I see the point you are driving at Norrin, but I just can't bring myself to buy into collective guilt.

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I am a liberal, a classical liberal. Classical liberalism is liberalism, but the current collectivists have captured that designation in the United States. In Europe they are glad enough to call themselves socialists. But no one in America wants to be called socialist and admit what they are.

Courage, Truth, Honor, Fidelity, Discipline, Hospitality, Industriousness, Self-Reliance, Perseverance

How come this is not reflected in the legal system? If i go murder someone, do they arrest everyone in my house, who was providing me with a place to live and eat? Usually only the one who commits the crime is found guilty.

I do like your enthusiasm and idealism, its just hard to buy into your collective guilt argument.

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This does not address Norrin's point. He was making a moral statement; you are shifting ground into a legal one. No, if you commit murder a police officer isn't going to arrest everyone in your house. However, a preacher might suggest that those around you were a bad influence, or that they should have stopped you or talked you out of it. And he would have a point.

The law must stop short, for practical reasons of the public good, from moral exactitude. But that doesn't mean we must do so. We are not the law.

W/r/t government atrocities, as I said before, no government can exist without public support, and that's true whether or not the public support is articulated and expressed through the convenient medium of elections. That makes the people responsible, to a degree, for what the government does. Only if the government acts in complete secrecy is this not true, and even then, the people are still responsible for supporting a government with the propensity to do such things. For example, even if the German people didn't know about the Holocaust, they certainly knew about Krystalnacht, the Nuremberg laws, and the harsh antisemitism of the Nazi regime, and they were responsible for supporting a government with that kind of propensity.

Certainly in a democracy (getting back to the thread topic), the people are responsible for what the government does, which includes the U.S. decision to use nuclear weapons on Japan. Even though the Manhattan Project was top secret and very few knew about it, the people certainly knew after the fact -- and President Truman was reelected three years later.

That is a horrible analogy.

If you murder someone? You are not the same as a government, made of of citizens, with a military, made up of citizens, who get their funding, from citizens.

It's not about guilt, it is about responsibility.

If the German people would have refused to fight for Hitler, there never would have been a WWII, or a holocaust.

All they had to do is say NO, I will not fight for you. Sure, many would have been killed, but how many Germans died during WWII anyways?

If the people share no responsibility, then a government can do anything it wants and the people are blameless?

Believe me, I do see your point. In places like Saudi Arabia, where there are no civil rights, no freedom of speech, or the press, it would be very difficult to do anything to try to change the government. In tyrannical regimes, I place LESS blame on the people, but there is still blame. In a country like America, where we do have freedom of speech and alleged freedom of the press, we have more responsibility.

Do you really believe that the people of the USA are totally blameless for the actions of our government?

Dead. Wrong. Both are 'guilt' issues and issues of responsibility. if you disagree with me, just say it.
No, if you commit murder a police officer isn't going to arrest everyone in your house. However, a preacher might suggest that those around you were a bad influence, or that they should have stopped you or talked you out of it. And he would have a point.

The law must stop short, for practical reasons of the public good, from moral exactitude. But that doesn't mean we must do so. We are not the law.[/quote] Fair point. But in the United Sates, we are in fact the law, as the laws are supposed to reflect our beliefs and morals.
You fail to consider the possibility that 'public support' can be acquired through violence, terrorism, and intimidation and can be acquired against the will of the people.
But the government could not commit secret atrocities if it did not have the 'consent of the governed' according to your idealistic and dreamy logic.
Do you only speak about 'public support' in the most general and vague senses in order to make your argument. Why are you failing to address the issue of those who did not welcome Hitler as Furher, but could do nothing about it?

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Ok, i thought the analogy was appropriate, but not really the issue here. Are you willing to consider the variety of ways in which governments acquire their human resources for the army, or their funds from the public? Its almost as if you are assuming that the citizenry is always complicit in these matters and can choose its course of action. Your answer is, i am assuming, well if all the citizens banded together, they could have their way. But that may not represent a strong consideration of reality. It is dreamy to assume that millions of citizens can all of sudden get on the same page and take a course of collective action. Its questionable if the chaotic elements of human nature and the limits of our species even allow such a thing to happen.

And you have studied the ratio between draftees and volunteers in this situation? Even if we consider that those who fought are guilty, what about all the citizens who were not asked to fight and did not fight?

If hitler had not made himself furher and decided for himself to take his state along that path, it would not have happened either!
Is it not more appropriate to focus on who designed the atrocities than those who may have been indirectly or unconsciously involved?
You are being way to simplistic, ignoring realities of human nature, and ignoring the paranoid environment of the interwar era.
Those who do the bad things are to blame. Not those stuck on the sidelines with no choice in the matter.
Good points.
No i do not. However, you are exxagerating the extent to which the american people have control over their government, which believe me, is not absolute.

I place blame with the people who do the act in question. That is physically do, or use their power to issue orders to get it done.

Just because a people are caught up in the same ploitical boundary as these folks it does not follow that their complicity can be assumed to have existed. I did not get to design the american system of government, so therefore i will refuse to be held accountable for the system's actions. Only those who praise the system and support the decisions in question can be held collectively accountable for the decisions in question.

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Look, this is not something I expect you to agree with.

No matter what type of government I have, it is MY DUTY, to try to stop that government if I believe it is committing evil acts.

Of course, it then becomes a matter of what is acceptable. Where does each individual draw the line?

There were German people who helped the Allies.

If you had been around in the late 1700's, would you have sided with the Americans, or the Tories?

If you were a German soldier in the SS and asked to kill women and children, would you have done so?

If you were a German citizen and learned of the holocaust while it was going on, would you help the allies of you had the chance?

I do not expect answers, as these types of scenarios are almost impossible to answer. You had to be there. There are too many variables to be able to say for sure what I would do, as it should be for most people.

What should we allow, as a people, from our government, before we become complicit in their actions?

Obviously, everyone is different and each of us have to decide for ourselves exactly how responsible we are for our government's actions.

The targets were a military port facility and an army staging area. Yes, unfortunatly, there was a large civilian populace.

The two we dropped were just about the last ones. Creating more would have taken a long while.

Incorrect.

For the second time:

(from post 154 page 11)

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From the fury of the Northmen, Good Lord, deliver us.

The A Bombs were the biggest war crimes in the human history and I hope that they will be the last ones. The second biggest war crimes are the Iraq war, the Vietnam war and the 4th the holocaust by Hitler.

The country which has done this A bombing should have been isolated from global policy for 1000 years. It is funny that the very same country has destroyed civilian population from independent countries by saying that the country may in the future have a capability to build a nuclear bomb. What a shame.

The very same country has used depleted uranium (DU) bombs and also given such weapons to Israel - as the result entire countries have been contaminated with radioactive pollution. The DU weapons are classified as Weapons of Mass Destruction. Again these two countries are the only ones which have used WMDs in the present history. This shows that after the A Bombs the international community should have isolated the evil countries - but they failed to do so because of economic reasons.

We have a big problem in our world as long as criminals are leading the global politics - any solution?

There are no "DU bombs". Such nonsensical claims are the product of profound ignorance.

After WWII, the "evil countries" were occupied and penalized for their actions (yours included).

Or have you conveniently forgotten your nation's alliance with the Nazis, Analyst? Your countrymen fought for the SS, voluntarily.

Finnish Volunteer Battalion of the Waffen-SS - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Matt

DU bombs indeed occur and according to international organizations they are classified to WMDs - also the humanitarian organizations have classified them to break international conventions. They are weapons of "evil countries". Thousands of sick US soldiers suffer from the impact of their own weapons , too.

The Finnish history is something any country could be proud of. We (4 million people) were fighting against USA, UK, Germany and Soviet Union in the WW2 and managed to maintain our independence thanks to our skilled fighters and excellent political understanding. Matt - you can try to say any lies but this is the fact. How many wars USA has won - ok one in Grenada - but lost at least 30 wars.

So, explain to me how when I said we were almost out, that having just ONE more is not almost out?

That part of what you said was correct.

This was the incorrect part:

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From the fury of the Northmen, Good Lord, deliver us.