Shooting at Navy Yard

by Kool Jo 28 Replies latest social current

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  mP

  Fraz

  hi mp - did an honours thesis on US foreign policy and interventions during the Cold War - I am very familiar with US interventionism and how bad it has been recently and was before Vietnam but between and the 2nd Gulf War (the 1st Gulf War was a sensible and measured response to Saddam's invasion of Kuwait; and Somalia was misconcieved but relatively harmless) it was significantly curtailed unitl George W made the mistake of getting involved in Afghanistan and Iraq.

  mP:

  And tahts the problem, there are too many mistakes. Mistakes that have costed millions of lives and untold damage. We dont call Hitler a mistake, we judge him as a war criminal. The sad thing is GWB was not the first to start a war, its practically an addiction of the US.

  Fraz:

  I still maintain that the strength of the US military is primarily defensive and actually decreases global conflict by acting as a deterrent.

  mP:

  YOu can call it what you want, but the US has been an aggressor and started more wars than nearly all other countries around the world put together. Its hard to be labelled peaceful when you start or support so many wars.

  Fraz:

  I can see why it looks like an oxymoron but you do need to recognise we are in a period of unparalleled peace and the strength of the US military is one of the reasons for that.

  mP:

  Actually that is completely untrue. When the chips were down in WW2 in 1939 who stood up against Hitler ? The British Empire and its friends were the only ones who had the backbone to stand up and fight and help Europe. Sure America eventually joined the fight and earlier on it sent supplies, but E, Australia and Canada and Russia were the ones fighting from the beginning. WW2 was won by mostly Russia not America.

  Sure America stood up against the Taliban, but considering they got their arms from America in the first place what does that tell you ? The Taliban while criminals and terrible people were never a world threat in any form. They were local and locked in their sad corner of the world.

  In terms of fighting for principal, the USA didnt stand up when it counted. Most of Americas little wars are just a bully fighting small opponents. You never see America challenging Russia or China, because they cant.
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  designs

  The shooter was known to have mental problems and had a record of discharging his weapons unsafely, he should have been picked out in the screening processes and denied work at the Naval Base. 12 or 13 killed, what a tragedy.
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  mP

  design:

  Dont all people who voluntarily join the military have mental problems ?

  Who joins an org thats primary purpose is to bomb and kill little countries ? Surely the covered up actions in afghanistan and iraq show the military is contains its fair share of psycopaths who want to blow up things and kill.

  Who joins the military knowing they are going to afghanistan where they have the privliege of often dropping bombs on the wrong village ?

  Isnt that the definition of a person with problems ?
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  designs

  In this case we are talking about conditions that are covered in the standards of psychiatric textbooks- hearing voices, delusions, extreme depression.

  The overall intent of the military is another issue.
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  mP

  @designs

  Words are cheap, actions are real. The American military can claim what it wants. All militarys claim the same, even the bad ones, like Hitler. They are all honourable and just.

  Look at the actions. Look at the history and think how will history judge all the little wars

  Anyone who joins an org thats budget has doubled and is spending money like crazy based on bombing poor villagers and making orphans all too often needs to have a hard look at themselves. its blood money.

  If the US military repeated their carelessness and actions in your city or state, you would have a different opinion. American was sad for the 3000 on 9/11, how sad would it be if it suffered 10's of thousands of 100s of thousands like Iraq or Afghanistan because of what America did. Or dont they count, are some more equal than others ?
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  BizzyBee

  US military adventurism could be an interesting topic to discuss, mP. Why don't you start a thread about it since you seem to have a lot to say about it?

  This thread, however, is about the tragic US Navy Yard shooting nothing of which indicates it had to do with US policies or that any of the victims were combat personnel. So far it seems to have everything to do with the all-too common scenario of a mentally disturbed individual shooting up his workplace. We need to investigate why this person's mental health indicators did not trigger the system to flag his behavior as potentially dangerous, and how he had access to guns.
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  Frazzled UBM

  Well said BizzyBee - it has more to say about availability of guns in the US and the unfortunate frequency of this sort of mass shootings in the US, than the US military
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  Frazzled UBM

  mp - I would also add that you may want to reconsideer making statements such as 'this is completely untrue' - your rejoinder re WWII missed the point of what I was saying about the security situation right now. But I don't want to ge into a tit for tat with you on this and you are entitled to your opinion but you need to be careful about accusations of things not being true unless you are entirely sure about the exact content of the statement you think you are saying is untrue and you have concrete adn complete evidence to the contrary. Such allegations quickly make discussions rancorous and don't promote a reasoned exchange of views. Exchanges of views shoudl be exactly that rather than a competition to see who is right. Regards Fraz
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  jgnat

  My sympathies to the families who lost their loved-ones before their time. mP, I'm calling you out on your statements about the military...on a separate thread.
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  FirstLastName

  " War is an ugly thing, but not the ugliest of things. The decayed and degraded state of moral and patriotic feeling which thinks nothing is worth war, is much worse. The person who has nothing for which he is willing to fight, nothing which is more important than his personal safety, is a miserable creature and has no chance of being free unless made and kept so by the exertions of better men than himself."

  John Stewart Mill

  English economist and philosopher (1806-1873

  My sympanthies to the families of lost love ones in DC.