From your perspective, who were the "good guys" in World War I?

[THE Bigzoman]

The Russian proletariat was the closest collection of people involved in WWI to being good. Mostly because they chose to leave that nightmarish wholesale slaughter of the international working-class once they rid themselves of the tsar.

The entire affair was just a murder of the world's poor for the ridiculous whims of the rich. A petty squabble between inbred cousins that cost millions of lives and gave rise to national socialism and Stalinism.

Seeing how the Boshevik's were in no way Marxist and the proletariat support for them eventually tarnished Karl Marx, who was really a pretty damn good thinker, i'd say they're almost as fucked up as other parties.

[breadisfunny]

Nothing we can really do about the people who had to witnessed the dark side of advancing technology in the form of warfare.

We can however, enjoy the film.

one can argue that technology would have advanced anyways albeit at a much slower pace and that because of world war I we actually closer to 90-100 million people dead because of world war II which resulted from the treaty of versailles whose contributions to humanity was wasted as a result of war. The incalculable amount of inventions and progress we could have made from those tens of millions would probably outstrip those that the war produced.

[Deleted]

Wow when i see the poll results i have the urge to puke.... how fucked up are your history lessons that you actually think faggotamerica, france and the brits did something good in this war? There never was a reason for them to take part in it, it just was austrias business together with serbia/russia

Infracted

[Crissi]

Wow when i see the poll results i have the urge to puke.... how fucked up are your history lessons that you actually think faggotamerica, france and the brits did something good in this war? There never was a reason for them to take part in it, it just was austrias business together with serbia/russia

what exactly made america faggoty? We did try to keep France and Britain from being stupidheads after the war...

[Deleted]

and with them,. you helped make the rise of extremism possible. Its a no win situation, but I find Nazism much more deplorable than regular ol warfare vs warfare fueled by racist extremism.

Not to downplay the atrocities the Nazis committed but...having a war right after the last one isn't going to look a whole lot prettier. You save the Jews, etc etc, but what if Germany wins that one? Sets up one right after, and so on and so forth.

Like as not, without something extreme happening Europe might very well to this day still be engaging in a new war every 5-10 years without the atrocities the Nazis committed , showing just how terrible and disgusting war is, and what it will bring.

@THE Bigzoman - I know, everyone wanted the same thing. But Germany was penalized for losing the war, not for wanting a slice of the cake.

[THE Bigzoman]

one can argue that technology would have advanced anyways albeit at a much slower pace and that because of world war I we actually closer to 90-100 million people dead because of world war II which resulted from the treaty of versailles whose contributions to humanity was wasted as a result of war. The incalculable amount of inventions and progress we could have made from those tens of millions would probably outstrip those that the war produced.

Assuming those people were used to their potential, yes.

But given the rising aspirations of Europe, the U.S, and Japan, was war really ever avoidable?

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Wow when i see the poll results i have the urge to puke.... how fucked up are your history lessons that you actually think faggotamerica, france and the brits did something good in this war? There never was a reason for them to take part in it, it just was austrias business together with serbia/russia

Germany had it coming when the U.S entered the war.

Wilson's hand would've never been played if Germany didn't try to plot against us with Mexcio.

[breadisfunny]

Assuming those people were used to their potential, yes.

But given the rising aspirations of Europe, the U.S, and Japan, was war really ever avoidable?

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Germany had it coming when the U.S entered the war.

Wilson's hand would've never been played if Germany didn't try to plot against us with Mexcio.

i thought america entered the war over the lusitania sinking?

[THE Bigzoman]

i thought america entered the war over the lusitania sinking?

The last straw was the Zimmerman note.

And to be fair, the Lusettania was in fact carrying weapons for the British.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Zimmermann_Telegram

[Deleted]

i thought america entered the war over the lusitania sinking?

If I recall correctly, the sinking pissed us off, but not quite enough to enter the war. The Mexican plot however, was the tipping point.

[breadisfunny]

what exactly made america faggoty? We did try to keep France and Britain from being stupidheads after the war...

i think what he's doing is rather obvious.

[Crissi]

i think what he's doing is rather obvious.

Oh, I know EXACTLY what he;s doing. sometimes I just like to know what fuels such stupidity.

[Self Inflicted Wounds]

I feel like people are looking at the question all wrong. If you't just talking about WW1, I think the Allies would be more good, considering it was mostly reactionary. We aren't talking about WW2 though. I understand that no one was "innocent," but since, you know, Germany and co actually decided to invade another country... I would say they would lean more towards the bad guys here.

[Deleted]

Oh, I know EXACTLY what he;s doing. sometimes I just like to know what fuels such stupidity.

Boredom...not leaving puberty yet...or not even entering it...etc etc.

[breadisfunny]

I feel like people are looking at the question all wrong. If you't just talking about WW1, I think the Allies would be more good, considering it was mostly reactionary. We aren't talking about WW2 though. I understand that no one was "innocent," but since, you know, Germany and co actually decided to invade another country... I would say they would lean more towards the bad guys here.

that was because of long standing treaties that most of the countries in europe had with each other. it was like a set of dominoes waiting for something to start the reaction. what should germany do back out of the treaty and just let austria invade serbia without helping? that wouldn't have stopped much if anything.

[Deleted]

I feel like people are looking at the question all wrong. If you't just talking about WW1, I think the Allies would be more good, considering it was mostly reactionary. We aren't talking about WW2 though. I understand that no one was "innocent," but since, you know, Germany and co actually decided to invade another country... I would say they would lean more towards the bad guys here.

Technically Germany's action was reactionary too. Pretty sure bad shit would still happen to this day if someone say....Mexico offed the Canadian PM or something like that. Maybe not quite war...but bad shit all the same.

[Crissi]

I feel like people are looking at the question all wrong. If you't just talking about WW1, I think the Allies would be more good, considering it was mostly reactionary. We aren't talking about WW2 though. I understand that no one was "innocent," but since, you know, Germany and co actually decided to invade another country... I would say they would lean more towards the bad guys here.

Maybe so. There isnt really any redeeming qualities about a country that refuses to hand a killer of royalty over though.

[Huntermyth]

even though they didn't side at ww2, both world wars' sore loser was the ottoman empire ( later on turkey )

[breadisfunny]

even though they didn't side at ww2, both world wars' sore loser was the ottoman empire ( later on turkey )

and the sore winners were france/britian(1) and russia(2).

[lawow74]

It was a stupid war that should not have come to pass. It's a prime example of what happens when you let nationalism and jingoism run wild. Thankfully its lessons loom even today of the dangers of being too anxious to rush off into conflict. It drove home just what a pointless slaughter war becomes in the modern era with mechanized killing tools and chemical warfare.

Neither side was good. Both were willing to keep throwing lives into a meatgrinder of blood, mud and barbed wire where artillery, machine guns, gas, airplanes and tanks churned them into a foul charnel pit. Millions of lives lost over the same few miles of land. All the dead from the many battles at Ypres alone are horrifying. They attempted to glorify it by trumping up the battles at sea and in the air, trying to distract the public from the daily name lists of the dead and pointless back-and-forth across No Man's Land.

It gets overshadowed by the Hell on Earth that Nazi Germany created with industrialized genocide in the concentration camps and the horror stories borne forth from that, and by the heroism we try and tell ourselves came about in opposing Hitler and his Axis Powers. But we must remember the roots of that evil first were seeded in the trenches of Europe, and tended by the backlash of reparations the very ones complicit in the horrors they claimed justified them laid upon their enemy.

As the combat veterans of the First World War have all passed on now, we must try ever harder to remind people of these acts, why and how they happened, just as we must strive to keep the Second World War in people's memories as its veterans and victims all die off in greater and greater numbers. For it is truly said, "Those who forget the past are doomed to repeat it."

[Deleted]

Seeing how the Boshevik's were in no way Marxist and the proletariat support for them eventually tarnished Karl Marx, who was really a pretty damn good thinker, i'd say they're almost as fucked up as other parties.

Meh. I could argue the effect of material conditions (inherited poverty, a world war and then a long civil war etc.) on early Bolshevism until the cows come home.

But, even if, unwittingly, they did just eventually replace a white tsar with a "red" one, it was still an awesome display of human willpower for the Russian people to shrug off the old world system (one that was particularly hard on them) and strive to build something new.

They were lied to, yes, and the revolution was stillborn, but for a brief moment they achieved something amazing.