Another WW-I Chemical Site In Washington, DC 249
WrongSizeGlass writes "The AP is reporting that the US Army Corps of Engineers has uncovered what appears to be the fourth major disposal area for World War I-era munitions and chemical weapons in the nation's capital. Digging was suspended at a construction site after 'workers pulled smoking glassware from the pit — preliminary tests show the glassware was contaminated with the toxic chemical arsenic trichloride. ... Workers also discovered a jar about three-quarters full of a dark liquid that turned out to be the chemical agent mustard.' Someone needs to remind our government of the meaning of NIMBY."
No Jahid Needed (Score:4, Insightful)
We seem intent enough upon killing ourselves. Outside help need not apply!
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Jahid? Is that when Jamaicans storm the country and distribute weed everywhere?
I'm not surprised (Score:2)
None of their 'disposal' methods were remotely safe and by the time the facilities get shut down, there's no documentation.
Pretty much anything that used to be a military testing facility or base should be treated as a superfund site.
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there's no documentation.
I'm sure the whole thing is very well documented, it's just that all that documentation on military activity is wherever the government keeps the rest of the classified information in order to protect themselves^Wus.
Explanation (Score:5, Insightful)
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Toxic chemicals leaching into the groundwater would go a long way towards explaining some of the things that go on in DC.
Does mustard gas corrupt people that fast?
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Sadly, it's not toxic enough.
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Then again, it could be that the cause and effect are just the opposite of what you're suggesting. They import lots of loonies.
Occam to the rescue! (Score:2, Insightful)
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Very few politicians live in that part of town.
Saddam's WMDs Found! (Score:5, Funny)
Maybe they're really Saddam's WMDs that Bush and Cheney were searching for all those years! Those sneaky Iraqis!
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Who allowed internet access from the Crawford Ranch again? You know how G gets when he's drinking.
Re:Saddam's WMDs Found! (Score:5, Interesting)
The US troops found the facility, right where the inspectors told them it was, the dumb as dirt grunts opened the buildings up, didn't find anything worth stealing, and left the doors (literally) wide open. Then they burned down the administrative offices, with all the material's documentation, hopped back in their hummers and drove off.
The real tragedy is that local villagers, not knowing what the stuff was, dumped the yellow cake on the ground and stole the barrels for domestic use. Months later visiting reporters found the containers being used for food and water storage, and the entire area horribly contaminated. Here at home it would be declared a disaster area, but in Iraq the occupiers have just left them there to die.
IIRC, KBR and Bechtel carried out the cleanup of the materials, hiring locals to shovel up yellow cake by hand with no protective equipment.
Aren't you proud?
Re:Saddam's WMDs Found! (Score:4, Insightful)
Citation Needed.
Re:Saddam's WMDs Found! (Score:4, Informative)
http://www.globalsecurity.org/wmd/world/iraq/tuwaitha.htm [globalsecurity.org]
http://www.globalpolicy.org/component/content/article/168/37640.html [globalpolicy.org]
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/middle_east/2856647.stm [bbc.co.uk]
http://www.mediamonitors.net/gowans36.html [mediamonitors.net]
That should get you started. Learn to use a search engine AC.
Re:Saddam's WMDs Found! (Score:4, Interesting)
The only link you provided that isn't a shrill and biased advocacy website is the BBC one, so it's the only one I bothered to reference. And I find no reference to reinforce your assertions.
So please take your big lies elsewhere.
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Even if true (which I am not qualified to comment on), this represents about 1/100th of the story. If you haven't read The Threatening Storm, by Kenneth Pollack, you simply don't know what you're talking about.
The Threatening Storm is a comprehensive look at all the machinations Saddam's regime took to confound, mislead and stymie inspectors. Pollack has as good or better a grasp of the events of this period than anyone in the world, as he was Director for Persian Gulf Affairs on President Clinton's Nationa
I know (Score:3, Funny)
Someone needs to remind our government of the meaning of NIMBY.
I know, that's what I've always said. I've always said we should have buried that stuff in Germany. Or at least England.
Re:I know (Score:5, Funny)
Thank you, but we have quite enough of your toxic crap already:
www.mcdonalds.co.uk
www.kfc.co.uk
etc.
Re:I know (Score:4, Funny)
NIMBY (Score:2, Insightful)
"Someone needs to remind our government of the meaning of NIMBY."
HUH! I can think of no more appropriate place than in our government's backyard. Where else should they be dumping this? City folk like them want to dump it out in my back yard. I don't want it. Let them keep it.
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Oh, cut the crap. The "big government" that you guys love to complain about didn't exist in 1914.
This could just as easily have happened in any other big city (in fact, it has [wikipedia.org] at least once). NIMBYism doesn't have much hold in DC, primarily because the city has very little sovereignty of its own. It astonishes me to this day that the city managed to keep I-95 out of the city center.
Going then now, Sir... (Score:5, Insightful)
Aye-aye, Captain! The time travel vessel is being readied in the launch bay, and your message will be delivered to those 1914 morons in just a few minutes!
Brilliant advice, Sir!
Remind? (Score:3, Insightful)
To what end? So they don't travel a century back in time to bury their weapons ever again?
Maybe they should also have some military official today apologize for someone else burying weapons in the distant past.
I believe this is a case of personifying the government as a 200-year-old, which leads to ridiculous statements, and worse, ridiculous policy.
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> I believe this is a case of personifying the government as a 200-year-old,
> which leads to ridiculous statements, and worse, ridiculous policy.
Yes. As ridiculous as, say, personifying corporations.
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200 years old? No wonder he's forgotten where he's buried stuff!
asinine (Score:5, Informative)
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Re:asinine (Score:4, Informative)
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I'd like to know, from a historical perspective, how this was just "misplaced" so close to the capital, even during war time. Unlike Europe, this is not an area where a war occurred
True, but it's certainly an area that the war might have spread to, had things gone differently. Perhaps the weapons were stockpiled there in case they might be needed to defend the capital?
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John Keegan tells of an area in France along the Somme where the freeze-thaw cycles still bring unexploded shells to the surface that landed there in 1916. The sugar-beet farms are worked by unmanned machines dragged across the fields on cables. Every so often a machine stops with a CLANK, and the army comes and takes the shell away.
Keegan calls it a place where the earth vomits.
rj
Nuclear fuel missing too (Score:2)
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other way around maybe? (Score:5, Insightful)
"They've created a hazardous waste site in the neighborhood," Wells said.
Actually, the neighborhood was created in the hazardous waste site.
further from TFA: the leftover munitions and chemicals were buried behind the school in what was then rural farmland
The article makes it sound like the chems found their way there after the housing development. How much of this is the army's fault... and how much of it is the housing developers fault? Surely they did a little research on the history of the land before they tried to start a housing development there? Probably not, or maybe that's why they got the land so cheap? I know someone personally that had a very close call with some land he almost bought, (got stuck with) that he found out just in time used to be where line transformers were rebuilt. (can you say "ground and buildings saturated with PCBs [wikipedia.org]?) When you buy something like that, it doesn't become exclusively your problem, but you now share a portion of the responsibility for its cleanup once it's deemed necessary.
Basically, if there's a toxic problem and you own it and you don't clean it up or get it cleaned up, you're on the hook for it even years down the road after it's changed hands several times. Of course, the more hands its passed through before someone forces the cleanup, the more diluted your share of the blame becomes. Unfortunately, for this reason, it's on their best interest to NOT clean it up, and to do everything they can to hide the problem, for as long as possible.
Someone's probably doing some research right now trying to figure out how well this chemical disposal was documented, who if anyone was negligent for not factoring it in or disclosing it, and who all is now on the list of people that will be footing the cleanup bill.
NIMBY? (Score:5, Informative)
The area was the Government's back-yard at the time, and the actual home where the munitions were found is Federal property today, so I think the NIMBY tag is misapplied.
There was a chemical weapons lab at American University during the first world war, and they apparently also were testing the weapons delivery systems, and fired all kinds of nasty stuff into what was then vacant land.
Which is not to say that it's OK, of course, only that it's a documentation and clean-up FAIL, and not really a NIMBY FAIL.
Also, I was surprised to see the article actually did refer to "smoking glassware", I had assumed that was an alarmist mis-interpretation of "smoked glass", but apparently they did find "smoking and fuming glassware".
Re:NIMBY? (Score:5, Funny)
Also, I was surprised to see the article actually did refer to "smoking glassware", I had assumed that was an alarmist mis-interpretation of "smoked glass",
I thought that it meant that they found some bongs and/or crack pipes.
This fills me with confidence... (Score:2, Interesting)
The meaning of NIMBY (Score:5, Informative)
I thought the meaning of NIMBY was, "Yes, I agree that our town needs a new trash dump/electrical plant/sewage plant/prison, but Not In My Back Yard.
Put it on the Black/Poor side of town.
That is, historically, the meaning of NIMBY.
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During WWI, Washington was very different (Score:5, Interesting)
Cows grazed near Georgetown until the WW TWO era.
I bet the munitions were dumped far from the monumental core, in an area the locals thought of as "the sticks". That doesn't excuse it of course, it just explains it.
NIMBY? (Score:4, Insightful)
This was 95 years ago. The chemical sites were there first; the backyards came later.
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MOD PARENT UP.
People move into areas that have dumps and roads and coal mines and other shit and then have the gall to complain.
How bout ya complain to the shady developers who cover over garbage, plant some grass and sell you a cookie cutter house that is worht shit?
In other news ... (Score:5, Funny)
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The ones who haven't died yet are most likely under health care.
Re:I've got a genius idea (Score:5, Insightful)
They're one of the very few things stopping "respectable businesses" (of any kind) from dumping such stuff wherever it's possible.
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Great! Government doing its job-- doing the job that the free-market can't provide for itself.
Now please work on getting the government back into its box of things the market can't provide for itself-- self defense, roads, and that's pretty much it.
Re:I've got a genius idea (Score:5, Funny)
leave healthcare in the hands of corporations (Score:5, Insightful)
they have a sterling track record in dealing with waste disposal, and they always have your well-being as their paramount concern
</sarcasm>
nobody in the healthcare debate believes government will handle healthcare super-efficiently and without bureaucracy or waste. it will simply be BETTER than what we had beforehand. at least the government has a mandate to take care of YOU rather than some shareholders
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"It is not from the benevolence of the butcher, the brewer, or the baker, that we expect our dinner, but from regard to their own interest. We address ourselves, not to their humanity but to their self-love, and never talk to them of our own necessities but of their advantages. Nobody but a beggar chooses to depend chiefly upon the benevolence of his fellow citizens."
— Adam Smith
Re:leave healthcare in the hands of corporations (Score:5, Insightful)
Of course if we put Adam Smith in charge, he would never allow the horrific corporate entities that we have in charge of our healthcare now to exist at all. He was not at all a fan of publicly traded corporations Since we've ignored all of his sage advice, clinging only to the most dumbed down summary of his general view on economics, we are now obligated to either socialize the most critical needs of the people or completely alter the business landscape (including dis-incorporating most large businesses) .
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Re:leave healthcare in the hands of corporations (Score:4, Interesting)
That doesn't mean government being in charge will be any better.
Assuming the US government can do as good a job as the governments of other first world countries, it should be [commonwealthfund.org].
Of course, maybe the US will simply fail where so many others have succeeded. That's always a possibility... but if that happens, at least it should put an end to the "US is always the best at everything" triumphalism memes.
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Assuming the US government can do as good a job as the governments of other first world countries, it should be. Of course, maybe the US will simply fail where so many others have succeeded.
The bill doesn't even attempt to do what other countries have done. It doesn't reform the system, it just adds a layer to the existing system. That's a bad sign.
but if that happens, at least it should put an end to the "US is always the best at everything" triumphalism memes.
That's an extremely depressing outlook. Besides, it won't even accomplish that, it will change it to, "US is always the best at everything....... unless liberals are in charge," which I don't think is what you want.
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Appeal to authority (Score:5, Insightful)
"It is not from the benevolence of the butcher, the brewer, or the baker, that we expect our dinner, but from regard to their own interest. We address ourselves, not to their humanity but to their self-love, and never talk to them of our own necessities but of their advantages. Nobody but a beggar chooses to depend chiefly upon the benevolence of his fellow citizens."
-- Adam Smith
You want to appeal to authority? Fine. I'll see your Adam Smith quote and raise you another. Here's what he has to say about the corporations you'd rather see in charge of things:
"[T]he greater part of [general shareholders] seldom pretend to understand any thing of the business of the company; and when the spirit of faction happens not to prevail among them, give themselves no trouble about it, but receive contentedly such halfyearly or yearly dividend as the directors think proper to make to them. This total exemption front trouble and front risk, beyond a limited sum, encourages many people to become adventurers in [corporations], who would, upon no account, hazard their fortunes in any private [partnership]. ... The directors of such companies, however, being the managers rather of other people's money than of their own, it cannot well be expected that they should watch over it with the same anxious vigilance with which the partners in a private [partnership] frequently watch over their own. Like the stewards of a rich man, they are apt to consider attention to small matters as not for their master's honour, and very easily give themselves a dispensation from having it. Negligence and profusion, therefore, must always prevail, more or less, in the management of the affairs of such a company."
-- Adam Smith, The Wealth of Nations, pp. 506 (some archaic terms substituted with modern ones.)
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no, I just have a lot of friends that are doctors, and I know how horrible their insurance premiums are now. And why? Because no matter how silly or frivolous a lawsuit might be, that doesn't preventing it from winning...like the various that Edwards won for his clients, despite every expert saying the cases were absurd.
But go ahead and attack me as a person because I think differently than you - it makes you stronger, better. It opens your horizons to endless possibilities, rivaled only by zombo.com
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The problem is that we didn't just have a vote for the government to take over health care. If we did, there might be some hope.
Instead, what we have now is a government plan that mandates everyone (eventually) buy a government-designed plan from a few government-regulated finance companies. There is no "insurance" here - insurance implies some sort of risk and there is no risk possible in the system that has been set up. It isn't a fund you pay into and eventually get all your money back, either.
We woul
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We would be far, far better off if everyone just put money into a savings account and used that money to pay medical bills. And hospitals and doctors were required to treat the people that didn't have the savings account and cost-shift it all over to the people that did.
Was this paragraph sarcasm? Cause that is basically what is going on with insurance and the rest of your post supports that the people with insurance pay for the people that don't. How would a savings account be any different?
Re:I've got a genius idea (Score:5, Informative)
The problem is that we didn't just have a vote for the government to take over health care. If we did, there might be some hope.
You're right. Instead, we had an election where we (overwhelmingly) voted for a party that touted HCR as a huge portion of its platform. Shame on them for following through on their promises!
Health savings account (Score:2)
We would be far, far better off if everyone just put money into a savings account and used that money to pay medical bills.
So I have $10,000 in a savings account, but the bill for the procedure is $20,000. Now what? You still need insurance. But some individual health insurers have integrated the benefits of your suggestion into high-deductible plans. Expenses up to $3,000 are paid out of the insured's tax-advantaged health savings account, but the insurer starts paying once the plan hits the deductible after, for example, a catastrophic incident requiring hospitalization.
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You'll have to figure out how to reanimate them first. Most of the boneheads responsible for this screwup have died from old age by now.
Re:I've got a genius idea, too (Score:5, Funny)
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I'd bet McCain would have tried something similar if he thought he could convince his party - Nixon certainly tried.
That sick kid from a family that can't afford private healthcare could infect yours, it's only common sense to do something about that.
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Ah, so that comment was so threatening to your world view and ideas that you could only attack the messenger anonymously. Are you that threatened and weak?
He does have a point. But, we'll pull it closer than WWI and post era civil servants deciding to bury the stuff in major metro area (back then, it was already big); Government run Medicare is broken, vastly broken. Government run Social Security is broke and broken. There is so much red tape in the military that non-warfighting tasks truly cost 3 to 4 tim
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You do realize we are in a/recovering from a corporate banking collapse right? You want the same type of business accumen that caused this recession to cater to the (let's say..) less affluent among us?
Government is definitely broken, but at least we have a chance at these things with the gubment calling the shots. Big corp has no motive other than profit. Why help people when it can just wait us out?
Re:mustard is a chemical agent? (Score:5, Interesting)
Gas! Gas! Quick, boys!–An ecstasy of fumbling,
Fitting the clumsy helmets just in time;
But someone still was yelling out and stumbling
And flound'ring like a man in fire or lime...
Dim, through the misty panes and thick green light,
As under a green sea, I saw him drowning.
In all my dreams, before my helpless sight,
He plunges at me, guttering, choking, drowning.
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I once accidentally breathed in a very small amount of chlorine gas.
I was coughing my lungs up for weeks.
This gave some very intimate appreciation of the horrors of the gas attacks in the trenches.
Vinegar is unfriendly too (Score:2)
I once accidentally breathed in a very small amount of chlorine gas.
I was coughing my lungs up for weeks.
This gave some very intimate appreciation of the horrors of the gas attacks in the trenches.
I once had the same effect after accidentally inhaling a face-full of balsamic vinegar steam. Not fun. Worst thing I've ever had in my lungs (even worse than pepper spray). Was coughing and short of breath for weeks.
Re:mustard is a chemical agent? (Score:5, Informative)
At least credit Wilfred Owen for his work, "Dulce et Decorum Est".
The First World War poets turned out some amazing work. I prefer Siegfried Sassoon, who is well worth reading,
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Maybe not that big of a difference...remember, it's related to WW1, there were Germans involved.
PS. They were the evil ones.
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Maybe not that big of a difference...remember, it's related to WW1, there were Germans involved.
PS. They were the evil ones.
They were simply misunderstood.
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Plus, they were only obeying orders...
Re:mustard is a chemical agent? (Score:5, Interesting)
WWI wasn't really a "Good vs. Bad" war. Austrian Duke Ferdinand gets assassinated by the Black Hand, Austria waits a few months before retaliating, resulting in defensive 'hidden treaties' between nearly most of Europe. Prussia and the Austrian empire team up, the rest of Europe says "we pretty much have to protect the Balkans because the retaliation took too long (and now the lay people see it as aggression instead of justice.)" Somehow the Ottomans see it as an opportunity to get back what they lost before, the US supplies arms to all sides of the war until the Zimmerman Telegram. Austria & Prussia go "Oh shit, we don't have enough people," keep fighting until they run out of resources, then get screwed over during the final negotiations (which then leads to an atmosphere where an insane Jew declares a war on Jews, Catholics, Gypsies, Gays, and pretty much anyone else he doesn't like)
So unlike WWII, WWI wasn't really a "Good vs. Bad", unless you consider the Black Hand the bad guys. Of course, my experiences may be a little biased since my heritage consists of growing up in what was considered the Little Germany of the US (and where the local papers were printed in German until the US began fighting in the war.) Also, having songs about "going after those Huns" couldn't possibly have been a form of racist propaganda.
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If you read very much about German preparations for the war (which they seem to have been working towards, though not in quite the same brutal way as the Nazis did a couple decades later) and the way that they (certainly Wilhelm and probably Moltke with Krupp stage managing more than a bit) managed the first few months of it, you may think differently.
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Everybody was preparing for the war back then. Everybody.
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Re:mustard is a chemical agent? (Score:5, Insightful)
Yes, and [what would become] Germany and France had been invading each other back and forth, with some British support on the Continent thrown in, since the middle of the 19th century with no major bloodshed or escalation. Small wars over border areas were so common they were pretty much considered a rite of passage and an opportunity for adventure and national pride. People on both sides _looked forward_ to another chance to swipe some territory from rivals, and had no idea that technology and tactics would render WWI into something very different from the "glorious wars" their fathers and grandfathers told stories about.
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You paint it in a bit simplistic "official" fashion though...war was on the brink for a few years already (with the complex balancing dance between empires happening on the Balkans). Killing of Ferdinand was mostly just a trigger (he wasn't even especially liked in Austria ffs!...)
Re:mustard is a chemical agent? (Score:5, Informative)
Blackadder: George, the British Empire at present covers a quarter of the globe, while the German Empire consists of a small sausage factory in Tanganyika. I hardly think we can be entirely absolved from blame on the imperialistic front.
Blackadder: You see, Baldrick, in order to prevent a war in Europe, two super blocs developed: us, the French and the Russians on one side; and the Germans and Austro-Hungary on the other. The idea was to have two vast, opposing armies, each acting as the other's deterrent. That way, there could never be a war.
Baldrick: Except, well, this is sort of a war, isn't it?
Blackadder: That's right. There was one tiny flaw in the plan.
George: Oh, what was that?
Blackadder: It was bollocks.
Re:mustard is a chemical agent? (Score:5, Funny)
> Someone needs to remind our government of the meaning of NIMBY.
Yeah, all this crap was supposed to be buried in New Jersey.
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Re:mustard is a chemical agent? (Score:5, Insightful)
I think you are confusing the First World War with the Second World War. There were no Nazis involved in the first war (I really shouldn't have to explain this). Allied propaganda aside, the Germans were no better or worse than the allied powers.
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Yes, you really shouldn't have. The time it took to write your post would be better spent by exploring the concept of humor and culinary habits.
(btw, I'm a total mix of nationalities & ethnicities involved in both world wars on eastern front, so if you need somebody who's allowed to make fun of those events... ;) )
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True, but they didn't win which means that they became evil retrospectively.
Also, that thing about invading France was a bit not cool.
Re:mustard is a chemical agent? (Score:5, Insightful)
I'm a patriotic military vet, a stickler for honoring the sacrifices of our troops from all wars... I just got back from a ceremony honoring WW II veterans in fact.
And I've come to completely agree with you about WW I. The more I look at it, the harder it is to see the Germans as particularly evil. They didn't start the war, that's for sure. And Britain and France didn't have a moral advantage over them in any way. The whole thing was one big great powers pissing match, and Woodrow Wilson should have kept his promise to keep the US out of it. Further, and it pains me to say this, but the allied powers are directly responsible for the rise of Hitler. The brutal conditions imposed on Germany after the war made his rise possible. And you can be sure that leaders of the US in WW II knew that as well, which is why they took a completely different approach to Germany after victory. Instead of making them wallow in suffering, rebuild the country to democratic standards and market prosperity. Because the communists were waiting for their opportunity of we did not.
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In my history class in Europe, WW1 and WW2 were taught as having been one big war, with a 20 year interlude.
Spot-on analysis, in other words.
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The brutal conditions imposed on Germany after the war made his rise possible. And you can be sure that leaders of the US in WW II knew that as well, which is why they took a completely different approach to Germany after victory. Instead of making them wallow in suffering, rebuild the country to democratic standards and market prosperity.
That is incorrect. Look up JCS 1067. Allies quite openly wanted to essentially starve large part of German population (they activelly prevented food aid from some neighbouring European countries). Plus all German industrial base, patents, etc. was for the taking. German POWs quickly reclassified to fall outside protection of conventions. Steps which could improve economy - forbidden. This changed only after few years, because...
...the communists were waiting for their opportunity of we did not.
That was the primary reason for sudden change of heart. So Germany won't fall,
Let's D.D.R. (Score:2)
And you can be sure that leaders of the US in WW II knew that as well, which is why they took a completely different approach to Germany after victory. Instead of making them wallow in suffering, rebuild the country to democratic standards and market prosperity. Because the communists were waiting for their opportunity of we did not.
The commies got what they wanted: DDR (and I don't mean Dance Dance Revolution) and the Berlin Wall.
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GP also said "PS They were the evil ones". So, either he believes WWI Allied propaganda, or he is confusing the two wars.
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Maybe not that big of a difference...remember, it's related to WW1, there were Germans involved.
PS. They were the evil ones.
Because they lost?
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There is quite a difference between http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mustard_(condiment) [wikipedia.org] and http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sulfur_mustard [wikipedia.org] (or mustard gas).
Well, technically, mustard the condiment is a chemical agent, in that it has chemicals and it isn't completely inert. But it's only been used as a weapon in food fights, as far as I'm aware.
Re:mustard is a chemical agent? (Score:5, Funny)
There is quite a difference between http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mustard_(condiment) [wikipedia.org] and http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sulfur_mustard [wikipedia.org] (or mustard gas).
Well, technically, mustard the condiment is a chemical agent, in that it has chemicals and it isn't completely inert. But it's only been used as a weapon in food fights, as far as I'm aware.
The condiment - especially the spicy brown type - causes my uncle Milt to generate some mighty potent mustard gas...