Re: Nuclear Holocaust (10/62)

Post #70,310 by rcareaga 12/21/02 10:13:29 PM Reply	Re: Nuclear Holocaust (10/62) You are perhaps a bit (only a bit) unjust here: the Sov regime in 1962 had had experience in living memory of the devastation of their land; America had to look back to the 1860s--vivid as those memories might be to the Trent Lott set. Khruschev had a visceral sense of the stakes that Kennedy lacked, although a miscalculation forty years ago would have resulted in consequences direr than the outer reaches of either man's memories. I speak as one who remembers the stripped supermarket shevles of 10/62. cordially, "Die Welt ist alles, was der Fall ist."
Post #70,404 by Brandioch 12/22/02 4:58:53 PM Reply	I think that applies a lot. Sorry to take this off on a tangent, but I think you've hit something that still colours the US's policies today. We do NOT have direct experience of living with the destruction of war. We see it sanitized and Disney-fied at the movies. But we don't live with it.
Post #70,405 by boxley 12/22/02 5:14:51 PM Reply	f you use the word civilian in your sentence Ill accept that. We have a lot of people that have seen war up close and blood on the fingers. thanx, bill will work for cash and other incentives [link\|http://home.tampabay.rr.com/boxley/resume/Resume.html\|skill set] You think that you can trust the government to look after your rights? ask an Indian
Post #70,421 by Brandioch 12/22/02 6:47:01 PM Reply	Sorry, I didn't clarify that sufficiently. That was what I meant when I said "We do NOT have direct experience of living with the destruction of war." We go there, we kill people, we come back to our nice, safe families. We go there, we bomb buildings, we come back to our nice, safe homes. We live in a safe environment (or just about as safe as can be found). At times, we leave this environment to go inflict some pain and loss on others and then we come back.
Post #70,673 by mmoffitt 12/24/02 11:24:38 AM Reply	Re: The stakes. This is what has troubled me since I was a little boy. Everything the Soviets did during the Cold War involving nuclear capability was a defensive action. And virtually everything we (the US) did was offensive. Indeed, it can well be argued that using two nukes in Japan was to send Soviet Russia a message. Still, we proclaimed our innocense to the world. "We" were the good guys, "They" the bad. Our propaganda worked, and continues to work exceedingly well. Soviet propaganda, otoh, was not at all effective. I speak here of the people. In 1969, during the Cold War, if you were an American in the Soviet Union you were treated like gold. I speak here of personal experience. My father has returned to Russia several times since the fall and his experiences since the fall were much different. He has been mugged each time, once bad enough to be flown to medical facilities in Frankfort. It seems now that they know us, they don't care much for us. Except, of course, for the new corrupt elite (including some old Bolsheviks) who can work now in concert with our corporations to exploit Russia and her people even more than the old Party ever did. We are not now, nor have we ever been, good World Citizens. I take heart in the knowledge that it is now our turn. It happened to the Ottoman Empire, the Roman Empire, the Turkish Empire, etc. We are, if we stay the course, going to fall as hard and as far as our imperialist predecessors.
Post #70,730 by Ashton 12/24/02 8:56:10 PM Reply	Defensive: an example. It was Livermore Labs, under \ufffdgis of our Other (Hungarian) Strangelove misanthrope, the Dark Dr. Teller et al - who spawned, invented, started the MIRVing; this at a time (dates escape my mentation just now) when we were well ahead of the quantities and qualities of Holocaust-producing Peace Missiles extant, yada yada. There was indeed No Need - but we could so we did. Oblivious to consequences - as ever, when pursuing an insanely-Great new techno idea.. The USSR simply had to respond to this overt and cynical escalation. Ronnie was willing to quadruple (?) our Nat'l Debt to spend the USSR into submission; some believe that was a wise solution. But our laissez-faire penny-pinching (re assisting their conversion to a more US Bizness-friendly target of exploitation) - indicates the same short-term-gain mentality which drives everything we implement. 90 days / next election. Our ongoing habits of er Christian Innocence won't soon dissipate (try turning the Other Cheek\ufffd to a Rumsfeld or worse!/earlier a Ego-besotted McNamara). It's part of the ingrained Disneyland fantasy that We Must be The Good since, God IS on Our ~~Currency~~ Side. Hey, this stuff Sells! How else explain the inevitable next (and soon) Solo First-Strike.. no matter what anyone in the world says. We shall unleash a reservoir of hatred such that - You Ain't Seen Nothin Yet, Bub. And this - no matter how 'surgical' our techno-toys or how many $100K insurance policies we later bestow upon the collaterals we damage, on National Tee Vee. Billy was able to buy off 7? 8? of the States - from pursuing legitimate legal redress from the barbarians. W and a lot of folk imagine we shall buy our way out of what is coming, keep the [oil] AND 'create' a nicely domesticated 'democratic' ME, orchestrated to Dubya's dream of "fixing the World" (As-told-to - Woodward, recently) Tune: It's a Small Small Small Small World \ufffd Disney Galactic Corp (Yes, they do think this way. No secret, that) Hah; pass the WassUp? bowl, Ashton, just about off to enjoy a last Pre-War celeb of the Season Hope you are 'off' to the same :-) When the rich assemble to concern themselves with the business of the poor, it is called Charity. When the poor assemble to concern themselves with the business of the rich, it is called Anarchy. -Paul Richards
Post #70,819 by a6l6e6x 12/25/02 4:33:25 PM Reply	Re: The stakes. And what happened on the ground did it not trouble you? From the Elbe River in Germany to Vladivostok (Владивосток) and on to the Bering Straits 12 timezones to the East you had the Soviet Union and it's client states. That's ignoring Cuba! And "revolutions" fomenting in other places in Central and South America, Africa, and Asia. These were defensive actions? Give me a break! Alex "No man's life, liberty, or property are safe while the legislature is in session."\t-- Mark Twain
Post #70,842 by Ashton 12/25/02 7:15:10 PM Reply	Of course! that is the "other side" of an infinite series of stimulus/response == the Same Game as makes the Palestinian/Israeli matter just as insoluble: from present juvenile Eye-for Eye Old Testament mindsets, forged in ignorance and superstitions of the past. I may be cracked, but - I deem that escalating the already significant risk of nuclear winter for All Species, via MIRV escalation: is on another scale from all of these ordinary, predictable homo-sap Power-quests. That was obscene, despicable and we started it. (As of 12/25/02: ICBM response time is still TWO MINUTES, last I heard from the hardened grapevine) Ashton When the rich assemble to concern themselves with the business of the poor, it is called Charity. When the poor assemble to concern themselves with the business of the rich, it is called Anarchy. -Paul Richards

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