The US fought for our freedoms from 1775 to 1783 and then 1812-1814, and a number of other times through the 1800s, and more recently from WW2 until the present day we have been at war pretty much continuously. As a result we have far more freedom than anyone else in the world. My question is how long can we go without a war surviving just on the freedoms we have built up? From the end of the War in Afghanistan to the start of the proxy war in Ukraine was just under 6 months, so that's some recent data. We had to send weapons over from the US starting with an act of Congress during 2021 then got the weapons (referred to as 'help' or 'aid') into a ship load, sent it to Poland then through Poland to Kyiv by rail, then distributed to the armed forces shelling Donetsk and other population centers in Eastern Donetsk, where the artillery shells were fired starting on Feb 16th. Russia moved in and interrupted the bombardment on Feb 24th. 6 months might be a low-ball figure. After WW1 we were at war in Russia for a year or so, but after that there was a gap until we joined WW2 of 20 years, so maybe we can go 20 years? I don't know, so I'll have to ask other people who know more about American history.
The US doesn't have to worry about invasion by land or sea. Who's going to invade us, Canada or Mexico? Don't male me laugh. Let's wait and see who wins the air war then.
I’d say next to never because we haven’t gone to war to fight for our “freedoms” in a long damn time, and we’re not really fighting any current wars for other peoples freedoms either.
The Vietnam War was to protect our freedom. If you were male and of age you had to go, or lose your freedom and go to jail. If you went you became property of the military. So you lost your freedom, either way.
My friend is two years older and served in 'nam. He gained the freedom to think, but only about the helicopter he was in coming down at an angle and turning, jumping out just before it hit the ground and the fireball going just over the top of him. and a year later when he was on the deck of a patrol boat behind sandbags and suddenly his friend's head exploded and he was hit in the ribs with an AK-47 bullet. he came back with some memories, and it was all for nothing.
The US Military leadership including Johnson, should have all been jailed for their inept prosecution of a war that never should have happened
There aren't many wars you've fought which I'd actually consider a threat to your freedoms. Revolutionary War and War of 1812 were. WWII you could make an argument for. Certainly not either Iraq War, Afghanistan, Vietnam, or Korea, except maybe the threat to military contractors' freedom to make shitloads of taxed money.
Thanks for starting an interesting thread / poll. Except for America's wars in 1776 and 1812, I feel that Americans are more likely to loose their freedoms from insidious domestic enemies rather than overt foreign threats. The greatest threats to our freedoms are not foreign but domestic totalitarians who want to lock you up for what they call "hate speech", for the drugs you chose to possess, destroy books revealing inconvenient truths or challenging sacred cows and disarm you to leave you at the mercy of vicious criminals and big government subjugation. In other words, I feel that our freedoms are in greater danger from domestic demagogues and totalitarians than from foreign ones. Finally, I find it ironic that we are most likely to sacrifice our freedoms during times of war to, allegedly, preserve our freedoms. For example, during WW 2, it seems like the thinking was that we had to incarcerate Japanese - Americans in order to keep them free which is a variation of: "We had to burn the village in order to save it." "So it goes..."
Words like Afghanistan and Iraq and even Ukraine aren't really about securing freedom for anybody it's about selling crap too both sides. I remember seeing a video of a bridge Ukraine blew up pretty recently couple months ago I think. And Russia had rebuilt it and were driving asphalt rollers over the freshly laid asphalt. And what brand of asphalt roller equipment was that? H.A.M.M. this is a construction equipment company that is a subsidiary of John Deere made in the good old USA. So that war is about breaking stuff and rebuilding it and drumming up business for corporations like John Deere even did this in world war II. I'm betting this is something that goes back to Mesopotamia. So when you're sitting here scratching your head what's this war for and you can't really come up with an answer it's not for freedom it's for money.
This is good to know. Now I can ignore GOP candidates this coming election cycle lying about the invasion at the border.
I agree that the Revolutionary War and the War of 1812 were critical for the freedom of all Americans but I don't quite see how WW 2 or WW 1 were about establishing or preserving freedom in America as there is no indication that the Axis Powers had the desire or the ability to invade the US. Covert British fabricated rumors of a German invasion of the Americas was overwhelmingly successful in duping the American public. (1) Some historians consider WW 1 and WW 2 as being one, big war with a cooling off period. As is always the case after a war, the vanquished are blamed for initiating hostilities and committing unspeakable atrocities but only after WW 2 did the victors come up with post war, Soviet style Show Trials to divert world attention from Allied atrocities during and after the war. These show trials were widely condemned by numerous Western jurists as a "sanctimonious fraud", a "high grade lynching" and, finally, Eisenhower's more ethical brother even called the Nuremberg trials: ".... a black page in the history of the world." Finally, if the motivating spirit behind WW 2 was ensuring Freedom, then France, the UK and the former USSR wouldn't have kept 4 million German POWs as slave labor as late as 1947. Even after the German - Soviet invasion of Poland, about 80% of all Americans were against being pulled into another European war but FDR, Morgenthau and the usual war profiteers still prevailed and the rest is history. As I mentioned in an earlier Post, Americans are far more likely to loose their freedoms from threats coming from within America, not without. Thanks, (1). "The conquest of the United States by Britain" http://www.thornwalker.com/ditch/mahl.htm EXCERPT "Mahl evaluates British intelligence activities in the United States as "one of the most important and successful covert operations of history." (p. 186) What is most astounding, however, is not the British activity but the collaboration by the Roosevelt administration. For while Britain was simply pursuing her perceived national interest, Roosevelt's cooperation with the intelligence service of a foreign state could certainly be labeled as treasonous.”CONTINUED
You make an interesting point. Low-cost drones could change the whole complexion of how wars, especially 'guerrila wars' are fought in the future. It appears that more and more, that's what we're seeing developing between Ukraine and Russia today.
I apologise in saying, but this thread is clueless - https://worldpopulationreview.com/country-rankings/freedom-index-by-country What you believe freedom is, and what freedom actually is, is too different things
My definition? Erm, click on link for the definition. There are various indexes to this idea from various countries, America being one of them supplying indexes.
I don't care about such polls. I know what freedom means to me-I also know lots of socialists whose concept of freedom demands others fund it
The point of the thread is to demonstrate with examples why the oft repeated excuse for going to war - to protect our freedoms, isn't really all that convincing, that people using the phrase are usually clueless. I recall when Congress voted for War in Afghanistan there were no good reasons, but a lot of blah blah about how 'they are jealous of our freedoms' and that we are fighting for our freedom. And it seemed timely as every fourth of July the main speech is one thanking our servicemen for our freedoms. In Senate all 96 present voted in favor of war in Afghanistan and in the House all except 1 voted in favor of war. I claim the line the media feed to the public about 'our freedoms' is rarely applicable.
Other Opinion Going to war cannot be couched in time frames. It depends upon when is going on in the world. We needed to go into Afghanistan to kill bin Laden after 9/11. He could not be allowed to get away with killing almost 3,000 Americans on our own soil. We then go into this nation building BS and stayed there for too long. We probably had to go after Saddam Hussein after he took over Kuwait. We could not allow him to control a significant portion of the world’s oil supply. If he had been allowed to stand there, he may have gone further.
What about big bully countries like Russia that attack smaller countries they share a border with then the smaller country fights back and invades them? How are they going to use their nuclear submarines?
The Vietnam war was a betrayal of our Vietnamese allies during WW2. Ho Chi Minh was our ally, and they helped rescue our aircraft crews that were shot down by the Japanese, getting them to safety. France wanted its colonies back after WW2. Roosevelt told the French to **** off. Then, when Roosevelt was dead, Truman supported the continued exploitation of Vietnam by France, driving Vietnam into the waiting arms of communist Soviet Union for military aid. It had nothing to do with freedom.
We have to disagree because I'm reporting what I recall the media saying back in the 1960s and you are talking about the truth, and the media and the truth rarely agree.
the people who prosecuted that war should have been jailed-or worse-for incompetence, treason-and being enemies of our constitution
