Ahmadinejad is the dangerous hand picked thug of the Mullahs who pull the strings. The fact that they have different customs and “political views” doesn’t mean they get a free pass. We should take them seriously when they make threats.

Sauron

The generation that actually has the right to speak about and judge the events that occurred during WWII are not members of this forum. They rendered their judgment based on the evidence of the time and that is good enough for me.

Iran’s so called president is simply using this hate fest to justify the destruction of Israel.

Sauron

Religions have to be judged by what it’s leadership says and does and what the believers do today. There seems to be only one religion that is currently still openly intolerant of other faiths. Personally I do not believe in any supernatural beings of any stripe certainly not any fashioned by people who lived 1000-3000 years ago.

Sauron

Arthur

Enjoyed your reply and I find your comment about the purges very instructive.

In Stalin’s case I am sure you are correct and the autocratic nature of the USSR is what allowed him to project his paranoia so successfully. He had plenty of help. The political structures of the USSR didn’t provide the checks on executive power for the obvious reason that no meaningful counter views were tolerated.

As to the evidence that exists in my head, well it is based on my read of events just as your evidence is but my judgment of the USSR and it’s Warpac clones, isn’t based on any kind of specific military issues, weaponry, who deployed what where and when (see GarryB and Kilcoo) or who banged on the podium at the UN with his shoe and said “we will bury you”. It’s boils down to the way the USSR and other communist dictatorships treated their people and the fact that they would have treated me and mine the same way if they had had the chance. It’s based on the fact that they used tanks rather than the ballot box. The fact that they had to build walls and fences to prevent their citizens from running away and shot many who tried. Those are the facts that I base my views on, not whether or not the USSR had more or less military power than NATO .

There has to be something terribly wrong about a system of government that it’s citizens will risk death by running through mines and barbed wire to flee from.

Finally I should add that I happen to have spoken to and worked with a number of those who fled from Warpac countries who came to Canada who were cold-war veterans as well. They were not ex-military that I recall but I can assure you they were never less than candid about their opinions of life under a USSR sponsored dictatorship.

Regards

Sauron

Meat

I agree with your main point that the USSR was the real threat during the cold war.

Those that refuse to acknowledge the expressed goal of the USSR to subjugate all of Europe as a extension of WWII, do so in spite of the evidence. They have developed a series of arguments that basically rest on the notion that the western allies caused the cold war because they had the nerve to resist. If the west had simply rolled over all would have been fine and dandy.

Those who promote this nonsense usually never lived a day under the USSR and often as not lived under military protection provided by others. My feeling is that even those who were not left-wingers to begin with, developed low self-esteem as a result of not being able to protect themselves.

I could go on but you get my drift.

Sauron

It will be particularly interesting to see how kids of 0 age fit in.

Sauron

Before J.R. Saul’s wife was appointed Governor General of Canada, they were just living together. One can only imagine what suggestions/hints/ considerations may have resulted in the hasty marriage that followed. Could this have been a form of noblesse oblige on Saul’s part, voluntarism, charity or (gasp) hypocrisy?

Sauron