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Is America the greatest Country anymore? Or do you agree with Will?

Is America the greatest Country anymore? Or do you agree with Will?


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Because it nicely illustrates how the term "war crime" is distorted to be used as a simple slur. And of course also because a lot of it is the usual anti-American drivel of the most base and primitive nature.

Do you adhere to the reasoning developed in the piece you linked to?
 
Because it nicely illustrates how the term "war crime" is distorted to be used as a simple slur. And of course also because a lot of it is the usual anti-American drivel of the most base and primitive nature.

Do you adhere to the reasoning developed in the piece you linked to?

These are quotes from the article which relate directly to the issue of whether or not the USA's killings in Vietnam and Iraq were war crimes:

"It is also undeniable that it has committed countless acts, as no less an authority than U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry noted in regard to Vietnam, which have been: “contrary to the laws of the Geneva Convention, and… ordered as established policies from the top down,” and that “the men who ordered this are war criminals.”

And its crimes against humanity have continued since Vietnam. Thirty years later, a Nuremberg prosecutor speaking of the U.S. invasion of Iraq stated that a “prima facie case can be made that the United States is guilty of the supreme crime against humanity, that being an illegal war of aggression against a sovereign nation.”

I can't argue with this kind of reasoning. Is it enough for you to accept that perhaps the USA is not the "greatest" country?
 
These are quotes from the article which relate directly to the issue of whether or not the USA's killings in Vietnam and Iraq were war crimes:

"It is also undeniable that it has committed countless acts, as no less an authority than U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry noted in regard to Vietnam, which have been: “contrary to the laws of the Geneva Convention, and… ordered as established policies from the top down,” and that “the men who ordered this are war criminals.”

And its crimes against humanity have continued since Vietnam. Thirty years later, a Nuremberg prosecutor speaking of the U.S. invasion of Iraq stated that a “prima facie case can be made that the United States is guilty of the supreme crime against humanity, that being an illegal war of aggression against a sovereign nation.”

I can't argue with this kind of reasoning. Is it enough for you to accept that perhaps the USA is not the "greatest" country?

You are free to believe in such blatant stupidity if you want. Clearly, following your reasoning, Franklin D. Roosevelt was the greatest war criminal in US history and US engagement in World War II was a massive series of war crimes.
 
Since there's still a few people on this thread who persist with the notion that the USA is objectively the best country in the world despite making some "mistakes", here's an interesting Wikipedia article about US war crimes for your perusal. Check the articles linked at the bottom too. Does anyone want to discuss these issues, in the context of national greatness?
United States war crimes - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Oh hell, that's just a thumb nail.
 
In war things get ****ing dirty.

I expect you would find similar actions from any country involved in any war.

Unacceptable, true. But it seems like the nature of war brings out the ugly side of humans, and the longer and dirtier it is the more likely something like that will happen.

That sounds a little apologetic.
 
People who readily accuse countries of "war crimes" usually have no idea what war crimes are.

Pretty sure that targeting civilians is in the definition.
 
Pretty sure that targeting civilians is in the definition.

it's not that simple. But people like to be simplistic.

In the invasion of Normandy civilians came under heavy fire. Was the invasion of Normandy a war crime?
 
Because it nicely illustrates how the term "war crime" is distorted to be used as a simple slur. And of course also because a lot of it is the usual anti-American drivel of the most base and primitive nature.

Do you adhere to the reasoning developed in the piece you linked to?

General Curtis LeMay acknowledged at the time (during his led fir bombing of Tokyo that killed 80,000 civilians) that if the US didn't win the war that he would be tried for war crimes. ;)
 
General Curtis LeMay acknowledged at the time (during his led fir bombing of Tokyo that killed 80,000 civilians) that if the US didn't win the war that he would be tried for treason. ;)

You are confusing "treason" with "war crime"?
 
it's not that simple. But people like to be simplistic.

In the invasion of Normandy civilians came under heavy fire. Was the invasion of Normandy a war crime?

I was thinking more about Dresden, Tokyo, Hiroshima and Nagasaki.
 
I was thinking more about Dresden, Tokyo, Hiroshima and Nagasaki.

None of those attacks on enemy-controlled cities and military positions and targets was in any reasonable sense a war crime. But I note that you didn't respond to what I said about the invasion of Normandy.
 
Excuse me, of course I meant war crimes as he in fact suggested.

Actually, with very few exceptions, virtually no military officers of Axis countries who were involved in the planning or commanding of large-scale bombing campaigns were charged with war crimes.
 
None of those attacks on enemy-controlled cities and military positions and targets was in any reasonable sense a war crime. But I note that you didn't respond to what I said about the invasion of Normandy.

Because I've never heard anybody suggest that those civilians were "targeted" as those I mentioned were.
 
Actually, with very few exceptions, virtually no military officers of Axis countries who were involved in the planning or commanding of large-scale bombing campaigns were charged with war crimes.

That's besides the point that LeMay knew that what he was engaged in was, and that if the US failed to defeat Japan, that it is he that would have been tried for war crimes.
 
That's besides the point that LeMay knew that what he was engaged in was, and that if the US failed to defeat Japan, that it is he that would have been tried for war crimes.

That is an assertion you are making. Bombing Japan was not a war crime.
 
Because I've never heard anybody suggest that those civilians were "targeted" as those I mentioned were.

Yes, I understood you don't know much about WWII history.
 
So who has suggested that they were targeted, hmm?

The bombing campaign and bombardements involved in the run up to the invasion of Normandy killed many thousands of civilians.

These bombings and bombardements "targeted" enemy-held positions, just as the bombing of Dresden, Hiroshima, Nagasaki and Tokyo "targeted" enemy-held positions.
 
Clearly in that case the chief war criminal would have been Franklin Roosevelt. But the point is moot since those that did lose the war were not tried for bombing enemy-held cities.

Not so clear according to LeMay. I've not heard anyone blame Roosevelt for war crimes, though he surely is guilty of having provoked a Japanese attack at Pearl Harbor.
 
The bombing campaign and bombardements involved in the run up to the invasion of Normandy killed many thousands of civilians.

These bombings and bombardements "targeted" enemy-held positions, just as the bombing of Dresden, Hiroshima, Nagasaki and Tokyo "targeted" enemy-held positions.

The nuclear weapons dropped on Hiroshima and Nagasaki were the least discriminant weapon used ever. Two civilian cities were targeted for annihilation. Apologise and defend it all you wish.
 
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