>In this war they go another country, kill all the men, slaughter all 
>the
> women and children, burn the houses,
>villages, crops, everything they can.

> You mean like the British RAF did against Germany's  civilians ?
> With a little help from the american govt.

Help us with our history, Juan.
Was that in Coventry **, or London during 'The Blitz' or ???
And, was that in 1941 before Sea-Lion or ???

ie "Everybody does it".
Doesn't make it right or something to be proud of.
But pity the decisions faced by men like eg "Bomber Harris", not to 
mention his masters, and hope never to have to be put in their 
position yourself.

And think closely about the distinction between civilians and soldiers 
in such all out war situations. Is it morally more acceptable to kill 
a mother's 18 year old uniformed son than eg her 16 year old munitions 
factory worker daughter? Or her 3 month old baby? (Clue: none of these 
is something you should aim at if at all possible, and each is 
something you may consider not aiming at even if its impossible).

Just as Hiroshima and Nagasaki certainly saved US lives (regardless of 
what the total motivation set was (Shorten the war, save US lives, 
save Japanese lives, revenge for Pearl Harbour, revenge for any number 
of other atrocities *, having a good time, excuse to try out the new 
toys, impressing Russia, ...)) and very very probably also saved 
Japanese lives overall, the "1000 bomber raids" (unlike the mass raids 
on eg Coventry) could reasonably have been expected to shorten the war 
and overall save lives. Not a justification but a valid point to 
ponder. It happened that they were not dealing with rational decision 
making by the sole decision maker, who preferred the destruction of 
ALL Germans and Germany rather than surrender, as he considered that 
if they could not win then Germans and Germany did not deserve to 
survive as a nation or individuals. In the last months of the war 
Hitler launched blanket orders for the destruction of all major German 
infrastructure so that neither the population or the victors would 
have any ability to use them. These orders were, to the maximum extent 
possible, diverted or altered by Albert Speer - Hitler's one-time 
personal architect and latterly his coordinator of production. 
Notwithstanding the fact that he was quite clearly a self serving 
egotistical liar (never knew anything about the Jews, m'lud), he was 
also brilliant & capable and is owed a great debt by the German 
people. He also personally prolonged the war substantially by 
rationalising and focusing the German war effort when it otherwise 
would have fallen apart far earlier on. Notice that German WW2 fighter 
planes were very substantially only the ME109 and the (magnificent) 
FW190 - for this we have Speer to thank. (Spitfire and Hurricane deja 
vu? :-) ).  His actions alone in maintaining German capability in the 
face of growing allied destruction probably cost more allied and 
German lives than all of Bomber Harris's efforts. But few ever seek to 
consider this when condemning (with variable justification) Dresden 
and the other great conflagrations. The death of ANYONE in war is a 
tragedy. All war is inextricable from evil to some extent.  Singling 
out some events as especially evil should in many cases be done only 
with a full knowledge of historical circumstance. For an easier test 
case than Dresden, or even Coventry, you could start with My Lai (or 
the currently in the news Iraqi equivalent whose name I do not yet 
know but which will go down in history books as the equivalent of My 
Lai).





        Russell McMahon



* Read the very moving, interesting "Three came home" by Agness Newton 
Keith  (Google knows) about her first hand and excessively up close 
and personal experiences as a Dutch internee in Japanese camps in 
Indonesia for some background.

** Vice Marshall "Smiling Albert" Kesselring claims that the bombing 
of civilian targets in Coventry was done in error. And that there was 
no intention to bomb the Cathedral. Even though Hitler gave specific 
orders that civilian targets should be bombed, and personally set 
targets, Kesselring said he had these orders altered after Hitler 
released them.  Purposeful or not, bombing the Cathedral was a vast 
mistake, as it acted as a rallying point for the British in days of 
darkness and despair.

NEVER bomb an Englishman's Castle! OR his Cathedral :-)


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