On the 11th hour of the 11th Day of the 11th month, the guns of World War I fell silent. And a war that should never have been fought – arguably by anyone, certainly by Americans – was done.

Americans who know their history celebrate Veterans Day not to honor war, but to recognize the soldiers who died and the soldiers who survived the wars of the past – and, hopefully, to ponder the futility of abandoning George Washington's advice to avoid the entangling alliances of distant continents and the mortal combats of the kings and conquerers who intrigues Americans rejected when the United States revolted against monarchy, colonialism and the madness of empire.

It is in that latter pondering that Americans would do well to recognize the courage of those who opposed the madness that was World War I, a courage born of a concern for America's troops that was not evidenced by their commander-in-chief.

Wisconsin Senator Robert M. La Follette, the great midwestern progressive leader of the first quarter of the American century, risked his political career to oppose World War I and to defend the free-speech rights of those who joined him in opposition.

La Follette rejected the arguments of President Woodrow Wilson as empty excuses for plunging the sons of Wisconsin farmers and factory worker in a European war where they had no place and no cause.

Wilson, a petty Anglophile of the worst sort, told the American people that entering the Europe's war on the side of the British king was some kind of fight for democracy. But La Follette challenged that fantasy by noting that there was scant democracy in the British colonies of Ireland, Egypt and India. Detailing the cruelties and bigotries of British colonialism, he condemned Wilson for seeking to "inflame the mind of our people into the frenzy of war."

Unfortunately, the frenzy of war won out. La Follette was one of just six senators to oppose the declaration of war that would send 166,516 Americans to their deaths and leave 204002 severely wounded. In the House, 50 members who opposed the declaration, including its sole woman member, Montana Republican Jeannette Rankin, who famously declared, "I want to stand by my country, but I cannot vote for war. I vote no."

For their opposition, La Follette, Rankin and their allies were branded traitors.

But La Follette knew the people were with him. He often recalled that, of all the letters he received during 19 years as a senator, more than a third came during the relatively short course of the war and they ran 60-1 in his favor. Four years after the war was done, Wisconsinites reelected La Follette to the Senate by a record margin.

Six years after the war's finish, 4.8 million Americans cast ballots for the ticket of La Follette and his fellow critic of the World War I war profiteers, Montana Senator Burton K. Wheeler, in the 1924 presidential race.

Along with the votes of his fellow Americans – which meant the most to the great democrat – La Follette would receive vindication from history.

President John Fitzgerald Kennedy, who celebrated La Follette's opposition to World War I as a profile in courage, would tell historian Arthur Schlesinger Jr. that Wilson's scheming to pull the United States into World War I merited placing Wilson low on any list of American president.

Surely, George W. Bush will rank lower.

A president has no greater responsibility than that of assuring that the men and women of the U.s. military are called to duty only when absolutely necessary. Wilson failed in that duty 90 years ago, just as Bush fails today. That is the painful truth of this Veteran's Day. But it is a truth that must never obscure our regard for the soldiers who serve and suffer in this country's name.

So, on this anniversary of that distant 11th day of that distant 11th month, let us honor all the dead of all America's wars. Let us honor the living by bringing the soldiers who are mired in the quagmire that is Iraq home from a Middle Eastern civil war in which they have no place and no cause. And let us honor those anti-war Americans who today display the courage, the wisdom and the sincere concern for the troops and the country they serve that was so well evidenced Robert M. La Follette nine decades ago.

Comments (34)

1. let's us honour all soldiers from any nation who have been cast to their death by the greed of kings and corporations sheltered in their castles of stone and glass.

   We are the Dead. Short days ago We lived, felt dawn, saw sunset glow, Loved, and were loved, and now we lie In Flanders fields.

   Posted by frosty zoom at 11/11/2007 @ 11:03am

2. and lets not nominate for the democratic ticket any who consistently enable the neofascists to embroil us in stupid, wasteful, bloody, self enriching, treasury emptying, evil wars by voting unapoligetically, stupidly and hypocritically insultingly for war in iraq, iran, and the constitution destroying, fascism enabling usapatriot act...

   notice i did not metion her specific name?

   Posted by ibbleblibble at 11/11/2007 @ 11:24am

3. One of your best posts, Mr Nichols. Sad, isn't it, that the gullible citizens of the USA don't learn the lessons of history? Had they done so, they would not have ratified in 2004 the presidency that the hopelessly politicized SCOTUS handed to Bush in 2000.

   Posted by oneworld at 11/11/2007 @ 11:58am

4. That's fair, a wish/prayer/positive thought, that all our soldiers be spared the rule of new fasconists.

   (Problem is, we are all currently being ruled over by new con supporters, servicers of dic'tator philosophy...)

   Posted by hsuBfools at 11/11/2007 @ 12:05pm

5. Seems the luster of old has worn off of ol' Woodrow.

   I remember not so long ago when some liberals HONORED the guy...took his 14 Points to heart, credited him for starting the League of Nations, etc. and merely put down the failure of same to "isolationist Republicans" (remember Woody was a Democrat, folks).

   The Hard Left never liked him its true (to get a good idea of that fight, watch "Reds" and the fuss over the 1916 Election). But Wilson wasn't truly rejected until later (mostly due to even Dem party loyalists being able to excuse his BLATENT racism).

   And of course WW-I was disasterous and more disasterous in the horrific PEACE it created, which so bankrupted Germany that they were forced to turn to a nut-job (MARKCANYON will disagree) to try to salvage their economy and national pride.

   Unfortunately in THIS war, WE are the ones already are closing in on bankruptcy and we've already got the nut-job in leadership. Hopefully we don't replace him in less than 12 months...with another.

   Posted by Mask at 11/11/2007 @ 12:54pm

6. Posted by MASK 11/11/2007 @ 12:54pm

   good to see someone not condemned to repeat the past by having forgotten it.

   "To call war the soil of courage and virtue is like calling debauchery the soil of love."

   George Santayana

   **offtopickish gem: "Injustice in this world is not something comparative; the wrong is deep, clear, and absolute in each private fate."

   Posted by frosty zoom at 11/11/2007 @ 1:02pm

7. "Six years after the war's finish, 4.8 million Americans cast ballots for the ticket of La Follette...."

   Doesn't seem like a ringing endorsement by the country ~Jomomma

   Actually, that 4.8 mil represented 17% of the total vote going to a third party candidacy --Progressive Party.

   In a society long wracked by big money corporate corruption that is a remarkable result. Ross Perot's 19% in '92 represents a contemporary example --fueled by his own personal fortune and an anti-NAFTA central theme.

   The grip of the marionette of duopoly on American economic/political life has found its mask removed via the hyper-incompetence of the Cheney-Bush presidency revealing a hideously ugly, power-mad, writhing with maggots face.

   On that count we may someday rank the Bush presidency quite highly.

   Posted by b_kool_66 at 11/11/2007 @ 3:00pm

8. Correction:

   The grip of the marionette of duopoly on American economic/political life has found the mask of it's master removed via the hyper-incompetence of the Cheney-Bush presidency revealing a hideously ugly, power-mad, writhing with maggots face.

   Posted by b_kool_66 at 11/11/2007 @ 3:08pm

9. Posted by B_KOOL_66 11/11/2007 @ 3:00pm

   Actually, that 4.8 mil represented 17% of the total vote going to a third party candidacy --Progressive Party.

   In a society long wracked by big money corporate corruption that is a remarkable result. Ross Perot's 19% in '92 represents a contemporary example --fueled by his own personal fortune and an anti-NAFTA central theme.

   This was actually not so much a third party run by LaFollette as it was a split in the Democratic Party, with the liberal wing following LaFollette and the conservative (Wilsonian) wing following Davis. It was a direct result of Wilson's presidency and the immediate after-effects of WWI: the failure of the Wilsonian "missionary diplomacy" that WWI participation, the Fourteen Points and all the rest of his foreign policy represented. The winner in 1924 was Coolidge (with 54% of the popular vote), the Republican, who had been able to capitalize on post-war economic problems and extreme dissatisfaction with Wilson to get elected in 1920.

   It's pretty much a perfect analogy for BushCo and the Republicans now, except the liberal Democrats of the 1920's are replaced by the centrist moderates of our own day as the critical swing. The Republicans have had their "missionary President" with Georgie-Boy and now they're in the position the Democrats found themselves in come 1919: in a deep electoral hole of their president's digging.

   Their problem is that this time around, there's unlikely to be a third party of any real electoral force, and even if there were it wouldn't benefit them, just as it didn't benefit the Democrats in 1924.

   Posted by Stwriley at 11/11/2007 @ 4:17pm

10. This was actually not so much a third party run by LaFollette as it was a split in the Democratic Party.....

    STWRILEY 11/11/2007 @ 4:17pm

    Aren't all third party runs ultimately the result of splits within either one or both major parties?

    That is the raison d'être of the two party system --to envelope and squeeze the energy from ideas seen as potentially dangerous to the ruling elites. This is US history writ large.

    With the recent rise of free market fundametalism --in a devil's pact with that uniquely American brand of religious fundamentalism -- we have been blessed with the birth of the hideous-horned baby of the Bush administration.

    The consolation we cling to is that monumental incompetence has riven their colossus with a vast network of rapidly propagating cracks.

    The question for us is how many will be trapped in its collapse, and what will be rebuilt in its footprints?

    Posted by b_kool_66 at 11/11/2007 @ 5:07pm

11. Back to NASCAR and the duel in the desert!

    Posted by b_kool_66 at 11/11/2007 @ 5:11pm

12. Posted by MADLIB 11/11/2007 @ 5:08pm

    I asked that of one of our resident neo-cons (PONTI maybe, don't remember)...and he said

    "Cheney was just being optimistic!"

    As if missing the TRUE figure by a factor of 10X was "having a cheery attitude"!

    Posted by Mask at 11/11/2007 @ 6:04pm

13. So...one thing I'm kind of curious to explore. Why was our decision to get involved with World War I a a bad one? I think there are really two questions that come into play here:

    1) Why is a willingness to pay attention to European affairs bad? For one thing, the claim that what happens in Europe doesn't affect us is manifestly absurd. The oceans are far from an impenetrable shield from the rest of the world, not only in terms of economics, but also in terms of military strength (see, German submarines). This doesn't mean that binding alliances are necessary; I'm pretty sure that we didn't have any going in anyway. We evaluated the situation and determined that the US had a compelling interest in getting involved.

    2) Why was this specific intervention in European affairs bad?

    This, I think, is where the more interesting clash is. Ultimately, I think there were a couple of good reasons for getting involved, even tossing aside for the moment the Lusitania and the Zimmerman letter.

    First, it was reasonable to believe that our intervention would make a significant difference in what seemed to be a stalemate situation. That's important because of the horrific effects that the trench-war stalemate was having. One, it was devastating a lot of territory in Europe, particularly since powers were resorting to more and more dangerous and environmentally destructive weaponry. Two, it was devastating European economies because fighting in countries helped to undermine a lot of infrastructure. Three, it was devastating European countries as a whole because of the vast repercussions of losing tons and tons of their citizens. Our ability to intervene and mitigate this was valuable not only because I would argue that we have at least some moral obligation to the rest of the world, but also because our interests were in play. The destruction of European economies and countries could only hurt us, not least due to the economic consequences, and those economic consequences are nothing to sneer at; the Great Depression as it was was bad enough, both for us and (see Hitler) for Europe.

    Second, though, there were good reasons to intervene on the side of the Triple Entente. I realize that there were significant flaws with powers such as England, etc, but I think it's reasonable to suggest that they were the lesser of multiple evils. For one, they had at least some semblance of a democratic government. The way they governed the colonies certainly wasn't democratic, but they at least had some democratic infrastructure at home, compared to the virtual lack of democratic infrastructure by the other side. Also, though Britain ended up using chemical weapons, remember that Germany was the first to do so, and I think that makes a meaningful difference as well. Finally, in order to defend not siding with the Entente, I think you have to defend siding with the Alliance (Germany, Austria-Hungary) instead, which is a really difficult case to make. If you side with neither, Germany will likely come after you, as they've already been doing with their wolf packs.

    In contrast to John Nichols, I really don't think that neutrality was anything near a compelling option. Given the value (if imperfect) that democracy has been shown to have, a war that was both important for US security and valuable in enabling democracy was definitely justified.

    Posted by Thrawn at 11/11/2007 @ 6:26pm

14. As if anything about Dick Cheney's disposition could be described as cheery or optimistic.

    Posted by MADLIB 11/11/2007 @ 7:41pm

    well,

    i imagine he's touched by a bit of mirth whilst eating quail.

    Posted by frosty zoom at 11/11/2007 @ 8:21pm

15. In contrast to John Nichols, I really don't think that neutrality was anything near a compelling option. Given the value (if imperfect) that democracy has been shown to have, a war that was both important for US security and valuable in enabling democracy was definitely justified.

    Posted by THRAWN 11/11/2007 @ 6:26pm

    THEORY SELDOM HAS A HEART...

    And even seldomer ends up a paraplegic or quadraplegic....

    Posted by w_m_bear at 11/11/2007 @ 9:49pm

16. Yeah, you're right. A lot of times, theory can ignore the impact on real people, and that's why I think that war should be an option of last resort when there's no other way to avoid the catastrophic implications that war is intended to forestall.

    That said,though, I think US involvement in WWI was one of those cases. In fact, I don't think my points left out real people at all. The economic argument I made wasn't simply "people might profit less." It was that if Europe actually gets devastated by continuing trench warfare (which we had the capacity to stop by giving an advantage to one side instead of maintaining a virtual standstill), we're likely to get the Great Depression but worse.

    Even more significantly, though, think of what the alternative scenario means for Europe, since presumably European lives kind of matter too. When trench warfare just keeps going for even longer than it ended up lasting, thanks in large part to our involvement, a lot of people didn't die that otherwise would have. A lot of families didn't have to live with dead fathers or brothers that otherwise would have. Unless you're going to suggest that an American life is the only life that really counts, I think you'll have a very difficult time confronting the very human cost that letting a war go on at a perpetual standstill would bring.

    Posted by Thrawn at 11/11/2007 @ 10:03pm

17. Posted by THRAWN 11/11/2007 @ 10:03pm

    Name a war the United States was involved in that you are against. I mean, you do a nice little dance, but I've yet to see you mention a single war you didn't twist seven ways till Sunday to find an excuse for.

    Posted by srjenkins at 11/12/2007 @ 01:02am

18. but I've yet to see you mention a single war you didn't twist seven ways till Sunday to find an excuse for.

    Posted by SRJENKINS 11/12/2007 @ 01:02am

    ¿1812?

    Posted by frosty zoom at 11/12/2007 @ 01:37am

19. "For their opposition, La Follette, Rankin and their allies were branded traitors" Rings a bell? Comes Voting day, I know of someone who will have a pen in hand!

    Posted by MoniqueF at 11/12/2007 @ 02:20am

20. Truth is since then (and probably before) to these days pacifists in this country are called anything from unpatriotic to traitor. Jane Fonda jumps into my mind; a liberal American that loved her country and wanted only to be a bridge between the two sides. Pacifists are looked as 'sissies', people that are afraid to fight, when is just the opposite: they are not that afraid to get killed as to have the load in conscience of killing other people. We need to change our collective trust in violence to trust in compromise and understanding.

    Looking at it from the opposite side, why would not we call traitors as well those who "manufacture" wars in support of their "ideas of world politics" instead of strict national defense? An example would be lying to favor arguments to enter into a war. A war is so costly in precious human lives and money that surely they should be charged as traitors for misguiding the country.

    As citizens we must support the Constitutional mandate that Congress and only Congress declares war. The objective of the Founding Fathers was to handle the decision into a lot of people so that it was fairly thought and argumented upon.

    The Veterans, innocent victims of so many "errors", have given their lives and/or their sufferings to the nation. When honoring them today, we must swear on a compromise not to allow any other of these hawks- that have huge economic gains by creating wars- to create wars that the American public will finally pay.

    Posted by Frank42 at 11/12/2007 @ 02:29am

21. thrawn's sense of history is interesting...nonsense, but interesting. reducing WWI to a battle of American economic interests and economic effects on Europe is simplistic and revisionist. It conveniently aligns with justifications for "american interests' by defining them as economic with the obvious segue to the 'fact' that 'prosperity' on a societal level trumps actual quality of life - we judge our moral compass by the number of millionnaires we have, not by the crimes we commit or prevent.

    Thrawn makes a pass, a weak pass, at a better moral compass by citing the environmental damage of trench warefare...presumably the ill affects of Mustard gas - that's an Anne Coulter comment. Mustard gas become inert very quickly and as was said about the 'smoking gun' of iraqi WMDs, Bush I war time laced shells would be somewhat unhealthy if you drank gallons of the "WMD" when the shells were found 12 years later, but otherwise it wouldn't likely be more unhealthy than a bender on Budweiser or some other crappy American beer.

    Comes, let's not be infants about this.

    There are all kinds of reasons to admire and despise Wilson. In th context of his time he wasn't particularly bad on race - everyone was bad on race. He wasn't that bad on interventionism - everone was bad or worse on that. Fer chrissake, we had been making the hemisphere our own mainly by crook and not by hook for decades. Teddy led that charge up the hill for the sole benefit of Hershey and US Fruit (to be fair there were other companies that carved out serfdoms - to say nothing of the mob and gambling). Wilson doesn't rank that low on the historical scale there.

    But our good poster isn't interested in history - he's interested in a parable that fits his or her narrative. God bless! I hope your life accords to your narrative...as long as it doesn't affect the rest of us who are rules by real moral decisions and less by theoretical concepts of democracy and top down (read...never reaches the bottom) economics.

    Posted by Sparsons at 11/12/2007 @ 03:23am

22. Posted by SRJENKINS 11/12/2007 @ 01:02am

    There's an important observation to be made here. Wars such as Iraq and Vietnam (the latter of which I'd probably oppose retrospectively) were wars that did not exist until the US decided to act. Wars such as WWI and WWII, on the other hand, did. The only thing that we were deciding for those wars was how we ourselves ought act given that a war was taking place regardless.

    Posted by FRANK42 11/12/2007 @ 02:29am

    I think you're right about some of this; Congress should definitely be responsible for actually declaring war. I disagree, however, about individuals such as Jane Fonda. Though I'm willing to agree that their goals may have been noble, I don't think that changes the fact that their actions were in fact the precise definition of treason. That's not to say that they were bad people, simply that they made very significant mistakes in judgment.

    Posted by SPARSONS 11/12/2007 @ 03:23am

    As much as unwarranted optimism and idealism are problematic, so is unwarranted cynicism. I'm not denying that Wilson was extraordinarily racist, but I think it's probably unfair to say that there were no positive motivations for getting involved in the war. More importantly, though, all I'm defending is that when analyzed from a moral and practical perspective, the decision to enter WWI was a justified one; that analysis, for the most part, has never been responded to (except perhaps for the chemical weapons analysis, which is probably about the least impactful analysis I gave).

    Posted by Thrawn at 11/12/2007 @ 07:54am

23. Posted by THRAWN 11/12/2007 @ 07:54am

    Wilson may have had "positive motivations" for getting into WW-I, but he should have RUN on those in 1916 (if he were honest) and not run on "I'll keep us out of that European war" (which he did).

    Wilson may have supported going into Europe...but he RAN FOR PRESIDENT on keeping us out of it....why? If his motives were so good?

    BTW, as your theory that "we would have had a Great Depression if the war in Europe had continued and was 'ended by us'"...sorry, but that's nuts as well as wrong.

    GDP for Britain and Italy had INCREASED. While it did decrease for Austria, Russia, France, and the Ottoman Empire, the brunt of the economic impact was on Austria, the Ottomans, and Germans....not our primary trading partner, the UK.

    Most of the economic devastation occurred WELL before we entered the war, and even without our help, the war would have likely been resolved before 1919. As such, there would have been virtually no difference in the economic outlook for the world (certainly no "Great Depression" in 1920) if we had simply stayed out of it.

    Additionally, due to the fact that we DID play a part in it, we demanded that British war debt be repaid immediately and they in turn demanded that the Germans pay reparations immediately...thus collapsing their economy and giving rise to Hitler. (not a point-by-point relationship, but enough of an impetus that might not have been there if we hadn't gotten involved).

    Posted by Mask at 11/12/2007 @ 08:59am

24. Excellent Mr. Nichols! Thanks are hereby offered you, sir, on this Veteran's (Armistice) Day Monday.

    Posted by lewwelge at 11/12/2007 @ 09:31am

25. Liberals honor ALL OF America's veterans. Conservatives merely honor those Americans who fought for freedom. Liberals ALSO honor those who fought for no good reason whatsoever over a pack of lies. Conservatives do not even acknowledge that those other veterans exist.

    Posted by conshame at 11/12/2007 @ 12:44pm

26. The current war economy improves the wealth and stability of a few exponentially and immediately disables and dictates the deaths in ignorance of the many.

    A peacetime economy slowly improves the healthy growth of an educated middle class.

    And which of the two does the current controlling new con servicers of dic'tator philosophy support?

    Perpetual war, of course.

    (Disclaimer: A nationally accepted perpetual war occurs only if controls for less than a factor of 850 US troop annual war deaths are in place, due to ethic rationale destabilization quotient being crossed as stated in business marketing strategic percentile population analysis.)

    Posted by hsuBfools at 11/12/2007 @ 1:41pm

27. NICHOLS' comments certainly bear out the maxim that history is written in the context of its time. As a narrow minded, anti war, anti colonial, anti empire type who opposes anything any conservative would propose just on principle, it is little wonder that, though he would view WWI as madness (which it was), he would also view its purpose as dishonorable (which it was not). If he cannot see the threat the Germans presented to the western world and the benefits of stopping their attempted hegamony in Europe, then his view of history is SO colored by his own current predjudices that he has no business writing about history. WWI prevented the spread of a less than benevolent colonial power. The wars madness, in an historical context, was a function of what the leadership of the day allowed the war to degenerate into, tactically, not its purpose. When Picketts men charged the Union positions at Gettysburg no one viewed the Norths' efforts to win as dishonorable, yet that battle was just as devastating "proportionately", so to speak, as the Marne or Ypres (Well, maybe Nichols does...) NICHOLS perception of Wilson is also steeped in 21st century pacifist perceptions: Wilson was pushed past his tolerance level with sub sinkings and German duplicity in North America. He is no more guilty of involving us in WWI after he was elected then Roosevelt was regarding WWII. Both men were imminently more practical then their detractors, including, of late JOHN NICHOLS.

    Lastly, I'm likening his comment that some here use Veterans Day as a reason to honor war as a cheap attempt to create a falacious arguement just so he can look good by shooting it down. I hardly think there is anyone out there who "honors war". NICHOLS is being nonsensical.

    Posted by CHIP THORNTON at 11/12/2007 @ 4:30pm

28. La Follette sounds like a bit of a prig to me. Am I the only one who finds American criticism of British imperialism hypocritical? What is the ethical difference between the British conquest of India and the American conquest of Wisconsin, or Amritsar and Wounded Knee?

    Posted by dr421 at 11/12/2007 @ 5:08pm

29. Additionally, due to the fact that we DID play a part in it, we demanded that British war debt be repaid immediately and they in turn demanded that the Germans pay reparations immediately...thus collapsing their economy and giving rise to Hitler. (not a point-by-point relationship, but enough of an impetus that might not have been there if we hadn't gotten involved).

    Posted by MASK

    All the debt France and Britain owed the US was why Wilson took us to war. If Germany won, the US would never recover what the French and British owed US banks, companies.

    Posted by mtspence05 at 11/12/2007 @ 5:19pm

30. DR421 There's an easier way for the people you describe to rid themselves of the hypocrisy: Stop viewing ANY of it as evil. While some colonial empires were more benevolent that others, today we regard determinimg the lives of others as wrong, or at least something to be approached with the respect of the "peoples in question". However, in the 19th century such concepts as bringing what was truly believed to be a better life to indigenous peoples was normal except to the most radical. We in the 21st century have no business judging their actions by the standards of 2007. In addition, I sometimes wonder where many of those colonial "victims" would be had they not come into contact with us. There was good and bad in the imperial era. We today need to get a little more real about that. After all, WE were the result of colonialism, and I wouldn't change THAT.

    Posted by CHIP THORNTON at 11/12/2007 @ 5:25pm

31. Posted by CHIP THORNTON

    The colonial powers were not interested in helping the natives, they were too busy helping themselves. Exploitation, enslavement, expropriation--it's not a good thing and there are no valid excuses for such actions. The Western powers did it all for the benefit of Western companies, just as the kings and queens of Europe raped the Americas for all they could.

    Posted by mtspence05 at 11/12/2007 @ 5:31pm

32. After all, WE were the result of colonialism, and I wouldn't change THAT.

    Posted by CHIP THORNTON

    Nice rationalization, Chip.

    Posted by mtspence05 at 11/12/2007 @ 5:32pm

33. Well, as I said MT, that is the current "wisdom" from some on here. I wonder what the boy in South Africa who lived because some colonial doctor gave him quinine for his malaria (instead of dying from an overdose of advice from his witch doctor) would think about it. Or the kids whose bones no longer protruded through their midriffs once a steady food supply started coming through. Rape? You think the natives own people didn't engage in it? And as far as our "conquest" goes, it was the most benevolent of what has been happening since time immemorial: the clash & overrunning of one culture by a more dominant one. Way it goes. And had the situations been reversed, they would have done the same to us. In fact the recent discovery of the Kenniwick man fossil might prove that the Indians did just that. So much for "victimhood"

    I don't know where you live, but if its here then I'm sure it was once Indian territory. You planning on giving it back any time soon?

    Posted by CHIP THORNTON at 11/12/2007 @ 5:43pm

34. Posted by MTSPENCE05 11/12/2007 @ 5:19pm

    Empty, by early 1917 EVERYBODY knew that Germany wasn't going to "win the war"...it was a matter of how badly they'd lose. You don't really think the collapsing Austro-Hungarian Empire and drained Germany were going to march into Paris in 1917, do you???

    Us jumping meant that we could claim, as our great-grandparents, grandparents, even parents did for many years that ..."we won World War-I" and claim a share of the "rewards", i.e. reparations.

    If we had stayed out, the UK would have paid us small chunks and balked at any strong demands with "Hey, we did the dying...why should you Americans get rich off that?"

    As it was, Pershing and his guys did some fighting. "We helped win the war" and they "owed us".

    Posted by Mask at 11/12/2007 @ 7:47pm