America absolutely loves a war...... but rarely does it bring peace

[Nithavela]

Just as a point of clarification, the United States is not at war with North Korea, the United Nations is. The US is involved in the war as a part of the UN, along with most other UN nations. Not sure why the Korean War is being painted as an "American war".

The UN is at war with North Korea? That's strange considering NK is actually part of the UN.

 

[Tallguy88]

My sentiments exactly. I was taken aback how he spoke of both horrific atrocities the United States committed so nonchalantly and then shamelessly resorted to the lame excuse of "Other countries have done worse," as if that even remotely dismisses or justifies any of the atrocities this country has committed during its jingoistic and tyrannical history. I think what was said in that post is an ideal example of how American patriotism, nationalism, and exceptionalism is way out of hand.

Well, he does have some good points. On a death for death ratio, the Japanese got off a lot easier than they should have. They deliberately killed millions of civilians in China, Manchuria, the Philippines, Korea, and Indochina. The US fought a total war against them until they were defeated. Then we stopped killing them and helped them rebuild their country while leaving their government more or less intact. It's been a while since I checked the numbers, but we could have killed something like a million more of them before their deaths were equal to the deaths they caused. But because we are not bloodthirty killers, we only fought until they gave up, rather than trying to pay them back in an eye-for-an-eye fashion. Add to that the fact that the Japanese started the war, both in China and against America, and it was a pretty clear case of what the Catholic Church classifies as a Just War.

 

[Tallguy88]

Well, it has been over 70 years...

That doesn't seem to get us off the hook for the Indian wars, slavery, the A-bombs, etc.

It's the double standard that gets under my skin more than anything. America is not immaculate by any means. But Europeans pointing fingers about us being war-mongering is pretty Ironic.

 

[Tallguy88]

The UN is at war with North Korea? That's strange considering NK is actually part of the UN.

Insofar as the Korean War was never concluded. Only an Armistice was enacted. I have no doubt that the UN would do nothing if NK resumed the war against the South. Russia and the PRoChina would keep the UN out. But during the War, it was a UN alliance that fought for the South against the North. I still have my grandpa's UN Service Medal he got for fighting in Korea.

 

[Nithavela]

That doesn't seem to get us off the hook for the Indian wars, slavery, the A-bombs, etc.

It's the double standard that gets under my skin more than anything. America is not immaculate by any means. But Europeans pointing fingers about us being war-mongering is pretty Ironic.

The point is that the USA is still involved in wars and has been for over 90% of it's history.

 

[Tallguy88]

NK is actually part of the UN.

Thanks to the PRC who bullied it through. But they also bullied through the resolution that the ROC/Taiwan cannot be admitted to the UN in anyway that is separate from the PRC. The UN shows it's flaws in these sorts of cases.

 

[All Englands Skies]

I starts this thread on the basis that I saw a headline about the USA "anhilalating" North Korea, and I pointed out that the US, a country I love, has been responsible for too many conflicts.

This thread was nothing about Islam, I've visited several Muslim countries and encountered nothing but hospitality and friendship. I'm going to IRAN next year and I bet I encounter the same.

Demonising an entire faith group is just plain wrong.

Having a discussion about the US employing more restraint on its huge military, and using diplomacy more is fair enough.

The title of this thread stating "America loves war.....", is hardly a rational title choice, bit strange to now act all indignant over it, claiming its just about debating Americas combat deployment.

Ah, Iran, the home of Shia hardliners who lock up apostates, do you complain much about what they're up to as much as you complain about the USA?

 

[Tallguy88]

The point is that the USA is still involved in wars and has been for over 90% of it's history.

Only using a very loosey-goosey definition of "war" that seems to be anytime a US bullet is shot in a country counts as a declaration of war. Using such a broad-brush lowest-common-demonimator definition, very few countries are going to have much better stats than the US in this regard. If for no other reason than we typically only get involved in foreign conflicts as part of an international coalition. So if Kosovo counts against us, it counts against all of NATO as well, which renders specific criticism of the US moot.

Under the US constitution, only Congress can declare war and that has only happened five times in history (1812, Mexican, Spanish, WW1, WW2). Using the more common "blood and treasure" standard that would make an unofficial action more apt to be called a "war", there's:

Revolutionary War (7 or 8 years depending on what is considered the starting point)
War of 1812 (3 years)
Mexican War (2 years)
Civil War (4 years)
Spanish War (3 months)
WW1 (1.5 years US involvement)
WW2 (3.5 years US involvement)
Korean War (3 years)
Vietnam War (depends how you count it. 19 years max)
Iraq 1 (7 months)
Afghanistan (ongoing, 15 years so far)
Iraq 2 (8 years)

So totalling that up gives 67 years roughly, but some of those were concurrent, so knock off Iraq 2 since all it's years happened during Afghanistan so that makes it 59 years at war if we give Vietnam a full 20 and start the Revolution based of the British counting of 8 years. So 59 years at war divided by 241 years since the Declaration of Independence gives us a percentage of 25% of our time being at war.

If we only count from the ratification of the Constitution in 1788, then we get just over 22% of our time spent at war (not counting the Revolution because it predated the Constitution).

 

[Shiloh Raven]

The point is that the USA is still involved in wars and has been for over 90% of it's history.

I thought I would repost this information because you mentioned this fact again. As I said in my original post, this article lists every war America has ever been in since its inception and it is an extensive list. The article is over two years old, so we'll need to add those two years to the total.

America Has Been at War 93% of the Time – 222 out of 239 Years – Since 1776

Here's a short excerpt from the article.

Indeed, most of the military operations launched since World War II have been launched by the U.S.

And American military spending dwarfs the rest of the world put together.

No wonder polls show that the world believes America is the number 1 threat to peace.

 

[Tallguy88]

I thought I would repost this article and information because you mentioned this again. As I said in my original post, this article lists every war America has ever been in since its inception and it is a long and very extensive list. This article is over two years old, so we will need to add those two years to the overall total.

America Has Been at War 93% of the Time – 222 out of 239 Years – Since 1776

And what do you think of my reasoning that shows the percentage to be closer to 22-25%? What are the stats for all other countries using the same metric that is being used in the article? If the point is to show we are a warmongering nation, it doesn't really work unless you can show how the numbers work out in comparison to other nations.

Here's a short excerpt from the article.

Indeed, most of the military operations launched since World War II have been launched by the U.S.

And American military spending dwarfs the rest of the world put together.

No wonder polls show that the world believes America is the number 1 threat to peace.

"Polls show" is a pretty meaningless thing. Easy to manipulate polls. Hence the "lies, darn lies, and statistics" phrase.

 

[Tallguy88]

Using the same sort of logic that "one soldier counts as a war/invasion", Britain isn't doing much better than the US:

British have invaded nine out of ten countries - so look out Luxembourg

Pink countries have been invaded by Britain.

 

[Shiloh Raven]

Reposting information on the United States military spending compared to other nations. The site is called Military Spending. There are a few charts available on this site. Here is one of the charts:

 

[Tallguy88]

Reposting information on the United States military spending compared to other nations. The site is called Military Spending. There are a few charts available on this site. Here is one of the charts:

I'm glad we are spending money on defense to stay technologically and operationally ahead of other nations. I'm not sure how this is a bad thing? As a percentage of GDP, Russia runs neck and neck with us on military spending, is just a lower total number since their economy isn't as strong as ours.

 

[Trogdor the Burninator]

Reposting information on the United States military spending compared to other nations. The site is called Military Spending. There are a few charts available on this site. Here is one of the charts:

If you look at programs like the F-35 it isn't hard to see why the US spends so much on the military

 

[Tallguy88]

If you look at programs like the F-35 it isn't hard to see why the US spends so much on the military

Or the F-22. Billions of dollars in research and development and Congress killed the program after only making about 120 of them.

 

[All Englands Skies]

Using the same sort of logic that "one soldier counts as a war/invasion", Britain isn't doing much better than the US:

British have invaded nine out of ten countries - so look out Luxembourg

Pink countries have been invaded by Britain.

A lot of Counties have been at war for 90% of their existence it seems, yet they still single out the USA.

You keep refuting them and they keep trying to make out the USA is worse by sheer will to make it so, its like they want the USA to fill the role they want it to fill in their heads.

 

[Nithavela]

Or the F-22. Billions of dollars in research and development and Congress killed the program after only making about 120 of them.

Sounds to me like you're country is getting fleeced by congress and the military industrial complex.

 

[Dave RP]

The title of this thread stating "America loves war.....", is hardly a rational title choice, bit strange to now act all indignant over it, claiming its just about debating Americas combat deployment.

Ah, Iran, the home of Shia hardliners who lock up apostates, do you complain much about what they're up to as much as you complain about the USA?

Iran has not invaded another country, has not used its military to destroy the legal regime of another country. I'll judge Iran more after my visit.

America has been involved in more wars than any other nation and spends more on its miliatary than any any other nation, with all that miliatary hardware available I believe conflict is more likely. The miliatary has too big an influence on policy.

And I'm not being indignant, the title of the thread was designed to get attention and it worked. I still think the world would be better if the US and others, involved their miliatary in other people's problems less frequently.

 

[Dave RP]

Only using a very loosey-goosey definition of "war" that seems to be anytime a US bullet is shot in a country counts as a declaration of war. Using such a broad-brush lowest-common-demonimator definition, very few countries are going to have much better stats than the US in this regard. If for no other reason than we typically only get involved in foreign conflicts as part of an international coalition. So if Kosovo counts against us, it counts against all of NATO as well, which renders specific criticism of the US moot.

Under the US constitution, only Congress can declare war and that has only happened five times in history (1812, Mexican, Spanish, WW1, WW2). Using the more common "blood and treasure" standard that would make an unofficial action more apt to be called a "war", there's:

Revolutionary War (7 or 8 years depending on what is considered the starting point)
War of 1812 (3 years)
Mexican War (2 years)
Civil War (4 years)
Spanish War (3 months)
WW1 (1.5 years US involvement)
WW2 (3.5 years US involvement)
Korean War (3 years)
Vietnam War (depends how you count it. 19 years max)
Iraq 1 (7 months)
Afghanistan (ongoing, 15 years so far)
Iraq 2 (8 years)

So totalling that up gives 67 years roughly, but some of those were concurrent, so knock off Iraq 2 since all it's years happened during Afghanistan so that makes it 59 years at war if we give Vietnam a full 20 and start the Revolution based of the British counting of 8 years. So 59 years at war divided by 241 years since the Declaration of Independence gives us a percentage of 25% of our time being at war.

If we only count from the ratification of the Constitution in 1788, then we get just over 22% of our time spent at war (not counting the Revolution because it predated the Constitution).

The revolution cannot be a war, by definition you weren't a country till you won that one, so that counts in your favour.

Historically we British have been in hundreds of conflicts, history is complex, i'm more concerned over the present and the US in my opinion is still too eager to use its vast military might, and we'd all be a little better off if they used it a bit less and used diplomacy a bit more.

 

[Dave RP]

I'm glad we are spending money on defense to stay technologically and operationally ahead of other nations. I'm not sure how this is a bad thing? As a percentage of GDP, Russia runs neck and neck with us on military spending, is just a lower total number since their economy isn't as strong as ours.

6% of a small amount is a small amount, 4% of a huge amount is a huge amount, what's your point? The UK spends about the same as Russia on Military spending, and some in the UK believe we are not spending enough.