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From: ins_akaa@jhunix.UUCP (Kenneth Adam Arromdee)
Newsgroups: net.politics
Subject: Re: Democracy, Wars, Imperialism and Nationalism:I
Message-ID: <1413@jhunix.UUCP>
Date: Tue, 10-Dec-85 13:43:17 EST
Article-I.D.: jhunix.1413
Posted: Tue Dec 10 13:43:17 1985
Date-Received: Mon, 16-Dec-85 19:43:15 EST
References: <432@ssc-bee.UUCP> <841@whuxl.UUCP> <1280@jhunix.UUCP> <849@whuxl.UUCP> <1316@jhunix.UUCP> <424@whuts.UUCP>
Reply-To: ins_akaa@jhunix.ARPA (Kenneth Adam Arromdee)
Organization: Johns Hopkins Univ. Computing Ctr.
Lines: 71

In article <424@whuts.UUCP> orb@whuts.UUCP (SEVENER) writes:
>Apparently Kenneth Arromdee needs to study his history more closely
>as he asks of my comment:
>          > >From me       >from Kenneth Arromdee
>> >But there is another myth which is quite popular in the US
>> >and other democracies, indeed it is a variant of rationalizations
>> >always used by nations preparing for War or actively engaged in it.
>> >For the US and Western democracies it is the myth that somehow
>> >"democracy" necessarily makes a country less likely to go to War.
>> When, in the 20th century, did a democracy invade another democracy?
>> Kenneth Arromdee
>
>1)If you mean when did an already independent democratic nation attack
>  another independent democratic nation then this is going to be made
>  more rare in the 20th century since by that time the majority of
>  the world was under the domination of European colonialism fostered
>  every bit as much by parliamentary democracies such as Britain and
>  France as by autocratic regimes like Germany and Imperial Russia. ...
>  In having such colonies to begin with it should be quite obvious
>  that Britain and France had to engage in numerous military interventions
>  and invasions in the colonialized world.  ...  Therefore countless
>  struggles for independence from Britain and France can be considered
>  wars in the direction of greater democracy *opposed* by democracies
>  like Britain and France.

Question: what is your definition of war?  If you count a decoloni-
zation struggle as a war, that definition would logically lead you to
positions that as far as I can tell (correct me if I'm wrong) you do not
support.  Specifically, the Soviet occupation of Eastern Europe and the
struggles against it, and Afghanistan, etc... must count as wars the blame
for whom is on the Soviets.

>2)In 1907 Austria passed a law providing for universal manhood
>  suffrage and subsequently elected a Parliament composed primarily of
>  Liberals, Christian Socialists, and Social Democrats.
>  Need I point out that Austria-Hungary despite the movement towards
>  democracy represented by this development was a major instigator ...
>  ...  Thus democratic France had no qualms about forming
>  an alliance with autocratic Csarist Russia.  France and Britain, both
>  democracies and rivals for centuries, could have easily ended up
>  on different sides. ... The reason they ended up on the same side had nothing
>  to do with sympathy with each other's democracy but rather each
>  nation's calculation of what ... would be in their own best interest.

First, saying that France and Britain "could have" ended up on different
sides doesn't count.

Here's some more about Austria-Hungary (Hungary this time) from the 1910
Encyclopedia Britannica, in a footnote in the "Hungary" article...
        The franchise is "probably the most illiberal in Europe."
        Servants, in the widest sense of the word, apprenticed workmen,
        and agricultural laborers are systematically excluded. The
        result is that the working classes are totally unrepresented in the
        parliament, only 6% of them, and 13% of the small trading class,
        possessing the franchise, which is only enjoyed by 6% of the entire
        population....

>                     tim sevener   whuxn!orb

I also note that though you have remarked in detail upon WWI, you didn't
remark at all here upon WWII.  Is this because it's excruciatingly obvious
that one side was right and the other was wrong?  WWI has been referred to
as a war by mistake, but WWII was a war by appeasement.
--
If you know the alphabet up to 'k', you can teach it up to 'k'.

Kenneth Arromdee
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