HDTenEightyP/NetNews huggingface dataset:
From: bx916@cleveland.Freenet.Edu (Ross W. Starkey)
Subject: Re: The bomb and the Soviets (was Re: Why firebomb civilians?/WWII
Reply-To: bx916@cleveland.Freenet.Edu (Ross W. Starkey)
Organization: Case Western Reserve University, Cleveland, OH (USA)
Date: Tue, 21 Jul 92 20:31:38 GMT


In a previous article, fester@island.COM (Mike Fester) says:

>In article <1992Jul16.170352.6834@usenet.ins.cwru.edu> bx916@cleveland.Freenet.Edu (Ross W. Starkey) writes:

>>I belong to to school of thought, by the way, that holds that the use of
>>the two atomic bombs was not only a good but a wonderful thing.  We used
>>them to end an enormously destructive war that could have dragged on for
>>another bloody year, and saved literally millions of lives (to say nothing
>>of billions of dollars) in doing so.
>
>Count my mother-in-law (who was a school girl in Koochi-shi), my grandmother-in
>-law (a school teacher who was forced to drill 9 year-old school girls in 
>how to attack American flame-throwers with bamboo spears) and a good 
>friends' father (a schoolboy in Hiroshima on "the day") as people who agree
>that the A-bombs saved countless Japanese lives.
>
>BTW, I am assuming that the word "wonderful" is used strictly to emphasize the
>contrast with the alternative; a full-scale invasion.

Absolutely.  The bombings themselves were terrible things.  But it was
WONDERFUL that the war ended in August 1945, instead of (say) August 1946
IF (a VERY big if) Operation Olympic and Operation Coronet had been
successful.  It is also wonderful that only two atomic bombs were dropped
and not fifty.
>
>Mike
>-- 
>Disclaimer - These opiini^H^H damn! ^H^H ^Q ^[ .... :w  :q  :wq  :wq! ^d  X ^?
>exit X Q  ^C ^? :quitbye  CtrlAltDel   ~~q  :~q  logout  save/quit :!QUIT
>^[zz ^[ZZZZZZ ^H  man vi ^@  ^L  ^[c  ^# ^E ^X ^I ^T ? help  helpquit ^D  ^d 
>man help ^C ^c help exit ?Quit ?q CtrlShftDel "Hey, what does this button d..."
>
nice .signature :-)

-- 
Whom first, whom later         No one is fool enough to choose war instead of
did you kill in battle,        peace - in peace sons bury fathers, but in war
Patroklos, when the gods       fathers bury sons.  It must have been heaven's
were calling deathward? HOMER  will that this should happen...      HERODOTUS
Newsgroups: soc.history,talk.politics.misc,ca.politics,rec.arts.books,misc.legal
From: slagle@lmsc.lockheed.com (Mark Slagle)
Subject: Re: _A Constitutional History of the United States_
Reply-To: slagle@lmsc.lockheed.com
In-reply-to: foy@aero.org's message of Wed, 29 Jul 1992 15:23:00 GMT
Organization: You wouldn't ask this if you'd seen my desk.
	<SLAGLE.92Jul29023137@sgi417.msd.lmsc.lockheed.com>
	<1992Jul29.152300.3151@aero.org>
Date: Thu, 30 Jul 92 07:22:20 GMT

In article <1992Jul29.152300.3151@aero.org>, foy@aero.org (Richard Foy) writes:

> Mark: Do you really think that Claytons comments about the state of reading
> were not intended as a generalized insult to the college students of today?

No, Richard, I do not think that his comments were intended
as a generalized insult to college students.  Even if they
were, that does not imply a rebuke of a specific member of
that group.  That would be a fallacious argument.  Surely
a generalized college student of today should know that.

I took his statement to be an observation of an undisputed,
so far as I know, fact that students entering college recently
are not as well prepared than have been students in prior years,
in particular that their reading and writing skills are 
underwhelming on average.  Do you have information contrary
to this point?

How do you get from that to a claim that a particular student
must necessarily be unprepared?
--
----
Mark E. Slagle                                 PO Box 61059
slagle@lmsc.lockheed.com                       Sunnyvale, CA   94088
408-756-0895                                   USA
Xref: sparky soc.history:6597 alt.war:1531 talk.politics.misc:35335 soc.culture.japan:6135
From: mst@vexpert.dbai.tuwien.ac.at (Markus Stumptner)
Newsgroups: soc.history,alt.war,talk.politics.misc,soc.culture.japan
Subject: Re: Relativity and Pearl Harbor (was: Japanese atrocities)
Date: 22 Jul 92 21:11:00 GMT
Organization: DB and ES Subdivision, TU Vienna

From article <ATAYLOR.92Jul21145758@gauss.nmsu.edu>, by ataylor@nmsu.edu (Nosy):
> <In article <n8tanpg@zola.esd.sgi.com> livesey@solntze.esd.sgi.com (Jon Livesey) writes:
> <   Yes, of course, and no-one is forgetting.  However, it's fifty
> <   years later, and people still rememember Pearl Harbour as a
> <   "Day of infamy" and still seem to experience a sense of outrage,
> <   and even some racist feelings, about the whole thing.
 
> 	Yeah, those survivors of the Bataan Death March should
> 	just shut up, right?
>	[Lots of true stuff about the Bataan Death March deleted] 

Now, all of what you said about the Bataan Death March may be true (I
don't see anything wrong in it, anyway), but what does it have to do
with the topic of Pearl Harbor as a "day of infamy"?  Nothing.  Of
course, you could argue that in the public image, these things tend to
mixed together, but then that is exactly what this discussion is
about: that they shouldn't be, i.e., you're showing a great example of
the problem with public perception of Pearl Harbor *as a way of
opening a war*.  Nobody denies that the Japanese did not conduct the
war according to the Geneva convention, but then that is not the
topic.
-- 
Markus Stumptner                                mst@vexpert.dbai.tuwien.ac.at
University of Technology Vienna                 vexpert!mst@relay.eu.net
Paniglg. 16, A-1040 Vienna, Austria             ...mcsun!vexpert!mst
From: cramer@optilink.UUCP (Clayton Cramer)
Newsgroups: soc.history
Subject: The problem of trusting popular press when writing history
Keywords: Chelmno,Eichmann,Goebbels,Irving
Date: 21 Jul 92 17:09:02 GMT
Organization: Optilink Corporation, Petaluma, CA

In article <15715@pitt.UUCP>, geb@dsl.pitt.edu (gordon e. banks) writes:
> In article <1992Jul16.155844.17088@midway.uchicago.edu> tb13@midway.uchicago.edu writes:
> >
> >The Time Magazine Article (this week) about the subject (found in the
> >brief articles that precede the news stories), called Irving "pro-Nazi,"
> >and stated that Irving contends that there were no gas chambers.  
> 
> Actually, the Time article that I saw (just a blurb, really) said
> he denied the holocaust, which is typical of Time's inability
> to get their facts straight.  I have yet to see an article in
> Time where I had any knowledge of the subject that they didn't
> botch.  I'll take the NY Times any day over Time.
> 
> Gordon Banks  N3JXP      | "Skepticism is the chastity of the intellect, and

I have the same experience -- Time seldom gets anything right.
The NY Times, on the other hand, contrary to their claim of the
being the "newspaper of record," simply doesn't cover a lot of
things that should be covered, usually because it doesn't fit in
with their leftist mindset.

This raises a disturbing question: how far should an historian
trust a newspaper account?  I recently had occasion to read some
articles from Time, in 1935 -- and the style is so similar, that
you might conclude that the same writers are still working there,
almost 60 years later.  The style has the same careful inclusion of 
most of the facts, but with a strong, insulting tone that shows that 
not even a pretense of objectivity is present.

I certainly wouldn't trust anything that appeared in Time unless
I could verify it in several other more reputable sources.
-- 
Clayton E. Cramer {uunet,pyramid}!optilink!cramer  My opinions, all mine!
"Well, maybe the Holocaust was right *for that culture*." -- a moral relativist
with whom I work.
Newsgroups: soc.history
From: fester@island.COM (Mike Fester)
Subject: Re: Why firebomb civilians?/WWII
Organization: /usr/local/rn/organization
Date: Mon, 27 Jul 1992 18:01:17 GMT

In article <23JUL199214120738@mars.lerc.nasa.gov> smpod@mars.lerc.nasa.gov (Stefan) writes:
>and.COM (Mike Fester) writes...
>>smpod@ariel.lerc.nasa.gov (Stefan) writes:
>>>fester@island.COM (Mike Fester) writes...
>> 
>>>You seem to be enamoured with legalese.   What do you mean by 'said state'?
>>>Are you saying that the U.S. was friendly with Japan?
>> 
>>Uh, well, yeah. We WERE negotiating with them at the time regarding their
>>incursions into China and SE Asia.
>
>Negotiationg with a country does not make it a friendly country.

Lack of a declaration of war and full diplomatic relations DO seem to indicate
'friendly" status, at elast as defined in the international scene.

>>>>Also, I believe the attacks on Japanese cities also reduced the effectiveness
>>>>of the Japanese military machine, which is a perfectly valid thing to attempt
>>>>to do.
>> 
>>>How did attacking the cities reduce the effectiveness of the Japanese military
>>>machine?
>> 
>>Uh, by destroying factories? By burning shops that supplied parts to the 
>>larger industries? By disrupting rail traffic? Shipyards?
>
>Why not bomb the factories, rail and shipyards instead of homes, temples and
>hospitals?

They did bomb those facilities. The Japanese industry at the time (and to this
day) is more dependant on "cottage factories", small, independant contrators 
that supply larger factories with parts, etc. These could not be pinpoint
bombed (as we did in Europe). Note also that this approach was successful; 
Japanese production went down. In Europe, despite round-the-clock bombing,
German production went UP, until the (centralized) factories were captured
by the advancing allies.

>>Really, if all this is confusing, why don't you follow soc.culture.japan? It
>>HAS been discussed rather thoroughly there.
>
>The confusion lies elsewhere ;-)

You mean Nasa?

Mike
-- 
Disclaimer - These opiini^H^H damn! ^H^H ^Q ^[ .... :w  :q  :wq  :wq! ^d  X ^?
exit X Q  ^C ^? :quitbye  CtrlAltDel   ~~q  :~q  logout  save/quit :!QUIT
^[zz ^[ZZZZZZ ^H  man vi ^@  ^L  ^[c  ^# ^E ^X ^I ^T ? help  helpquit ^D  ^d 
man help ^C ^c help exit ?Quit ?q CtrlShftDel "Hey, what does this button d..."
From: ggrieve@cbnewsi.cb.att.com (greig.grieve)
Newsgroups: soc.history
Subject: Re: Population of Rome
Summary: age and size of sewers may be a clue
Date: 29 Jul 92 13:19:08 GMT
Organization: AT&T

> 
> >During the time of
> >the Roman Empire, there were few "big" cities.  What was the population of
> >Rome at that time?  20,000?  === Al Sparks
> 
> Rome's population in the Empire era was more than 1 million, perhaps close


Rome has ancient sewers, built on a large scale by the Etruscans in about 700BC.
The diameter of the Cloaca Maxima is about 5 metres where it opens into the
Tiber. This seems to indicate a large population from an early date.Pliny's
"Natural History" book 36,104-108 gives a brief description.
From: krzystek@milton.u.washington.edu (Jerzy Krzystek)
Newsgroups: soc.history
Subject: Kohl, Waldheim and Hitlerjugend
Date: 22 Jul 92 02:00:13 GMT
Organization: University of Washington, Seattle

bx916@cleveland.Freenet.Edu (Ross W. Starkey) writes:


>BUT, three to four months ago, I read in the New York Times that Kohl was
>visiting Kurt Waldheim, a known nazi and member of the SS and suspected of
>war crimes.

Let's keep the facts straight, please: Waldheim was a *Wehrmacht* officer 
in the rank of lieutenant. So were former German chancellor Helmudt
Schmidt and present president, Richard von Weizsaecker.

What made Waldheim's case special was that he had covered up this fragment
of his past. Also, the army unit with which he served as an intelligence
officer committed crimes against British POW's and Balkan civilian 
population, including Jews. As far as I know, Waldheim was never accused 
of committing them personally, only of being aware of them at the time.

I am no fan of Waldheim at all and I think he disqualified himself
as a politician, but for a dissenting view of the anti-Waldheim campaign 
in the U.S. see Simon Wiesenthal's book "Justice not Vengeance"
(Weidenfeld and Nicolson, London 1989). Wiesenthal's opinion is that 
people who initiated this campaign displayed significant ignorance 
and bad will and caused enormous damage to Jewish-Austrian relations.

Another item:

>I originally brought it up to point out that in the eighties, the people of
                                                               ^^^^^^^^^^^^^
>the Warsaw Pact may not have seen beyond the fact that the German people
^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^
>had elected a former member of the Hitler Youth as Chancellor, and may have
>drawn conclusions from that fact.  

Can you explain what you mean by "the people of the Warsaw Pact"?
I have always thought that the WP was just a military pact. Have you 
ever heard of "the NATO people"?

Anyway, notwithstanding the name problem, such generalizations are, to
put it very mildly, risky business. Each of the nations living behind
the former Iron Curtain is a distinct entity, and as such cannot be
treated as part of one larger family. E.g. regarding the "German problem"
a typical Czech attitude can be very different from a typical Polish
one.

As for the reaction of Kohl's ascent to power in 1982 or 1983, the 
prevalent reaction at least in Poland was that he became the first German
*not burdened* by World War II experiences to be elected chancellor.
Obviously his Hitlerjugend past was not taken seriously. As for
other Eastern European (as I prefer to call them) peoples, I simply 
do not know, and suspect your guessing is not supported by facts.


Jurek Krzystek

University of Washington, Seattle
Newsgroups: soc.history
From: cohen@cumuli.vmsmail.ethz.ch (Mark Cohen)
Subject: Edward II
Originator: mark@agnew
Organization: Dept. of Chemistry, Swiss Federal Institute of Technology (ETH)
Date: Mon, 27 Jul 1992 12:59:24 GMT

I have some questions about the reign of Edward the second of England
these result from watching the D.Jarman film Edward II. The film is based
on the Marlow play. Basically I'd like to know how much Marlow and Jarman
relied on documented events and how much is dramatic licence. Specifically
i) Was it really a red hot poker or was Edwards death more mundane
ii) How old was Prince Edward (later Ed III) when Edward II was deposed/killed
iii) Does any one know what the relationship between Gaverston and Edward II
     really was.
iv) How wide spread was the disruption that surrounded the overthrow of 
    Edward II was it a palace coup or a wide spread revolt.

Thanks in advance for any responses.
Mark Cohen
Xref: sparky soc.history:6547 alt.war:1521 talk.politics.misc:35062 soc.culture.japan:6094
From: cramer@optilink.UUCP (Clayton Cramer)
Newsgroups: soc.history
Subject: Re: NATO/Warsaw Pact forces (was Re: Greatest Prez...)
Date: 22 Jul 92 17:11:00 GMT
Organization: Optilink Corporation, Petaluma, CA

In article <JMC.92Jul21180301@SAIL.Stanford.EDU>, jmc@SAIL.Stanford.EDU (John McCarthy) writes:
> The extreme superiority of the M1A1 tank to the T-72 was a big
> surprise to the U.S. as well as everyone else.  A Soviet general
> said that this was just to the export version of the T-72.
> Maybe so.
> --
> John McCarthy, Computer Science Department, Stanford, CA 94305

There is a book titled _Inside the Soviet Army_, written by a 
Soviet Army defector using the pseudonym Viktor Suvorov, which
explains why the Soviet Union sold export models of major weapon
systems, rather than the internal consumption version: to make
sure that today's "allies" didn't become tomorrow's enemies.  Also,
the cost was lower on the stripper export models.

There are aspects to the book that are suspicious -- too much
information seems to be in the book for an army captain to have
had access to.  On the other hand, there are large numbers of
facts that I have had confirmed by Soviet expatriates (about
recruiting practices, the inductees giving away all their personal
possessions the night before, brutality of recruiting sergeants)
and from other, more trustworthy sources.


-- 
Clayton E. Cramer {uunet,pyramid}!optilink!cramer  My opinions, all mine!
"Well, maybe the Holocaust was right *for that culture*." -- a moral relativist
with whom I work.
Newsgroups: soc.history
From: jmc@SAIL.Stanford.EDU (John McCarthy)
Subject: Re: Relativity and Pearl Harbor (was: Japanese atrocities)
Reply-To: jmc@cs.Stanford.EDU
Organization: Computer Science Department, Stanford University
	<STEINLY.92Jul20183207@topaz.ucsc.edu>
	<1992Jul23.163123.2447@island.COM>
Date: 23 Jul 92 11:53:23

Hmm.  The Soviet invasions of Czechoslovakia and Afghanistan don't count.
--
John McCarthy, Computer Science Department, Stanford, CA 94305
*
He who refuses to do arithmetic is doomed to talk nonsense.

Newsgroups: soc.history,talk.politics.misc,ca.politics,rec.arts.books,misc.legal
From: slagle@lmsc.lockheed.com (Mark Slagle)
Subject: Re: _A Constitutional History of the United States_
Reply-To: slagle@lmsc.lockheed.com
In-reply-to: foy@aero.org's message of Wed, 29 Jul 1992 15:15:32 GMT
Organization: You wouldn't ask this if you'd seen my desk.
	<1992Jul29.151532.2789@aero.org>
Date: Thu, 30 Jul 92 07:37:35 GMT

In article <1992Jul29.151532.2789@aero.org>, foy@aero.org (Richard Foy) writes:

> It frustrates when I hear people condemning those who don't read. 

In what sense is recommending a book that is accessible to
those with limited reading skills equivalent to "condemning
those who don't read?"  It seems rather more like the opposite
to me.

> Though I grew up in an era when reading was the norm, I am not
> blinded to the fact that the world has changed. The written
> word is no longer the primary means of extended communication.
> That, as a fact, is neither good or bad. It is only different.

It is not just different, it is bad.  It is virtually impossible
to convey and argue subtle points of an abstract nature in a 
visual medium.

> Think of the images of brutality in South Africa captured by handycams
> which have done so much to change that culture. Think how much Los Angeles
> was changed by 1 minute of amatuer video captured over a year ago. 

May I presume that by these changes you are referring to the 
spontaneous urban renewal program?  The video of the King 
beating is a cogent example of how the medium of visual 
communication is lacking in subtlety.

> Those who have important ideas to communicate would do well to think about
> they can communicate them through video rather hopelessly wishing for the
> good old days.

Video sound bites are communication, but they are not
reasoning and logical argumentation.  As the world becomes
more complex, we need written communication more than ever.
Wishing that this were not so does not solve the problems
of illiteracy.  One thing that might help is suggesting
reading materials that can help to develop an interest in
the written word in those who lack it.  That would seem to
be just what Clayton Cramer was doing.  So what's wrong
with that?
--
----
Mark E. Slagle                                 PO Box 61059
slagle@lmsc.lockheed.com                       Sunnyvale, CA   94088
408-756-0895                                   USA
Newsgroups: soc.history,alt.war,talk.politics.misc,soc.culture.japan
From: ataylor@nmsu.edu (Nosy)
Subject: Re: Relativity and Pearl Harbor (was: Japanese atrocities)
Organization: NMSU Computer Science
Date: Tue, 21 Jul 1992 22:09:00 GMT

<In article <2uuZNB1w164w@netlink.cts.com> galan@netlink.cts.com (Greg Gross) writes:
<   livesey@solntze.esd.sgi.com (Jon Livesey) writes:

<   > In article <13rev3INNqj1@agate.berkeley.edu>, tedrick@triangle.Berkeley.EDU (
<   > |> ->Americans make just a bit too big of a deal about Pearl Harbor.
<   > |> 
<   > |> Yeah, all they did was launch a surprise attack, without a declaration
<   > |> of war, sink the Pacific Fleet, except for a few carriers, then overun
<   > |> half the Pacific. What's to complain about? :-)
<   > 
<   > I'd put it slightly differently.  It's not so much that 
<   > Americans make a big deal out of Pearl Harbour; more that 
<   > they portray the surprise element as being of overwhelming 
<   > importance.

<   True. 
 
	Part of that surprise was the ongoing peace talks; 
	Americans like to believe that "as long as someone
	is talking, they aren't going to start a fight".
	Delivering a major military assault BEFORE declaring
	war AND while claiming to be in a "peace process"
	was a shock to Americans. Europeans would not have
	been so surprised, shocked and angered.

<   > Surprise attacks are not that uncommon.   The British made a
<   > surprise attack on the Danish Fleet.  The Russians made a 
<   > surprise attack on the Turkish fleet.   In 1900-14 the French
<   > were very worried about the possibility of a German surprise
<   > attack, and in 1914 the British mobilised their fleet partly
<   > to avoid the possibility of such an attack.

<   You also could've mentioned the British ari attack on the Italian flet at 
<   Taranto, which is what gave the Japanese the idea for Pearl Harbor in the 
<   first place.

	Note, however, that the British had already declared
	war on Italy; they were not engaged in "peace" talks.

<   > Moreover, the war was already in full swing, even though the
<   > US was trying to remain neutral, and Hitler had launched a
<   > surprise attack on Russia the previous summer, and there had
<   > already been unprovoked attacks on US ships in the Atlantic.
<   > 
<   > It's always seemed to me that there is a certain psychological
<   > element to all that "Day of infamy" business.   It seems that
<   > concentrating so much on how wicked the Japanese were draws
<   > attention away from the really very embarrassing question
<   > of how the US Navy allowed itself to be Copenhagened so badly.
<   > The Pacific Fleet allowed itself to get caught at anchor
<   > like some third rate "Brass polish and white paint" Navy.
<   > No wonder they complained.
 
	There is also the little matter of Bataan, the "Railway
	of Death" in Burma and so on.
Newsgroups: soc.history