Resolve

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Otherguy Overby

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I watched Ollie North's show about the battle over Okinawa Sunday night.

Casualties:
Okinawa civilians......... more than 130,000 killed
Japanses soldiers and conscripts..more than 130,000 killed
US......... 72,000 casualties with...... 18,900 killed or missing.

I wonder if the US would still have the resolve to fight and win something like WWII again? Or a battle like Okinawa?

Thoughts?
 
I think you'd be surprised at what properly motivated Americans can do today. Bear in mind also that FDR was not fighting the MSM.
 
I wonder if the US would still have the resolve to fight and win something like WWII again? Or a battle like Okinawa?
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That's a huge question. As a country the people and our mission has changed from the time of the great generation coming out of the great depression and dust bowl with FDR at the healm. There is also a great amount of idealism about those times; it certainly wasn't a time without debates and hard line results.

However an example, whether accurate or not, exists right now when a group of people slammed jet planes into the world trade towers, the pentagon, and the incident in PA. Outside of the current controversy regarding "why" we are in Iraq and a lot of misinformation running around by the press, the whitehouse, and just regular people - I think how we see ourselves and our "mission" in the world has changed, and not for the better in my opinion. We seem to mistrust ourselves as a nation, certainly our government does, and our mission than ever before. If anything, it is more confused.
 
I wonder if the US would still have the resolve to fight and win something like WWII again?
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Keep in mind the circumstances surrounding WWII. Both Germany and Japan had initiated wars against their neighbors. It looked inevitable that they would eventually clash with the US. The country of the enemy's origin was easy to determine. we had clear cut goals; that being total annihilation of the enemy's war machine and the removal of the offending government. Plus, In Japan's case, there was naked aggression against us. The objectives were clear, the conditions for victory were clear, and the reasons we went to war were clear. When America has these parameters, there is no enemy on the globe that can stand against us. When the objective is obfuscated by politics, the conditions for victory unclear, and the enemy is an amorphous blob labeled 'them', we tend to bog down over the details of who, what where, and why.
 
I wonder if the US would still have the resolve to fight and win something like WWII again?
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YES...

But only if the sheep get really, really scared and stay that way. Once the sheep calm down and start milling aimlessly about again the resolve would dissolve.
 
Thanks

Thanks for a bit of optimism!

I also wonder what tack the media might take. The people in the media just aren't like those during WWII.

There would also be a bunch of useful idiots like these to deal with:
http://www.littlegreenfootballs.com/weblog/?entry=5581_Echoes_of_Appeasement

I googled up the phrase "peace in our time" and got that and others.

YES...

But only if the sheep get really, really scared and stay that way. Once the sheep calm down and start milling aimlessly about again the resolve would dissolve.
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Yes, that too. It sure seems like fear is used really often these days to sell some agenda. Land of the governed and home of the fearful... comes to mind.
 
I do not thank it will happen that way again
Way to much media now days, they want to show everything negative about anything that has to do with a gun
 
IIRC, more than 5,000 American sailors were killed by Japanese suicide pilots off the coast of Okinawa during the battle. We were losing an average of 1.5 capital ships a day.
JT
 
I doubt war would ever be fought like that again in the nuclear age. I would have to believe that if world powers were ever to collide like that again nuclear weapons would be used.

Either our enemy would begin to be pushed back and would resort to using nukes or we would be forced to use our nukes in a preemptive strike. Otherwise, most of the conflicts in third world countries will be of the guerrilla / insurgent nature.

As for the Media and protestors, you'll always have "peaceniks." Where there are dissentors, you'll always have sensationalists to cover it. Remember we're a 24 hour world now and thats a lot of dead air to fill.
 
During World War Two we were united in the effort - every man woman and child old enough to understand what was going on. Some might have had other feelings, but you never heard about it. The president also didn't have the news media snipping at him. Our people then had the resolve to fight the war, take the losses and win - unconditionally.

Not sure that this is still true. We seem to be divided between those that are unwilling to fight for anything, and those who want nothing but a nice clean war with no bloodshed.

Then there is the media .... Today we lost 5 men ...

War is indeed hell ... but there are some things that are worse, and a sheeple welfare state doesn't breed the best soldiers. The ones we have are the best - but I often wonder if we have enough.
 
IIRC the Brits lost about 60,000 men in the first Battle of the Somme- In the first day. Look around any sleepy English town for the war memorial- there will be one and the numbers are staggering when you see how small the town is. Typically the list of First world war dead is about 4 or five times as long as the WW2 list...
 
And our numbers pale in comparison to the Russian/German numbers on the Eastern front, especially Stalingrad. The numbers from WWII (and WWI) are staggering no matter where you look.

I'm not sure that the world (let alone the USA) would be willing to fight a war on that scale.

WWII Military Casualties
Soviet Union 8,668,000
Germany 3,250,000
Japan 1,506,000
China 1,324,000
Poland 850,000
Hungary 750,000
Greece 520,000
Rumania 520,000
Austria 380,000
France 340,000
Italy 330,000
Great Britain 326,000
Yugoslavia 300,000
USA 295,000
Finland 79,000
Canada 42,000
India 36,000
Australia 29,000
Bulgaria 19,000
Holland 14,000
Spain 12,000
New Zealand 12,000
Belgium 10,000
South Africa 9,000
Norway 5,000
Denmark 4,000
from: http://bss.sfsu.edu/tygiel/Hist427/texts/wwiicasualty.htm
 
A more interesting question would be under what circumstances would an Okinawa-style campaign be necessary with today’s military technology, tactics, and intelligence? When we’ve answered that, then we can question American resolve.

~G. Fink
 
you mention censorship like it was a good thing...
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Censorship has been around since man first took up a pen. Gov. does it, the News media is the worst about it. and the people do it.
Before world war II it has been learned that we did know about the camps but it was buried back in the papers if at all. They did not do stories becuse alot of business wanted to do business with them. When it came to the fact that we had to go to war all of the sudden it was in the front.
Before 24 hr. news the media had hours if not a day or two to spin there side now they have less than a min to get the story out so they tend to spin very badly and are getting noticed. (internet has alot to do with this too)
This kind of reporting has been around since man first took up the pen.
Look at Nam Tet off. media had it as we lost when we kicked there ass.
and they suprised the hell out of us too.
Reports have that the North Vet. Gen said that they almost gave up but when he heard the crap back here then he knew all he needed to do was hang on and get high body count.
Russians helping them too.

One other thing during WWII commie was a bad thing to be hunted down and shot.
Now Commies are good matter of fact they are better than us.
 
You mean besides the “commies” who were our allies, right? :rolleyes:

Though it’s often forgotten today, during the Second World War, there were anti-war sentiments and criticism of President F. D. Roosevelt in the media.

~G. Fink
 
Oleg Volk:

>> ... you mention censorship like it was a good thing... <<

I was a very young kid, but I still remember Pearl Harbor Sunday.

I don't think there was formal censorship. It was more a case of where there was a lot of decent before the war, but when the shooting started everybody came together. On December 8th, 1941 – the day after Pearl Harbor - we were one nation, indivisible - in the true sense. We saw that after 911... But it soon fell apart. World War Two lasted about 3 ½ years for us, and during that time the resolve never slipped, even during the darkest days. We stuck together through thick and thin, never looked back, and in the end we won.
 
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