Does The Special Relationship Between the UK & USA Exist?

[Xenophon]

And we finally see Di's white flag waving in the breeze.

Enjoy your views, no doubt they're entirely objective and impeccably sourced. There is of course only every one view of history and since it's yours it must be right.

Says the guy who is making it up off the cuff.

It's not 'my opinion' it was in fact the opinion of Luddendorf, Hindenburg, the Krown prince, The Kaiser, Conrad, Foch, Petain, Cardona, Haig...

Every single senior military officer on both sides.

But of course they are all wrong, what do they know, they were only there and fighting the war, you, 90 years later, obviously know better.

 

[Diuretic]

And we finally see Di's white flag waving in the breeze.

Enjoy your views, no doubt they're entirely objective and impeccably sourced. There is of course only every one view of history and since it's yours it must be right.

Says the guy who is making it up off the cuff.

It's not 'my opinion' it was in fact the opinion of Luddendorf, Hindenburg, the Krown prince, The Kaiser, Conrad, Foch, Petain, Cardona, Haig...

Every single senior military officer on both sides.

But of course they are all wrong, what do they know, they were only there and fighting the war, you, 90 years later, obviously know better.

You're really upset aren't you? Why is that? Are you an isolationist? Does the fact that the US even entered WWI upset you? It's not easy for me either mister. I find myself almost by default having to justify a war of imperialism, a war that killed something like 18 million people and a war that was waged by, on the British side, a bunch of upper class twits who, in the way of things, fought a contemporary war with outdated tactics, who threw men to their deaths because of their own stupidity. You know why the British Army ceased to recruit on a regional basis after WWI? It was because whole streets in various cities and towns lost a whole generation of men. My own grandfather joined the British Army in 1915 and immediately shipped out to France. Among other locations he fought with his regiment at Paschandael. Just thiink, if he hadn't made it out of that hell hole alive then I wouldn't be here apparently tormenting you.

Start a thread, educate me rather than type insulting words and phrases into your computer. I can be educated.

 

[Diuretic]

Now back to the special rellationship.

Gordon Brown was given a warm reception. Does this mean the special relationship can be saved?

 

[Toro]

Yes.

 

[Diuretic]

That's a good outcome then

 

[Xenophon]

You're really upset aren't you? Why is that? Are you an isolationist? Does the fact that the US even entered WWI upset you? It's not easy for me either mister. I find myself almost by default having to justify a war of imperialism, a war that killed something like 18 million people and a war that was waged by, on the British side, a bunch of upper class twits who, in the way of things, fought a contemporary war with outdated tactics, who threw men to their deaths because of their own stupidity. You know why the British Army ceased to recruit on a regional basis after WWI? It was because whole streets in various cities and towns lost a whole generation of men. My own grandfather joined the British Army in 1915 and immediately shipped out to France. Among other locations he fought with his regiment at Paschandael. Just thiink, if he hadn't made it out of that hell hole alive then I wouldn't be here apparently tormenting you.

Start a thread, educate me rather than type insulting words and phrases into your computer. I can be educated.

After the war they called themselves the lost generation.

The French lost so many young men that they had trouble fielding an army 20 years later to fight Hitler.

I'm not an isolationist as such, more of someone that regrets that US history is filled with invasions and ocupations and wars for less then altruistic reasons.

You see, i consider Wilson one of the great villians in history, they don't talk about it these days, but he was in fact a huge racist, his famous '14 points' basically claim that different ethnic peoples must have their own nations and can never live in one nation (which is supremly ironic as he was POTUS of a nation based on the premise they can) and this leads to the fracturing of Europe into little states, and sets up many of the problems that would cause the second world war.

WWI had many unforseen effects, one was that people lost faith for the first time in science, as science had been used to make more effective means of slaughter.

People also lost faith for the first time in governments, it was unthinkable for example in germany that people of authority didn't know what they were doing, yet before the war was over Germany was rife with people's commisariats exactly the same as the Russian model, many formed by sailors of the Imperial Navy (another irony as the Russian version also began with sailors). They groups of 'workers and peasants' refused to follow the orders and decrees of the old order which they blaimed for starting and prolonging the war. Parts of the German empire even had communist governments briefly.

The two 'children' of the war were really Leninist Communism and facism/nazism, these two extremist governments could never had existed as such before the war.

Perhaps the largest betrayal the US had was allowing the allies to blame germany for the war and acting as if they had won the war decisivly (this would have happened by 1919, the germans had begun to fall apart in October of 1918) while the germans could claim that they had not, this lead to the famous Hitler saying of 'the stab in the back' that 'jews' and socialists gave up the war and the army could have won it, a lie of course.

The US congress refused to ratify the Versailles treaty, they recognized that it would lay the ground work for a new war. The USA made a seperate peace with the central powers. But Congress did take one last bit of 'revenge' on Wilson for letting all this happen, they refused to support his idea for a 'league of Nations.' Without US support the league would have no international support and no funds and it proved to be a paper tiger.

The collapse of traditional morality in the 1920s was a direct result of the slaughter of WWI and the pandemic which followed it. Almost ten million men were killed in the war, and 21 million died in 1918-19 of a mysterious influenza that many believed was devine punishment for the sins of man. An attitude erupted of 'who cares about morality' which is understandable after the massive horror and death the war brought.

In many ways WWI was far more influential in changing the world then WWII was, the effects of WWII have mostly vanished now (bi-polar world, USA dominating all), and it is true also that WWII simply finished what WWI began.

The last supreme irony of a war filled with irony is the comment of Conrad, the austrain supreme commander who caused the war to start because of his insistance on invading serbia, which had a Russian garuntee:

'Austria Hungary must wage war for political reasons'

The war ended Austria Hungary.

 

[Diuretic]

I said I could be eductated and I was, thanks for an interesting post. I mean that.

 

[necritan]

I think the truly special bound we share with them....is how we gave up a big FU to tyranny and kicked their asses in the Revolutionary War.

Which is funny.......cuzz we may have to do it all over again...

 

[Diuretic]

The irony is that you got rid of British tyranny before the British did. It took them a long time to get out from under the yoke of tyranny. But that's another story.

 

[Munin]

This crap was created during the First world War, when Wilson conned the USA into bailing out the English and french who could not defeat the Germans.

I feel no afinity to the UK, and view them as the founders did, as a government that never has our best interests at heart.

It seems like you ignore everything that happened before the founding fathers.

What about the fact that you don't speak french or spanish?

And about the fact that all your founding fathers you speak of have british ancestors and possibly even still have British relatives?

 

[Xenophon]

This crap was created during the First world War, when Wilson conned the USA into bailing out the English and french who could not defeat the Germans.

I feel no afinity to the UK, and view them as the founders did, as a government that never has our best interests at heart.

It seems like you ignore everything that happened before the founding fathers.

What about the fact that you don't speak french or spanish?

And about the fact that all your founding fathers you speak of have british ancestors and possibly even still have British relatives?

What about the facts you ignore, such as the United States fought not one, but 2 wars with britain before the nation was 25 years old?

What about the fact that Britain supported the South in the civil war against the Union and was forced after the war to pay a huge indemnity to the United States to pay for the damage British ships under confederate flags did?

I have not 'ignored' anything, we had no 'special relationship' with Britain, this was concocted in the 20th century to justify twice entering wars on the side of Britain. FDR in fact favored the Soviets over the British who he viewed as evil exploiters of colonials, and often rebuffed churchill to side with stalin.

 

[Diuretic]

I need to interject. America was right to get out from under the heel of the British. Heck this is worth its own thread. For all the scept'red isle and Alice Duer stuff, Britain has been a class-ridden tyranny for most of its history. Its history deserves a witheringly critical analysis. When it comes to democracy in the world the US has done more to advance the idea than the Brits did for many years even in their own country. I would venture that if it weren't for WWII that Britain would never have thrown of its class-based tyranny. It's not even properly thrown off but at least it lost some of its effect post WWII.

 

[Xenophon]

In actual fact, the USA had such a relationship with FRANCE, not the UK from the revolution through the first world war.

The French helped the US acchive it's independance, and if you look in Manhatten harbor you see a tangible reminder of the close ties between the United states and France, a statue called 'Liberty lighting the world.'

This relationship is also seen in WWII, many of the Holywood propaganda movies are pro Free French (films such as Casablanca) and show the French in a favorable light, far more often then films supporting Britian (the Brits made their own classic war movies, the best piece of propaganda was 'Mrs Miniver' which is a beautiful tribute to the English way of life).

Events since the second world war cooled our relations with France (De Gaulle played a huge part in destorying that relationship) and today we eye the French as the butt of jokes and self interested betrayers.

A sad state of affairs to view the nation that gave us Lafayette.

 

[Diuretic]

Good points. I do know how France helped the nascent US. I don't know the details (but I did have a few beers in a bar in New Orleans that was apparently connected with Jean Lafitte, I must say though half a dozen beers there and I wasn't that well educated about the connection but I was a lot).

I would think it may have been - given it was prior to the French Revolution - a case of my enemy's enemy is my friend, which is fair enough of course. If the French could keep the British distracted with an uprising in its American colonies then that would help France in its seemingly interminable wars with Britain/England in Europe. But I'll stand corrected of course.

I think France at the time was as bad as Britain in terms of the issue of absolute monarchy and imperialism.

De Gaulle was a prick. He even went to Canada and stirred up merde in Quebec.

 

[Xenophon]

The French of course were happy to join in the American revolution to get back at the UK for the loss during the 7 year's war, but the ideals of the war became all the rage in the French court.

The spark of America lit a similar fuse in France (Lafayette was heavily involved in the early days of the french republic) and many Americans felt sentimental for the nation that had helped them at the cost of their own nation's economy.

It wasn't always a smooth ride, their was friction when Napoleon was emperor, and it was worse when his relation Napoleon III ran France, but the third republic (born out of the defeat of the Franco-Prussian war) and the USA were extremly close.

It's a shame many Americans aern't taught their nation's history, they only know the very recent past.

 

[Diuretic]

Not just Americans. I was taught history in two countries I grew up in and looking back on both I can tell you I got the edited version both times. "Events" aren't history, not that I'm a historian or anything, just that it was one of my favourite subjects in my schools.

Perhaps it was the Brunerian approach that necessarily left out some of the details to allow us kids to understand but I still feel a bit cheated. I was told Wolfe and Clive were heroes. No-one told me what they were really up to. I had to find out for myself.

 

[Munin]

This crap was created during the First world War, when Wilson conned the USA into bailing out the English and french who could not defeat the Germans.

I feel no afinity to the UK, and view them as the founders did, as a government that never has our best interests at heart.

It seems like you ignore everything that happened before the founding fathers.

What about the fact that you don't speak french or spanish?

And about the fact that all your founding fathers you speak of have british ancestors and possibly even still have British relatives?

What about the facts you ignore, such as the United States fought not one, but 2 wars with britain before the nation was 25 years old?

What about the fact that Britain supported the South in the civil war against the Union and was forced after the war to pay a huge indemnity to the United States to pay for the damage British ships under confederate flags did?

I have not 'ignored' anything, we had no 'special relationship' with Britain, this was concocted in the 20th century to justify twice entering wars on the side of Britain. FDR in fact favored the Soviets over the British who he viewed as evil exploiters of colonials, and often rebuffed churchill to side with stalin.

Surely they fought wars with each other. France, the UK and Germany also fought many wars with each other, yet they are now united in the EU (a phase between a close trade, justice, ... agreement and becoming 1 country) and have very good relations.

What I was pointing out is that a very large number of the colonial Americans were British and they also have many things that they inherited from them: one of those things is the english language another one is that the UK and the US both have their own measurement system (unlike the metric system that is used by all other European nations).

And then you have the fact that modern America wouldn't exist if it weren't for the British creation of the american colonies, the "immigration" of the British ancestors of the founding fathers and of many other important americans. America is historically connected to the British, that connection is still clearly visible today.

 

[Diuretic]

The Brits were basically marauders in their mercantilist and colonialist-imperialist phases of history, they may have had to strike a deal with the Norse when the Danelaw was established and eventually succumbed (by really rotten luck) to the invasion of the Normans (there's that Norse reprise) led by Guillaume in 1066 but they learned well. Possibly under Ellizabeth I they decided that they were going to do a Rule Britannia on everyone else (regardless of the shite going on at home).

The reason that we can communicate using English (with allowances for quirks) is because the Brits were the most fiercely mercantilist and imperalist nation the world has seen since Rome.

 

[editec]

World War I was a disaster for Europe. None of Europe's Monarchs wanted it, and few of its ministers wanted either.

Except for Churchill, of course. He was hot to trot much like Bush II was hot to be a WAR TIME PRESIDENT.

World War II was really the second half of that conflict.

The USA should have stayed the hell out of the World War I.

The treaty of Versaillies would never have happened the way it did and none of us would ever have heard of Hitler.

While the Germans were being starved into submission, they were still advanced on all fronts, and everyone was losing interest in continuing that war.

Some kind of peace probably would have happened before it did, had American stayed out of it.

America was making a fortune selling into that war, and it would have been far better off to let it take its course without our troops.

It's arguable that the world would be a far better place today if the USA had stayed the hell of out it.

 

[Diuretic]

America didn't make a fortune selling into that war. Certain corporations made a fortune selling into that war. The beginning of transnationalism?