Well written piece that conjurs up some of Charles Lindberg's speeches and the arguments he was using in opposing intervention in Europe.

and then what? No European Union? No American intervention? No Cold War? No globalisation of trade? No internet?

You can never assert whether history influenced life in a good or bad way.

It's a discussion without an end.
War is necessary whenever the power decides that it is. War

So, between Hitler's propaganda, Goering's masterful air shows, and failures of both the French and British intelligence bureaus, the Luftwaffe was made out (in 1936) to be far more fearsome than it actually was (in 1936).

Thus, "Baldwin lied, innocent Germans died"?

Fast forward a bit. A major rationale for the investment of hundreds of billions of dollars and diversion of some of the finest minds in the Allied nations was the threat of a German nuclear weapon. Yet, in 1945, it turned out that the Germans were nowhere near the completion of an atomic bomb. Given the diversion of resources, perhaps the chant would have been "Einstein lied, Allied soldiers needlessly died!"

I'm beginning to wonder if the battle of Lepanto was necessary. Maybe the Muslims should have taken Europe in the 16th century and gotten it over with. Today they would be a lot of unemployed quasi-pacifists who do all their jihading with their mouths.

I just blogged about William Shawcross on the absolute necessity of the Iraq War, and his second thoughts about Vietnam as well. I skimped on his argument some, especially on WMDs. His article is not online, but will appear in the new edition of his book Allies.

By jumping straight to the Nazi example, you have invoked Godwin's Law and lost this argument, the argument presumably being over the question, "Was the recent Iraq war justified?"

Where was the imminent threat to any of Iraq's neighbors? Where, for that matter, was the imminent threat to the United States? The correct answer is that there never was such a thing, just as there were no weapons of mass destruction, and so on. The pretext for the Iraq war was a tissue of lies; pulling the old, wrong Nazi simile was dumb when Bush tried it before the war started and just as dumb now.

After the attack on Pearl Harbor America should have asked the Japanese what they wanted and given it to them. Almost 3,000 American lives were enough.

Instead we went on and wasted hundreds and thousands of American lives. And for what? To keep the Japanese from killing and subjugating Asians? Who cares.

We should have brought the boys home. If the Japanese wanted Pearl Harbor as the price to end the war we should have given it to them. There were a lot of Japs living there any way.

#5,

As soon as Saddam broke the cease fire agreement the war was technically on.

The rest is just a matter of details.

In fact his assistance in the matter of WTC 1 was a deal breaker.

In fact Congress and Pres. Clinton effectively declared war on Saddam in 1998. The Iraq Regime Change Act (approximately). Official policy.

Bush just implimented official bi-partisan policy.

I have heard Kos is going to destroy the DLC in a week or so. Can't come a minute too soon.

LOL

"By jumping straight to the Nazi example, you have invoked Godwin's Law and lost this argument"

Godwin's Law: As an online discussion grows longer, the probability of a comparison involving Nazis or Hitler approaches 1.

Says nothing there about winning or losing the argument. No soup for you.

Actually, "Rob McMillin," there's no "argument" here that I'm aware of. It's an inquiry into the absurdity of presuming it is possible to determine what wars are "necessary" and what are not. The anti-Iraq War voices seem increasingly obsessed with the notion of "unnecessary" wars. But in these two cases we're talking about a war now, justified because it prevents a worse calamity later. But unless you can rewind the tape of history and play it twice, once with the preventive war once without it, there's no way to prove that one way or the other.

No one is compared to a Nazi here. No one is compared to Hitler. Nobody has put forth a rhetorical "law," to my knowledge, that says "you are forbidden to discuss World War II."

So Simon, Japan and Russia should start a shooting war any moment now (they are still officially at war)

I think a usefull way to see if a war was necessary is to look at it with hindsight. If you knew how it woud end would you still have fought it? And the civil war is definitly an example of a war which wouldn't have been fought if the result would have been known from the start. Way to many deaths and destruction.

This fictional Rhineland war would not have been fought the way you describe. The German army would have been routed but it wouldn't have risen against Hitler (why, i doubt many Germans where against the liberation of the Rhineland). They would have started a liberation war in the occupied zone and the French would have left it after some years. This would have been an absolute example of a unnecesarry war. Would it have stopped WWII? I don't know but most of those deaths where Germans and Russians anyway. France came off lightly and as such this may have been the best course of action.

The German army would have been routed but it wouldn't have risen against Hitler

Maybe not then, but we know for a fact that officers were planning a coup over his Sudetan adventure.

a -- France "got off lightly?" Well I guess those Jews weren't really Frenchmen (or human) so no big deal then. France lost about 2 million lives in the war, so purely by lives lost it would have been better to avoid War with Hitler later by taking it earlier.

THAT is the point; sometimes WAR is inevitable. It was inevitable the moment Hitler took power, anyone who took the trouble to read Mein Kampf would have known that (as Churchill did).

IF War was inevitable, then the best course of action is to take the War when it is most favorable for you and least favorable for your enemy who is forcing War upon you.

WAS War with Saddam inevitable? Evidence suggests yes:

1. Pointless assasination plot against Ex-President Bush in April 1993 in Kuwait leading to June 1993 cruise missile attacks in Baghdad ordered by Clinton.

2. Constant hostile targeting of US aircraft in violation of cease fire agreement.

3. Harboring of 1993 WTC bomber Abdul Rahman Yassin complete with car, stipend, apartment in Baghdad.

4. Official Celebration of 9/11.

5. Arrests in Germany 2000 of Iraqi IIS agents plotting to attack US military bases there.

6. Czech intelligence on plots by Saddam's IIS (expelled Iraqi consular officer for this) to blow up Radio Free Europe.

7. Inexplicable and makes-no-sense refusal to allow inspectors in to search for WMDs (if he had none WHAT was he hiding?)

8. Helping two of the 9/11 Hijackers get through Kuala Lumpur customs through the offices of an Iraqi Embassy employee who was IIS, and attendance of 9/11 meeting by same IIS agent (reported as footnote in 9/11 Commission Report, larger reporting by Senate Intelligence Committee Report on 9/11).

9. Harboring Abu Nidal, architect of the Achille Lauro hijacking and fugitive from US justice who murdered Leon Klinghoffer in his wheelchair. Nidal like Yassin had a stipend, car, and apartment.

I could go on and on, but these are all material issues demonstrating continued Iraqi hostility to the US. Post 9/11 we weren't going to go along, Saddam would get with the program (drop the overt terror against the US) or he'd get solved. Simple as that.

The pacificists and appeasers of the 30's measure up quite favorably to today's incarnation of that ilk. At least back then, they had the carnage of WWI fresh in their minds. How can someone look back and disparage them for wanting to avoid a repeat?

Today in Iraq, we have no such carnage. Instead, we have a low-instensty that we can wage without even scratching the surface of the might this nation could muster - if we were united.

But the problem is that we are not united. And I doubt that this nation CAN be united given the absolute moral and intellectual corruption of today's socialist dominated Democratic party.

So instead of a winning this low-intensity conflict, it is looking increasingly like we will lose. And our loss in Iraq will be a global catastrophe. The Democrats KNOW this and they JUST DON'T CARE as long as the catastrophe can be pinned on Bush and the Republicans.

So today's pacifists and appeasers apparently prefer a global conflagration to the winning in Iraq. From crisis comes opportunity.

"I think a usefull way to see if a war was necessary is to look at it with hindsight. If you knew how it woud end would you still have fought it? "

Useful to historians maybe. The problem with this approach is that it does little for you in he here and now. Wars and battles do change the fortunes of the world, despite what some hairbrained professors with too much time on their hands think. The problem is you rarely know what the change will be until it is too late. I could spend all day listing the number of times a great leaders sudden death shook the future of nations (Ghengis Khan as his armies massed for the invasion of Europe comes to mind).

As Jim Rockford says, war was inevitable from 1933.
The attempts to avoid it by appeasement, and the justification of this by the (exagerrated) "unfairness" of the Versailles settlement to Germany, only made it worse when it came.
Certainly in 1936, and very likely in 1938, Germany could have been defeated by the Allies.

What a's objection fails to recognise is that the war that bregan in 1939 came frighteningly close to victory for Germany.
Had Britain been defeated or capitulated in 1940, Operation Barbarossa could have started earlier and with no diversion of German resources to other theatres; probability of German victory over the Soviet Union would have been far higher, probability of the US intervening far lower.

Setting aside the genocidal consequences for the peoples of eastern Europe, how would France have fared as part of Europa under the shadow of the 1000 Year Reich? Not well, I suspect.

If America had never fought in WWI...

Germany wouldn't have been defeated, Hitler would never have come into power, and WWII would never have happened.

We could play this game all day long.

I blame the entire 20th Century on Charles Martel for winning the Battle of Tours.

Jim, there were only about 550 000 French death, not 1.5 million.

#8 - RTFW.

There is a tradition in many Usenet newsgroups that once such a comparison is made, the thread is over, and whoever mentioned the Nazis has automatically lost whatever argument was in progress.

#9 - you're kidding, right? No, there's no argument here, nope, nobody's likening the circumstances in Iraq to those in 1936 Germany, nope, not at all.

Did you even read the post above?

Nothing is inevitable. If I smoke 2 packs a day for 50 years I may get emphysema and lung cancer. It is not a certainty. But it is a probability. If other european powers had stepped in early to depose uncle adolf in a decisive manner, who knows what would have happened.

However, who amongst us thinks that if Neville Chamberlain could take back his 1938 pact with Hitler, essentially giving Nazi Germany the Sudetenland and Czekoslovakia, he would do so. The appeasement of psycopaths has long held to be a disastrous course of events. It is the essence of naivete to assume that kindness begets kindness. There will always be psycopaths in the world, and every once in a while, one of the millions of existing psycopaths gets into a position to do some serious damage to whole populations. If somebody wishes to play the appeasement odds, history has demonstrated many times over that survival odds are against the appeaser, noble and peaceful though their thoughts and intentions may be. Yes, some wars are inevitable. My only concern with the current middle east conflict is that it is not being prosecuted vigorously enough. This particular family of rats should be put out of business once, and decisively. The popular brand of religion in the middle East seems to be very adept at breeding suicidal psycopaths with extraordinary delusions of grandeur. Civilized and free societies can take care of this now, next year, in the next decade, or in the next 100 years. History and it’s precedents are clear in one thing, one day, we will be forced to take care of it. I cannot think of any successful appeasement strategy in history. I hate to sound like a hard ass, but sometimes, that’s just the way it is.

I almost forgot to mention, there is a 3rd choice if one does not wish to fight or appease, one can join them. Anybody want to get up before dawn every day and bow down towards the east? Suicidal psycopaths are highly valued at the top of this social food chain.

To go back to head topic:

A necessary war is one in which we were directly confronted,in direct danger, or directly attacked; and that war can directly deal with this threat.
I agree that the revolutionary war, the civil war (Lincoln strongly beleived, and was probably right, that the survival of the union was more important than anything else.), and WWII were necessary. In all of these, a blow was struck against the nation, and the nation responded. I'm not familar enough with the complexities of WWI to make a judgement call.
I also beleive that sometimes peacekeeping/police action is a good things. But these wars are, by definition, unneccessary to the survival of the US. However, like all wars there need to be very specific engagement goals. Running our federal budget into the ground to help someone else does not strengthen the united states.

The problems with wars like Korea/Vietnam is not that their objective's were not noble (saving those from communism), but ill-defined. Atacking a faceless army indefinately in a culture you do not understand, for a population that does not neccessarily want freedom is unlikely to be sucesfull. In vietnam we found ourselves bogged down between two sides which were (shock) both corrupt and evil. We could have fought the war forever and never brought peace and democracy. Furthermore, the south korean 'truce', and the Vietnam 'loss' have not destroyed the USA (or, at least not yet) and are thus unneccessary.

The Iraq war is a slightly different war, in that we were confronted with a nuclear 'threat', which later turned out to be false. Invasion, has so far not stoped WMD's (they didn't exist) or prevented terrorists from gaining access to nukes, which still may be possible through Iran and Pakistan. Furthermore, it is becoming more and more likely that the 'humanitarian' secondary goal is also failing (which indirectly could have created democracy and reduce terrorism). Although anything could still happen, that is how it appears today.

WWII is not a good comparison to Iraq, because Hitler commanded the most technical army ever seen, and Saddam was mostly contained (note that we toppeled his forces in two weeks). Hitler was part of a coalition that attacked us directly at pearl harbor. While it is possible that Saddam 'may have' atacked us indirectly, the overthrow of Saddam has not prevented terrorism in any shape or form. If we failed in WWII, a japanese/German invasion was certain, if we fail in Iraq (which sucks for the Iraqis) the union still survives.

Question: If we save Iraq, but the american dollar falls to nothing... is it worth it?

Two comments

#1) The attack on Carter for saying the revolutionary war was unnecessary is one of the most sad failures to read context I have ever seen. He quite clearly says that the British could have avoided the war by recognizing that they were trying to dominate a people who were an ocean away and a world different in culture. I.e. he has no beef with the nascent US fighting for its independence, his beef is with the brits for forcing it to a war.

Your implication (and the freepers' via the link) that Carter thinks the US shouldn't have fought for its independence is really pretty sad.

#2) You complain that he doesn't establish a definition of what's a necessary war - but actually from the quote it's quite clear that he's responding specifically to the argument that Iraq had vast stores of WMDs and was a direct threat. I don't have to remind you what became of that particular justification of the war's "necessity".

He does indeed make allowances that the world is safer without SH, that the Iraqi people are better off without him, and that if democracy is the final outcome, that will be a good thing. What exactly is your complaint?

#3) You give as an example of a "necessary" war a hypothetical conflict that might have averted WWII. I'm sure the world leaders of 1936 would have loved the benefit of your acute hindsight, but they didn't have it, and they'd just seen a few million men fed to the meat grinder in WWI.

In the meantime, there is absolutely no parallel between that situation and today's. In 1936, Germany was the most powerful military force in the world ... and growing rapidly. In 2003, Iraq had a military one-third the size it had had ten years before, when we kicked its ass all over the gulf. In 2003, a full third of Iraqi airspace was occupied daily by the air force of a military power (the US) easily dozens of times its' size and decades more advanced in technology.

Iraq of 2003 resembles Germany of 1936 not at all, in terms of its' ability to threaten the world and its' neighbors militarily, so while your post shows in great detail your knowledge of the 1930's European social/military milieu, it's ultimately completely irrelevant: The fact that you can demonstrate the existence of a necessary war proves absolutely nothing about this one.

Yeah, a 1936 war might have been a good idea in terms of averting WWII. So what?

People who get off on wars and military history often assume that all of them, at least all the ones WE were involved in, were "necessary" -- and support all future hypothetical conflicts as well. Peaceniks often assume that no wars are ever "necessary". Both groups are dreadfully wrong. Sadly, most vocal people fall into one of those two categories. Even more sadly, most Americans go along with a war as long as it remains fun and exciting to watch on TV.

lots of questions for alchemist;

What do you define as we in "we were directly confronted"? (ie does the we include Americans abroad, or US embassies, or forces stationed abroad)

Is it direct danger to US citizens lives or government institutions?

Would people have to die in the direct attack or does an attack on say power grids meet this requirement? If people have to die, then how many?

How do we determine what populations "want freedom"? Are there some that do not? What are they?

Can the American dollar really fall to nothing?
Thank you for your time,
Jeffrey

Great post. Following on what Simon said, there was also the necessary war of the continuation of Iraq-Kuwait conflict:

Aafter Iraq broke the UN ceasefire agreement and in support of the uprising by Kurdish and Shiite freedom fighters, the United States re-entered Iraq. Denied airpower by American fighter support, and with it's army crumbling in desertion and revolt, the Hussein regeim quickly fell. Though a period of unrest followed, with the lifting of sanctions and nation building support, the emergence of a prosperous and stable democratic state in the heart of the middle east allowed the withdrawal of US forces from the Islamic holy lands in Saudi Arabia, easing arab fears of a second colonsation by the West. Without these tensions, democratic modes of thought were faclilitated throughout the region and various radical islamists movements aimed at destablilsing secular arab governments failed to gain popularity, eventually dissipating.

In 2006, New York's World Trade Center celebrated it's 40th anniversary.

The saying is "stitch in time saves nine", another good one is "penny wise, pound foolish"

Funny Seth but you forget the US forces needed in to protect kuwait and Saudi Arabia from the Islamic republics of Iraq and Iran. It would also be the fifth anniversity of the day Iran exploded their bomb (which was developed with the help of Iraq)

In the meantime, there is absolutely no parallel between that situation and today's. In 1936, Germany was the most powerful military force in the world ... and growing rapidly. In 2003, Iraq had a military one-third the size it had had ten years before, when we kicked its ass all over the gulf. In 2003, a full third of Iraqi airspace was occupied daily by the air force of a military power (the US) easily dozens of times its' size and decades more advanced in technology.

In 1936, Germany wasn't the most powerful military in the world. IMHO, France acting on its own could have beaten Germany handily, if it had acted promptly at the time of the Rhineland crisis. There were only 20,000 German troops in the Rhineland. The buildup of the German military was still under way. Remember overt violation of the Treaty of Versailles was recent (in 1935 if I recall correctly).

#25 "A",

Heh... Us essentially having done now what I had us doing then, I suppose that means you expect Iraq to become an islamic theocracy, and a successful nuke test out of Iran with their help by 2010. Guess we'll see.

#23)What do you define as we in "we were directly confronted"? (attacks on embassies/powergrids/industry/civilians) and How much damage requires a direct confrontation?

I guess it's going change a little bit depending on the specific circumstances (or the individual) For me, it's does it endanger our national security.. Is there a direct attack on the homeland.. (and the key part)... where war is necessary to solve the problem.
There are always alternatives to war that can be considered, especially against terrorist groups. Can special-ops track and remove attackers? Can steps be taken to prevent a second attack? And finally... if we begin a war will it prevent further attacks? (and further: is the cost of that action greater than the initial attack?)

How do we determine what populations "want freedom"? Are there some that do not? What are they?
I should have phrased this a little differently earlier... I should say not that some people don't want freedom, but that the chances of creating a stable democracy in some countries (at specific points in time) may be difficult. Vietnam was really more in the midst of a civil war than a battle for freedom. I don't support communism, but realize that many civillians hated the corrupt and ruthless goverment more than the communists. This creates a difficult situation to be resolved by war alone. At best, we could have only held the rebellion at bay indefinately.
In Iraq: religous, ethnic and pollitical tensions will make it very difficult to establish a democracy. I am not saying it can't be done, just that it needs to be considered in the cost of bringing freedom.

Can the american dollar fall to nothing?
Again, I oversimplified. My point is what if we spend so much money in Iraq that we can no longer afford to hold together the basic functions of the american goverment? What if China gives so many loans to the US that it essentially keeps a say in how our goverment operates? If we are forced to repay these loans with brutal taxes or massive inflation is Iraq worth it?
I'm not saying these things will happen, just that they are certainly plausible and need to be considered when considering an 'occupation' with no forseeable end.

alchemist,

Thank you for your answers and clarifications. Specifically regarding who "wants freedom". I have read some of your comments before, and I did not think you would take a position that some would not want freedom. Just checking.

The Chinese invest in our economy and we purchase their goods. Perhaps this keeps us out of an "unnecessary war".

Take care,
Jeffrey

In keeping w/ Callimachus' original posting, alchemist, one is left wondering whether the UK would consider fighting Hitler to have been worth it, given that the UK had to mortgage its empire to the United States in order to do so?

Or, for that matter, if aiding the USSR (by either the US or Great Britain) in the war against Germany would be worth it, if it would lead to an "occupation" (such as still goes on in Germany) if we won.

Presumably, one would conclude that defeating the Berlin regime, ruling a population whose sole experience with truly democratic experience had led to the rise of the Bavarian corporal, was hardly worthwhile, if it would simply lead to a global "cold war." Better to leave them alone, w/ the understanding that, so long as the British Empire (or the United States) were left alone, continental Europe should take care of itself?

This would, of course, be especially appealing in 1936, when no one really knew what a Nazi regime would even mean. I mean, for all its overstatements about the Jews, it wasn't like the Nazi party had acted in any untoward way regarding its own population, had it? (Kristallnacht was still two years away, after all, and the "Final Solution" was six years away.)

#30) I've rewritten this post about three times now. This is all difficult considering the initial scenario is theoretical...

I think Winston Churchill was fairly aware that Hitler was not going to stand with 'breathing room', and would not be satisfied with Europe. Obviously, the public was terrified enough of WWI that no one would deal with this threat until it was too late. By then the German force was an overpowered monster, and pacifism had failed.

My understanding of Russia was that it was a tactical move designed to create a 2-front war that would split German forces. This move was not particularly liked by any leader (except Stalin) but a move that was needed to bring initial victory.

German occupation was set-up after years of planning, espeically by US forces after seeing Europe handle WWI. So things were planned to create a stable environment to rebuild and slowly move Germany into a democracy. This was done because it was understood that a stable Germany was in the best interests of peace in Europe.

So is occupation to create a democracy necessary? I'll change that to a sometimes. If Canada collapsed into a civil, it would obviously be in our best interest to stabilitze the forces and bring peace, but not neccessary for our survival. We would have to be realistic about how many resources would could spend, especially if these new nations were unwilling or unable to bring a truce.

The same goes for the Mid-East. A stable mid-east would benefit the entire world, however we have survived human history wihout it. To make it more difficult, religous,ethnic and historical ties make this process very difficult for the time being.

You give as an example of a "necessary" war a hypothetical conflict that might have averted WWII. I'm sure the world leaders of 1936 would have loved the benefit of your acute hindsight, but they didn't have it, and they'd just seen a few million men fed to the meat grinder in WWI.

Historical speculation is just ingenious trifling. As soon as you take one step outside what actually happened, you're in Butterfly Effect land, and anything can happen, nothing is predictable. I think the scenario I laid out is reasonably plausible -- France had a far larger military than Germany -- but that's as far as I can say.

Just an off-the-top-of-my-head example: Suppose Gore wins in 2000. He visits different places in the next year than Bush did in fact. That changes the way the FBI looks at certain places and certain files. Let's say he visits an aircraft pilot training school in June 2001. Let's say somebody in the bowels of an FBI office takes a third look at a file that's been seen twice already, and this time, something clicks about certain Middle Eastern names.

P.S.: Hey, Idaho; that was three comments, not two.