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feedmegin posted:Luckier than some of the people who were enslaved in Africa by Africans, too, which is a line pro-slavery people in the US pushed. 'Over here we take care of them like they're our kids; if they were back in Africa they'd literally be eaten/sacrificed so this is better'. Well, it is totally inaccurate in that the "we treat them like family" line was a bunch of pro-slavery horseshit spouted by both people defending the institution in the ACW and its apologists after the fact. For every well-published example of a guy who treated his slaves half way decently - Washington inevitably comes up in these discussions - there were lots more who were utter shitheads. Even some of the "nicer" ones could have a pretty ugly side. Jefferson was generally credited with treating his slaves OK but he also did the math and figured out that the "natural growth" (i.e. reproduction) of his slaves was of far greater economic import to his estate than the actual loving farming, which really seals the idea that they were property to be disposed of in order to profit their owner. And as nice as he supposedly was, there is a whoooooooole lot of room to discuss just how welcome his nighttime visits to Sally Hemmings were.
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Apr 21, 2016 17:00
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Cyrano4747 posted:Well, it is totally inaccurate in that the "we treat them like family" line was a bunch of pro-slavery horseshit spouted by both people defending the institution in the ACW and its apologists after the fact. For every well-published example of a guy who treated his slaves half way decently - Washington inevitably comes up in these discussions - there were lots more who were utter shitheads. Even some of the "nicer" ones could have a pretty ugly side. Jefferson was generally credited with treating his slaves OK but he also did the math and figured out that the "natural growth" (i.e. reproduction) of his slaves was of far greater economic import to his estate than the actual loving farming, which really seals the idea that they were property to be disposed of in order to profit their owner. And as nice as he supposedly was, there is a whoooooooole lot of room to discuss just how welcome his nighttime visits to Sally Hemmings were. Yes, I probably should have noted that. I was saying this was the line they were pushing, not claiming it was actually true, lest I come off like a Klan member or something. 
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Apr 21, 2016 17:06
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Nenonen posted:Isn't that how all railroads pretty much everywhere have started? At first you had mining companies building narrow gauge tracks, passenger rail came as an afterthought in Europe as well. I wouldn't say passenger rail was an 'afterthought' for railway planners. In the very early 19th century the only viable steam railways were things like colliery lines due to the fact that steam locomotives were not very powerful and people had not quite figured out how to make tracks. Once this got sorted out people were building passenger and freight lines. The Liverpool and Manchester, the first steam traction only, double tracked intercity railway was built in 1830 and intended for both freight and passengers.
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Apr 21, 2016 17:11
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Cyrano4747 posted:Well, it is totally inaccurate in that the "we treat them like family" line was a bunch of pro-slavery horseshit spouted by both people defending the institution in the ACW and its apologists after the fact. For every well-published example of a guy who treated his slaves half way decently - Washington inevitably comes up in these discussions - there were lots more who were utter shitheads. quote:“A large farmer, Colonel McQuiller in Cashaw county, South Carolina, was in the habit of driving nails into a hogshead so as to leave the point of the nail just protruding in the inside of the cask; into this, he used to put his slaves for punishment, and roll them down a very long and steep hill. I have heard from several slaves, (though I had no means of ascertaining the truth of this statement,) that in this way he had killed six or seven of his slaves.”
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Apr 21, 2016 17:34
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darthbob88 posted:From A Narrative of the Adventures and Escape of Moses Roper, From American Slavery, 1848: its pretty good general rule that the bigger the operation the worse it got. when you only had 3-5 slaves and you worked with them it was a very different interaction than being a plantation owner. normally all of the "treated like family" stories are cherry picked from small family farms or whatever since yeah, you can find some examples of former slaves sticking around since jim crow made other options less appealing then sticking with the former master who was not all that bad.
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Apr 21, 2016 17:39
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SeanBeansShako posted:East India Company looks the other way and is like 'famine? what famine?' I have a certain amount of sympathy for the officials who actually gave a poo poo about the locals. My personal favorite is probably the first governor general of Bengal (phoneposting and cannot remember name  ) who basically spent enormous amounts of time and paper asserting that A) Bengalis had an assload to offer the empire above and beyond their value as expendable labor and B) treating them humanely and allowing them a certain amount of agency was the most efficient and beneficial for everyone involved strategy.These folks didn't exactly always win the arguments. Edit: admittedly if I were born two hundred years earlier I'd be using the phrase "white man's burden" unironically, but so did some decidedly non shitheads. 
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Apr 21, 2016 18:30
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GreyjoyBastard posted:Edit: admittedly if I were born two hundred years earlier I'd be using the phrase "white man's burden" unironically, but so did some decidedly non shitheads. There is an argument to be made that what we today call development aid is pretty much exactly the same concept, and it is widely accepted by the political mainstream as something we should do.
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Apr 21, 2016 18:41
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I have a question for Hitler's brain: if Hitler himself had not been a victim of chemical warfare, do you think the Nazis would have used it in WW2? What about biological warfare?
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Apr 21, 2016 18:46
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There's always going to be a spectrum of people ranging from those who believed in the imperial project, those that thought it was the lesser evil, and those just in it for wealth and power.
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Apr 21, 2016 18:51
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Nebakenezzer posted:I have a question for Hitler's brain: if Hitler himself had not been a victim of chemical warfare, do you think the Nazis would have used it in WW2? What about biological warfare? I've no idea, but if they had, they probably would have dropped it on all those pesky forts that formed pockets and such, as well as any ghetto uprisings.
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Apr 21, 2016 20:30
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Nebakenezzer posted:I have a question for Hitler's brain: if Hitler himself had not been a victim of chemical warfare, do you think the Nazis would have used it in WW2? What about biological warfare? No way to answer. It's deep in to gay black hitler territory. That said, I think that a lot of the things that made chemical weapons attractive in WW1 weren't there in WW2. You see a lot few combats on fixed positions where just gassing a fuckload of people makes sense. A lot of the use of gas in WW1 was to try to drive people out of trenches, natural low-points where it would settle. When you're in a much more fluid war of movement it's just not as useful a weapon as when you're dug in on static lines for years on end. Really, now that I think about it, if anyone was going to use gas it probably would have been the US just blanketing Shitheap Atol #245 for a few weeks to make the landing that much easier.
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Apr 21, 2016 20:35
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ArchangeI posted:There is an argument to be made that what we today call development aid is pretty much exactly the same concept, and it is widely accepted by the political mainstream as something we should do. I am completely on board with this interpretation, and also, surprisingly, in favor of developmental aid. 
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Apr 21, 2016 20:48
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Nebakenezzer posted:I have a question for Hitler's brain: if Hitler himself had not been a victim of chemical warfare, do you think the Nazis would have used it in WW2? What about biological warfare? I think Hitler's personal experiences have been overplayed. Chemical weapons weren't all that effective or reliable in WW1 and in WW2 everyone had gas masks from the start, why even bother?
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Apr 21, 2016 20:50
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Cyrano4747 posted:Well, it is totally inaccurate in that the "we treat them like family" line was a bunch of pro-slavery horseshit spouted by both people defending the institution in the ACW and its apologists after the fact. For every well-published example of a guy who treated his slaves half way decently - Washington inevitably comes up in these discussions - there were lots more who were utter shitheads. Even some of the "nicer" ones could have a pretty ugly side. Jefferson was generally credited with treating his slaves OK but he also did the math and figured out that the "natural growth" (i.e. reproduction) of his slaves was of far greater economic import to his estate than the actual loving farming, which really seals the idea that they were property to be disposed of in order to profit their owner. And as nice as he supposedly was, there is a whoooooooole lot of room to discuss just how welcome his nighttime visits to Sally Hemmings were. I think it's also important that Black Codes enforced in most Southern states made it illegal to be too nice to your slaves, lest one slave owner's mercy lead to unrest among the property of the rest. Cruelty was mandatory, kindness forbidden, and this was explicitly and legally enforced to prevent uprisings. Also the whole 'slaves in Africa too' thing is kinda BS because, for one, the New World demand for labor created a huge and distorting market for chattel that handed more weapons over to whatever groups were more willing to take slaves. Funny how that tends to lead to a growth in slaver polities...
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Apr 21, 2016 21:18
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Cyrano4747 posted:Really, now that I think about it, if anyone was going to use gas it probably would have been the US just blanketing Shitheap Atol #245 for a few weeks to make the landing that much easier. IIRC the Japanese were really, really scared of US gas attacks, to the point that while they had their own gas program, they weren't willing to put it into use, even if the US forces used gas in isolated cases, to avoid creating an environment of full-scale gas warfare. Nenonen posted:I think Hitler's personal experiences have been overplayed. Chemical weapons weren't all that effective or reliable in WW1 and in WW2 everyone had gas masks from the start, why even bother? There is the deal with sarin/tabun, where mirror imaging resulted in the Germans not using gas due to fear of retaliation in kind.
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Apr 21, 2016 21:21
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They were. I cannot find it now, but just a couple of weeks ago I was reading a transcript of a post-war interrogation of some Japanese Army bigwig, where they asked him in detail about the Japanese plans to defend their home islands against US invasion. They were planning huge resistance and quite a bit of suicide poo poo, but he was quite clear on the point that they were really, really against the idea of using gas, for fear of escalation/US response.
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Apr 21, 2016 21:26
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Nenonen posted:I think Hitler's personal experiences have been overplayed. Chemical weapons weren't all that effective or reliable in WW1 and in WW2 everyone had gas masks from the start, why even bother? Wouln't gasbombing cities have been an effective way to kill other side's civilians?
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Apr 21, 2016 22:03
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I imagine if the US had nuclear weapons earlier, we might have just nuked the atolls and called it a day.
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Apr 21, 2016 22:11
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Hogge Wild posted:Wouln't gasbombing cities have been an effective way to kill other side's civilians? The US army's chemical warfare department drew up plans for doing this to Japan, and the casualty projections were pretty horrific. And by horrific I mean 5 million dead.
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Apr 21, 2016 22:16
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cheerfullydrab posted:http://exiledonline.com/when-pigs-fly-and-scold-brits-lecturing-sri-lanka/all/1/ Don't read War Nerd. As penance for your sins, say fifty Hail Mahans.
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Apr 21, 2016 22:22
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ALL-PRO SEXMAN posted:Don't read War Nerd.
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Apr 21, 2016 22:25
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P-Mack posted:The US army's chemical warfare department drew up plans for doing this to Japan, and the casualty projections were pretty horrific. drat.
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Apr 21, 2016 22:25
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Saint Celestine posted:I imagine if the US had nuclear weapons earlier, we might have just nuked the atolls and called it a day. Not really. We needed them as forward bases for the advance across the Pacific.
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Apr 21, 2016 22:28
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ALL-PRO SEXMAN posted:Not really. We needed them as forward bases for the advance across the Pacific. That implies being aware that you can't use nuked atols as forward bases.
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Apr 21, 2016 22:30
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my dad posted:That implies being aware that you can't use nuked atols as forward bases. Well, for a start you can't build airfields and buildings on a submerged crater.
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Apr 21, 2016 22:32
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MrMojok posted:They were. I cannot find it now, but just a couple of weeks ago I was reading a transcript of a post-war interrogation of some Japanese Army bigwig, where they asked him in detail about the Japanese plans to defend their home islands against US invasion. At some point a few years ago in the Cold War thread the topic of WMDs and Imperial Japan came up. They had a bioweapons program (that deathcamp expernmental unit was captured by the Soviets, who disturbingly took all the research back to Russia and continued it) and a suprise method of attacking with it with their crazy aircraft carrier submarines. They eventually nixed the idea of using bioweapons because the Japanese were afraid it would be 'the first shot in a war against all of humanity'. If this was partially the endless fight between the IJA and the IJN, I've no idea. Cyrano4747 posted:No way to answer. It's deep in to gay black hitler territory. I know; I was just wondering how nasty it would have been if the Nazis decided this was the way to go. I don't know very much about chemical warfare, especially where the Allies and the Axis were in World War 2. I'm actually not even sure what the potential weapons would have been. Phosgene is nasty as gently caress, but maybe you are right - it just didn't fit in WW2 for the most part. (To get all black gay hitler for a moment, I can see the Nazis using chemical warfare on the eastern front, especially against civilians, since genocide and annihilation was mission objectives anyway.) Less sure about bioweapons, though I do think the Nazis assassinated Dr. Frederick Banting (yeah, the guy who discovered insulin for use on diabetics was a huge advocate of germ warfare, and he wouldn't stop talking it up to Churchill.)
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Apr 21, 2016 22:37
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so we owe the nazis for preventing churchill from making another fuckup then?
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Apr 21, 2016 22:45
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Nenonen posted:I think Hitler's personal experiences have been overplayed. Chemical weapons weren't all that effective or reliable in WW1 and in WW2 everyone had gas masks from the start, why even bother? Not true for WWI - gas was used throughout the war and proved effective on many occasions due to various factors, like the much higher concentration and static deployment of troops compared to WWII and the relative crudeness of anti-chemical equipment. Blister agents were effective area denial tools since you had to go through no-mans land to get to the other side's trenches, so dispersing mustard gas droplets across an area could pose a persistent and horrific threat to troops trying to pass through it. Gas shells were also a vital element to artillery counterbattery fire since they proved very useful for supressing enemy gunners, both through the gas itself and the fact that you can't operate an artillery piece as well in a gas mask. ALL-PRO SEXMAN posted:Well, for a start you can't build airfields and buildings on a submerged crater. Not with that attitude
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Apr 21, 2016 22:46
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Agean90 posted:so we owe the nazis for preventing churchill from making another fuckup then? Not really, by 1942 the United Kingdom had enough anthrax to render Germany uninhabitable for centuries.
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Apr 21, 2016 22:52
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Nebakenezzer posted:At some point a few years ago in the Cold War thread the topic of WMDs and Imperial Japan came up. They had a bioweapons program (that deathcamp expernmental unit was captured by the Soviets, who disturbingly took all the research back to Russia and continued it) and a suprise method of attacking with it with their crazy aircraft carrier submarines. They eventually nixed the idea of using bioweapons because the Japanese were afraid it would be 'the first shot in a war against all of humanity'. If this was partially the endless fight between the IJA and the IJN, I've no idea. Wikipeadia doesn't have anything about an assasination, where have you read about it?
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Apr 21, 2016 23:13
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Hogge Wild posted:Wikipeadia doesn't have anything about an assasination, where have you read about it? https://www.amazon.ca/The-Banting-Enigma-Assassination-Frederick/dp/1894463706 Well, I should say a friend read this book. Basically dude died in an airplane crash, and it was believed to be sabotage. If so it's one of the few successful Nazi North American operations.
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Apr 21, 2016 23:20
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Nebakenezzer posted:https://www.amazon.ca/The-Banting-Enigma-Assassination-Frederick/dp/1894463706 Sweden lost more pilots during WWII than Finland did even though Sweden was neutral. And Nazi spies weren't really good at anything. So I'd say that it's far likelier that it was just a normal plane crash than a successful Nazi spy operation. Also, some reviewer says it's just a novel.
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Apr 21, 2016 23:23
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Hogge Wild posted:Sweden lost more pilots during WWII than Finland did even though Sweden was neutral. And Nazi spies weren't really good at anything. So I'd say that it's far likelier that it was just a normal plane crash than a successful Nazi spy operation. I know, I just noticed that! For gently caress's sake, ignore me, I'm been listening to a friend who doesn't distinguish these things.
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Apr 21, 2016 23:29
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Nebakenezzer posted:I know, I just noticed that! For gently caress's sake, ignore me, I'm been listening to a friend who doesn't distinguish these things. imo you should ask your friend for more theories
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Apr 21, 2016 23:34
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ArchangeI posted:There is an argument to be made that what we today call development aid is pretty much exactly the same concept, and it is widely accepted by the political mainstream as something we should do.
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Apr 22, 2016 00:21
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my dad posted:An Armenian buddy of mine complained about them, those guys put up a very, er, tastefoul billboard near the genocide memorial in Boston a couple of weeks ago. Holy poo poo dude The intended message here is "whatever causes the least amount of problems should be considered the truth," right? I cant believe they're so up front about that but I can't see what else it could mean.
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Apr 22, 2016 00:26
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Arquinsiel posted:I think that'd more be white man's guilt now, but either way it's still infantilising non-europeans. Instead of "those guys have it hard being not white" it's now "those guys have it hard being where we hosed up". It's still "those guys have it hard because they aren't like us, so we should help them become more like us, the pinnacles of human development." That said, providing clean drinking water isn't imperialism no matter who pays for it.
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Apr 22, 2016 00:52
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Is there a good example of the civilian population fighting an organized army en masse ala World War II post invasion Japan?
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Apr 22, 2016 01:03
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bewbies posted:Is there a good example of the civilian population fighting an organized army en masse ala World War II post invasion Japan?
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Apr 22, 2016 01:07
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bewbies posted:Is there a good example of the civilian population fighting an organized army en masse ala World War II post invasion Japan? Depends on what you consider "en masse." Vietnam was pretty much a civilian uprising against the US military. Iraq was mostly fighting against civilian partisans. Pretty much any guerilla war could fit into that.
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Apr 22, 2016 01:19
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