Author Topic: The Tet Offensive  (Read 7068 times)

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Plane

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Re: The Tet Offensive
« Reply #45 on: February 09, 2008, 12:31:34 AM »
<<Communism killed or imprisoned all the Chineese that didn't like Communism , if that is Unity Unity is not worth the effort.>>

plane, not only do I have no idea where you get this nonsense from, but I'm amazed how you can parrot that crap with no reflection whatsoever.  There's over a billion people in China, almost a billion and a half in fact.  Do you have any idea how many people would have to be killed or imprisoned if they had to deal with  "all the Chinese that didn't like Communism?"  They generally go after enemies of the regime

<<Communiosm made the regular famines worse . . . >>

How'd they do that?

<< . . .  but hid them >>

How'd they do that?

<< there is no controversy about whether there was a large famine in 59-63 only a controversy of how bad it was , >>

So what's the range of difference?  What's the big estimate and what's the small estimate?

<<a little less communistic is a little better fed >>

That is ludicrous, China was plagued by famine for millennia before anybody every thought of communism.   It was endemic to the country

<<,they will shuck the whole idea and eat well someday.>>

I've been there once and my wife's been there twice, and from what we've both seen, they're eating pretty well already.

Yes , Mao is dead and Communism isn't feeling so well either , they have allowed millionaires to reappear , and private hands to aquire capitol , thus they are better fed.

Famine need not have occured in the aftermath of WWII There were Americans who wanted to suport Chinese agriclture , notably Claire Chenout who wanted to help the people directly that had helped him so much . The Common Chineese citizen who would build airfeilds bare handed  and rescue downed Americans at great personal risk , just to help fight the Japaneese.

Europe recovered better in part because of the Mashall plan , China just kept on haveing war , fighting off the potential of a Marshall plan.

Communism does cause famine , it does this diectly , if this is not demonstrrated by enourmous famines in Maoist China then is it not demonstrated in recent North Korean famines?
« Last Edit: February 09, 2008, 11:30:48 PM by Plane »

Michael Tee

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Re: The Tet Offensive
« Reply #46 on: February 09, 2008, 01:22:15 AM »
<<Yes , Mao is dead and Communism isn't feeling so well either , they have allowed millionaires to reappear , and rivate hands to aquire caitol , >>

They're sure as hell taking communism in a new direction but they still have a firm grip on the steering.  You know communism as a governing philosophy has to be a little bit flexible and accommodating.  This happened in Cuba, where I saw that Fidel instituted mercados libres for small farmers to sell limited amounts of their own produce, and then he shut them down; in Viet Nam when the Viet Minh first allowed for small landlords to keep their holdings and then they turfed them out.  In the U.S.S.R. concessions were made to capitalism and then revoked when no longer needed. 

There's even a name for the policy:  "Two steps forward, one step back."

All you know is where the Party leadership has taken the people to for now - - unless you have a crystal ball, you can't see whether the next step will be forwards or backwards.



<< . . . thus they are better fed.>>

Well, now you know better than the rest of us.  On what do you base your conclusion (a) that the Chinese ARE in fact better fed?  and (b) that if they are better fed, it's because they allowed the private control of some amounts of capital? and (c) that if they are better fed, it's somehow due to the fact that China now has its first millionaires?  Because personally I can't see the connection.

<<Famine need not have occured in the aftermath of WWII >>

You gotta be kidding.  The Japs devastated the fucking country.  There was a huge famine (1944) during WWII.

<<There were Americans who wanted to suport Chinese agriclture , notably Claire Chenout who wanted to help the people directly that had helped him so much. >>

LMFAO.  Claire Chennault was a well-paid agent and gun for hire (The Flying Tigers) of the Soong family, the richest family in China, of one of the Soong family's daughters, Mme. Chiang Kai Shek and of her husband, the Generalissimo.  Chiang was the leader of the KMT (Nationalist) Party, which was fighting the CPC (Communist Party of China) and its attempts to free the country from foreign (American) domination.   Chiang and the reactionary fascists and warlords who supported him, grew rich off the misery of the workers and peasants of China.   The support of Claire Chennault would have been the kiss of death to any agricultural project - - the Chinese had finally been roused to demand national independence, not a chance to live out their lives as one more Amerikkkan puppet state.

<<The Common Chineese citizen who would build airfeilds bare handed  and rescue downed Americans at great personal risk , just to help fight the Japaneese.>>

I think you can safely assume that this was due much more to widespread hatred of the barbaric Jap invaders than to any particular affection for the Americans.  The Chinese, especially in the coastal areas, never forgot the cruelty and brutality that accompanied the crushing of the Boxer Rebellion by the Western Powers, nor the Opium Wars that let the foreign opium traders into their country in the first place, in defiance of the Emperor's ban on the importation of opium.  There was an enormous popular resentment of Westerners, despite the wartime propaganda designed to show the great love affair between the Chinese and American peoples.

If you want to read a fictionalized account of a real-life WWII firefight between American troops in China and a band of Chinese Nationalist army deserters, during a retreat from a major Jap advance, as witnessed by an American war correspondent, Theodore White, who was there, take a look at his book, "The Mountain Road," which examines the burning anger of some Chinese foot-soldiers towards Americans generally.  I recall reading, I believe in LIFE magazine, White's non-fiction account of the same battle, with photos.

<<Europe recovered better in part because of the Mashall plan , China just kept on haveing war , fighting off the potential of a Marshall plan.>>

They evidently knew what they were doing.  Marshall Plan aid came with a lot of strings attached.  Chairman Mao knew all about strings and Trojan Horses.  He didn't want the Marshall Plan, China was going to pull itself up by its own bootstraps if necessary, but it would after centuries of foreign colonization and arrogance, finally be master once again in its own house.

<<Communism does cause famine , it does this diectly , if this is not demonstrrated by enourmous famines in Maoist China then is it not demonstrated in recent North Korean famines?>>

I can't even begin to count the reasons why this last statement is ridiculous - - 1, because China always had famine, had it for millennia before Communism was even a gleam in Karl Marx's eye, 2, there was no "enormous famine" during Mao's regime and whatever the magnitude of it, if it even existed, there had been much bigger and many more famines before the alleged famine of Mao's time and 3, I have never seen a shred of evidence that the famines of North Korea are in any way to to communism as opposed to Western and South Korean sabotage, blockade, crop poisoning or other dirty tricks.

Plane

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Re: The Tet Offensive
« Reply #47 on: February 09, 2008, 04:45:22 PM »
Crop poisoning?

Tell me you just made that up , hehehe.

South Korea has a large middle class and a pretty powerfull business class that spans the middle and wealthy , this ensures that capital is not only produced but that it keeps moveing ,keeps reproduceing itself.

North Korea has a very strong central planning system , which ensures that every change in conditions is coped with promptly after it is over.

Korea is too small to claim that the weather is diffrent in one from the other , the North had more mines and factorys after WWII than the south , the only real diffrence is that Communism is stodgy and Capitalism is nimble .

This may be an oversimplafacation , but it is a fact that the Koreans are as nearly pure a scientific experiment as can be produced to test the virtues of their respective systems.

South Korea is not perfect , but it does not take two generations to change leadership.


Michael Tee

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Re: The Tet Offensive
« Reply #48 on: February 09, 2008, 05:44:58 PM »
<<Crop poisoning?   Tell me you just made that up , hehehe.>>

Why would I make that up?  You really think the CIA has moral scruples that would keep it from poisoning crops?  Ever hear of Agent Orange?

<<South Korea has a large middle class and a pretty powerfull business class that spans the middle and wealthy , this ensures that capital is not only produced but that it keeps moveing ,keeps reproduceing itself.>>

What it ensures is wage slavery, progressively lop-sided distribution of wealth and a guarantee that the earth will be put to whatever uses best serve the profit motive of the industrialists who can buy their food anywhere and not the interests of the masses, who require cheap, locally grown food.


<<North Korea has a very strong central planning system , which ensures that every change in conditions is coped with promptly after it is over.>>

Cute theory.  Central planning can't adapt to change, capitalism can.  HA!  When anything really important has to be done in a fast-changing environment, notice how it gets done:  the Manhattan Project and the Allied Expeditionary Force, two examples only of top-down planningand centralized command; not Ike AND Montgomery, but Ike over Mongomery and Patton and everybody else.  History proves that regimes with central command and control did fine.  China is one good example, Cuba another.

<<Korea is too small to claim that the weather is diffrent in one from the other . . . >>

Well, sorry, I'm no expert on the geography and climate of the Korean Peninsula and neither are you.  Nor are we experts in Korean agriculture.  When I hear an expert explain the difference if any between agricultural conditions in North and South Korea, then I'll form an opinion and till then I won't.

<< the North had more mines and factorys after WWII than the south . . . >>

The North's priorities were not its mines and its factories.  It needed to re-unite the Peninsula, rather than leave half of it under an American puppet dictatorship.

<<the only real diffrence is that Communism is stodgy and Capitalism is nimble.>>

The only real difference is that Kim Jong Il refused to allow the rape of an entire population for the benefit of Amerikkkan puppeteers whose aim was to establish a ruling class paradise and a workers' hell.

<<This may be an oversimplafacation , but it is a fact that the Koreans are as nearly pure a scientific experiment as can be produced to test the virtues of their respective systems.>>

How do you figure that?  One used low-paid wage-slaves kept in line by a vicious, murderous right-wing dictatorship to enrich a small ruling class and gain U.S. financial and military support, the other used low-paid wage slaves kept in line by a vicious, murderous left-wing dictatorship to build a powerful military force with its own nukes.  Who's to say in the long run which system ended up better off?

<<South Korea is not perfect . . . >>

Well, at least you got THAT right.

<< . . .  but it does not take two generations to change leadership.>>

No, but it sure took a helluva lot of dead human bodies.

Plane

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Re: The Tet Offensive
« Reply #49 on: February 09, 2008, 05:54:12 PM »
<<Crop poisoning?   Tell me you just made that up , hehehe.>>

Why would I make that up?  You really think the CIA has moral scruples that would keep it from poisoning crops?  Ever hear of Agent Orange?


So you did make it up.


For the rest of your answer I accept it as a perfect reversal of reality , North Korea is hell for anyone who likes freedom or likes to eat. South Korea isn't hard to emmigrate from if you don't like it.

Communism promises exactly what it destroys .

Xavier_Onassis

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Re: The Tet Offensive
« Reply #50 on: February 09, 2008, 10:22:12 PM »
South Koreans went through some hard times under dictators like Syngman Rhee and his successors, but since the mid-90's, South Korea has become a prosperous nation where pretty much everyone has a fairly decent standard of living.

North Korea is backward and unlikely to advance at all. What North Korea has is not so much Communism as a monarchy with a singularly incompetent monarch. All this Great Leader and Dear leader worship is not Marx, it's just medieval.

Koreans are very hard-working and determined people, and under South Korean democracy they have prospered. The North will have to wait until Kim Jung Il dies or is overthrown.
"Time flies like an arrow; fruit flies like a banana."

Plane

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Re: The Tet Offensive
« Reply #51 on: February 09, 2008, 11:43:19 PM »
South Koreans went through some hard times under dictators like Syngman Rhee and his successors, but since the mid-90's, South Korea has become a prosperous nation where pretty much everyone has a fairly decent standard of living.

North Korea is backward and unlikely to advance at all. What North Korea has is not so much Communism as a monarchy with a singularly incompetent monarch. All this Great Leader and Dear leader worship is not Marx, it's just medieval.

Koreans are very hard-working and determined people, and under South Korean democracy they have prospered. The North will have to wait until Kim Jung Il dies or is overthrown.

I agree mostly with your assessment , when given a chance people often work for their own benefit , this applies politically , and a South Korea has become more politically free it has become more liable to become even more free.

One of the chief problems with Communism is the vain promise that the harsh state controll will ever fade , there is no mechanism to cause or encourage this and no matter how well the communist government starts , without the element of democracy the trend is to devolve into Monarchy.

Chin is struggling with momentous decisions , but still many of those decisions are made in a small ogliogarcial circle from the top. Mao told his people that the real leader was the people whose wishes would be understood and served by the leadership , strange that with this idea having the leadership chosen by election was considered a bad idea , Mao couldn't risk his revolutions success in the hands of another.

George Washington on the other hand ,understood that to make a king of himself would have been the destruction of his revolution. We were very lucky to have had such a wise leader early on , from Robespierre to Mao the folly of holding too much power too long and too centrally has been demonstrated and the example of Cincinattus and George Washington has been borne out as especially wise.
« Last Edit: February 11, 2008, 12:49:33 AM by Plane »

Xavier_Onassis

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Re: The Tet Offensive
« Reply #52 on: February 10, 2008, 01:06:58 PM »
China has always been a collectivist society, because of the huge population. As for voting, your personal vote in a country of 300,000,000 like the US is a lot less (about 100 times less, actually) influential than it would be in Costa Rica, which has under 3,000,000. In China, which has 1,200,000,000 people, one vote is worth only one fourth as much as a vote in the US. I don't know about you, but I have voted in every election since I was 18, and my vote has NEVER swung any election. Had I never voted, it would have changed nothing.  Most of the time, I am forced to vote for people that offer no real logical choice. JUniorbush is too despicable and mronic to even consider, and John Kerry was hardly my favorite Democrat.

The men controlling China can certainly be faulted for the pollution problem, as well as other problems such as the massive dislocations of people for the Three Gorges Project, and the suppression of Falin Gong, but you also have to admire the expertise of a constant growth rate of 10% annually for an unprecedented time with a bearable inflation rate. No economic planners of any political persuasion have ever done this before.

China is a far different case from North Korea. China is a Communist government with a laissez-faire economy, for the most part. North Korea is a hereditary monarchy ineffectively disguised as a Communist state.
"Time flies like an arrow; fruit flies like a banana."

Plane

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Re: The Tet Offensive
« Reply #53 on: February 11, 2008, 12:55:19 AM »

The men controlling China can certainly be faulted for the pollution problem, as well as other problems such as the massive dislocations of people for the Three Gorges Project, and the suppression of Falin Gong, but you also have to admire the expertise of a constant growth rate of 10% annually for an unprecedented time with a bearable inflation rate. No economic planners of any political persuasion have ever done this before.



When you take the grip off the throat amazeing that breathing happens so much better.

There is nothing wrong with the Chineese that woud have prevented them from the same pace of progress tha the Japaneese enjoyed throuh the Sixtys and Seventys , it was te government interfering with absolutely every market decision that kept the air out of the Chinee economys lungs.
 
China was a Monarchy for a very long time , and a Comunist nation for  few decades , they are catching up to what might have been earlyer if the people were not so weighted by government .