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The Great Folly of World War I
American Thinker.com ^ | November 18, 2017 | Mike Konrad

Posted on 11/18/2017 5:48:48 AM PST by Kaslin

World War I was the greatest folly by far to befall Western civilization. The second greatest folly was America entering the catastrophe. The totalitarian rebounds that followed were consequences that could have been avoided.

I am not excusing German militarism, which indeed played a major part. The kaiser was arguably mentally ill, with dreams of martial glory and building an empire.

He had ignored the advice of Bismarck, who, though militarist himself, had enough sense to limit his territorial ambitions. Bismarck knew that Germany was surrounded on all sides and that it is not good to provoke rivals. So the kaiser pressured Bismarck to resign. The kaiser wanted Germany to have her "Place in the Sun."

The problem was that the sun was already owned by the British, and it never set on their empire.

Now, to be sure, British complaints about German militarism rang hollow when Britain sought a navy as big as her next two competitors combined, and when the British Empire owned a quarter of the planet, against the wishes of most of its inhabitants. The French Empire was similarly culpable, though not quite as large. Nor can the French be excused of the charge of militarism. After her defeat in the Franco-Prussian War, France went on an arms-building binge. Her policy toward Germany was "revanchism" – revenge.

(Excerpt) Read more at americanthinker.com ...


TOPICS: Culture/Society; Editorial; Germany
KEYWORDS: europe; ww1
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To: allendale

The Great War killed, on average, roughly 10000 men a day.

Every day.

Seven days a week.

365 days a year.

For over four years.


81 posted on 11/19/2017 4:10:52 AM PST by DuncanWaring (The Lord uses the good ones; the bad ones use the Lord.)
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To: chimera

In the Spring of 1918, the Germans were exhausted, but the French/English were even worse-off.

The German Spring Offensive was well on its way to Paris when they were stopped only by the Americans at Belleau Wood.


82 posted on 11/19/2017 4:16:26 AM PST by DuncanWaring (The Lord uses the good ones; the bad ones use the Lord.)
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To: x
If the allies lost WWI, there would almost certainly have been something like fascism or communism or military dictatorship in Italy, and probably in France

And how does that compare with the suicidal "democracy" they have there now?

83 posted on 11/19/2017 4:22:27 AM PST by Jim Noble (Single payer is coming. Which kind do you like)
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To: DuncanWaring

That was quite decisive. The Germans went all-in on that offensive and knew if it came up short they’d have to sign the armistice. Ludendorff knew it was a race against time and the handwriting was on the wall that if the operation failed they were done.


84 posted on 11/19/2017 5:07:12 AM PST by chimera
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To: Kaslin

Bump from the grandson of a fellow who help build subs against the Kaiser at the Phila. Navy Yard


85 posted on 11/19/2017 5:16:32 AM PST by foreverfree
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To: DiogenesLamp

You haven’t changed my mind about the Civil War and slavery, but we do agree about the harmful aftereffects of the Civil War. Given the deeply Christian culture of the South, I suspect (without any real evidence) that slavery would ended in a generation or two without the Civil War, and racial reconciliation in the South would have been quicker and more peaceful. But to the bondsman, a generation or two is his entire life.


86 posted on 11/19/2017 5:22:56 AM PST by Lonesome in Massachussets (Psephomancers for Hillary!)
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To: iowamark

If the US was so hung up about the Zimmerman Note, we should have simply occupied Mexico....Problem solved, and with a lot less bloodshed.


87 posted on 11/19/2017 5:46:58 AM PST by dfwgator
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To: Jim Noble
A German victory in WW I would have been incomparably better than the actual outcome. WW II, not so much.

I agree.

88 posted on 11/19/2017 5:48:14 AM PST by dfwgator
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To: dfwgator

The US did occupy Veracruz in 1914, and Pershing invaded northern Mexico in 1916-17, chasing Pancho Villa.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_occupation_of_Veracruz


89 posted on 11/19/2017 5:57:36 AM PST by iowamark
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To: iowamark

Obviously we needed to go a bit further.


90 posted on 11/19/2017 6:00:30 AM PST by dfwgator
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To: G Larry
"Konrad’s predictions as to the results of the U.S. staying out of WWI are filled with guess work and wishful thinking."

What? Of course alternate histories are guess work. And I've no problem with wishing that bloodbaths like the Somme never happened.

This was a cousin's war, we had no business in it.

10 days after the USA entered WW1, Germany sent Lenin via sealed train to Russia. If our entering had any part in Germany doing this to get Russia out of the war, we have a great amount of blood on our hands.

91 posted on 11/19/2017 8:16:40 AM PST by slowhandluke (It's hard to be cynical enough in this age.)
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To: odawg
Even Hitler and Stalin, as almost totally evil as they were, would not allow the use of poison gas.

Ummm... you might want to ask the Jewish people about that one...

92 posted on 11/19/2017 8:21:20 AM PST by Teacher317 (We have now sunk to a depth at which restatement of the obvious is the first duty of intelligent men)
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To: Lurker
“Its not in our nature to be the murdering, feared, masters of the world.“

I’m not so sure about that. If you’d put it to a vote in 1943 Americans would have quite happily exterminated every Japanese on the planet. We’d have made what the Romans did to Carthage look like a Sunday school picnic.

It's not in our nature, but if you push us... anything is possible. We aren't robots.

93 posted on 11/19/2017 8:48:20 AM PST by Teacher317 (We have now sunk to a depth at which restatement of the obvious is the first duty of intelligent men)
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To: NTHockey
Wilson and Roosevelt, both promised to keep us out of war, got the votes and promptly took us to war. Both provoked our entry with belligerent moves against our opponents.

Your History teacher should be flogged. Roosevelt "provoked" Pearl Harbor?!? Pray tell, what was the "belligerent" move by FDR that pushed the Emperor to order the attack. We will wait while you try to dream something up.

(Hint: Japan did not care one whit about the US "lend/lease" of arms in Europe, so don't even bother trying to pretend that was a provocation in Japan's eyes.)

94 posted on 11/19/2017 9:00:59 AM PST by Teacher317 (We have now sunk to a depth at which restatement of the obvious is the first duty of intelligent men)
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To: Teacher317

Moving the fleet to Hawaii. Cutting off oil to Japan. Supporting China in their war against China. How’s that for starters? Read “Day of Deceit” and then sue YOUR history teacher.


95 posted on 11/19/2017 9:27:15 AM PST by NTHockey (Rules of engagement #1: Take no prisoners. And to the NSA trolls, FU)
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To: slowhandluke

“10 days after the USA entered WW1, Germany sent Lenin via sealed train to Russia.”

There’s an interesting movie about how that came together starring Ben Kingsley as Lenin. The storyline has a lot of pre-revolution Russian personalities that I was unaware of prior to watching it.

http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0174862/combined


96 posted on 11/19/2017 10:54:25 AM PST by Rebelbase (The urge to save humanity is almost always only a false-face for the urge to rule it.-- H.L. Mencken)
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To: Kaslin

http://themetapicture.com/if-wwi-was-a-bar-fight/


97 posted on 11/19/2017 12:12:40 PM PST by Impy (The democrat party is the enemy of your family and civilization itself, forget that at your peril.)
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To: slowhandluke

I’ll start by wishing that Eve had not eaten the forbidden fruit.


98 posted on 11/19/2017 7:47:13 PM PST by G Larry (There is no great virtue in bargaining with the Devil)
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To: iowamark
In 1917, nobody could have predicted the Depression, the rise of Hitler, and WWII. A German military victory in 1917-18 seemed like a terrible thing, and it would have been.

No one could have predicted what would happen, but my point is that had we not intervened, the worst aspects of what did happen, likely would not have happened.

99 posted on 11/20/2017 7:13:08 AM PST by DiogenesLamp ("of parents owing allegiance to no other sovereignty.")
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To: Lonesome in Massachussets
You haven’t changed my mind about the Civil War and slavery, but we do agree about the harmful aftereffects of the Civil War. Given the deeply Christian culture of the South, I suspect (without any real evidence) that slavery would ended in a generation or two without the Civil War, and racial reconciliation in the South would have been quicker and more peaceful.

Here I agree with you. I think the economics of it would have failed too, but it might have taken between 20 and 80 years for that to happen. Social pressure would have never abated, and state by state, the South too would have succumbed to the influence that had earlier purged the institution in the Northern states.

But to the bondsman, a generation or two is his entire life.

In the calculus of the lesser of two evils, I lean toward believing it would have been better to not have killed 750,000 people in war directly, along with the claimed 2 million who died as a result of starvation, disease and exposure, as well as setting up the Omni-powerful Federal Leviathan we have now and eroding our original rights as independent states.

What we have now is more lingering and more extensive than what would have resulted from slavery declining naturally.

100 posted on 11/20/2017 7:32:04 AM PST by DiogenesLamp ("of parents owing allegiance to no other sovereignty.")
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