THE UN- What Future?

[Tromboner999]

You would be singing a different tune if your country was attacked by terrorists in which Sadam supports and harbors.

So, King, are you saying that the Dutch would have unilaterally bombed and invaded Iraq and Afghanistan?

Holland did in fact send the taskforce to run Afghanistan for half a year, together with Germany. They just left a few months back.

And we helped with Iraq, somehow, we're still there. Voting on whether or not we'll stay is up soon.

Well, I feel sheepish, I should've researched before I opened my big mouth....
What's the general feeling in Holland about these wars, anyway. Is average Joe Dutchman in favor or against them for the most part?

 

[Paladin Solo]

Sander, do you know anything about Vietnam? Do you know the casualties caused, taken by all sides, how many civilians died, or how vicious the fighting was? And once again, where is solid evidence about those conspircies about Roosevelt? Or is it not real and good enough for you that he might have actually had good intentions and think he is doing some good by negotiating? Why would we not just do what we did in WW1, and just join up without being attacked on a mass scale, save us some innocent lives. No one complained about that decision, or said it was unjustified. So why in God's name would we allow mass casualties? To make us look in justification you say? Like I said, if we wanted that, we could have just declared war like what we did in WW1, and no one would complain or say boo, at home or abroad.

 

[Sander]

Sander, do you know anything about Vietnam? Do you know the casualties caused, taken by all sides, how many civilians died, or how vicious the fighting was?

If you mean, do I have the numbers ready? The no, I don't, but I can look them up. What I do know, is that WW2 was of a completely different scale.

And once again, where is solid evidence about those conspircies about Roosevelt?

Once again? You mean for the first time, right?
And ehmm, as I said, there is no solid evidence. But, in case you hadn't noticed, the fact that Roosevelt MIGHT have prepared Pearl Harbor was not my main point.

Or is it not real and good enough for you that he might have actually had good intentions and think he is doing some good by negotiating?

Did I ever say he was doing something bad? No, you make that out of it.

Why would we not just do what we did in WW1, and just join up without being attacked on a mass scale, save us some innocent lives.

What? Are you really this ignorant? YOu only joined up after a telegram was intercepted which showed that Germany tried to get Mexico to attack you guys. Again, self interest, not heroism. *sigh*

No one complained about that decision, or said it was unjustified.

Actually, isolationists did. And what's more, you weren't aggressors, you were basically defending yourself. This is very different.

So why in God's name would we allow mass casualties?

It's called isolationism. Because it's none of your business(Before you go off on a huge rant, I'm not saying that this is my viewpoint).

Like I said, if we wanted that, we could have just declared war like what we did in WW1, and no one would complain or say boo, at home or abroad.

EHmm...now, I'm not totally grasping what you're saying here, and "in justification" isn't really decent English either. But, if I'm grasping what you're saying, you're saying that you could've just let WW2 go without doing anything.
ANd indeed, you could've. Of course, there is still the tiny part of war being declared on you. But, who cares, right?

 

[welsh]

Re: World War 2-

There is pretty good evidence that Roosevelt knew that cutting Japan off of oil was going to lead to war, and that Roosevelt was leading the country to war for a few years before Dec 7th.

If you look at some of the agreements between the US and England during that time- the Lend-Lease agreement, the Atlantic Charter, and it looks pretty good that the US is getting ready for war.

The Japanese had not been doing well in China and had intervene South, I believe through indochina, to cut off supplies to the Chinese resistance. The US had come down on the oil embargo to force them out.

When the Japanese said they would withdraw, Roosevelt said that wasn't good enough. They would have to withdraw from all of China. This was too much for the Japanese.

The Japanese seemed to be pretty clear that the war wouldn't last. If you look at the documents, there is even a section where the Emperor takes the unusual step of saying, in the right political way, "What are you crazy? Taking us to war that we will inevitably lose?"

The idea was that the Japanese would have a year, maybe two to run rampant around the Pacific and than it would be a matter of trying to wear the americans out so they would make an amicable peace. But if the Japanese gave of China, and if the Americans cut off oil, that basically would mean that Japan would always be a subordinate power.

It's also pretty convincing that Roosevelt knew this, that either the Japanese would cave in or attack, and that the Japanese would probably attack. It's also pretty convincing that this was the means by which the US would be able to come into the war. If Germany had not declared war on the US, the US would have declared on Germany.

If you like I can send you the article.

 

[Brother None]

What's the general feeling in Holland about these wars, anyway. Is average Joe Dutchman in favor or against them for the most part?

Against them.

We have a pretty large and vocal muslim minority, they've been protesting, mostly peacefully, a lot, with, of course, a lot of Dutchies, especially from the socialist parties.

Still, few people actually support the war, but even fewer actually care enough to do anything about it, we're mostly dealing with Holland's own problems, which are manyfold.

Plus our current government is pretty fascist, and they like to suck up to the US, hence our help.

The help for Afghanistan was simply a UN-thing, though, nobody was really against that.

 

[Loxley]

There was a pretty strong isolanistic movement in the US before WW2 and therefore it was difficult for roosevelt to go to war, he needed a good reason, one that would wake upp the people and piss them of, pearl harbor was just such a event, weather it was planned or not is an open speculation.

Study history a little better King and you will see this.

 

[Sander]

There was a pretty strong isolanistic movement in the US before WW2

YOu mean that the isolationist movement basically dictated the political international moes of the USA. Literally. After WW1, they just retreated back on their nice own little part of North-America and didn't do anything at all. Until they got attacked, that is.

 

[Brother None]

There was a pretty strong isolanistic movement in the US before WW2

YOu mean that the isolationist movement basically dictated the political international moes of the USA. Literally. After WW1, they just retreated back on their nice own little part of North-America and didn't do anything at all. Until they got attacked, that is.

That is neither completely true nor completely fair.

The USA did play a large part in the huge failures after WW I. I'm referring to Wilson's 14 points, Wilson's International League of Nations and failed interventions in the war-torn collapsed former Russian Empire in the East (both the Soviet Union and the dozen of fledgling nations sprouting up).

The US did retreat soon after WW I, though, but not sooner than England, so you can blame them of the same evil. Both of them just left France to run the continent, and hell if France had either the will or the ability to do that.

And didn't the US supply England and the Soviet Union before really getting involved in WW II? I'm not sure...

 

[welsh]

Yes, the US did support the Brits before coming into the War through the lend lease program. I am not sure if they supported the Soviets though.

As for the US position after World War 1, most of the 14 Points got dumped during the Versailles Conference, though not so much by Wilson's doing. Wilson did get the League of Nations passed but when it came for the US to join, the movement got dumped.

But it wasn't because the US was isolationists. In fact, only a minority were isolationists. What happened was that the two sides that wanted the US to become more involved in the world couldn't agree. One group wanted to join the League of Nations and purse more multilateral policy. The other group didn't want to join but wanted to be engaged in the world, (the unilateralist school) and finally a smaller group wanted to be isolationists. Because the two internationalists groups couldn't decide the matter, the isolationists ended up winning out.

Thus the "Empty Chair" at the League of Nations, left open for the US. But that doesn't mean the US wasn't there. The US did attend, but not as a member and was fairly involved in many of the international treaties to follow the war- including the Convention that made Aggressive War illegal (a convention signed by Germany and latter used against them in the Nuremburg Tribunals). The US was also involved in a number of disarmament conventions during that period as well.

Thus the argument that the US was isolationists, isn't really true, even if the US didn't join the League of Nations, and thus was one of the reasons for the League's failure. I would add that the League had a number of problems in its constitution as well, but that's another issue.

 

[welsh]

This is a bit off topic, but WTF, it's international environmental stuff and it's somewhat related-
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Kyoto’s not dead yet

Dec 4th 2003
From The Economist Global Agenda


A Russian presidential adviser has said the country cannot sign the Kyoto climate-change treaty. If true, the accord would be dead. But the deputy economy minister insists that Russia is moving towards ratification. What is going on?

“THIS protocol cannot be ratified.” So declared Andrei Illarionov, a senior adviser to Russia’s President Vladimir Putin, on Tuesday December 2nd. His comment splashed cold water on a conference taking place this week and next in Milan devoted to the Kyoto protocol, a United Nations treaty on climate change. It set off a panic among Kyoto’s supporters. The following day Mukhamed Tsikhanov, the deputy economy minister responsible for Kyoto, seemed to flatly contradict Mr Illarionov: “There are no decisions about ratification apart from the fact that we are moving towards ratification.” This did not bring much clarity to the situation, but it did calm the fears of those supporting the treaty.

What Russia eventually decides to do will determine Kyoto’s fate. Ever since President George Bush yanked the United States out of the accord in early 2001, it has looked shaky. Its arcane rules require 55 countries (representing at least 55% of the industrial world’s greenhouse-gas emissions in 1990) to ratify the pact before it comes into force. With the United States and some smaller countries out already, the decisive vote lays with Russia.

So what is Russia up to? One explanation might be that its policymakers are at daggers drawn about the issue. Neither Mr Illarionov, who has often criticised the treaty for placing onerous burdens on Russia, nor Mr Tsikhanov has the last word. Only the Russian parliament can reject the treaty with authority, and only Mr Putin can decide when and whether to submit it for approval. Revealingly, the Russian president said as recently as September that Russia is “preparing for ratification”.

So why did a senior Russian official make such unpleasant noises just as the Milan conference got under way? The short answer is money. The Russians feel cheated by the Kyoto process. Mr Illarionov’s suggestion that the treaty will keep Russia mired in poverty is unfounded, argues Jonathan Pershing of the World Resources Institute, a green think-tank in Washington, for it actually allocates extremely generous emissions allowances for Russia based on Soviet-era levels of industrial activity—heavy industry collapsed after the Soviet Union broke apart. That was done as a bribe during the original Kyoto negotiations, with the understanding that America (the world’s biggest emitter of greenhouse gases and the country least inclined to make cuts at home) would purchase Russia’s unused emissions quota under a complex trading scheme. Greens derided this arrangement, but the Russians saw profit and kept mum.

With the departure of the Americans from the treaty, however, Russia has lost the main potential customer for its “hot air” and the price of tradable emissions has collapsed. So now Russia is trying to blackmail the European Union, which is desperate for the treaty to come into force, into promising investment guarantees, favourable prices for exports of Russian natural gas or other economic goodies (including help with getting Russia accepted as a member of the World Trade Organisation). In short, Russia may be using the threat of pulling out as a bargaining chip.

Mr Putin may yet send the Kyoto treaty for ratification. However, this week’s hysteria notwithstanding, a final decision may not come before Moscow’s presidential elections next March. After all, brinksmanship is a time-honoured Russian game, and waiting only strengthens Russia’s ability to extract concessions. Rumours of Kyoto’s demise appear to be exaggerated