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I was born and raised in Normandy, and saw the dire sacrifice a generation had to make. On my way to school, I could see the bullet holes in the walls, the tomb

I was born and raised in Normandy, and saw the dire sacrifice a generation had to make. On my way to school, I could see the bullet holes in the walls, the tombstones of nameless soldiers, the bombs and mines we had to defuse in the fields. What our grandfathers did was noble. What we do now is the business of war. I find it diminishing to compare what they did to what Google does now.

GordonS 9y ago
I completely agree with this. Trying to compare WWII to the actions of the modern military is absurd. How can you possibly compare it with overthrowing governments in South America and the Middle East, Vietnam, Guantanamo, Abu Gharib, drone strikes on hospitals, up to 200k civilians dead in Iraq, and much more - and of coursr the deeply, deeply questionable motives of all of these. The actions of our ancestors in WWII were borne out of necessity - those of the modern military are driven by money, greed, propaganda and political point-scoring.
- Maybestring 9y ago
  >drone strikes on hospitals, up to 200k civilians dead in Iraq You are looking at allied actions in WWII through rose colored glasses if you think that's worse. Dresden, Tokyo, Nagasaki, Hiroshima, Berlin, Saint-Nazair... the allies engaged in total war. Civillians are part of the war making capability of a nation, and in WWII all sides considered them to be valid targets. In Saint-Nazair's case it wasn't even enemy civillians. The German U-boat port was too heavily fortified, so the British wiped out the occupied French town that fed it.
  - dredmorbius 9y ago
    I'd add Nanking, London, Warsaw, Auschwitz, Amsterdam, and Bataan to your list, and that's off the top of my head. The British, U.S., USSR, Germans, Japanese, and Italians all practiced atrocities and mass warfare and/or genocide against civilian populations. I'm not challenging the credibility of your list, only the one-sidedness.
  - batmansmk 9y ago
    You made your point: war is dirty. But that was not my claim either. If we want to defend the necessity and impact of those weapons, they should be taken in the context of modern american and NATO warfare, not in the context of WW2. Normandy 1944 was a very different conflict than Libya 2011 for instance.
jacquesm 9y ago
That's because they were actually defending against an aggressor. The business of war most of the time makes us the aggressors.

GordonS 9y ago

I completely agree with this. Trying to compare WWII to the actions of the modern military is absurd. How can you possibly compare it with overthrowing governments in South America and the Middle East, Vietnam, Guantanamo, Abu Gharib, drone strikes on hospitals, up to 200k civilians dead in Iraq, and much more - and of coursr the deeply, deeply questionable motives of all of these. The actions of our ancestors in WWII were borne out of necessity - those of the modern military are driven by money, greed, propaganda and political point-scoring.

Maybestring 9y ago
>drone strikes on hospitals, up to 200k civilians dead in Iraq You are looking at allied actions in WWII through rose colored glasses if you think that's worse. Dresden, Tokyo, Nagasaki, Hiroshima, Berlin, Saint-Nazair... the allies engaged in total war. Civillians are part of the war making capability of a nation, and in WWII all sides considered them to be valid targets. In Saint-Nazair's case it wasn't even enemy civillians. The German U-boat port was too heavily fortified, so the British wiped out the occupied French town that fed it.
- dredmorbius 9y ago
  I'd add Nanking, London, Warsaw, Auschwitz, Amsterdam, and Bataan to your list, and that's off the top of my head. The British, U.S., USSR, Germans, Japanese, and Italians all practiced atrocities and mass warfare and/or genocide against civilian populations. I'm not challenging the credibility of your list, only the one-sidedness.
- batmansmk 9y ago
  You made your point: war is dirty. But that was not my claim either. If we want to defend the necessity and impact of those weapons, they should be taken in the context of modern american and NATO warfare, not in the context of WW2. Normandy 1944 was a very different conflict than Libya 2011 for instance.

jacquesm 9y ago

That's because they were actually defending against an aggressor. The business of war most of the time makes us the aggressors.