Dear John Bing,

Speaking of learning history, your interpretation of 20th century
history is rather spotty. I recommend that peace museums consider
programming in world history to be a key element of lifelong learning
activities.

WW2 was fought over colonies and the natural resources therein. It was
very much connected to oil, especially, which was an important
condition in both the war along the Pacific Rim and Hitler's drive to
the Baku oil fields. (Not coincidentally, a general area that is the
focus of contention by big powers today.)  Oil was very clearly a major
trigger for the Japan-US conflict, and the attack on the US fleet in
Hawaii was connected to the oil embargo of Japan. Certainly one of the
major resources coming out of what is now Indonesia and coastal Vietnam
is oil. c.f. Royal Dutch Shell.

At least some in government in England (such as Churchill) and the US
favored pushing Germany toward the USSR in the hopes of doing it in.
Thus, while Germany began its blitzkrieg in June 1941, the opening a
second front was held up until June 1944. The fact that the USSR
decisively defeated Germany on the 'eastern' front explains both how
that war was actually decided and why a second front in Europe was
finally opened - to try and occupy France and points east before the
Red Army could.

Chamberlain wasn't trying to secure peace in Europe as some abstract
concept, he was trying to buy some time for England to prepare for the
coming conflict.

If anything, the maneuvering - as well as the real shooting in China,
Ethiopia and Spain - by the so-called Allied and Axis powers before the
main hostilities commenced is a clear example of how it didn't really
matter who fired the first shot. As Clausewitz observed in general and
a century earlier, the coming war was the continuation of their
politics by other, violent, means.

-L.D.


On Wednesday, July 21, 2004, at 12:04 AM, Automatic digest processor
wrote:

 > Date:    Mon, 19 Jul 2004 20:45:10 -0700
 > From:    "John A. Bing" <[log in to unmask]>
 > Subject: Re: Stonewalk
 >
 > I have restrained myself from entering this thread as I viewed it as a
 > rather naive effort of claiming that one could make war go away by
 > just being nice and not having an army.  It makes me wonder if they
 > still teach history in our schools.  I also wonder if the proponents
 > of no army are just doing this as a political message for the coming
 > election.  A few points:
 >
 > Did anyone think of how many fewer millions of people would have been
 > killed in WWII if Chamberlain had taken a strong stand to Hitler
 > instead of relying on Hitler's assurance on non aggression.  We all
 > can take a lesson by watching the old newsreel of Chamberlain getting
 > out of the airplane and holding up a piece of paper and claiming that
 > because of his agreement with Hitler there will be "..peace in our
 > times..." Ha.
 >
 > Hitler invaded Poland  and Russia not because they had armies but
 > because they had small armies that he could conquer.
 >
 > Ask the people of Belgian and Luxembourg, both of which had minuscule
 > armies what their "peace" was during WWI as well as in WWII.
 >
 > Lastly, if you are repulsed by war, shooting and hurting people, why
 > don't you get rid of the police.  They are just the communities's
 > equivalent of an army.  Just think how your lives would change if we
 > didn't have our police or as they are often referred to as "peace
 > officers." You can be sure it would find us all hunkering down in our
 > houses scared to go out because of all the thugs and robbers out
 > there.
 >
 > We need our police and we need our army and, we need to stop the
 > Hitlers and el Quida BEFORE they do us harm.  The only point is that
 > firm and factual justification will only come when they write the
 > history, and if you are wrong, you probably won't be around to read
 > it.
 > John Bing

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