Tracy,

>This is very interesting (your discussion with Peter) because from what I observed, most older folks in Netherlands around the mid 80s were very very very unfriendly (and sometimes downright rude) towards Germans when they visited Netherlands.

Times have changed. I really don't know whether your experience was representative to the whole dutch population. But certainly at that time, there were still feelings of hate against the germans. You have to realize that at that point it was only about 40 years ago, and many people still remembered and related to WWII and the horrors.

For example the germans in 1944 cut off all food supply to amsterdam, which resulted in hunger, and many people lost some family because off the germans in WII. That are things people not easely forget and forgive.

Today, there are not many germans left who directly participated in WII. German tourists are welcome visitors. It might be a bit different for some people, but personally I have more problems with 'immigrants' who refuse to integrate into our society.

>
>
>>>>Hi evan,
>>>>
>>>>>>>>How on earth could even win a war again china ??
>>>>>>>
>>>>>>>They are pretty low tech. No ability to project their power via the water, land or air.
>>>>>>
>>>>>>China, currently is getting more high tech by the minute. Their economy is booming. But even more important. If the US can't win the war in iraq, how can they win the war in china.
>>>>>>
>>>>>>We have to realise that there are no convential wars to fight. I'm sure the the nato can win the battle technically, but as shown in iraq it is hard to break them and protect themselve against terroristic attacks.
>>>>>
>>>>>Hi Walter. I agree with you (sorta :-)). The US/UK quickly defeated the Iraq military on the battlefield and with (much) more difficultly could do the same with China. As with Iraq, I believe that China could not be successfully occupied by the US.
>>>>>
>>>>>Though I would have stacked the odds against the US (and west) at successfully occupying Germany and Japan. Both were done stunningly well.
>>>>
>>>>Japan was never occupied... They were forced to surrender. As for defeating the germans, they were defeated by a number of nations (e.g. UK, Canada, US AND Red Army), of which the red army might have been the sole cause for losing the war. If Germany had not had to fight on two different fronts, the outcome could have been way different and I'd been speaking german right now.
>>>
>>>What's wrong with German?
>>
>>Not much with the language, but givin the reason why and your jewish background, you might not even been born...
>>
>>>Oh, I now know. It are all those naamvallen. How do they call that in German and English? :)
>>
>>I absolutely have no idea, and to be honest I even don't want to know. At highschool I only had about 1/2 year of german and I must say I don't regret it.
>>
>>Walter,