ISIS Looking to develop chemical weapons

[Will Wiley]

There will never be a rule book for war...that anybody engaged in war will pay any attention to. At the close of WWII the U.S. dropped atom bombs on the Japanese to test them. This was definitely the case with the plutonium bomb dropped on Nagasaki. It was absolutely unnecessary, but...we were at war and all is fair in war. War is inherently not some noble thing but instead the adoption of criminal attitudes toward designated enemies. War itself is a crime. War strategy is codified criminal attitude. It has never worked to the benefit of the human race, still we cling to it like a toddler clings to its pacifier. So yeah! ISIS is under asymmetric attack and it will get as absolutely terrible as it can in hopes of surviving. But..both side are engaging criminal activity and the French and Americans using airpower is disgraceful in my opinion. I don't condone chemical warfare ever, but as long as there is this suspension of all rules, this thing called war, we will be seeing things like this happening.

Dropping the bomb was the best course of action at that time. Any other course of action (including doing nothing) would have resulted in more dead on every side.

Evidence for that assertion?

 

[Crazy Eddie]

There will never be a rule book for war...that anybody engaged in war will pay any attention to. At the close of WWII the U.S. dropped atom bombs on the Japanese to test them. This was definitely the case with the plutonium bomb dropped on Nagasaki. It was absolutely unnecessary, but...we were at war and all is fair in war. War is inherently not some noble thing but instead the adoption of criminal attitudes toward designated enemies. War itself is a crime. War strategy is codified criminal attitude. It has never worked to the benefit of the human race, still we cling to it like a toddler clings to its pacifier. So yeah! ISIS is under asymmetric attack and it will get as absolutely terrible as it can in hopes of surviving. But..both side are engaging criminal activity and the French and Americans using airpower is disgraceful in my opinion. I don't condone chemical warfare ever, but as long as there is this suspension of all rules, this thing called war, we will be seeing things like this happening.

Dropping the bomb was the best course of action at that time. Any other course of action (including doing nothing) would have resulted in more dead on every side.

That's actually confirmed bullshit: the Japanese government didn't KNOW about the atomic bombs until after the war's end. They had conflicting reports they were never able to confirm but the only thing they knew for sure was that Hiroshima and Nagasaki had been attacked and heavily damaged (military officials at the time assumed it was caused by conventional bombing; their confusion was in not knowing where the bombers had come from or how the the Americans had gotten such a massive strike force in and out without anyone noticing).

It has been suggested by many historians that the atomic bombings weren't meant to impress the Japanese, but the Russians. The Japanese lacked the intelligence capabilities or the observational capacity to figure out what had happened to those cities, but the Soviets figured it out pretty quickly: the Americans had a new bomb of unimaginable destructive power, AND they were already using it.

There's no question as to whether or not Japan would have surrendered. They were beaten, and they knew it. It was never a question of whether or not Japan would actually surrender. It was a question of whether or not they were surrender BEFORE THE RUSSIANS GOT THERE.

 

[Will Wiley]

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/entry...ing-chemical-weapons_564decace4b08c74b7348e65

With this news, plus Paris, plus the Russian jet downing, I say we have no choice. ISIS is a state actor at this point. It's pointless to refuse to acknowledge that basic truth. And it is time for a full scale war against it. The thought of Chemical weapons in the hands of these people is beyond the pale. They must be defeated. Invade it. Conquer that territory and turn it into a Sunni but peace loving state - like Japan or Germany after WWII. We could do it, but we just have to commit ourselves to it. Might take about 500,000 troops, but with Europe and the U.S. acting together it could be done. Maybe a lot less than that. Better now than after they have chemical weapons. I say we have to move fast. Chemical weapons aren't too hard to develop. They may not have them now, but give them a year or even six months. I wouldn't underestimate these fucktards anymore. The bombing campaign is not working, and ultimately will not work. The local armies do not have the wherewithal to go in there. Only a united US Europe and even Russian group can - under UN auspices. We can rebuild later. At this point the threat is imply too great.

SLD

PS: And yes, I'll be happy to go again if called; although they told me I'm too old. I'm still subject to recall.

It seems like you want to try something that has been shown to not work though. We know what will happen if American troops go in. They will kill lots of civilians. I'm not saying this to anti-American. It is an observable fact.
The US has spent several trillion dollars in recent history destroying countries and making more terrorists.

We need to man up, and apologise to all the orphans and widows we have created. Then we need to round up all the politicians who took this course and jail them or execute them

 

[Crazy Eddie]

We need to man up, and apologise to all the orphans and widows we have created. Then we need to round up all the politicians who took this course and jail them or execute them

I cannot condone that, because I do not support corporal punishment.

I would prefer to round them up and send them off to exile. Preferably, to be dropped off in the seediest slum district of whatever country they most recently voted to invade. IF by some miracle they manage to make it back to the United States alive, we then round them up and send them to the second most recent country they voted to invade. Repeat ad infinitum until karma has been satisfied.

 

[Loren Pechtel]

Dropping the bomb was the best course of action at that time. Any other course of action (including doing nothing) would have resulted in more dead on every side.

Evidence for that assertion?

If the war had magically ended instead of the bombs being dropped more Japanese would have died of starvation than died from the bombs. At the end of the war Japan was not capable of feeding itself.

 

[Loren Pechtel]

Dropping the bomb was the best course of action at that time. Any other course of action (including doing nothing) would have resulted in more dead on every side.

That's actually confirmed bullshit: the Japanese government didn't KNOW about the atomic bombs until after the war's end. They had conflicting reports they were never able to confirm but the only thing they knew for sure was that Hiroshima and Nagasaki had been attacked and heavily damaged (military officials at the time assumed it was caused by conventional bombing; their confusion was in not knowing where the bombers had come from or how the the Americans had gotten such a massive strike force in and out without anyone noticing).

Revisionist garbage. They knew the bombs were atomic. It's irrelevant anyway as it doesn't matter if they knew they were atomic--the important point was that we showed that we could smash them with single planes from high altitude. This rendered their plan of trying to drive us off by making final victory too bloody moot.

There's no question as to whether or not Japan would have surrendered. They were beaten, and they knew it. It was never a question of whether or not Japan would actually surrender. It was a question of whether or not they were surrender BEFORE THE RUSSIANS GOT THERE.

No--what they were holding out for was making victory so bloody that we would give up and leave them alone.

 

[Crazy Eddie]

That's actually confirmed bullshit: the Japanese government didn't KNOW about the atomic bombs until after the war's end. They had conflicting reports they were never able to confirm but the only thing they knew for sure was that Hiroshima and Nagasaki had been attacked and heavily damaged (military officials at the time assumed it was caused by conventional bombing; their confusion was in not knowing where the bombers had come from or how the the Americans had gotten such a massive strike force in and out without anyone noticing).

Revisionist garbage. They knew the bombs were atomic.

And they knew that HOW? They and the rest of the world had no idea what atomic bombs WERE, let alone how to recognize when one had been used against them.

It's irrelevant anyway as it doesn't matter if they knew they were atomic--the important point was that we showed that we could smash them with single planes from high altitude...

Two things they ALSO didn't know until after the war's end. Again, they had only confused and largely contradictory reports from survivors and responders about what happened in both cities and no way to confirm any of them. Many of those reports were second or thirdhand, and most were little better than rumors.

This rendered their plan of trying to drive us off by making final victory too bloody moot.

Actually, their plan was to surrender under terms that would allow their military establishment to remain in place and preserve some measure of dignity in the process (you know, like what USUALLY happens when you lose a war). Truman wasn't having that; the only way to keep the Soviet Union from invading Japan was to occupy it in full.

No--what they were holding out for was making victory so bloody that we would give up and leave them alone.

LOL WHAT???

What hallucinatory fantasy is this you're entertaining that Japan thought if they could just hold out long enough we would get scared and go away?

They'd lost everything. They were screwed, and they knew it. Every engagement of the war after the Philippine Sea was pretty much an attempt by Japan to cut their losses and impose some kind of stalemate where they could realistically call for a ceasefire. They had no illusions whatsoever of the Americans "leaving them alone." The ENTIRE goal at that point was stopping the American advance before they lost too much ground.

The TINY kernel of truth in your little delusion is the fact that Japan was hoping to prevent the occupation of their homeland at any cost and it was hoped that making the final invasion as costly as possible would convince the Americans to accept a ceasefire without occupation. Still absent from your (lack of) logical thought is why occupation was neccesary in the first place. The answer is "The Soviet Union." And that, more than anything, is why the bombs were dropped.

 

[Loren Pechtel]

Revisionist garbage. They knew the bombs were atomic.

And they knew that HOW? They and the rest of the world had no idea what atomic bombs WERE, let alone how to recognize when one had been used against them.

Japan and Germany had their own bomb programs. They didn't get very far but they knew what the result looked like.

It's irrelevant anyway as it doesn't matter if they knew they were atomic--the important point was that we showed that we could smash them with single planes from high altitude...

Two things they ALSO didn't know until after the war's end. Again, they had only confused and largely contradictory reports from survivors and responders about what happened in both cities and no way to confirm any of them. Many of those reports were second or thirdhand, and most were little better than rumors.

City goes boom, no big wave of bombers. What more did they need to see?

This rendered their plan of trying to drive us off by making final victory too bloody moot.

Actually, their plan was to surrender under terms that would allow their military establishment to remain in place and preserve some measure of dignity in the process (you know, like what USUALLY happens when you lose a war). Truman wasn't having that; the only way to keep the Soviet Union from invading Japan was to occupy it in full.

You're not contradicting me.

No--what they were holding out for was making victory so bloody that we would give up and leave them alone.

LOL WHAT???

What hallucinatory fantasy is this you're entertaining that Japan thought if they could just hold out long enough we would get scared and go away?

Not scared, but decide it wasn't worth the lives to finish the job. They could have made taking Japan very bloody--but the bomb changed the whole economics. (Actually, it was more a bluff--our production rate was too low.)

 

[Will Wiley]

Evidence for that assertion?

If the war had magically ended instead of the bombs being dropped more Japanese would have died of starvation than died from the bombs. At the end of the war Japan was not capable of feeding itself.

I asked for evidence, so I'll assume you have none.
What about your new assertion? Any evidence?

 

[arkirk]

There will never be a rule book for war...that anybody engaged in war will pay any attention to. At the close of WWII the U.S. dropped atom bombs on the Japanese to test them. This was definitely the case with the plutonium bomb dropped on Nagasaki. It was absolutely unnecessary, but...we were at war and all is fair in war. War is inherently not some noble thing but instead the adoption of criminal attitudes toward designated enemies. War itself is a crime. War strategy is codified criminal attitude. It has never worked to the benefit of the human race, still we cling to it like a toddler clings to its pacifier. So yeah! ISIS is under asymmetric attack and it will get as absolutely terrible as it can in hopes of surviving. But..both side are engaging criminal activity and the French and Americans using airpower is disgraceful in my opinion. I don't condone chemical warfare ever, but as long as there is this suspension of all rules, this thing called war, we will be seeing things like this happening.

Dropping the bomb was the best course of action at that time. Any other course of action (including doing nothing) would have resulted in more dead on every side.

That is NOT TRUE. Nowhere does anybody cling to that idea. Dropping an atom bomb is NEVER the best course of action. The Japanese were defeated long before the bomb was dropped and they were anticipating even more problems because Russia decided it wanted to partake of the victory over Japan and was on its way. People who think like you are a danger to the future of our race. You always advocate killing designated enemies and do a real good job of pointing to those who you think need killing. I feel comforted that most sane people pay no attention to your faulty advice.

After the Hiroshima bomb there was no reason for any more bombing...except military experts wanted the Japanese people as guinea pigs to observer any differences in effects on human beings of the two types of bomb. This type of thinking was really nothing new to the American government. They tested African American populations in the Tuskegee experiment by shooting them up with siphillis to study the development of the disease. That to any sane person is a dastardly deed but we still had clear eyed experimenters perfectly willing to lie to people and infect them with disease.

On highway 247 between Victorville and Yucca Valley, California, there is a dry lake with a monument at the highway where it memorialized the intentional infection of a Native American tribe wit small pox that ended its existence in that location. There are similar monuments on the I-10. Infection the natives with Small Pox fomites appears to have been quite popular for clearing land of Indians. What happened at Nagasaki did not have to happen. You have to call gratuitous killing and maiming of your fellow man what it is...a fucking crime. What my country did to these people does not make others' crimes against humanity any more moral or less criminal. We just seem to be a nation that is absolutely myopic when it comes to our own hubris. I feel that you go out of your way to promote it.

 

[Jayjay]

Whether it was right or wrong at the time, I think that if the atom bomb wasn't used, the world wouldn't see the horrible consequences. It would be seen as just another very big bomb and it might be used in some other war, maybe with worse consequences.

 

[braces_for_impact]

Back to present day, I don't see how this is news, really. If Jihadists get a hold of weapons of mass destruction of any kind, I see nothing holding them back from using them. Be they chemical, biological, or nuclear.

 

[Loren Pechtel]

Dropping the bomb was the best course of action at that time. Any other course of action (including doing nothing) would have resulted in more dead on every side.

That is NOT TRUE. Nowhere does anybody cling to that idea. Dropping an atom bomb is NEVER the best course of action. The Japanese were defeated long before the bomb was dropped and they were anticipating even more problems because Russia decided it wanted to partake of the victory over Japan and was on its way. People who think like you are a danger to the future of our race. You always advocate killing designated enemies and do a real good job of pointing to those who you think need killing. I feel comforted that most sane people pay no attention to your faulty advice.

You live in a fantasy world where there's always a good answer.

After the Hiroshima bomb there was no reason for any more bombing...except military experts wanted the Japanese people as guinea pigs to observer any differences in effects on human beings of the two types of bomb. This type of thinking was really nothing new to the American government. They tested African American populations in the Tuskegee experiment by shooting them up with siphillis to study the development of the disease. That to any sane person is a dastardly deed but we still had clear eyed experimenters perfectly willing to lie to people and infect them with disease.

It was a close-run thing whether Japan surrendered even after Hiroshima. Without Nagasaki they probably wouldn't have surrendered.

On highway 247 between Victorville and Yucca Valley, California, there is a dry lake with a monument at the highway where it memorialized the intentional infection of a Native American tribe wit small pox that ended its existence in that location. There are similar monuments on the I-10. Infection the natives with Small Pox fomites appears to have been quite popular for clearing land of Indians. What happened at Nagasaki did not have to happen. You have to call gratuitous killing and maiming of your fellow man what it is...a fucking crime. What my country did to these people does not make others' crimes against humanity any more moral or less criminal. We just seem to be a nation that is absolutely myopic when it comes to our own hubris. I feel that you go out of your way to promote it.

Smallpox devastated the New World long before any white men were in what would become California.