It's clear that I did not express my thoughts well at all!

I was supporting the statement that war never become a good thing.

War is bad, plain and simple.

WWII started because Hitler warred against all those around him. Had Hitler opted to leave things be - i.e. NOT start warring with neighbours - there would have been no WWII.

Hitler brought war and (that) war was BAD for everyone.
It is plausible in my head that Hitler would not have had concentration camps if he wasn't planning for war and did not end up in war. Hitler was bent on war basically from the start.

Hitler was bad and brought bad war on the whole world.

I said it was a "just" war. I can never say that it was a "good" war because it is clear to me that NO WAR IS EVER GOOD.
Nevertheless, I accept that sometimes there has to be war - when the antics of SOMEONE ELSE are aggression necessitating response. Also, when clearly there is "genocide" going on in some place. ANd in both cases I believe that the U.N. must find a way to deal with it, including the option for war as REMEDY.

I know that some people feel that the Iraq war was a "good" war and I disagree with them. I know that some people feel that the Iraq war was a "just" war and I disagree with them in that MORE TIME might well have displaced Saddam without big bloodshed and destruction. With more time I might well have been on the "just war" side too, but it didn't happen.

I hope this is clearer. I continue to think that EvanD way over-simplified the issue and I cannot agree that it was a "good" war.

A few more comments in-line...

Jim
>>>>And my last words. War never become a good thing.
>>>
>>>Are you saying that the World War II, the war against the Nazi's wasn't a good thing? Millions more people would have died in concentration camps.
>>
>>I think you're over-simplifying...
>>
>>The bad thing was Germany warring with neighbours, thus forcing WWII. Had Germany kept to itself there would have been no WWII (assuming that Japan would have had less 'motivation' as a result of no European front).
>>
>>I think it can be agreed that while WWII was a "just" war as far as the Allies were concerned, NOTHING "good" came of it while tons and tons of BAD resulted.
>>
>>Closing concentration camps that never would have been does not make WWII a "good" war.
>
>Huh? Jim, some (no, all) of your wordings really amaze me.
>
>Why do you say 'I think it can be agreed that'? I can't find the English opposite expression over 'over-simplifying', but that is what came to my mind.

You don't agree that WWII was a JUST war? If you can think it was "good" then I've gotta think you also feel it was "just".

>
>And I really don't understand what you're talking about when you say that nothing good came out of it, instead tons of bad did.

Millions of people killed. Millions of people maimed. Cities and town flattened. A whole people marked for destruction. I'm sorry, but I can't call that "good". The best I can do is say that it was "just" because it all started by the hand of a wacko.

>
>And what do you mean with 'closing concentration camps that never would have been'???

Had Hitler not been such a wacko OR if the people had stopped him somewhere along the line there would have been no 'annexations' and no war. I sterongly suspect that there would have been no concentration camps had Hitler been stopped earlier or there had been no war (i.e. no agression by Hitler).

>
>Another point: Evan implicitly claimed that WWII was a just war. The fact that it was a WORLD war, is of minor importance here. A non-world war can be just also. Why on earth did you start to discuss the WORLD aspect of that war? What does that have to do with what Evan brought to our attention?

Evan brought "the world" into it, not me. Evan has recently been using single examples to "disprove" some statement. In this case it was that "War never become a good thing" which I believe was meant to say 'war is never a good thing'.
That WWII was "just" does NOT make it "good". I wholeheartdly support the notion that no war is good and that everything should be done to avoid such. [for instance, I considered the Afghanistan was a just war because reasonable efforts were made to avert it, but it was still not "good"].

>
>Let me make clear where I stand in discussions like this one. I'm not saying that all wars are good things, but would there have never been wars, then we would now all be slaves. Of several things, a good mix of individual freedom and social responsibility is more important than peace-in-our-time. One might argue about what a good mix is, but in some countries it is, as far as I am concerned, simply a bad mix, currently.

"Peace in our time" was not my idea of a smart thing then, nor would I see it so now necessarily (see above re Afghanistan).
But to PRETEND altruistic reasons for a war is not even "just", let alone "good".
It cannot be argued that Saddam being gone is a "good" thing. It is. BUT that does not justify that war. We will never know if he might not have been gone in 2 or 4 or 6 or?? months had the U.N. been allowed to continue to operate on the situation.
Thousands dead, thousands maimed, infrastructure destroyed and corporations getting rich on the backs of the American people is NOT my idea of "good".

I hope you understand my position better now.