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> Beautiful ideals were painted for our boys who were sent out to die. This was the "war to end all wars." This was the "war to make the world safe for democrac

by aazaa 7y ago

> Beautiful ideals were painted for our boys who were sent out to die. This was the "war to end all wars." This was the "war to make the world safe for democracy." No one mentioned to them, as they marched away, that their going and their dying would mean huge war profits. No one told these American soldiers that they might be shot down by bullets made by their own brothers here. No one told them that the ships on which they were going to cross might be torpedoed by submarines built with United States patents. They were just told it was to be a "glorious adventure." Very strange how WWI makes almost no sense from today's perspective. Every country was damaged either directly by the conflict, or indirectly through its protracted (and still ongoing) resolution. Had those young men simply decided to do nothing rather than join, the world would have been a better place. I'd be curious to know Butler's take on WWII (he died in 1940). That's the one that people seem most hung up on. It's the only war in living memory considered near universally "good" by those in the US. It's the war that's invoked by every administration trying to stir up popular support for a military adventure in a country most voters can't place on a map. I'm doubtful our current reverence for WWII will stand the test of time. Long after Hitler has been replaced by the next boogeyman, history students of the future will scratch their heads at what could have possibly motivated a young man to volunteer for such a fool's errand.

cheeko1234 7y ago
This radiolab podcast goes into detail of men deciding to do nothing on both sides in WWI, but it got complicated really fast: https://www.wnycstudios.org/podcasts/radiolab/segments/104010-one-good-deed-deserves-another https://www.wnycstudios.org/podcasts/radiolab/segments/10401...
- commandlinefan 7y ago
  The whole “white feather” campaign during WWI (women would hand unenlisted young men a “white feather” which was understood to represent cowardice and shame men into enlisting) really contrasts with the unemployment that British soldiers faced after the war: “no former servicemen need apply” was a common warning on shops in the early 20’s. They were treated like garbage before the war, during the war, and after it, too.
  - TurkishPoptart 7y ago
    Why were they discriminated against after the war? In the US, former servicemen got the world handed to them on a silver platter.
    - Apocryphon 7y ago
      Not after the Vietnam War, so it seems like the near-veneration of veterans in the modern world didn't happen until fairly recently.
      - commandlinefan 7y ago
        That matches my father’s experience - he said he had to leave Virginia because nobody was hiring former sailors after Vietnam.
Spooky23 7y ago
WW1 and 2 were the same conflict. The apparent stupidity of WW1 is really a function of how accustomed we are to modern industry, communications, and some of the things hard-won by that conflict. End of the day, it was all about resources, and is no different than today’s conflicts, which boil down to oil on the supply and the control of money on the demand side.
- zaroth 7y ago
  Except now Iran shoots missiles at a US base in Iraq and the price of oil barely budged. Times have changed, and the US is much more energy independent. And over the next decade even more so as the EV revolution and renewable energy continue to dominate. IMO the increasing irrelevance of the Middle East will continue to increase world peace and prosperity, at the expense of some truly awful regimes which will crumble.
- kazen44 7y ago
  some historians argue the prussian-franco war, ww1 and ww2 are essentially the same conflict.
pstuart 7y ago
The recent report on the failure of the war in Afghanistan shows that it makes no sense either. And it's going on right now.
lostcolony 7y ago
So WWII as being necessary to stop Hitler, I can see withstanding the test of time. The things that caused WWII, Hitler's rise to power, and the systems that enabled and, frankly, bent him and the Nazis towards the evils they committed, I think we were culpable for, for how Germany was positioned on the world stage post WWI. Germany was ripe for a demagogue, and people needed the sense of security mindlessly following one provides.
- jacquesm 7y ago
  What made America ripe for a demagogue?
  - deciplex 7y ago
    The capitalist project has failed, and our Constitution - poorly written even for the time - is wholly unequipped to deal with the crisis, nor the emergence of highly ideological political parties.
    - minikites 7y ago
      I agree overall on both points, but it's worth noting that the founders intended for the constitution to be amended much more frequently than it has been.
    - nlfwhulsdhouv 7y ago
      The challenge becomes what to do next. Do we follow Lenin's teaching and attempt a revolution, do we structure our society around trade-unionism, do we need to invent a new form of government, or are we destined to a fascist future ruled by increasingly imperial powers?
  - lostcolony 7y ago
    Increased unaddressed income inequality, a growing partisan divide that led to a large group feeling disenfranchised enough to rally around a candidate whose whole platform was "burn the status quo to the ground", etc? I mean...we didn't have an unnecessary war that left us in a bad state; we got there ourselves.
socialdemocrat 7y ago
I know it is not a popular view but I think WWII was a major mistake. We could of course not have stopped Hitler's initial actions, but it was the West's choice to wage war against Hitler. I think that was a mistake. The rational was to keep Poland and the Czech republic free. However at the end of the war neither country was free. They had fallen under the Soviet sphere of influence. The goals they set hence failed. They KNEW Hitler planned to attack Russia. He had spoken for years about that. That meant they would go through Poland. The sneaky but rational solution would have been to sacrifice Poland temporary and let Hitler attack Russia. Russia and Germany would have worn each other out. At the end a heavily built up allied military could have marched in and cleaned up.
- vearwhershuh 7y ago
  I know it is not a popular view but I think WWII was a major mistake It's a plenty popular idea, but people won't say so publicly because of social pressure: The Greatest Generation, The Good War, etc.
  - icebraining 7y ago
    The Greatest Generation is an US concept, which only entered the war after it was attacked.
- the_af 7y ago
  Note that while this wasn't widely known in the West at the time and therefore cannot be their justification for going to war against Hitler, Nazi Germany's "Generalplan Ost" [0] (their "General Plan for the East", a plan of global genocide so vast it defies belief) called for the almost total extermination of the populations of most Slavic countries, Russia and Poland included. If I remember correctly, the quota for Poland was 80% Poles -- and note I say Poles, not Jewish Poles -- to be exterminated. So on the one hand, Cold War Poland ended up a puppet of the Soviets. Repression of dissidents, etc. But the Poles were alive. On the other hand, had Nazi Germany won and completed their plan there would be no Poles left to complain about their lack of freedom. So was WWII really a mistake? ---- [0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Generalplan_Ost https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Generalplan_Ost
agumonkey 7y ago
I read on Reddit that some do. It's just not enough
mewse-hn 7y ago
WWII was the last time modern industrialized nations were openly at war with each other. The nuclear bomb changed everything. That's one reason WWII is regarded differently than anything that has come since. Hitler's extermination of the Jews will have him as a historical villain for a long, long time.
AnIdiotOnTheNet 7y ago
> Long after Hitler has been replaced by the next boogeyman I don't envy the people living in those times. Hitler is one hell of a boogeyman to top.
- roenxi 7y ago
  It depends how you measure it as there were worse people in the same era as Hitler. If I recall the stats correctly it is a much better bet to be led by someone like Hitler over Stalin or Mao. The ethnically targeted nature of the holocaust is the main claim to 'worst of the worst' status, but honestly it isn't obvious to me that a dead Jew is more horrific than a dead anyone else. They are both pretty bad.
  - AnimalMuppet 7y ago
    Hitler was horrible. Stalin was horrible. Stalin killed more people. But Stalin had more years in which to do it, and ruled a larger population. If you calculate (total body count) / (people-years ruled), I suspect Hitler was worse. (He might not be worse than Pol Pot, though...)
    - yourapostasy 7y ago
      Famine deaths [1] still outclass genocide deaths [2], and there is still insufficient data on the Native American genocide, though it is likely on the same order as the Holocaust. You are right that the death rate per unit time wasn't as high, and the Holocaust is probably up there on that basis. The Holodomor is pretty on par with the Holocaust for death rate per unit time at the low end of death estimates, and outstrips the Holocaust at the high end of estimates, happened first, but wasn't publicized until relatively recently. Never underestimate the depths of muderous intent those who wield power can potentially inflict. [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_famines https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_famines [2] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_genocides_by_death_toll https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_genocides_by_death_tol...
      - 7y ago
sabarn01 7y ago
> Very strange how WWI makes almost no sense from today's perspective. Every country was damaged either directly by the conflict, or indirectly through its protracted (and still ongoing) resolution. We get to look back with hind sight and only remember negative consequences from positive actions. The US entered WW1 after Germany began unrestricted submarine ware fare for the second time, and coming on the heels of the Zimmerman telegram. France and Belgium were invaded by hostile power. Germany feared Russian modernization and fear of not being able to Compete with France and Russia. Russia sided with the Serbs. France Sided with Russia whose alliance it has sought to counteract the power of a newly unified Germany which had defeated France in 1871 taken territory and imposed a large reparation payment. Austria an absolute monarchy wanted to quite serb nationalism.
earlINmeyerkeg 7y ago
WWII had a compulsory draft where it was already established by then that congress had the power to initiate a draft. It was also hashed out that it was a federal issue and not a state one. Which we all know is hot garbage. The government quite literally says, your individual freedoms are not greater than our goal for the country. If you ask me, that sounds NO different than communism! But when you fight for uncle sam, it must mean "the greater good" is good, just because the "greater good" isn't commie red "greater good."
- frenchyatwork 7y ago
  That issue was already resolved much more poignantly in the American Civil War.
mncolinlee 7y ago
Honestly, the most interesting chapter in Butler's career has to be when he stopped a Fascist American coup attempt against FDR by many of the war profiteers he spoke about. https://www.npr.org/2012/02/12/145472726/when-the-bankers-plotted-to-overthrow-fdr https://www.npr.org/2012/02/12/145472726/when-the-bankers-pl...
elfexec 7y ago
> Beautiful ideals were painted for our boys who were sent out to die... They were just told it was to be a "glorious adventure. Told by whom? Oh that's right, the news media. People really need to go look into why the NYTimes, WashingtonPost, Pulitzer's properties, Hearst's properties, etc were created and how their yellow journalism played into wars even to this day. Also keep in mind, the biggest ( proportionally ) benefactor of war isn't defense contractors, it's the news industry. https://www.mediaite.com/news/tucker-carlson-scores-highest-ratings-ever-at-8-p-m-during-coverage-of-iran-crisis/ https://www.mediaite.com/news/tucker-carlson-scores-highest-... People forgot that WashingtonPost went bankrupt in the first half of the 1900s and the news industry was in danger of collapse. What saved the industry? War. Keep in mind that the news industry, especially the NYTimes ( a company created by a banker ) editorial board, attacked Butler as a "hoaxer" ( aka conspiracy peddler ). How times change, but the propaganda remains the same. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Business_Plot https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Business_Plot > Very strange how WWI makes almost no sense from today's perspective. WW1 makes total sense. By WW1, the entire world had been conquered by European powers and America. Every piece of land on earth was under European/American control or influence. So european powers had no one left to fight but themselves. > Every country was damaged either directly by the conflict, or indirectly through its protracted (and still ongoing) resolution. Europe was in ruins and more importantly fractured. Go read TS Eliot's The Waste Land. It's partly about his angst of over a broken europe and the collapse of western civilization and the ultimate pointlessness of that war. > It's the only war in living memory considered near universally "good" by those in the US. It's considered good because propaganda tells us it's good. Propaganda tells us its good because we came out on top. But I don't see how a war with nukes and upwards of 120 million dead could be considered good. That's more dead than the worst pandemic in recent history - spanish flu which killed upwards of 100 million. I doubt anyone would say the spanish flu was "good". > I'm doubtful our current reverence for WWII will stand the test of time. Reverence of ww2 will be determined by who is in power. History, as all other propaganda, is written by those in power.
- generalpass 7y ago
  > Reverence of ww2 will be determined by who is in power. History, as all other propaganda, is written by those in power. I think this occurs within some time frame of the event, and even then only among the better known, funded and "court approved" historians. There will be outcast historians that plug away at recording various facts surrounding the event (e.g., continued investigation into whether FDR was intentionally bellicose, was it truly necessary to nuke Japan, was fire bombing the German civilians tactically useful, etc.).
RcouF1uZ4gsC 7y ago
>Had those young men simply decided to do nothing rather than join, the world would have been a better place. I am not so sure. I think the main reason that decolonization happened is that a whole generation of young men were lost and Europe was too exhausted and poor from the two world wars to keep its colonies. Without WWI, there would not have been WWII which would have left the European nations as the premier powers in the world who would have held on to their colonies in Asia and Africa. So without WWI, there would still be a pretty high chance that India would still be a British colony. Europe may have been a better place, but probably not the rest of the world.
scoopitywoop 7y ago
> Had those young men simply decided to do nothing rather than join, the world would have been a better place. Words cannot express how disappointed I am with people who say things like this. Assuming you believe that your country's political system is not worth overthrowing, then serving your country is an honorable act, and people who have served should not be criticized for taking on the burden that is service. Quite the opposite. Now if your political system is beyond repair and unsalvageable through reform, then sure, service is not honorable. It's unfortunate that so many of my fellow citizens seem to take the intellectually lazy way out: Criticize the choice to serve, but be unwilling to reform/overthrow their government. This line of thinking is so widespread, it's truly disheartening.
romwell 7y ago
>Very strange how WWI makes almost no sense from today's perspective. Every country was damaged either directly by the conflict, or indirectly through its protracted (and still ongoing) resolution. US won big in that war. WWI nearly bankrupted the British Empire, guess who it was loaning money from? (Hint: it's the US[1]). The only finally paid it off in 2015. WWI turned the US into a world power, and marked the end of many (other) Empires. As for the European powers, the war made a lot of sense before it started, as a lot of money was spent on making the shiny toys that killed so many people. Maybe not to the citizens of the countries that took part in the war, but surely to the profiteers. Finally, one can argue that the war made sense for Germany in the long run, in spite of all the losses. Before the war, Germany was surrounded by Empires: the Russian Empire, the British Empire, the French Empire, the Austro-Hungarian and the Ottoman ones. Germany was allied with some of them, threatened by others, but the history shows how fickle the alliances were. Fast-forward to today, and Germany is still there, while the Empires are gone. WW1 effectively took down the Russian Empire, and was the beginning of the end of the British one (to say nothing of the others). I am being facetious here, but if the goal of WW1 was to establish a more friendly Europe for German ambitions, then that goal was eventually accomplished. That's to say, the war made sense for Germany because it was surrounded by states that stood to lose more (if you ignore human life). Of course, this argument doesn't make sense if you care about people to the slightest extent. But the people who start the wars rarely do. [1]https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/History_of_the_British_national_debt#World_War_I https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/History_of_the_British_nationa...
- kazen44 7y ago
  Also, world war 1 was revolutionary in terms of politics. The many countries (sometimes newly established after the fall of an empire like austrian-hungary or russia) suddenly found themselves with a completely new political system. The november revolution in germany resulted in the abolishment of the monarchy and firmly entreched social-democrats inside the political spectrum. It also shows us why having a young democracy without a strong sense of institutional-ism and tradition is incredible fragile.
tim333 7y ago
The stupid thing about WWII is the whole thing was could have been avoided by people being reasonable with the Treaty of Versailles. The deal they signed effectively putting Germany into debt bondage made something going pear shaped pretty much inevitable, as predicted quite clearly by Keynes in The Economic Consequences of the Peace. Of course by the time Hitler had tanks rolling it was too late to sort things peacefully. Thankfully they learned the lesson and were economically easy going on Germany and Japan after WWII but it was a darn expensive lesson. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Economic_Consequences_of_the_Peace https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Economic_Consequences_of_t...
- Gibbon1 7y ago
  The other thing that happened was the Weimar Republic under Heinrich Bruning responded to the onset of the great depression with austerity measures. Just like the US did with similar results; deflation, industrial collapse, massive unemployment, and civil unrest. The difference was the US got FDR instead of Hitler. Modern Economists hate talking about this and have managed to drop it down the memory hole.
  - kazen44 7y ago
    Also, the weimar republic was a very young democracy in a country with very little democratic traditions. Many germans simply didn't believe democracy was the form of goverment required to battle the great depression and return germany to it's former glory. Both on the left side aswell as the right side of the political spectrum. The nearly endless turmoil during the 20's was a result of that.
    - Gibbon1 7y ago
      Always seems to me that political culture is long lived and difficult to change. Seems really common that revolutionaries once they take over find it impossible to govern without mimicking the previous government. AKA how the Soviet Union ended up looking a lot like the Czarist Russia. Ditto a bunch of former states. And how China seems to be slipping back into rule by mandarins under an figurative emperor.
vanniv 7y ago
Well, as the entirety of my people were saved from extinction, I for one am glad that some "fools" decided to risk their lives to end what was otherwise a very effective genocide. As it stands, a third of us were murdered by the "Third Reich", and our numbers have still not recovered.
vanniv 7y ago
You are an antisemite, a monster, and a true Nazi.

by aazaa 7y ago

cheeko1234 7y ago

This radiolab podcast goes into detail of men deciding to do nothing on both sides in WWI, but it got complicated really fast: https://www.wnycstudios.org/podcasts/radiolab/segments/104010-one-good-deed-deserves-another https://www.wnycstudios.org/podcasts/radiolab/segments/10401...

commandlinefan 7y ago
The whole “white feather” campaign during WWI (women would hand unenlisted young men a “white feather” which was understood to represent cowardice and shame men into enlisting) really contrasts with the unemployment that British soldiers faced after the war: “no former servicemen need apply” was a common warning on shops in the early 20’s. They were treated like garbage before the war, during the war, and after it, too.
- TurkishPoptart 7y ago
  Why were they discriminated against after the war? In the US, former servicemen got the world handed to them on a silver platter.
  - Apocryphon 7y ago
    Not after the Vietnam War, so it seems like the near-veneration of veterans in the modern world didn't happen until fairly recently.
    - commandlinefan 7y ago
      That matches my father’s experience - he said he had to leave Virginia because nobody was hiring former sailors after Vietnam.

Spooky23 7y ago

WW1 and 2 were the same conflict. The apparent stupidity of WW1 is really a function of how accustomed we are to modern industry, communications, and some of the things hard-won by that conflict. End of the day, it was all about resources, and is no different than today’s conflicts, which boil down to oil on the supply and the control of money on the demand side.

zaroth 7y ago
Except now Iran shoots missiles at a US base in Iraq and the price of oil barely budged. Times have changed, and the US is much more energy independent. And over the next decade even more so as the EV revolution and renewable energy continue to dominate. IMO the increasing irrelevance of the Middle East will continue to increase world peace and prosperity, at the expense of some truly awful regimes which will crumble.
kazen44 7y ago
some historians argue the prussian-franco war, ww1 and ww2 are essentially the same conflict.

pstuart 7y ago

The recent report on the failure of the war in Afghanistan shows that it makes no sense either. And it's going on right now.

lostcolony 7y ago

So WWII as being necessary to stop Hitler, I can see withstanding the test of time. The things that caused WWII, Hitler's rise to power, and the systems that enabled and, frankly, bent him and the Nazis towards the evils they committed, I think we were culpable for, for how Germany was positioned on the world stage post WWI. Germany was ripe for a demagogue, and people needed the sense of security mindlessly following one provides.

jacquesm 7y ago
What made America ripe for a demagogue?
- deciplex 7y ago
  The capitalist project has failed, and our Constitution - poorly written even for the time - is wholly unequipped to deal with the crisis, nor the emergence of highly ideological political parties.
  - minikites 7y ago
    I agree overall on both points, but it's worth noting that the founders intended for the constitution to be amended much more frequently than it has been.
  - nlfwhulsdhouv 7y ago
    The challenge becomes what to do next. Do we follow Lenin's teaching and attempt a revolution, do we structure our society around trade-unionism, do we need to invent a new form of government, or are we destined to a fascist future ruled by increasingly imperial powers?
- lostcolony 7y ago
  Increased unaddressed income inequality, a growing partisan divide that led to a large group feeling disenfranchised enough to rally around a candidate whose whole platform was "burn the status quo to the ground", etc? I mean...we didn't have an unnecessary war that left us in a bad state; we got there ourselves.

socialdemocrat 7y ago

I know it is not a popular view but I think WWII was a major mistake. We could of course not have stopped Hitler's initial actions, but it was the West's choice to wage war against Hitler. I think that was a mistake. The rational was to keep Poland and the Czech republic free. However at the end of the war neither country was free. They had fallen under the Soviet sphere of influence. The goals they set hence failed. They KNEW Hitler planned to attack Russia. He had spoken for years about that. That meant they would go through Poland. The sneaky but rational solution would have been to sacrifice Poland temporary and let Hitler attack Russia. Russia and Germany would have worn each other out. At the end a heavily built up allied military could have marched in and cleaned up.

vearwhershuh 7y ago
I know it is not a popular view but I think WWII was a major mistake It's a plenty popular idea, but people won't say so publicly because of social pressure: The Greatest Generation, The Good War, etc.
- icebraining 7y ago
  The Greatest Generation is an US concept, which only entered the war after it was attacked.
the_af 7y ago
Note that while this wasn't widely known in the West at the time and therefore cannot be their justification for going to war against Hitler, Nazi Germany's "Generalplan Ost" [0] (their "General Plan for the East", a plan of global genocide so vast it defies belief) called for the almost total extermination of the populations of most Slavic countries, Russia and Poland included. If I remember correctly, the quota for Poland was 80% Poles -- and note I say Poles, not Jewish Poles -- to be exterminated. So on the one hand, Cold War Poland ended up a puppet of the Soviets. Repression of dissidents, etc. But the Poles were alive. On the other hand, had Nazi Germany won and completed their plan there would be no Poles left to complain about their lack of freedom. So was WWII really a mistake? ---- [0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Generalplan_Ost https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Generalplan_Ost

agumonkey 7y ago

I read on Reddit that some do. It's just not enough

mewse-hn 7y ago

WWII was the last time modern industrialized nations were openly at war with each other. The nuclear bomb changed everything. That's one reason WWII is regarded differently than anything that has come since. Hitler's extermination of the Jews will have him as a historical villain for a long, long time.

AnIdiotOnTheNet 7y ago

> Long after Hitler has been replaced by the next boogeyman I don't envy the people living in those times. Hitler is one hell of a boogeyman to top.

roenxi 7y ago
It depends how you measure it as there were worse people in the same era as Hitler. If I recall the stats correctly it is a much better bet to be led by someone like Hitler over Stalin or Mao. The ethnically targeted nature of the holocaust is the main claim to 'worst of the worst' status, but honestly it isn't obvious to me that a dead Jew is more horrific than a dead anyone else. They are both pretty bad.
- AnimalMuppet 7y ago
  Hitler was horrible. Stalin was horrible. Stalin killed more people. But Stalin had more years in which to do it, and ruled a larger population. If you calculate (total body count) / (people-years ruled), I suspect Hitler was worse. (He might not be worse than Pol Pot, though...)
  - yourapostasy 7y ago
    Famine deaths [1] still outclass genocide deaths [2], and there is still insufficient data on the Native American genocide, though it is likely on the same order as the Holocaust. You are right that the death rate per unit time wasn't as high, and the Holocaust is probably up there on that basis. The Holodomor is pretty on par with the Holocaust for death rate per unit time at the low end of death estimates, and outstrips the Holocaust at the high end of estimates, happened first, but wasn't publicized until relatively recently. Never underestimate the depths of muderous intent those who wield power can potentially inflict. [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_famines https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_famines [2] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_genocides_by_death_toll https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_genocides_by_death_tol...
    - 7y ago

sabarn01 7y ago

> Very strange how WWI makes almost no sense from today's perspective. Every country was damaged either directly by the conflict, or indirectly through its protracted (and still ongoing) resolution. We get to look back with hind sight and only remember negative consequences from positive actions. The US entered WW1 after Germany began unrestricted submarine ware fare for the second time, and coming on the heels of the Zimmerman telegram. France and Belgium were invaded by hostile power. Germany feared Russian modernization and fear of not being able to Compete with France and Russia. Russia sided with the Serbs. France Sided with Russia whose alliance it has sought to counteract the power of a newly unified Germany which had defeated France in 1871 taken territory and imposed a large reparation payment. Austria an absolute monarchy wanted to quite serb nationalism.

earlINmeyerkeg 7y ago

WWII had a compulsory draft where it was already established by then that congress had the power to initiate a draft. It was also hashed out that it was a federal issue and not a state one. Which we all know is hot garbage. The government quite literally says, your individual freedoms are not greater than our goal for the country. If you ask me, that sounds NO different than communism! But when you fight for uncle sam, it must mean "the greater good" is good, just because the "greater good" isn't commie red "greater good."

frenchyatwork 7y ago
That issue was already resolved much more poignantly in the American Civil War.

mncolinlee 7y ago

Honestly, the most interesting chapter in Butler's career has to be when he stopped a Fascist American coup attempt against FDR by many of the war profiteers he spoke about. https://www.npr.org/2012/02/12/145472726/when-the-bankers-plotted-to-overthrow-fdr https://www.npr.org/2012/02/12/145472726/when-the-bankers-pl...

elfexec 7y ago

> Beautiful ideals were painted for our boys who were sent out to die... They were just told it was to be a "glorious adventure. Told by whom? Oh that's right, the news media. People really need to go look into why the NYTimes, WashingtonPost, Pulitzer's properties, Hearst's properties, etc were created and how their yellow journalism played into wars even to this day. Also keep in mind, the biggest ( proportionally ) benefactor of war isn't defense contractors, it's the news industry. https://www.mediaite.com/news/tucker-carlson-scores-highest-ratings-ever-at-8-p-m-during-coverage-of-iran-crisis/ https://www.mediaite.com/news/tucker-carlson-scores-highest-... People forgot that WashingtonPost went bankrupt in the first half of the 1900s and the news industry was in danger of collapse. What saved the industry? War. Keep in mind that the news industry, especially the NYTimes ( a company created by a banker ) editorial board, attacked Butler as a "hoaxer" ( aka conspiracy peddler ). How times change, but the propaganda remains the same. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Business_Plot https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Business_Plot > Very strange how WWI makes almost no sense from today's perspective. WW1 makes total sense. By WW1, the entire world had been conquered by European powers and America. Every piece of land on earth was under European/American control or influence. So european powers had no one left to fight but themselves. > Every country was damaged either directly by the conflict, or indirectly through its protracted (and still ongoing) resolution. Europe was in ruins and more importantly fractured. Go read TS Eliot's The Waste Land. It's partly about his angst of over a broken europe and the collapse of western civilization and the ultimate pointlessness of that war. > It's the only war in living memory considered near universally "good" by those in the US. It's considered good because propaganda tells us it's good. Propaganda tells us its good because we came out on top. But I don't see how a war with nukes and upwards of 120 million dead could be considered good. That's more dead than the worst pandemic in recent history - spanish flu which killed upwards of 100 million. I doubt anyone would say the spanish flu was "good". > I'm doubtful our current reverence for WWII will stand the test of time. Reverence of ww2 will be determined by who is in power. History, as all other propaganda, is written by those in power.

generalpass 7y ago
> Reverence of ww2 will be determined by who is in power. History, as all other propaganda, is written by those in power. I think this occurs within some time frame of the event, and even then only among the better known, funded and "court approved" historians. There will be outcast historians that plug away at recording various facts surrounding the event (e.g., continued investigation into whether FDR was intentionally bellicose, was it truly necessary to nuke Japan, was fire bombing the German civilians tactically useful, etc.).

RcouF1uZ4gsC 7y ago

>Had those young men simply decided to do nothing rather than join, the world would have been a better place. I am not so sure. I think the main reason that decolonization happened is that a whole generation of young men were lost and Europe was too exhausted and poor from the two world wars to keep its colonies. Without WWI, there would not have been WWII which would have left the European nations as the premier powers in the world who would have held on to their colonies in Asia and Africa. So without WWI, there would still be a pretty high chance that India would still be a British colony. Europe may have been a better place, but probably not the rest of the world.

scoopitywoop 7y ago

> Had those young men simply decided to do nothing rather than join, the world would have been a better place. Words cannot express how disappointed I am with people who say things like this. Assuming you believe that your country's political system is not worth overthrowing, then serving your country is an honorable act, and people who have served should not be criticized for taking on the burden that is service. Quite the opposite. Now if your political system is beyond repair and unsalvageable through reform, then sure, service is not honorable. It's unfortunate that so many of my fellow citizens seem to take the intellectually lazy way out: Criticize the choice to serve, but be unwilling to reform/overthrow their government. This line of thinking is so widespread, it's truly disheartening.

romwell 7y ago

>Very strange how WWI makes almost no sense from today's perspective. Every country was damaged either directly by the conflict, or indirectly through its protracted (and still ongoing) resolution. US won big in that war. WWI nearly bankrupted the British Empire, guess who it was loaning money from? (Hint: it's the US[1]). The only finally paid it off in 2015. WWI turned the US into a world power, and marked the end of many (other) Empires. As for the European powers, the war made a lot of sense before it started, as a lot of money was spent on making the shiny toys that killed so many people. Maybe not to the citizens of the countries that took part in the war, but surely to the profiteers. Finally, one can argue that the war made sense for Germany in the long run, in spite of all the losses. Before the war, Germany was surrounded by Empires: the Russian Empire, the British Empire, the French Empire, the Austro-Hungarian and the Ottoman ones. Germany was allied with some of them, threatened by others, but the history shows how fickle the alliances were. Fast-forward to today, and Germany is still there, while the Empires are gone. WW1 effectively took down the Russian Empire, and was the beginning of the end of the British one (to say nothing of the others). I am being facetious here, but if the goal of WW1 was to establish a more friendly Europe for German ambitions, then that goal was eventually accomplished. That's to say, the war made sense for Germany because it was surrounded by states that stood to lose more (if you ignore human life). Of course, this argument doesn't make sense if you care about people to the slightest extent. But the people who start the wars rarely do. [1]https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/History_of_the_British_national_debt#World_War_I https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/History_of_the_British_nationa...

kazen44 7y ago
Also, world war 1 was revolutionary in terms of politics. The many countries (sometimes newly established after the fall of an empire like austrian-hungary or russia) suddenly found themselves with a completely new political system. The november revolution in germany resulted in the abolishment of the monarchy and firmly entreched social-democrats inside the political spectrum. It also shows us why having a young democracy without a strong sense of institutional-ism and tradition is incredible fragile.

tim333 7y ago

The stupid thing about WWII is the whole thing was could have been avoided by people being reasonable with the Treaty of Versailles. The deal they signed effectively putting Germany into debt bondage made something going pear shaped pretty much inevitable, as predicted quite clearly by Keynes in The Economic Consequences of the Peace. Of course by the time Hitler had tanks rolling it was too late to sort things peacefully. Thankfully they learned the lesson and were economically easy going on Germany and Japan after WWII but it was a darn expensive lesson. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Economic_Consequences_of_the_Peace https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Economic_Consequences_of_t...

Gibbon1 7y ago
The other thing that happened was the Weimar Republic under Heinrich Bruning responded to the onset of the great depression with austerity measures. Just like the US did with similar results; deflation, industrial collapse, massive unemployment, and civil unrest. The difference was the US got FDR instead of Hitler. Modern Economists hate talking about this and have managed to drop it down the memory hole.
- kazen44 7y ago
  Also, the weimar republic was a very young democracy in a country with very little democratic traditions. Many germans simply didn't believe democracy was the form of goverment required to battle the great depression and return germany to it's former glory. Both on the left side aswell as the right side of the political spectrum. The nearly endless turmoil during the 20's was a result of that.
  - Gibbon1 7y ago
    Always seems to me that political culture is long lived and difficult to change. Seems really common that revolutionaries once they take over find it impossible to govern without mimicking the previous government. AKA how the Soviet Union ended up looking a lot like the Czarist Russia. Ditto a bunch of former states. And how China seems to be slipping back into rule by mandarins under an figurative emperor.

vanniv 7y ago

Well, as the entirety of my people were saved from extinction, I for one am glad that some "fools" decided to risk their lives to end what was otherwise a very effective genocide. As it stands, a third of us were murdered by the "Third Reich", and our numbers have still not recovered.

vanniv 7y ago

You are an antisemite, a monster, and a true Nazi.