes, which is surprisingly common regardless of who it comes from. People are scared of each other, in many cases with good reason. Too much complacency can bite one in the behind, as much as too much paranoia can get one in uneccessary trouble. The hard part is balancing these insticts in a way that ensures one's survival without going overboard with pre-emptive bloodshed that usually earns one enemies for entire generations.

As you have correctly stated, it's always much more complicated than black and white

On the topic of the Korean war, it was indeed a UN sanctioned operation. As for Vietnam however, i think i have a slightly different reading of the situation. From what i've read, the Vietcong problem was a local insurgency. It relied a lot on the freedom of moving supplies through North Vietnam and neighboring states sympathetic to their cause but it was not an invasion, it was south Vietnamese locals turned guerrillas.

Much like it was during the civil war in my country (45-49, right after WWII) between communist guerrillas and the official Greek government forces returning from exile as part of the allied forces in the N.Africa, the rebels received safe haven and supply routes from neighboring communist states like Albania, Yugoslavia and Bulgaria. Had the Greek government army attacked these countries, it's safe to assume that the situation would have escalated.
Instead, they focused strictly on COIN operations and relocating the rural population to metropolitan areas under government control, which denied the guerrilas their source of support in the countryside (supplies, food and recruits, either from willing sympathisers or by force). This cut off the guerrilla's lifeline inside the country to such an extent that outside help was a non-issue, especially since the states helping them preferred to stay covert than get actively mixed-up and risk all out war.

The American strategy in Vietnam did follow along these routes as far as operations within S.Vietnam were concerned, with the added benefit of mobile air-lifted armies. In fact, i think the US tactically won every single major engagement they fought, or most of them. Where they went wrong was that they attacked the neighboring VC sympathisers, effectively dragging them into more actively supporting the VC and broadening the pool of enemies. This is a bad move if the other guy is willing to bleed more than you do and as history has shown, you can win the battles on the tactical level, come ahead in the body-count contest and yet still lose the war on the whole. That's essentially what's happening in the current wars as well, where instead of isolating the problem into easy to tackle, set-piece situations, there is an overwhelming urge to go overkill on any kind of opposition all at once, which only serves to lengthen the list of people with an axe to grind. A recent example were the battles in Faluja, where a city that was governed by an openly pro-American council turned into a hotbed of anti-occupation activity, mainly due to ignorance of the local customs and socially accepted practices.

It might sound funny or hard to juggle, but in COIN situations it's things like that that count the most: knowing how the locals think and what is likely to get on their nerves and turn them into raving fanatics overnight is far more beneficial to knowing how to call a fire support mission, not to mention far less costly in lives on both sides.

It's pretty interesting how the British were always better versed in this type of warfare, in fact it's due to them being the main advisors of the Greek army during most of the civil war that the local guerrillas were defeated.

[WTE_Galway]

Originally Posted by Blackdog_kt

It's pretty interesting how the British were always better versed in this type of warfare, in fact it's due to them being the main advisors of the Greek army during most of the civil war that the local guerrillas were defeated.

Completely understandable when you consider they had the largest Colonial Empire ever established.

Pre WWI the Zulu Wars and the Boar War were significant influences.

It was during the Boar War that Britain formulated and implemented the Concentration Camp as a solution to isolating political dissidents and undesirables. A system adopted and taken to extremes later by Hitler.

Early 20th Century the British fought counter insurgency campaigns in Somali, in Iraq (Mesopotamia) and faced an extended insurgency in India.

More recently major insurgencies occurred in Malaya, Kenya and lets never forget Northern Ireland.

These are worth a read:

http://www.jepeterson.net/sitebuilde...s_and_Iraq.pdf

http://www.dtic.mil/cgi-bin/GetTRDoc...f&AD=ADA479660

[BadAim]

I have resisted 'till now, but I can do so no longer. This is a unique time in history, where there is a deep dichotomy between two types of folks. There are, on the one side, those who believe that "Moral Fiber" is a real and useful thing, quite apart from any attempt to reason it away. On the same side would be those that consider "Valor", and "Bravery" to be "good". These folks might, as an example, give a grave sort of respect to the men of the U-boat service, for their "valor in the face of overwhelming odds", even though they might have killed their grandfather (as an aside, one of the very best of these men, Otto Kreshmer, became a high ranking Officer in the German Navy after the war, and as such an ally to the very men to whom he was such a grave danger during the war).

On the other, are those who don't hold to such things as "good" or "evil". For these folks, there is a great difficulty in defining anything along the "gray area" that is war, for these poor folks, there can be no way of grasping such matters of the heart as the other sort of men do, who subscribe to the idea of "aughtness". The idea that there are things that aught to be done, and things that aught not be done. Those who can't call to reference what C.S. Lewis called the "Tao", that which past generations have always simply accepted as "good" and "right", these poor fellows have no way of relating to us poor unenlightened wretches who don't understand the "party line" or whatever is the latest fad of political correctness.

I suppose that such dinosaurs as us who believe that there is such thing as "good" and "evil" and actually believe there might be some greater judge of the lesser or greater of the two, should "go quietly into the night". Alas, it is not our nature.

It is merely fact that the one should not fathom the other.

[Blackdog_kt]

Originally Posted by Splitter

I do know this....I now need to go research the Greek civil war...I had no idea there was such a thing.

Splitter

Just make sure to split your sources so you can come up with your own impartial conclusions
A lot of the memoirs were written by people who fought and they are understandably tainted by their personal experiences...or to put it mildly, there's a lot of biased books on either side.

That war resulted in a series of opposing pendulum swings that still affect the country to an extent. The communist faction dragged the nation into yet another war right after WWII with their refusal to take part in the election and their reluctance to disarm, this resulted in the demonization of all communists regardless of their actions, leading many to exile based only on their political beliefs (even people who didn't fight against the government army), not to mention that the government was initially short on troops (most of the Greek army that managed to evacute after the occupation was still in the Middle East where they had fought against the Axis, we even had a couple Flower class corvettes in the D-Day fleet yet almost nothing back home, truth be told it was mostly the commies that manage to drive wermacht out from most of the rural areas, hence their initial approval ratings by the general populace) and re-instated into active service a minority of people that sided with the Axis occupation forces during the war as a stop-gap measure (the kind of axis-collaborating auxiliary troops found in many parts of occupied Europe), which then resulted in the general public showing resentment towards the ruling elite (the king at the time and the official governments), this led to another flare up of socialist ideologies and instability during the mid-late 60s, which was followed by a coup and a 7 year military junta to crack down on dissent, which ended after the war and partitioning of Cyprus and the student uprisings, giving us the democracy we have today, where politicians behave like they are untouchable because of the collective bad memmory of the junta ( the lesser of two evils mentality) and have made it a business to bestow their position upon their children like they were, well, kings practicing hereditary succesion, but they again have recently been largely devalued on the whole due to their failures and scandals in economy and protecting interests and rights that are ours by treaties and international laws, yet they bow down to foreign centers of power for personal gain. Confusing, eh?
Ok, deep breath

Lot's of dirty back-room deals and secret blows in that story, some coming from those that were expected to act in such a way, yet an alarmingly significant portion coming from allies as well. It should make a good read if you can get a clear idea of the timelines and persons involved.

Wikipedia is your safest bet to get the gist of things, start from 1936 and go from there

[Friendly_flyer]

Civil wars are always ugly, and take a long time to heal.