Ever wondered what would happen if a nuke hit your city? Wonder no more!

[nbelcik]

Originally Posted by BVS

It's amazing how one of the first wars thoroughly documented in motion picture and recorded by "modern" media methods can still be SO revisionist.

Makes you wonder how much of history we have absolutely wrong.


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Yeah, it's amazing how many people in the West believe false narratives about the war. Like most people believe that it was the UK and U.S. invading France that led to the end of Nazi Germany, when by that point the war was already won. Once the Nazis were turned back in the Eastern Front and began to retreat, the war was over for them. It's amazing the absolute scale of the Eastern Front and how much bigger it was than the Western Front. I'll find a link to a very good video about WWII casualties and post it.

And not to mention the fact that there's people out there that deny the Holocaust occurred, even though the Holocaust is one of the most thoroughly documented atrocities of history. It's amazing what cognitive dissonance can do to people.


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[nbelcik]

http://youtu.be/_vjj13l6Pb4


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[Oregoropa]

[Hollow Island]

Originally Posted by nbelcik

Yeah, it's amazing how many people in the West believe false narratives about the war.

I don't know about the US or UK, but I bet most people in Canada don't even know that there was an eastern front, or that Russia was even in the war.

DaveC, you're right on when pointing out that an attack on a military facility is not a war crime. But in a world where attacks on military facilitates and soldiers are called acts of terror, I'm not sure how many people would agree with you. Right now it seems as though the military are treated as victims, while the real victims (the civilians who always make up the majority of deaths) are forgotten or denied their status. The military exists to fight and kill. This will sound callous, but dying is in their job description, same as killing is. And any death is sad, but it's not like there's a draft any more. Though many people are forced into the army by socio-economic factors and false promises....anyway. Gonna listen to SOI and watch the Jays tear the Yankees apart.

Oh yeah: rape is a major part of any war. That's what soldiers do. Pretending that the Japanese were the only ones to do it is to deny human nature, or whatever it is that makes soldiers rape. It's sick. But why are people more bothered about soldiers raping civilians than they are about them killing civilians?

I don't care for war, though I love War. As the man said, gold is the reason for the wars we wage. Nobody gave a shit about the Jews. Alright! Off to watch ball. I'm a bit drunk. Sorry.

[Oregoropa]

I was doing research into family members of my grandfathers generation. My paternal grandfather had it pretty easy

Paternal Grandfather - Based at an Army Air Corps airfield in Trinidad. Was a part of the air ferry system that flew supplies from the US to Brazil across the Atlantic to points beyond including Iran, India, North Africa.

His Brother - Bomber crew that flew B-26 Marauders into France to support D-Day

Grandmother's Brother - US Army. Captured by Germans during Battle of the Bulge. Spoke very little about except that were fed boiled horse gums for food during captivity.

Step Grandfather - Flew P-51 recon missions over China.

I have a distant relative that was in the Polish Army and was severly injured by gas exposure during 1939 invasion.

[BVS]

Originally Posted by Oregoropa

I was doing research into family members of my grandfathers generation. My paternal grandfather had it pretty easy

Paternal Grandfather - Based at an Army Air Corps airfield in Trinidad. Was a part of the air ferry system that flew supplies from the US to Brazil across the Atlantic to points beyond including Iran, India, North Africa.

His Brother - Bomber crew that flew B-26 Marauders into France to support D-Day

Grandmother's Brother - US Army. Captured by Germans during Battle of the Bulge. Spoke very little about except that were fed boiled horse gums for food during captivity.

Step Grandfather - Flew P-51 recon missions over China.

I have a distant relative that was in the Polish Army and was severly injured by gas exposure during 1939 invasion.

And your point? Is that it's personal for you?


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[bobsaget77]

Originally Posted by BVS

And your point? Is that it's personal for you?


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Why are you so antagonistic all the time? You must be a blast at parties.


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[Oregoropa]

Originally Posted by BVS

And your point? Is that it's personal for you?


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Jeez BVS. Not making any point. Just trying to get a World War 2 discussion going that's not about arguments, but what personal stories people may have.

Why do you have to nitpick everything apart? Isn't it obvious I wasn't arguing in that section but just talking about World War II. We might actually have some interesting stories to tell without the infighting.

Just chill. Not everything Bob and I say is meant to be combative.

[BVS]

Originally Posted by bobsaget77

Why are you so antagonistic all the time? You must be a blast at parties.


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It was an odd post given the original nature of the thread, despite the recent turn. I asked a question. I didn't attack, call names, or resort to your tactics; would you have preferred that?


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[BVS]

Originally Posted by Oregoropa

Jeez BVS. Not making any point. Just trying to get a World War 2 discussion going that's not about arguments, but what personal stories people may have.



Why do you have to nitpick everything apart? Isn't it obvious I wasn't arguing in that section but just talking about World War II. We might actually have some interesting stories to tell without the infighting.



Just chill. Not everything Bob and I say is meant to be combative.

This has nothing to do with you or Bob.

I was trying to understand the context. It was an odd transition.


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[Oregoropa]

Originally Posted by BVS

This has nothing to do with you or Bob.

I was trying to understand the context. It was an odd transition.


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OK. All forgiven.

[dazzledbylight]

Originally Posted by Mack_Again

Nuclear bombs hit my country twice already so yeah, wut up, people?

not sure i would have agreed with dropping them. sorry for the harrowing experience your country underwent.

We in NYC in the early 70's were one of the first American cities
to view a traveling exhibit on the artifacts and film about Hiroshima
& Nagasaki.

The very ionic "stopped watch", some melted something, a piece of wall with
a shadow burned into it from the light of the bomb and what or whom? ever had been casting it.

And i became part of the anti-nuclear weapons (and later energy)
activists. Did meet Japanese A-Bomb Survivors - The Hibakushas, who were in nyc during the Sept? opening of The UN.

[nbelcik]

My great grandfather was at Leyte Gulf on an aircraft carrier that was hit by a kamikaze. I finally got him to talk about it when I was a kid because I was very interested in WWII history. We also talked a bit about the bomb a couple years ago because I was doing a school project on it and he said that for his whole life he supported dropping the bomb until he saw a documentary that showed the suffering of the civilians. Ever since then, he's been of the opinion that there were more options than the bomb or invasion and we should have looked into those options.


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[Oregoropa]

Originally Posted by nbelcik

My great grandfather was at Leyte Gulf on an aircraft carrier that was hit by a kamikaze.

That must have been a crazy story. Leyte Gulf was the beginning of the Kamikaze attacks. Biggest naval battle in history.

[bono_212]

Originally Posted by nbelcik

Yeah, it's amazing how many people in the West believe false narratives about the war. Like most people believe that it was the UK and U.S. invading France that led to the end of Nazi Germany, when by that point the war was already won. Once the Nazis were turned back in the Eastern Front and began to retreat, the war was over for them. It's amazing the absolute scale of the Eastern Front and how much bigger it was than the Western Front. I'll find a link to a very good video about WWII casualties and post it.

And not to mention the fact that there's people out there that deny the Holocaust occurred, even though the Holocaust is one of the most thoroughly documented atrocities of history. It's amazing what cognitive dissonance can do to people.


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Why do people also insist on belittling and ignoring the good done by the US / UK /Allies in the war as well, though? Don't pretend like the war wouldn't have continued on longer and meanwhile the atrocities of the Holocaust would have continued. I'm not sure why there's such a stronger desire by modern society to try and turn everything done by the United States into a negative.

But that's the Western front. As for Japan, I don't like the dropping of the bomb, and it's not an excuse but there's no denying that the Japanese committed their own atrocities. I wish the bombs hadn't been dropped and I hope they will forever be the reminder, the barrier to anyone ever doing it again. I pray that positive can at least be taken from the events in Japan.

[nbelcik]

Originally Posted by bono_212

Why do people also insist on belittling and ignoring the good done by the US / UK /Allies in the war as well, though? Don't pretend like the war wouldn't have continued on longer and meanwhile the atrocities of the Holocaust would have continued. I'm not sure why there's such a stronger desire by modern society to try and turn everything done by the United States into a negative.

No one's denying that we did a lot of good things during the war and were the good side in the conflict. The U.S. and UK liberated Western Europe and helped defeat the most evil regime the world has ever seen. But it's important to have an accurate view of history and to realize that even countries that are fighting for a good cause can do bad things. In war, atrocities are committed by both sides and the other side being incredibly worse doesn't excuse actions such as the indiscriminate killing of civilians. Countries are made up of people and people have flaws.


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[nbelcik]

Originally Posted by Oregoropa

That must have been a crazy story. Leyte Gulf was the beginning of the Kamikaze attacks. Biggest naval battle in history.

Yeah, he said it was the scariest thing he's ever experienced. I can't even imagine going through what he went through at the age I'm at, I believe he was in his in his early 20s and I'm 20 right now. Hard to believe many of the people fighting were my age and under.


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[bono_212]

Originally Posted by nbelcik

No one's denying that we did a lot of good things during the war and were the good side in the conflict. The U.S. and UK liberated Western Europe and helped defeat the most evil regime the world has ever seen. But it's important to have an accurate view of history and to realize that even countries that are fighting for a good cause can do bad things. In war, atrocities are committed by both sides and the other side being incredibly worse doesn't excuse actions such as the indiscriminate killing of civilians. Countries are made up of people and people have flaws.


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My point is that there's a danger in only pushing the bad part. Your post seemed to suggest that the Allied actions on the Western front were meaningless beyond Russia.

[Oregoropa]

Hitler made such bad decisions such as invading the ussr because he was injected with a cocktail of drugs by his doctor including Crystal meth daily.

Watched a show on history channel that a synthetic version of meth in tablet form was given to German soldiers allowing them to fight for days on end without empathy. That's one of the reason blitzkrieg was so effective in the first 2 years of the war. But the tweaker soldiers became hopelessly addicted by 1942 and crashed hard when the supply lines were stretched in the east. They wrote letters home begging family and friends to send prevatin (the name for the meth). Was a fascinating show.


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[nbelcik]

Originally Posted by bono_212

My point is that there's a danger in only pushing the bad part. Your post seemed to suggest that the Allied actions on the Western front were meaningless beyond Russia.

I said the war was pretty much won by the time the UK and US invaded. And I do think that the Western conventional wisdom about the war deemphasizes the Eastern Front. The Nazis lost 500,000 troops total in the Western Front. But in the East, at the Battle of Stalingrad, they lost 500,000 troops and had 100,000 troops taken prisoner and that's just one battle. The scale of the Eastern Front was so much larger than the Western Front. And once Germany began to be pushed back in the Eastern Front it was only a matter of time before they lost. What we did was simply speed up the time before the Nazis were defeated.


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