TheWiseOldFart

Op-ed by TheWiseOldFart Most of you know that I am a proud pacifist. As an original Baby Boomer, born in 1946, I have been curious about history for most of my life. The most important facts I learned involved the history of wars: their origin, the loss of life, and what was accomplished. I will not bore you with all of what I learned over decades, but I can summarize the facts in a concise manner. WHY MEN RESORT TO WARS Any man or woman with average intelligence is aware that any military conflict between nations must be the last resort, or a defensive measure after one of the nations wages a military assault on the other. Early in recorded history, the three reasons for declaring war were based on acquisition of land, disputes involving personal relationships, religious beliefs, and the male ego. THE VERY EXISTENCE OF THE UNITED STATES BEGAN WITH A WAR [Settlements in the New World began with the Spanish in 1492/1493, followed by the English, who established Jamestown in 1607. ] Most...

Op-ed by TheWiseOldFart One year before my mother gave birth to me, Japan surrendered and WWII came to an end. President Harry Truman knew that the war was won, but to prevent the loss of more American lives. he made the most controversial decision in the history of the world. Truman ordered the murder of tens of thousands of innocent men, women and children. It was of no interest to many of our nation’s leaders because they were Japanese. On August 6, 1945, 80 years ago today, an atomic bomb was dropped on Hiroshima, and on August 9, 1945, another weapon of mass destruction leveled the city of Nagasaki. [The atomic bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki in 1945 killed an estimated 100,000 to 146,000 people by the end of 1945, with Hiroshima accounting for roughly 66,000 to 140,000 deaths, and Nagasaki for approximately 39,000 to 70,000. Many more deaths occurred in the following years due to radiation-related illnesses like cancer, leading to combined total death tolls of over 200,000, wi...

Op-ed by TheWiseOldFart First and foremost, the people of any country involved in a military conflict never “win a war.” Only military leaders and politicians discuss winning wars, and they, and only they profit from the deaths of hundreds of thousands of innocent men, women, and children. What has never been discussed since WWII is the fact that America’s government nor its military leaders have “won” a single war. Our military left in disgrace from Korea, Vietnam, Iraq, and eventually, Afghanistan. However, the people living in those countries, and of their adversary, the United States of America, lost brothers, sisters, sons, daughters, fathers, husbands, and wives. People who can never be replaced. Being an original “baby boomer,” I often think of the tens of thousands of lives taken by the decision of one man in August of 1945. On August 6 and August 9, atomic bombs were dropped on the cities of Hiroshima and Nagasaki. A total of approximately 120,000 Japanese citizens were killed...