posted
France was home to about 1 million troops as of D-Day, Mucus, as well as 2000+ tanks and guns. Now, obviously not every single one of those troops would have been able to be shipped off to the Eastern Front...but a very sizable portion of them would have been able to be drawn off had there been no fear of an American-led invasion from the West.
My question is: how long could even Stalin have kept bleeding his country dry for the war on Germany, if Germany were able to focus its attention almost entirely on the USSR?
posted
(before edit) Yes, and both of those authors take that into account. In fact the latter author allows a portion of troops to depart for the Eastern front even earlier, just shortly after the fall of France rather than after D-Day. But still, this is not enough.
(after edit) And as for how far Stalin could have pushed it, looking it up, the latter author is of the opinion that this would have lead to 40 million dead Russians rather than the historical 24 million dead (latter number from Wiki).
The former author (D-Day fails) is of the opinion that the difference would be insignificant. In fact, the breakdown in co-operation between the Soviets and the Allies might even have lead the Soviets to invade northern Japan given the right conditions.
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posted
I haven't read the book - it sounds like something to put on my list, though - but I was sure they had. I didn't think you'd recommend a book where they failed to take such a basic element into account, after all.
My beef is that with such enormous changes, it's really difficult to predict which way things would have gone is all-and anyone who tries is probably selling something. Be it Americans who want credit for saving the world from the Nazis, or Soviets who want the same.
It's just that the Soviets were helping the Nazis first-that's my beef with Blayne, really.
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posted
I'd include this in an edit, but we're on triple revisions of edits, so I'll start clean, heh.
quote: (after edit) And as for how far Stalin could have pushed it, looking it up, the latter author is of the opinion that this would have lead to 40 million dead Russians rather than the historical 24 million dead (latter number from Wiki).
Perhaps. I certainly 'credit' Stalin with the willingness to push in spite of such casualties, it's true. I'm dubious about his nation's willingness or even ability to endure them is all.
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posted
The book would actually be more interesting for an American actually. Published by the American Historical Society, it is a bit American/Eurocentric with multiple essays on the American Civil War, the War of Independence, and many inflection points in Europe. But only two essays on the East really.
In this case, the former author is American, while the latter is British. The latter's motivation, if I had to guess with my "speculation radar" is that he wrote a biography on Halifax which lead him to believe that it was a really good idea that Halifax didn't win over Churchill for leadership of Britain. I can't really guess on the former.
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Blayne Bradley
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posted
I think some of you are still missing the overwhelming fact that in June 1944 the USSR was already in Romania and I'll repeat again a week from launching Operation Bagration, the German positions in France were filled with volkstrum, hitler youth, and maybe 3-5 elite SS divisions, the majority of actual fighting divisions were in France recovering from action on the eastern front had D-Day failed any spare troops transferred from French occupation duty to the eastern front would have simply been swallowed up by the large front that the Germans already couldn't defend or hold onto.
By 1944 the Soviets had already learned every lesson taught to them by the Germans in how to wage mechanized war and we see this in Operation Bagration and then the push to Warsaw and later Operation August Storm in Manchuria.
The question of Soviet aid of Germany before this is irrelevent finger pointing and a tangental redirection away from the question from the original jingoist Pax Americana statement "If it weren't for us we would all be speaking German" bullcrud, if it weren't for the Tsaritsa Poley you would all be speaking German.
D-Day was irrelevant whose only long term benefit was having a Allied presence in Western Europe and ending the war a few months earlier not years.
Americans can be proud of helping the Soviet Union through Lend-Lease which was fairly critical (and something I've never denied) and providing 2/3's of Red Army trucks which allowed Soviet advances to go as far and as fast as they did.
quote: My question is: how long could even Stalin have kept bleeding his country dry for the war on Germany, if Germany were able to focus its attention almost entirely on the USSR?
Check my link, by 1944 they were already winning and about to advance into Germany, assuming DDay never happens.
quote: It's just that the Soviets were helping the Nazis first-that's my beef with Blayne, really.
Ultimately irrelevent and justifiable under realist paradigms, irrelevent because it has nothing to do with the discussion of you or whoever it was claiming America as the sole victor of WWII which discredits the millions of Soviet military deaths and denigrates the military achievements of the Red Army.
And there was certainly not 1 million German troops in France, 1 million allied troops certainly not German.
The 40 Million dead is unlikely as the 24 million dead is principly comprised of civilian dead, by 1944 it would've been military dead and by that time Soviet doctrine and leadership had improved significantly.
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quote: The question of Soviet aid of Germany before this is irrelevent finger pointing and a tangental redirection away from the question from the original jingoist Pax Americana statement "If it weren't for us we would all be speaking German" bullcrud, if it weren't for the Tsaritsa Poley you would all be speaking German.
It's not irrelevant to me, Blayne, nor to any of the points I'm making, though I can certainly see how it helps your argument to confuse my statements with steven's.
In any event, the idea that the United States would be speaking German were it not for the Soviet Union is at least as stupid as the idea that Europe would be speaking German if not for the Soviets.
quote: Americans can be proud of helping the Soviet Union through Lend-Lease which was fairly critical (and something I've never denied) and providing 2/3's of Red Army trucks which allowed Soviet advances to go as far and as fast as they did.
We shouldn't be proud of helping the Soviet Union, because as it turns out they used their triumph over the Third Reich as an excuse to conquer and tyrannize much of Europe for the next two generations. It was necessary to help the Soviet Union, somewhat, but we shouldn't be proud of it. Instead we should be embarrassed at how incredibly stupid and easily duped we were by the likes of evil scumbags like Stalin.
quote:Ultimately irrelevent and justifiable under realist paradigms, irrelevent because it has nothing to do with the discussion of you or whoever it was claiming America as the sole victor of WWII which discredits the millions of Soviet military deaths and denigrates the military achievements of the Red Army.
OK, for people who aren't Blayne Bradley, 'realist paradigms' means something other than: aggressive military conquest is acceptable if it's a Soviet or a Chinese doing the aggressing and taking the territory. As subsequent European (and Asian! Look at what the USSR tried constantly to do to your beloved China, Blayne, and you're stickin' up for `em!) history illustrates, 'realist paradigms' for Stalin mean 'seize and hold as much territory as I possibly can for as long as I can'.
And that's all. And that's the discussion I'm having, and however much you insist it's irrelevant won't change the fact that it is, because I'm not talking about what steven was talking about, and it's been long enough that you ought to clear the partisanship out of your eyes and take note of who is saying what.
You're defending the power-grabs of Stalin as somehow justified necessities, Blayne. It seems like there really isn't anything a 20th century Communist leader can do that will ever draw criticism from you. You're malanthrop talking politics on this issue.
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quote:Ultimately irrelevent and justifiable under realist paradigms
This is sort of like when you throw out 'de facto and de jure'
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Blayne Bradley
unregistered
posted
quote:Originally posted by Rakeesh:
quote: The question of Soviet aid of Germany before this is irrelevent finger pointing and a tangental redirection away from the question from the original jingoist Pax Americana statement "If it weren't for us we would all be speaking German" bullcrud, if it weren't for the Tsaritsa Poley you would all be speaking German.
It's not irrelevant to me, Blayne, nor to any of the points I'm making, though I can certainly see how it helps your argument to confuse my statements with steven's.
In any event, the idea that the United States would be speaking German were it not for the Soviet Union is at least as stupid as the idea that Europe would be speaking German if not for the Soviets.
quote: Americans can be proud of helping the Soviet Union through Lend-Lease which was fairly critical (and something I've never denied) and providing 2/3's of Red Army trucks which allowed Soviet advances to go as far and as fast as they did.
We shouldn't be proud of helping the Soviet Union, because as it turns out they used their triumph over the Third Reich as an excuse to conquer and tyrannize much of Europe for the next two generations. It was necessary to help the Soviet Union, somewhat, but we shouldn't be proud of it. Instead we should be embarrassed at how incredibly stupid and easily duped we were by the likes of evil scumbags like Stalin.
quote:Ultimately irrelevent and justifiable under realist paradigms, irrelevent because it has nothing to do with the discussion of you or whoever it was claiming America as the sole victor of WWII which discredits the millions of Soviet military deaths and denigrates the military achievements of the Red Army.
OK, for people who aren't Blayne Bradley, 'realist paradigms' means something other than: aggressive military conquest is acceptable if it's a Soviet or a Chinese doing the aggressing and taking the territory. As subsequent European (and Asian! Look at what the USSR tried constantly to do to your beloved China, Blayne, and you're stickin' up for `em!) history illustrates, 'realist paradigms' for Stalin mean 'seize and hold as much territory as I possibly can for as long as I can'.
And that's all. And that's the discussion I'm having, and however much you insist it's irrelevant won't change the fact that it is, because I'm not talking about what steven was talking about, and it's been long enough that you ought to clear the partisanship out of your eyes and take note of who is saying what.
You're defending the power-grabs of Stalin as somehow justified necessities, Blayne. It seems like there really isn't anything a 20th century Communist leader can do that will ever draw criticism from you. You're malanthrop talking politics on this issue.
Gabriel Temkin disagrees with you.
Look your the one whose broadening the argument and going off kilter, someone probably you as I don't remember said "we'ld all be speaking German if it weren't for the Americans" this in the war it is spoken aka "America Saves the Day" absolutely ignores the hardship and accomplishments of the Tsartitsa Poley.
Its arrogance, and your the one whose trying to distract the issue by somehow making it alright to make the claim because the "USSR started it" as a justifable excuse to slander their very real accomplishments and belittle them, and then you go on saying "we should be disgusted for this and this" uh hello? Things happen, its politics, todays friend is tomorrows enemy.
Saying I'm the malanthrop of this issue is an ad hominem and a logical fallacy, the fact of the matter is we're veering away from historical facts and into that of opinion.
The facts is that the USA did not single handedly win the war, period, ipsu facto whatever, undeniable, if you disagree with me bring up sources and we can debate that, but what your doing is excuse/counter excuse whoring and confusing the argument.
As for the 1 million figure given how many of these are regular whermact units? How many are reserves? Garrison units? Volkstrum? Occupied territory conscripts? What was the make up and the OOB of these units and who were commanding them? Germans? What were their positions? Were they actually commited front line soldiers or does it include logistics or were significant portions of them spread out throughout the occupied area and Vichy france?
Its a given that a certain percentage of these are not easily redeployed or move to the Eastern front nor easily equipped to such a theater and then would take truly desperate situation such as the Soviets breaching past the vistula river for the remainder of these to be moved.
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quote:Originally posted by Blayne Bradley: ... going off kilter, someone probably you as I don't remember said "we'ld all be speaking German if it weren't for the Americans" ...
For the record, Steven not Rakeesh on both counts.
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Blayne Bradley
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posted
Alrighty doesnt really change that its him talking to me about my disagreement.
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It was awesome when the White House "got it" and refused to get sucked into the Iranian election issue as a bogeyman. But no such luck in this case, I expect that this will simultaneously injure any civilian movement behind Google's decision and tie the hands of any liberal faction within the CCP that might want to be sympathetic towards Google.
quote:Originally posted by Kwea: We helped the Soviet's mechanize, we gave them and the other European countries tons of aid and munitions, and we didn't try to parcel up any part of Europe for ourselves.
Pop quiz for you. Of the two superpowers that emerged from the second war, which one still has garrisons all over Europe?
quote:The rest of Europe might be speaking Russian.
As opposed to speaking English, as they do now? I'm not saying I would have preferred Russian; but the Anglo-Saxon nations have no room to accuse others of imperialism.
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quote: Look your the one whose broadening the argument and going off kilter, someone probably you as I don't remember said "we'ld all be speaking German if it weren't for the Americans" this in the war it is spoken aka "America Saves the Day" absolutely ignores the hardship and accomplishments of the Tsartitsa Poley.
When memory fails, there's a little known tool that can be used to supplement it: it's called the mouse, and using it with your computer you can scroll up the damn page and see for yourself what exactly I said. Which, for at least the third time now, is not what you think I said.
quote: Its arrogance, and your the one whose trying to distract the issue by somehow making it alright to make the claim because the "USSR started it" as a justifable excuse to slander their very real accomplishments and belittle them, and then you go on saying "we should be disgusted for this and this" uh hello? Things happen, its politics, todays friend is tomorrows enemy.
OK...exactly what issue am I distracting from? I'm saying, let's not heap accolades on the USSR for its vital role in defeating Nazi Germany because, up until the Nazis turned on the USSR, they were helping them. And they weren't getting the Nazis coffee, they were helping conquer Europe and divide it up between them.
I respect the Soviet contribution in helping deal with a problem they were neck-deep in creating - much worse than the United States not joining the League of Nations, by the way, there being a difference between negligence and active involvement - and that's it. And even that respect is mitigated by the fact that the USSR spent all those millions of lives only in order to grab more land and tyrannize Eastern Europe for decades.
quote:Saying I'm the malanthrop of this issue is an ad hominem and a logical fallacy, the fact of the matter is we're veering away from historical facts and into that of opinion.
You're the malanthrop on this issue because repeatedly now you've either outright ignored or completely misstated what others have said (me, specifically), and bulldozed on ahead as though your bogus points were fact.
quote: The facts is that the USA did not single handedly win the war, period, ipsu facto whatever, undeniable, if you disagree with me bring up sources and we can debate that, but what your doing is excuse/counter excuse whoring and confusing the argument.
Did steven even say that? I sure as hell didn't. I don't disagree with the foolish straw man point you've made, Blayne. Move on.
quote:Alrighty doesnt really change that its him talking to me about my disagreement.
You're right. When you're talking to me, it doesn't matter whether or not I said the things you're claiming I said.
Wait a second, that's total nonsense. Which is why you win the malanthrop award for the thread.
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quote:Pop quiz for you. Of the two superpowers that emerged from the second war, which one still has garrisons all over Europe?
Yeah, and European nations are all just clamoring for us to withdraw from those bases, right?
quote:As opposed to speaking English, as they do now? I'm not saying I would have preferred Russian; but the Anglo-Saxon nations have no room to accuse others of imperialism.
But we're in a pretty good position to accuse the Soviet Union, at least, of aggressive tyranny.
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quote:Originally posted by King of Men: As opposed to speaking English, as they do now? I'm not saying I would have preferred Russian; but the Anglo-Saxon nations have no room to accuse others of imperialism.
Luckily, the United States is a Celtic nation.
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quote:Yeah, and European nations are all just clamouring for us to withdraw from those bases, right?
I think you might find that American troops are rather less popular than they were twenty years ago. But in any case, what of it? Successful imperialists don't go about raping the local women and grinding the faces of the poor. It does not follow that their actions must therefore be put under some other category.
Or to put it differently: Suppose the German government determined that it was no longer in its interest to have those American bases on its soil, and the American government decided that it was in the US interest to keep them where they are. Whose interests do you think would prevail? It is not as though the US keeps troops in Europe from the sheer goodness of its heart, as a sort of economy-stimulating Grand Tour for the troops before they go off on their GI-Bill college educations. They are there because successive American governments have felt that this is in their best interest.
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quote:I think you might find that American troops are rather less popular than they were twenty years ago. But in any case, what of it? Successful imperialists don't go about raping the local women and grinding the faces of the poor. It does not follow that their actions must therefore be put under some other category.
Well, if we're defining imperialist as a nation that does something with the willing consent of another nation, then frankly the term doesn't have much meaning. What control does our military allow us to exert on these nations that is also contrary to the interests of those nations themselves?
quote:Suppose the German government determined that it was no longer in its interest to have those American bases on its soil, and the American government decided that it was in the US interest to keep them where they are. Whose interests do you think would prevail?
I suppose that if the German government asked us, using all the right and proper legal terms and whatnot, to withdraw our military from its territory, we would do so. Do you actually believe we would refuse to do so? We would immediately, before the ink was even dry on the requests, become invaders and occupiers. Dude, there are people in this country right now who think we shouldn't be in Afghanistan. What do you imagine the uproar would be if we were in Germany against German will?
quote:It is not as though the US keeps troops in Europe from the sheer goodness of its heart, as a sort of economy-stimulating Grand Tour for the troops before they go off on their GI-Bill college educations. They are there because successive American governments have felt that this is in their best interest.
Well, among other things they're also there because successive German governments were scared out of their minds at the prospect of living next door unassisted to the USSR. I mean, seriously, you're painting with a very one-sided brush.
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posted
Intriguingly, we may not need a hypothetical German situation. The Japanese and Americans are wrangling over whether a relocation of the Okinawa military base within Okinawa will proceed as the Americans want or whether it will be removed from the island as the locals and Japanese want.
quote:Yukio Hatoyama, the new prime minister, personally promised Okinawans during the election campaign that Futenma would be shunted off the island.
That promise swiftly put his government at loggerheads with the Obama administration. As one of her first acts of diplomacy last February, Mrs Clinton signed an agreement under which Japan would contribute $6 billion to relocating Futenma. The other signatory was from the former Liberal Democratic government, which was doomed to suffer an electoral rout in August. But a deal, the Obama administration insisted to the DPJ, was a deal. Some analysts believe that may have been an overly bossy assessment. Even under the Liberal Democratic Party (LDP), which for much of its 53 years in power was a pliant American ally, the Futenma relocation was often a source of friction.
quote:To make matters worse, most Okinawans seem determined to hold Mr Hatoyama to his word about removing the base altogether. As the painting at the Sakima gallery suggests, Okinawa nurtures an historic grudge against the mother country, piqued by the second world war massacre. Many locals feel that for too long Tokyo has outsourced American bases to the island—it houses 60% of American forces and their families in Japan—and offered only grubby fiscal handouts in return.
posted
It sounds like it will likely take longer than that, using rancorous court battles as a guideline.
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Blayne Bradley
unregistered
posted
quote:Originally posted by Rakeesh: Blayne,
quote:Gabriel Temkin disagrees with you.
OK, that's nice.
quote: Look your the one whose broadening the argument and going off kilter, someone probably you as I don't remember said "we'ld all be speaking German if it weren't for the Americans" this in the war it is spoken aka "America Saves the Day" absolutely ignores the hardship and accomplishments of the Tsartitsa Poley.
When memory fails, there's a little known tool that can be used to supplement it: it's called the mouse, and using it with your computer you can scroll up the damn page and see for yourself what exactly I said. Which, for at least the third time now, is not what you think I said.
quote: Its arrogance, and your the one whose trying to distract the issue by somehow making it alright to make the claim because the "USSR started it" as a justifable excuse to slander their very real accomplishments and belittle them, and then you go on saying "we should be disgusted for this and this" uh hello? Things happen, its politics, todays friend is tomorrows enemy.
OK...exactly what issue am I distracting from? I'm saying, let's not heap accolades on the USSR for its vital role in defeating Nazi Germany because, up until the Nazis turned on the USSR, they were helping them. And they weren't getting the Nazis coffee, they were helping conquer Europe and divide it up between them.
I respect the Soviet contribution in helping deal with a problem they were neck-deep in creating - much worse than the United States not joining the League of Nations, by the way, there being a difference between negligence and active involvement - and that's it. And even that respect is mitigated by the fact that the USSR spent all those millions of lives only in order to grab more land and tyrannize Eastern Europe for decades.
quote:Saying I'm the malanthrop of this issue is an ad hominem and a logical fallacy, the fact of the matter is we're veering away from historical facts and into that of opinion.
You're the malanthrop on this issue because repeatedly now you've either outright ignored or completely misstated what others have said (me, specifically), and bulldozed on ahead as though your bogus points were fact.
quote: The facts is that the USA did not single handedly win the war, period, ipsu facto whatever, undeniable, if you disagree with me bring up sources and we can debate that, but what your doing is excuse/counter excuse whoring and confusing the argument.
Did steven even say that? I sure as hell didn't. I don't disagree with the foolish straw man point you've made, Blayne. Move on.
quote:Alrighty doesnt really change that its him talking to me about my disagreement.
You're right. When you're talking to me, it doesn't matter whether or not I said the things you're claiming I said.
Wait a second, that's total nonsense. Which is why you win the malanthrop award for the thread.
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quote:Pop quiz for you. Of the two superpowers that emerged from the second war, which one still has garrisons all over Europe?
Yeah, and European nations are all just clamoring for us to withdraw from those bases, right?
quote:As opposed to speaking English, as they do now? I'm not saying I would have preferred Russian; but the Anglo-Saxon nations have no room to accuse others of imperialism.
But we're in a pretty good position to accuse the Soviet Union, at least, of aggressive tyranny.
The point is that you have this whole mindset against the former Soviet Union for their actions or whatever but the fact for the matter is despite having all of this information Jews who fought for the Red Army in the Great Patriotic War felt the Red Army was their last great hope for survival and still look upon it as a necessity even when they left, your descriptions of it being an aggressive tyranny is just more side stepping from you backing away from an argument of facts to moralized grandstanding.
Who cares whose responding to what, your the one who challenged me on who is responsible for who so now your the one in the argument, once more more side stepping.
"Did steven even say that? I sure as hell didn't. I don't disagree with the foolish straw man point you've made, Blayne."
Yes steven did say that and it is an altitude many Americans ignorantly share (including you apparently) and it annoys me, you however decided to be argumentative and trying to belittle the Soviet contributions towards victory through irrelevant finger pointing your the one who should move on.
I notice you backed away hurriedly from the actual argument that was based on facts and went back to white and black moralized grandstanding again.
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quote:The point is that you have this whole mindset against the former Soviet Union for their actions or whatever but the fact for the matter is despite having all of this information Jews who fought for the Red Army in the Great Patriotic War felt the Red Army was their last great hope for survival and still look upon it as a necessity even when they left, your descriptions of it being an aggressive tyranny is just more side stepping from you backing away from an argument of facts to moralized grandstanding.
OK, I'm going to try and parse this paragraph into something that makes sense. But keep in mind I'm just guessing, so you may need to, y'know, actually express yourself clearly or whatever if you want to be understood correctly.
Yes, I have this 'whole mindset' against the former USSR for their actions, because those actions were frequently downright awful and led to an increase in suffering and unhappiness for millions of human beings across thousands of miles of the world.
Just because, once upon a time, they fought someone who was just as bad or worse than they were doesn't change that. Especially since they were helping those people first, and only started fighting them after they turned on them.
I know the Russians call it the 'Great Patriotic War', but a more accurate name for it would be the 'Great Holy Crap the Evil Scumbags We Hopped in Bed with Turned on Us War'.
You're bringing in the fact that many Jews sided with the USSR against Nazi Germany as a point in the USSR's favor, and I'm the one sidestepping things? Listen to yourself. What on Earth do Jews have to do with this discussion, Blayne?
quote:Who cares whose responding to what, your the one who challenged me on who is responsible for who so now your the one in the argument, once more more side stepping.
When, exactly, did I challenge you and what exactly do you mean by this, Blayne? Because the kind of discussion you're having, I might as well start arguing against you for supporting the rights of illegal extraterrestrials.
quote: Yes steven did say that and it is an altitude many Americans ignorantly share (including you apparently) and it annoys me, you however decided to be argumentative and trying to belittle the Soviet contributions towards victory through irrelevant finger pointing your the one who should move on.
Dude. I don't believe that. I've said repeatedly now I don't believe that. I have no control over whether or not you're annoyed at me for things I haven't said.
quote:I notice you backed away hurriedly from the actual argument that was based on facts and went back to white and black moralized grandstanding again.
Which argument was that, exactly? The 'factual' argument about a great big hypothetical question? You cited one man who claimed one number, I cited another. But if you're complaining about the fact that I'm not engaging in the argument over whether or not the USSR could have beaten Germany entirely on its own, well, you're right. Because I don't much care about that argument. I care about the Soviet Union getting some big moral credit for defeating the Nazis.
OK, I really, really should have come to this realization sooner, but there's clearly no point in discussing this with you. So now I'ma just stop.
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posted
Blayne: Please quote and snip parts of the Rakeesh's post that you're actually responding to. Please do not quote the whole thing. If you are generically responding to the whole thing, quoting the first few lines is sufficient.
(Although, I suggest that the exercise of quoting specific parts of other people's posts might help you parse them more carefully which is a good thing)
quote:Originally posted by Rakeesh: ... I know the Russians call it the 'Great Patriotic War', but a more accurate name for it would be the 'Great Holy Crap the Evil Scumbags We Hopped in Bed with Turned on Us War'.
That would be identical to the Iraq War and too similar to the Afghanistan War which is 'Great Holy Crap the Evil Holy Scumbags We Hopped in Bed with Turned on Us War'
posted
I wholeheartedly agree, Mucus. Though in fairness to us, at least when we sided with them, we were trying to - in addition to furthering our own economic interests - shore up our side against the USSR.
The Soviet motivation for the Molotov–Ribbentrop Pact seems to be in the eyes of pretty much everybody except Blayne, "We'd really like to own a bigger chunk of Europe."
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posted
I'd hardly agree with that, and I wasn't for the war at all. It's a matter of scope, at the very least.
I don't see us gaining any benefit from this, myself. It's COSTING us money, not making it for us, nor will we want to kill all of them.
If we wanted to do that, it would be over already, and we'd own all the sand (no big woop) and oil (very big woop) we could use in the next 50 years. Or not, and it would REALLY be a holy war against us.
I'd hardly call it the same as WWII though, even if it was not the right thing to do.
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