Why I No Longer Feel Comfortable Wearing a Poppy

[Geckos48]

www.huffingtonpost.co.uk/madeleine-fry/poppy-day_b_4169581.html

very eloquently put. Exactly how I feel about the whole debacle.

November 11th should be for those who selflessly gave their lives in the World Wars, not those who chose to fight dubious campaigns abroad.

Well. That was shit.

Today, 31 Oct 2013, the Council for Bosnia Missing Persons have confirmed the discovery of the remains of 360 bodies in a Mass Grave in a town in Northern Bosnia. They are still looking for the graves of the other 1200 persons missing from this town.

Today. More than 20 years since the start of that war. Fucking hell.

You know what - I'll wear my poppy for them. RIP.

skylerwhite

Not in the slightest, flatpack I'm not claiming to be a specialist in WW2.

Your constant refusal to wave any actual knowledge proved that. I don't even think we could use the term 'generalist' to cover your knowledge of WW2.

Some of my colleagues are, I heard a paper this week by on of the historians I've mentioned above, and I'm simply reporting what appears to be the emerging consensus based on the most cutting-edge research.

Except that you haven't, really, have you? You've said that the 'turning point' for WW2 was on the Eastern front but you've not actually told me anything at all. Feel free to 'simply report', but don't report simply. Outside academia, we don't tolerate such low standards.

But if you're determined to cling to older, more occidentalist versions, that is, of course, your prerogative.

Gosh. Could you be any more patronising? I'd be prepared to take it if you knew the square root of fuck all about the subject you're smugly hectoring me about.

Geckos48

Peaceful nations Rarely get targeted,

Seriously? What about Belgium, the Netherlands, Luxembourg, Norway and Denmark by Nazi Germany? What about Finland by Soviet Russia? Were they aggressive? What about Greece? Did they attack Fascist Italy?

All peaceful nations. All targeted.

after WW11 it was Very unlikely that we would be targeted,

What about the Soviets? What stopped the Cold War turning hot? Was it the CND?

You have talked solely about attacks that happened years and years ago!

Yes there will always be times when force is needed, but that hasn't been the case for a long, long time.

I think maintaining an understanding that if needed, we will fight, rather than having a huge armed forces who we have to 'find' work for, which really is all that Afghanistan was about... finding stuff for the army to do and has done nothing for the country.

Our armed forces is a shambles and our activities abroad create terrorists.

Gee, flatpack your aggression is alarming. I note you haven't bothered to comment on the link I posted which actually demonstrates what historians who spend their careers working on this area think. Not sure what your point about 'low standards' in academia refers to, I'm afraid.

As shit as the millions dead in Iraq?

I will not wear a poppy for them. Poor sods, killed by US. We can't change arseholes existing in the world but we can stop being one of the biggest ones.

There is far more warning of attack before it gets to troops on the ground. Sorting out world trade would be a big start.

If people have enough, if the arms trade is regulated and folk are allowed to farm, live and grow, then there will be no war.

OP maybe you should support Peace One Day, a global campaign to encourage peace. www.peacedirect.org/landing-page/peace-day/?gclid=CMX7pI3VwboCFebMtAod3xcABw Peace One Day

So in short, I would stop fighting with wars and start fighting with peace...

Its so sad that people cannot see anything BUT war as being an option. Nazi Germany sprung out of gross mistreatment of the Germans after WW1

those are the lessons we should have learned. Not to continue fighting, making terrorists abroad and coming home with blood on our hands.

Its just not the way we should be operating as a nation.

Years and years ago? Really? So the stuff LtEve is talking about is ancient history? As relevant as, I dunno, Trafalgar?

There are MORE options than war. I really wish people could see that.

Link to the report on Tomasica. God, the youngest is an 18 month old child

The British Military ARE NOT a shambles. It was the bloody UN not letting us go in as a Fighting Force that lead to these atrocities. The UN learned their lesson though, and let us go in immediately when Kosovo kicked off - result? A conflict that was over as soon as it started.

Our activities abroad help people. Terrorists don't need a reason to commit atrocities. Their whole aim is to create terror.

I have a poppy and this is to remember the terrible events of the world wars. We must never forget

Our activities abroad do NOT help people. Ask the people of Iraq, their country was destroyed by our 'help' all for lies.

I bet the youngest killed under that guise was younger than 18months old.

bloody emotive claptrap.

List of (probable) dead in Iraq en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Casualties_of_the_Iraq_War

Of course its hard to get a complete number because we only take note of our own dead, other casualties dont matter to our armed forces.

Millions were dead in Iraq before we got involved - Saddam Hussein was a Genocidal Manaic who killed his own people, the Kurds, and anyone who disagreed with him.

How have we helped the people of Libya?

We had free reign there and we destroyed their country too

For cheaper oil and nothing else.

Anyone who believes our military work for 'human rights' issues is seriously deluded.

Human rights are NEVER improved by war, just like an act of domestic violence would not be improved by burning a house down with kids asleep inside it.

there are Other Ways.

Saddam Hussein was hanged for killing 14 people not for mass genocide.

I think it is others who need the history lesson. Namely who put Saddam in power in the first place, who trained him and who gave him the weapons to kill

Terrorists don't need a reason to commit atrocities. Their whole aim is to create terror.

LtEve I agree with much of what you're posting about Bosnia and Kosovo, but the above statement is really too simplistic and sort of presents the view of terrorists as psychopaths, committed to violence at all costs, irrational etc. Most terrorists do have reasons for their actions - we might not agree with their reasoning, but their activities are rational and justifiable in their world-view.

"terrorists dont need reasons to commit atrocities'

I agree, our armed forces prove that almost yearly.

'Our activities abroad do NOT help people'

Jesus Christ, OP. Do you really, really believe that?

"There would be no war if people refused to fight them"

Wear your poppy, donate to TRBL/SSAFA/H4H or dont, but please spare me from simplistic nonsense like that.