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Home Front: WoT
VDH: War Clouds
2014-12-10
Under such conditions, history's wars usually start when some opportunistic -- but often relatively weaker -- power does something unwise on the gamble that the perceived benefits outweigh the risks. That belligerence is only prevented when more powerful countries collectively make it clear to the aggressor that it would be suicidal to start a war that would end in the aggressor's sure defeat.

What is scary in these unstable times is that a powerful United States either thinks that it is weak or believes that its past oversight of the postwar order was either wrong or too costly -- or that after Afghanistan, Iraq and Libya, America is no longer a force for positive change.


A large war is looming, one that will be far more costly than the preventative vigilance that might have stopped it.
Posted by:Ulaitle Glearong5012

#7  Interesting to see mention of Liddell Hart. The only one in the west to take his tactics seriously were the Germans. He had German flag officers attending his speeches with hardly any westerners and low and behold the Germans used his tactics very successfully in their drive towards Moscow.

I suspect our enemies are learning from our tactics right now while we try to dismantle the more successful ones for being unpleasant.
Posted by: rjschwarz   2014-12-10 15:28  

#6  "It's like we don't want to win."

Bambi and his minions don't want us to, Al. (Note they don't think of themselves as us.) >:-(
Posted by: Barbara   2014-12-10 13:30  

#5  In the new PC world where everybody gets a prize for participating and no one loses, winning is not acceptable. Everyone has to feel good about themselves. Insuring self-esteem replaces learning as the goal of education. Blame is never assigned to anyone unless it assigned to everyone. Failure does not occur. It is a sad bunch of 1960s hippie hogwash and has little to do with the extant dangerous realities then or now. We will have to confront our enemies and win or submit to someone's boot or die. Kumbaya does not work if your enemies don't believe in the concept--it is not long before someone strong fills the vacuum of weakness you have created for yourself.
Posted by: JohnQC   2014-12-10 12:08  

#4  The appeasers of the 1930s at least had the example of WWI to avoid repeating. We gave up after a sliver of those casualties and after imposing all sorts of constraints on ourselves.

It's like we don't want to win.
Posted by: Frozen Al   2014-12-10 10:41  

#3  Chamberlain the Appeaser is gone

In his defense, the military had been victim of over a decade of decline in support of just maintenance. He did initiate a crash program to regenerate the industry need to rearm before Poland. At that point he was buying time. With all the talk about Putin and Russia, has anyone seen the contemporary major Euro states do likewise?
Posted by: Procopius2k   2014-12-10 08:17  

#2  A large war is looming, one that will be far more costly than the preventative vigilance that might have stopped it.

It does seem like 1939 except the weapons are more dangerous. Although Chamberlain the Appeaser is gone, there are plenty of appeasers in the West who won't address rising threats in the M.E., Iran and Russia. They continue living in a fool's paradise such as Europe did in 1939. The politicians distract with P.C. nonsense and hope the threats will go away. It is the ostrich approach to geo-political threats. One can't appease the world's bullies ever--they will over-reach, expand and try to make you submit to their wants and/or ideology.
Posted by: JohnQC   2014-12-10 07:58  

#1  Much as the reasons for WWII...US isolation and pacifism and rampant weak kneed namby pamby diplomacy encouraged Hitler and Japan to go forward.

When Germany invaded Poland, Liddell Hart said the BEF could have beaten Germany in a week. The diplomacy of the 30s gave Hitler time to build a viable military. In 1939, Poland stretched Germany's logistics and manpower very thin.
Posted by: Mystic   2014-12-10 00:51  

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