|
WickedHate posted:That's the really terrible thing about the nukes. Not only did they kill countless innocent civilians, but if they didn't things probably would have been a million times worse, especially for civilians. No, the decision to use the nukes was the right choice. It saved countless American lives, and likely saved Japanese lives, as well, though that likely wasn't taken into account((nor should it have been).
|
#
?
Apr 6, 2015 21:05
|
|
|
|
| # ? Jun 5, 2024 09:19 |
|
|
WickedHate posted:Everyone says WWII was the only morally justified war, but it really wasn't. The nukes were wrong, Dresden was wrong, the internment camps were wong...there were no good guys. The US, UK, and Russia have always been villians and the Holocaust or Imperial Japanese war crimes didn't change that. Citation on the US or UK doing anything close to the Holocaust or the Rape of Nanking during the 30s or 40s, please. Randaconda has a new favorite as of 21:12 on Apr 6, 2015 |
|
#
?
Apr 6, 2015 21:09
|
|
|
Oh Hell No posted:Yeah, if the Jews and the Slavs had just taken one for the team and let themselves be exterminated, we could have avoided a lot of that mess. Look, all I'm saying is we just let Hitler have the Sudetenland and there won't be any more problems.
|
|
#
?
Apr 6, 2015 21:10
|
|
|
Hope this hasn't been posted yet, as it's the most unnerving thing I can think of: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_unidentified_murder_victims_in_the_United_States EDIT: specifically, the composites and reconstructions  
china bot has a new favorite as of 21:37 on Apr 6, 2015 |
|
#
?
Apr 6, 2015 21:32
|
|
|
whiteyfats posted:Citation on the US or UK doing anything close to the Holocaust or the Rape of Nanking during the 30s or 40s, please. Please, minorities were still being lynched in the streets and in their homes decades after WWII. Germany and Japan were doing that poo poo on a grand scale and in massive events that can be named, and that's the only reason people call them "the bad guys" when in reality nearly every country is just as bad as each other. I'm not sticking up for Japan or Germany, I'm just against framing the Allies as heroic do gooders when they'd also been extermanating and torturing people for their race, religion, sexuality, and mental condition for as long as they existed.
|
|
#
?
Apr 6, 2015 21:46
|
|
|
WickedHate posted:Please, minorities were still being lynched in the streets and in their homes decades after WWII. Germany and Japan were doing that poo poo on a grand scale and in massive events that can be named, and that's the only reason people call them "the bad guys" when in reality nearly every country is just as bad as each other. I'm not sticking up for Japan or Germany, I'm just against framing the Allies as heroic do gooders when they'd also been extermanating and torturing people for their race, religion, sexuality, and mental condition for as long as they existed. 
|
|
#
?
Apr 6, 2015 21:49
|
|
|
WickedHate posted:Please, minorities were still being lynched in the streets and in their homes decades after WWII. Germany and Japan were doing that poo poo on a grand scale and in massive events that can be named, and that's the only reason people call them "the bad guys" when in reality nearly every country is just as bad as each other. I'm not sticking up for Japan or Germany, I'm just against framing the Allies as heroic do gooders when they'd also been extermanating and torturing people for their race, religion, sexuality, and mental condition for as long as they existed. On the scale of either of those? Within a million miles? Citation, please.
|
|
#
?
Apr 6, 2015 22:34
|
|
|
WickedHate posted:Please, minorities were still being lynched in the streets and in their homes decades after WWII. Germany and Japan were doing that poo poo on a grand scale and in massive events that can be named, and that's the only reason people call them "the bad guys" when in reality nearly every country is just as bad as each other. I'm not sticking up for Japan or Germany, I'm just against framing the Allies as heroic do gooders when they'd also been extermanating and torturing people for their race, religion, sexuality, and mental condition for as long as they existed. I, too, remember when Churchill killed 6 million ethnic minorities in the concentration camps of England.
|
|
#
?
Apr 6, 2015 22:36
|
|
|
Mr. Gibbycrumbles posted:I, too, remember when Churchill killed 6 million ethnic minorities in the concentration camps of England. My grandfather was one of the leaders of the Rape of Berlin.
|
|
#
?
Apr 6, 2015 22:37
|
|
|
If you wanna point out the US and friends as bad guys, just look at WWI. It's a lot better (worse?) than WWII in that regard.
|
|
#
?
Apr 6, 2015 23:20
|
|
|
ranbo das posted:If you wanna point out the US and friends as bad guys, just look at WWI. It's a lot better (worse?) than WWII in that regard. Hey, the US was barely in that one. 
|
|
#
?
Apr 6, 2015 23:33
|
|
|
Oh man, 80 posts in my favorite thread! I can't pretend I don't think nuclear weapons and power are fascinating, but more weird stuff please. For content, I don't know how widespread this dude is: [url] http://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Akinwale_Arobieke [/url] (I apologize if that looks jacked up. Phone posting)
|
|
#
?
Apr 6, 2015 23:48
|
|
|
ranbo das, please elaborate on this, if you can. I'm actually really interested in the subject, but don't know as much about US involvement as I do the European powers. Or, if you don't want to continue the derail, I guess not. Either or.
|
|
#
?
Apr 6, 2015 23:50
|
|
|
whiteyfats posted:My grandfather was one of the leaders of the Rape of Berlin. I can't tell if you're being facetious but the Soviets weren't exactly pleasant on their way to pay back the Nazis in kind for Barbarossa. We tend to gloss over the eastern front of the war because it's not nearly as glamorous (and doesn't make for good TV) but if ever there was a textbook example of "pay evil unto evil" it would've been the Soviet march to Berlin at the close of the war. And while the US and UK weren't exactly joining in on the fun, they weren't too broke up about the communists raping and pillaging their way across East Prussia if it meant less dead GIs on their end.
|
|
#
?
Apr 6, 2015 23:52
|
|
|
whiteyfats posted:On the scale of either of those? Within a million miles? Citation, please. I don't think anyone is trying to draw a direct moral equivalence between the sides of ww2. There were unequivocally quantum differences between the morality of at least the western allies and the Nazis/Japan. But the horrible and unnerving thing about war is that is creates this hosed up moral compass that dictates certain results for certain costs. LeMay's firebombing campaign is simply hideous beyond belief, though not as hideous as the slaughters of china and the subsequent experimentation and hosed up poo poo that the Japanese regime lorded over. What people cannot seem to understand about this debate is that it is possible to decry the actions of our side without condoning the actions of the other. The rape of Nanjing was horrendous, a disgusting act and a blight on the face of the 20th century, but it is not the only one that took place in that war on either side - for a comparison in terms of scale as you're asking, the firebombing of Tokyo caused as many civilian deaths - possibly more. I know it's a tedious debate but focusing on "hurr hurr some guy is saying the nazis weren't the bad guys" is simplifying history to the point of idiocy. The truly scary and unnerving thing about Wikipedia articles relating to all huge civilian massacres of the Second World War is that all of them were planned and perpetrated by people not unlike ourselves. On all sides. Someone sat down and planned it and then other men enacted them. My grandfather was a bomber pilot who took part in some of the big British raids (that even churchill thought were unnecessary terror bombings) towards the end of the war. He was told that he was bombing industry mixed into residential areas, and that he would be "de housing". So he did it! And that is terrifying. Unnerving as all hell. War produces a hosed up moral compass - it has to! Whatever the justification for any way, however right it is and whatever the results, it is always about killing.
|
|
#
?
Apr 7, 2015 00:14
|
|
|
For once I have no qualms about attempting to derail the conversation. The Blue Ringed Octopus One of the worlds most dangerous marine animals.  I used to live right near a lake that had one of the highest concentrations of these little fuckers on the east coast of Australia. Why are they so dangerous? Well; Wikipedia on something other than loving world war 2 posted:No blue-ringed octopus antivenom is available yet, making it one of the deadliest reef inhabitants in the ocean. Alright, so point of order on them "fleeing" - they like to hide under detritus and have been known to take up in things like discarded coke cans. They're so tiny that you might not see them before you disturb them. On the subject of crazy venomous poo poo that lives here, how about the worlds most deadly snake - the Fierce Snake, AKA the Inland Taipan:  wikipedia posted:The inland taipan is considered the most venomous snake in the world; based on the median lethal dose value in mice, its venom, drop for drop, is by far the most toxic of any snake – much more so than even sea snakes – and it has the most toxic venom of any reptile when tested on human heart cell culture That's right fuckos, it's the deadliest snake in the world however you want to count it: wikipedia posted:
To break that down, one drop of its venom is enough to kill more than a million mice. The upshot of this is that they are very shy snakes, and their natural habitat in Australia is very small. Most of the recorded bites since the snake was identified in 1972 have been non-lethal, but their venom is still highly destructive: quote:Inland taipan snake venom contains potent presynaptic neurotoxins (toxins in venom that cause paralysis or muscle weakness). Also present are postsynaptic neurotoxins, which are less potent but more rapid acting than the presynaptic neurotoxins...The development of general and/or respiratory paralysis is of paramount concern in that these are often difficult to reverse once established, even with large amounts of antivenom. Prolonged intubation and ventilatory support (perhaps up to 1 week or longer) may be required... I was going to post some poo poo about the King Brown snake as well but I'm pretty hung over so gently caress it. They aren't as deadly as the Inland Taipan, but their habitat covers most of the of the country and they are highly aggressive and fast movers. Their strike range is immense, and they've been known to bite people who are sleeping. What a fucker. DPM has a new favorite as of 00:21 on Apr 7, 2015 |
|
#
?
Apr 7, 2015 00:16
|
|
|
Mr. Gibbycrumbles posted:I, too, remember when Churchill killed 6 million ethnic minorities in the concentration camps of England. Probably not the best person to use in your edgy response as that racist jew hating oval office loved the "original" concentration camps. And loving lol at people trying to pick good guys in WW2. It's was the biggest shitshow to ever happen and the most disgusting chapter of history. It's been 70 years I think we can drop the flag waving, relax and admit everyone came out of it with a blackened soul. The most unnerving thing in this thread is me finding out that people still think the biggest conflict that the worlds ever seen was some kind of loving cartoon.
|
|
#
?
Apr 7, 2015 01:16
|
|
|
I am not saying it's moral or "good", but this is how they justified it at the time: World War 2 was a "total war": entire nations in arms against each other. In a total war, there are no "civilians". The people back home making the bullets and the bombs and the tanks are just as much participants in the war as the soldiers at the front line, and therefore "valid targets", along with the infrastructure and anything else that supports, feeds, or arms the soldiers at the front. I wish I could find it, but I once read a letter home from a WWI German zeppelin pilot justifying to his mother his participation in the bombing raids over civilian Britain in just this way, even though he knew people were calling zeppelin raiders like him "baby killers". They couldn't have only targeted industrial and military targets even if they wanted to, anyway. The Army's own survey after the war concluded only 20% of bombs landed within a thousand feet of their targets. So part of this was just technological and tactical limitations. "We can't hit the factory unless we level the whole loving town." Imagined has a new favorite as of 01:53 on Apr 7, 2015 |
|
#
?
Apr 7, 2015 01:46
|
|
|
Allow me to deliver my carefully worded statement on the inherent badness and/or goodness of WWII and the actions therein, and then make a joke about how the REALLY unnerving thing is that people exist who have a different opinion than me. This is clearly the thread for that. Wait, no, that's loving retarded, read this instead: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_rampage_killers All over the world, sometimes people snap and kill a lot of people single-handedly. Take, for example, Woo_Bum-kon, who killed 57 people (including himself) over the course of a few hours. Why? He had an argument with his girlfriend, and he may have gotten drunk.
|
|
#
?
Apr 7, 2015 01:49
|
|
|
Imagined posted:World War 2 was a "total war": entire nations in arms against each other. In a total war, there are no "civilians". The people back home making the bullets and the bombs and the tanks are just as much participants in the war as the soldiers at the front line, and therefore "valid targets", along with the infrastructure and anything else that supports, feeds, or arms the soldiers at the front. Do you actually believe that? Because that's bullshit.
|
|
#
?
Apr 7, 2015 01:49
|
|
|
No, but they did. Good reading comprehension though. Found that letter: quote:We who strike the enemy where his heart beats have been slandered as "baby-killers" and "murderers of women"... What we do is repugnant to us too, but necessary. Very necessary. Nowadays there is no such animal as a non-combatant; modern warfare is total warfare. A soldier cannot function at the front without the factory worker, the farmer and all the other providers behind him. Source So you can take your "that's bullshit" and shove it up your rear end. To make it relevant to the thread, the unnerving part is that the "logic" of strategic carpet bombing almost always failed anyway. Far from breaking the "enemy" population's will and morale, it served as a rallying point and made them work harder. Even Germany, who was bombed possibly harder and more consistently than anybody, increased its industrial capacity during the war. So we firebombed shitloads of civilians and lost a fuckload of bomber crews and didn't achieve much worth the misery inflicted. Source: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Strategic_bombing_during_World_War_II Imagined has a new favorite as of 02:08 on Apr 7, 2015 |
|
#
?
Apr 7, 2015 01:55
|
|
|
There's going to be a Wikipedia page about me soon and how I tracked down and murdered a bunch of bickering nerds, keep an eye out for it
|
|
#
?
Apr 7, 2015 01:59
|
|
|
peter gabriel's murder of several bickering goons was beneficial in that it prevented a number of other deaths. Was it the right choice? No. Was it the correct choice? Unequivocally so.
|
|
#
?
Apr 7, 2015 02:04
|
|
|
peter gabriel posted:There's going to be a Wikipedia page about me soon and how I tracked down and murdered a bunch of bickering nerds, keep an eye out for it Scary and unnerving: many goons will probably laugh at this post (like I did), while at the same time remembering that one time we did that, a goon ended up shooting folks over puckins.
|
|
#
?
Apr 7, 2015 02:05
|
|
|
Son of Thunderbeast posted:Scary and unnerving: many goons will probably laugh at this post (like I did), while at the same time remembering that one time we did that, a goon ended up shooting folks over puckins. Yeah that puts things into perspective somewhat, WW2 is no where near as important as puckins, thanks for the reality check man 
|
|
#
?
Apr 7, 2015 02:07
|
|
|
Son of Thunderbeast posted:Scary and unnerving: many goons will probably laugh at this post (like I did), while at the same time remembering that one time we did that, a goon ended up shooting folks over puckins. Let's be honest, some goons laughed at that as well. Something Awful is pretty much a lodestone for people with horrifying senses of humor. Say, can someone repost the stuff about the ships that ran aground in the arctic? The bit where one of the crewmen warns the natives not to visit the shantytown of tents nearby the frozen ship gives me chills -- it's the kind of thing that'd make for a good horror story. Screaming Idiot has a new favorite as of 02:15 on Apr 7, 2015 |
|
#
?
Apr 7, 2015 02:13
|
|
|
 War is bad and hosed up things happen during a war, even to civilians. Let's move past this idea and post more content. Content: Kinetic Bombardment AKA Project Thor AKA the Rods From God are some fascinating Cold War ideas about weapons tech (to fit the current theme) and they're also fairly creepy in a weird way I can't explain. Wikipedia posted:A kinetic bombardment or a kinetic orbital strike is the hypothetical act of attacking a planetary surface with an inert projectile, where the destructive force comes from the kinetic energy of the projectile impacting at very high velocities. The concept is often encountered in science fiction[citation needed] and originated during the Cold War. Basically, it's like having a giant fuckoff revolver in space you use to bust a cap all up in people's secure bunkers. It uses no explosives, it's just a giant bullet the size of a telephone pole made from tungsten, but it would hit with a tremendous impact capable of destroying very secure facilities. All things considered, these would be much better to have countries dickwave over instead of nukes, due to the precision and lack of radioactivity, but it's unlikely it will ever actually be made or implemented.  e. poo poo, i was image leeching like a huge loving jerk blunt for century has a new favorite as of 02:46 on Apr 7, 2015 |
|
#
?
Apr 7, 2015 02:17
|
|
|
I have seen kinetic bombardment used as a criticism of militaries in science fiction, though. For example, once you have FTL and the ability to make something like a Death Star, doing so is ludicrous because you could much more easily and cheaply hit Alderaan with something that literally is a moon.
|
|
#
?
Apr 7, 2015 02:20
|
|
|
blunt for century posted:
Aren't the ship-mounted rail guns they've been testing lately just miniature versions of these? Somebody has a new favorite as of 02:47 on Apr 7, 2015 |
|
#
?
Apr 7, 2015 02:21
|
|
|
natetimm posted:Aren't the ship-mounted rail guns they've been testing lately just miniature versions of these? In a way, yeah. It's just a huge impact, rather than an explosive, but rail guns use magnetism and Project Thor would just use gravity, and maybe a booster rocket just to start the launch.
|
|
#
?
Apr 7, 2015 02:26
|
|
|
peter gabriel posted:Yeah that puts things into perspective somewhat, WW2 is no where near as important as puckins, thanks for the reality check man I prayed for a miracle and lo, peter gabriel did appear, and righteously smote many a wicked rear end  Will be home soon, and I will save this thread with ghosts and planes. You will see.
|
|
#
?
Apr 7, 2015 02:44
|
|
t
|
Literally Kermit posted:I prayed for a miracle and lo, peter gabriel did appear, and righteously smote many a wicked rear end Feeling like I'm the one who started this whole mess, please post it soon.
|
|
#
?
Apr 7, 2015 02:56
|
|
|
blunt for century posted:In a way, yeah. It's just a huge impact, rather than an explosive, but rail guns use magnetism and Project Thor would just use gravity, and maybe a booster rocket just to start the launch. IIRC they were also being discussed again around the start of the Iraq war, right? I'd say these days the over-the-horizon strike capabilities of the new US warships removes some of the need of that sort of thing  I am tempted to do a post talking about some of the interesting weapon systems the US Navy is working on (Rail guns since they were mentioned earlier, CIWS systems, and the new Laser turrets, etc) but I don't want to kick off another 6 page thread buster about the ethics of warfare and etc.
|
|
#
?
Apr 7, 2015 03:04
|
|
|
DumbparameciuM posted:IIRC they were also being discussed again around the start of the Iraq war, right? Honestly, that would be a good OP for a PYF weird weapons or whatever thread, which we probably need anyway. 
|
|
#
?
Apr 7, 2015 03:05
|
|
|
Imagined posted:I have seen kinetic bombardment used as a criticism of militaries in science fiction, though. For example, once you have FTL and the ability to make something like a Death Star, doing so is ludicrous because you could much more easily and cheaply hit Alderaan with something that literally is a moon. A less drastic but no less ruinous thing to do to a planet would be to create a Kessler Syndrome. Basically if you blow up a big artificial satellite in orbit you can completely shut a planet off from any kind of space industry. Not just travel but satellites too. How it works is that a big enough object will create an expanding cloud of debris which will then create more debris as it hits anything else in orbit.
|
|
#
?
Apr 7, 2015 03:17
|
|
|
DicktheCat posted:ranbo das, please elaborate on this, if you can. I'm actually really interested in the subject, but don't know as much about US involvement as I do the European powers. The USA was just kinda looking for an excuse to get involved in WWI. We were basically playing the "we're not touching you" game with the Germans, where we would do everything up to the line and sometimes cross over it, but not really to the extent to where it was outright hostile. For example, the British cut the transatlantic cables connecting Germany and the US, forcing Germany to use US radio towers to communicate with the USA. When the British found out about this, they said it wasn't fair because the Germans might use those towers to communicate with warships. Because of this, the USA forced anyone who used their towers to provide full transcripts to the Us military, and (indirectly) to the British since we were supporting them. The French and British, of course, still had access to their cables, so they never used the US radio towers, meaning it essentially only compromised Germany. Another good example is the Lusitania. The Germans found out that the ship was going to be used to smuggle weapons and such to the British, which was against maritime law (we had been doing this for a while, they just hadn't really caught us yet). Germany went as far as to take out an ad in the paper warning people not to travel on the Lusitania. Unsurprisingly, it gets torpedoed, which causes a huge outcry because those evil germans are breaking the rules of war (conveniently ignoring the fact they broke them because we were breaking them). Eventually Germany got desperate, because the allies had the economic might of the USA behind them and Germany was basically isolated and declared unrestricted sub warfare to try to cut off the Allies supply lines, which brought the USA into the war and hastened the end of the war. With the USA in the war Germany knew it was basically over. They had fought France and Britain to a standstill but were slowly losing ground, and the entrance of the USA provided fresh troops, greater levels of support, and perhaps most importantly a huge morale boost for the Allied forces. Eventually the allies rallied, Germany was crushed, and the Treaty of Versailles was signed. In a rare stroke of foresight, the USA disagreed with the treaty as too punitive, but as the new kids on the block we didn't really have pull in Europe and it got signed, setting the stage for WWII. The thing is, WWI was a war without "bad guys" (what happened in Belgium exempted), and the Allies overreached with their forced reparations. The end of WWII was almost as harsh, but in that case a couple years later the Allies decided that hey, maybe helping rebuild would be a better idea than stripping everything from the Germans (we still did that for close to two years though). Basically, we were really lovely to the Germans and deserve some blame for WWII.
|
|
#
?
Apr 7, 2015 03:48
|
|
|
Well...... http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Armenian_Genocide
|
|
#
?
Apr 7, 2015 03:56
|
|
|
DumbparameciuM posted:For once I have no qualms about attempting to derail the conversation. How do people stay alive in Australia?
|
|
#
?
Apr 7, 2015 04:03
|
|
|
VidaGrey posted:How do people stay alive in Australia? Eternal vigilance.
|
|
#
?
Apr 7, 2015 04:56
|
|
|
|
| # ? Jun 5, 2024 09:19 |
|
|
VidaGrey posted:How do people stay alive in Australia? My pillow ran away the other night. Turns out it was just a spider's abdomen. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Eastern_tarantula quote:The Eastern tarantula has been known to eat small birds, hence the nickname "Bird-eating spider"; however, they typically eat large insects, small mammals and amphibians, such as cane toads and frogs It was probably scared since I wear a live Saltwater Crocodile for Pajamas.  That's Cassius, currently the largest Crocodile in captivity. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cassius_(crocodile) quote:The animal measures 5.48 metres (18 ft 0 in) in length, weighs 2,200 pounds (998 kg) and is estimated to be more than 100 years old Kicker is, he's just the largest in captivity: quote:The official, authentic record length for a crocodile from Australia was 6.15 m (20.2 ft) for a specimen killed in the McArthur River in June 1960 We eat them on burgers occasionally. Like most of our non-endangered, native, animals. Ol Sweepy has a new favorite as of 07:25 on Apr 7, 2015 |
|
#
?
Apr 7, 2015 07:12
|
|
