Can War Ever be "Justifiable"?

[Chakra-X]

In the end, both GWB and Lincoln got exactly what they wanted, though, so kudos to them.

But..But...Honest Abe!

I get a weird feeling when Bush and Lincoln are legitimately compared. But I only agree on that on the broad sense.

However, as a strict follower of the constitution, Lincoln refused to take any action against the South unless the Unionists themselves were attacked first. This finally happened in April 1861.

Wikipedia also states he was an "outspoken opponent" against the expansion of slavery in America (though the keyword "expansion" may be misleading").

Bush on the other hand has supported the idea of "preemptive strikes" against countries to prevent a terrorist attack. Bush has also abused signing orders more than any other President, basically circumventing the constitution. And Chenney, yeesh, he basically thinks the President is above the law when it comes to "doing his job".

I think Lincoln's actions were much more noble, or at least crafted better, than Bush's.

And I highly doubt the North was the pure side in the Civil War, but if the South based their entire quality of life on slaves and depended on them, but still treated them like ****, then there's something wrong with that picture.

 

[Zeonix]

I wouldn't call him a strict constitutionalist:

http://usgovinfo.about.com/od/rightsandfreedoms/a/habeuscorpus.htm
http://www.fff.org/freedom/1100e.asp

 

[ZeroNightmare]

The emperor of Japan didnt even know what was going on until the war was almost over because the military council kept lieing and feeding him and the people propaganda.

Lets leave george out of this :/

 

[Zeonix]

The emperor of Japan didnt even know what was going on until the war was almost over because the military council kept lieing and feeding him and the people propaganda.

Lets leave george out of this :/

Well, there are two trains of thought regarding the emperor. The first is what you said, and the second is the emperor was a bull**** artist and said anything he could to keep from being charged with war crimes.

I tend to gravitate towards the latter perspective.

I kinda don't see the point in leaving GWB out of this conversation as we're currently unofficially waging war against two countries.

 

[Chakra-X]

I wouldn't call him a strict constitutionalist:

http://usgovinfo.about.com/od/rightsandfreedoms/a/habeuscorpus.htm
http://www.fff.org/freedom/1100e.asp

Well damn =/. I learned something. But is there a President out there that would not increase their powers in times of war?

But in Lincoln's defense, The US was literally being torn a part, with an actual war going on. Bush's war is a little bit more messy. I'll admit I'm biased, since I can not just picture Bush in the same league as Lincoln.

And as for bringing the current war into discussion, part of me instantly believes that what is going on does not have enough justification and that it's a no brainer, but part of me did not want to hear points that justify a "war" I've been hearing/learning about for the past couple of years.

 

[Zeonix]

Just because everyone else is doing it doesn't mean it's right.

The Iraqi and Afghani "conflicts" aren't nearly as black and white as most people believe. Should we have waged war for the reasons we were given? Absolutely not, but at the same time we aren't nearly as knowledgeable as we would like to believe. If I were given the same intel as higher ranking government officials, I don't know if I'd take the high road. There are long-term goals that we're simply not considering when we think of the Middle East. Why have we basically surrounded Iran? Why are we maintaining such a heavy presence in the ME? Why are we supporting, arming and funding Israel? The answers to these questions and more give us a better understanding of the big picture. Personally, I think we're trying to secure the ME in order to ensure that we have a steady supply of the natural resources we so desperately require. Why? Because we know China is a threat, and we know Russia intends to return to their former glory. Once you stop looking at every event as separate and unrelated events and realize everything is connected, you can't help but realize we're (not limited to just the US) simply preparing for something much larger.

Of course, even all of this is just a small part of a much larger picture and it'd more than a few paragraphs to describe every facet. Anyone who tells you life is simple is a liar.

 

[Chakra-X]

Of course, even all of this is just a small part of a much larger picture and it'd more than a few paragraphs to describe every facet. Anyone who tells you life is simple is a liar.

I don't believe that just because a lot of people do/think something that it is right, I just thought most opinions here would have been similar.

Sometimes I wish politics and life were black and white. Things would be so much more easier and less frustrating =/. But, I honestly believe, many things that are complicated now do not have to be complicated. We just make it that way.

 

[ZeroNightmare]

As long as you say your fighting for god I guess wars justifiable, just make sure you kill lots of infidels.

 

[vahn9]

i think using wikipedia as a source is wrong because anyone you me or some guy who wants his own version of history and edit that page your using for whatever reason do i think war is justifiable as someone in the military i'll tell you some times you gotta fight for ****. wrong right or whatever the thing with iraq something alot of people forget many people im not saying you guys is the president of the united states of america picks what wars we fight not the people fighting it so for people to always ***** about oh its the people who are fighting how can it be the military's fault if the person you voted for started the war.

If you wanna ask if i like people from iraq id tell you no because i had some friends die to them but do i hate each and everyone of them no i don't because thats just stupid and for you to say we torture them thats just ****en retarded i guess you don't know anything about the geneva convention and what it means to treat a prisoner of war most of those people from that country would kill you no problem and they have no problem expressing that to you and i know first hand one thing i'll tell you about them is iraqi's are some real homo's not making fun of them but i mean some ***'s man on thrusday i think it was they believe allah isn't watching those ****ers would be having *** orgy's with each other *** ass stick in the botty ass ***s

i don't think we caused the torture they torture them selfs with butt humping each other

 

[Dzamija]

Using bombs encased with radioactive material doesn't justify not using Nuclear weapons. I find it kind of wierd that your saying "The nukes were terrible, they produced tons of radioactive waste that will come to haunt us" then you suggest using radioactive bombs instead of nuclear weapons.

As I said, they're much, much weaker than nuclear weapons. It's used-up uranium from power plants that NATO put in their bombs when they did their business here in Serbia. They still pack a punch, but they don't cause third limbs to grow and ****. Understand?

If at first you don't succeed.... try again.

You succeeded in causing the biggest boom ever up until then, and the most destruction and death with a single bomb. I still think Japan would give up sooner or later if you gave them more than 3 days to think about it.

<hr style="color: rgb(255, 255, 255);" size="1"> <!-- / icon and title --><!-- message -->

i think using wikipedia as a source is wrong because anyone you me or some guy who wants his own version of history and edit that page your using for whatever reason do i think war is justifiable as someone in the military i'll tell you some times you gotta fight for ****. wrong right or whatever the thing with iraq something alot of people forget many people im not saying you guys is the president of the united states of america picks what wars we fight not the people fighting it so for people to always ***** about oh its the people who are fighting how can it be the military's fault if the person you voted for started the war.

Do you even know why the war in Iraq began? And did you ask yourself if it was reason enough to send a country back to the stone age and kill thousands of people?

If you wanna ask if i like people from iraq id tell you no because i had some friends die to them but do i hate each and everyone of them no i don't because thats just stupid and for you to say we torture them thats just ****en retarded i guess you don't know anything about the geneva convention and what it means to treat a prisoner of war most of those people from that country would kill you no problem and they have no problem expressing that to you

Well what did you expect when you massively invade their country and basically doing the same thing that you're complaning about, to them? Of course they're gonna fight back.

 

[Prozac]

As long as you say your fighting for god I guess wars justifiable, just make sure you kill lots of infidels.

the hell?
That's the worst reason to wage war with anyone..

seriously now, that's just plain stupid

 

[Deman]

i think using wikipedia as a source is wrong because anyone you me or some guy who wants his own version of history and edit that page your using for whatever reason do i think war is justifiable as someone in the military i'll tell you some times you gotta fight for ****. wrong right or whatever the thing with iraq something alot of people forget many people im not saying you guys is the president of the united states of america picks what wars we fight not the people fighting it so for people to always ***** about oh its the people who are fighting how can it be the military's fault if the person you voted for started the war.

If you wanna ask if i like people from iraq id tell you no because i had some friends die to them but do i hate each and everyone of them no i don't because thats just stupid and for you to say we torture them thats just ****en retarded i guess you don't know anything about the geneva convention and what it means to treat a prisoner of war most of those people from that country would kill you no problem and they have no problem expressing that to you and i know first hand one thing i'll tell you about them is iraqi's are some real homo's not making fun of them but i mean some ***'s man on thrusday i think it was they believe allah isn't watching those ****ers would be having *** orgy's with each other *** ass stick in the botty ass ***s

i don't think we caused the torture they torture them selfs with butt humping each other

Let's see... Warning :warning: for the bolded part. You can't say you aren't making fun of them, then proceed to insult them. I'm not making fun of you, but you have really ****ty grammar. Learn some punctuation. It doesn't work like that. But seriously though, I don't care about commas or semicolons but at least use periods.

 

[Dzamija]

the hell?
That's the worst reason to wage war with anyone..

seriously now, that's just plain stupid

I think that was a joke, Prozac

 

[tolore]

You succeeded in causing the biggest boom ever up until then, and the most destruction and death with a single bomb. I still think Japan would give up sooner or later if you gave them more than 3 days to think about it.

But it's not just 3 days of 'hum i wonder if they'll give up or not'. It's 3 days of WAR, people are dying during those three days, so instead of letting them surrender sooner or later, we chose to make them give up sooner. It was probably better for both countries that way, and it was definitely better for us that way.

 

[Dzamija]

It is three days of war, but during those three days, all the casualties combined couldn't be compared to the casualties caused by those two bombs.

 

[Zeonix]

And the casualties caused by those two bombs combined would have been exceeded by far had the US and Japan fought a conventional war all the way to the Emperor's Palace.

 

[Dzamija]

How can you be sure it would've come down to a conventional war?

 

[Zeonix]

Because that's the type of war they were already engaged in -_-.

 

[Dzamija]

I don't recall an invasion of Japan. I knew there were Naval battles with Japan but that's about it.

 

[Zeonix]

Really? Just naval battles? Marines and their Japanese counterparts weren't dying by the tens of thousands to take over piece of **** islands? We weren't slowly island hopping our way to Japan? The Pacific theater was far worse than the European theater in a myriad of ways.

You obviously need to do a lot of research.