(no subject)
Aha! I live! Sunny San Diego soon to be a memory as we leave port at an undisclosed time (security and all that), I figured I'd let people know that I'm still here, just with a bad Net connection that precludes frequent (or even infrequent) postings.
I won't go too into detail about my time here--I'll leave that for a later time and a better connection--but I just read something that I just have to put down the resulting thoughts. Seems I've read all the books I brought with me to sustain me for the duration of the cruise block (three books for a month-long cruise...ha), so I went on the hunt for more. In my stupidity, I went on Monday and got four or five from a B. Dalton in Horton Plaza. I've since read all but one. But the last one I got from a used book sale here on the base by the NEX, and it looks like it should last me until I get home. It's about the same size as Les Miserables, but thinner paper, so it might actually be a bit longer...*flips through it*...1483 pages, not including the index. The title:
The Rise and Fall of the Third Reich
I've only read the Foreword so far, but it's written by a guy who actually lived through Nazi Germany, having seen the Nazis as a threat as early as the 20's. The Foreword only introduces the book, and explains how it was written with the help of a staggering amount of Nazi records captured by the Allies in their march through Europe. With their customary efficiency, the Nazis left almost an hourly record of their rise and fall since the early days; there was much additional stuff to be found as well, like the German Naval records dating from the founding of the modern German Navy--in the 1860's--to April of 1945--when the records were found.
Anyway, the book was copyrighted in 1960. I can't remember if the Russians had the bomb at that point, but the last paragraph of the Foreword made me sit up and take notice:
"In our new age of terrifying, lethal gadgets, which supplanted so swiftly the old one, the first great aggressive war, if it should come, will be launched by suicidal little madmed pressing an electronic button. Such a war will not last long and none will ever follow it. There will be no conquerors and no conquests, but only the charred bones of the dead on an uninhabited planet."
Since I've had time to kill, I thought I'd put some thoughts down on e-paper, and this just provides me with a stimulus for doing so.
War does usually make for startling advances in new ways to destroy each other. The Second World War was no exception, and was perhaps the biggest turning point in killing technology. Say what you will about the invention of cruise missiles, plastic, and high-tech bombers. World War I began the transition, but technology had only advanced to the point where it was necessary to sit entrenched for years, the only result being massive casualties. World War II finished the breakaway from the Napoleonic style of battle that consisted of standing volley lines and bayonet charges on a grassy battlefield.
With World War II came astounding new technologies: infantry weapons like the M1 that didn't require manual loading; fighters and bombers leagues beyond bi- and triplanes in speed, maneuverability, survivability, and payload; tanks that were more than large, slow targets; ships and subs more lethal than before. And above all, in our pursuit of an end-all, do-all, kill-all means to end the war we created the spectre of Armageddon: the atomic bomb. Little more is required to send chills down a person's spine than to see a photo of a mushroom cloud, to watch a video of the Bikini Atoll demonstration, or to see the remains of Hiroshima and Nagasaki. Anyone who sees such things and doesn't have the slightest tingle of fear is a fool.
Even with such power possible, we still felt unhappy with our new toy. Destroying a city at a time wasn't enough. We began advancing the technology to the point where now we can range from a small, localized attack to a strike similar to releasing a piece of the Sun on a huge portion of the planet. That was perhaps due in part to the theft of the technology by the Russians, who were understandably uneasy about the possibility of being subjugated by the only nation in posession of such weapons. Since they soon had a bomb of their own, we just had to go one better; "in the name of science," "to protect ourselves from Russian attack," whatever the reason, we were just insecure--a species trait. Soon we couldn't progress any farther along the kill-power road, so we just started building more, the end result being the power to shatter the planet numerous times over. Shirer (the guy who wrote the book I'm reading) saw this coming as early as the late 50's, as I'm sure anybody with a brain did too.
Granted we've progressed beyond the days of mutually-assured destruction, at least insofar as the Cold War and the Soviet Bear are concerned. But my case remains: World War II was a time of speedy advances in the killing trade, and at the same time it was the jumping-off point for issues that still trouble us today, the advent of atomic strikes far from being the least of them.
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Now that I've sufficiently harped on the facts of atomic weapons and how humans are the only species that actively pursues new and "better" ways to kill itself, I'll end with saying that I can't wait to get home at the end of the month, and that I'm eagerly anticipating both the 4th and the 6th like you wouldn't believe. See you all in about two weeks! ;-)
I won't go too into detail about my time here--I'll leave that for a later time and a better connection--but I just read something that I just have to put down the resulting thoughts. Seems I've read all the books I brought with me to sustain me for the duration of the cruise block (three books for a month-long cruise...ha), so I went on the hunt for more. In my stupidity, I went on Monday and got four or five from a B. Dalton in Horton Plaza. I've since read all but one. But the last one I got from a used book sale here on the base by the NEX, and it looks like it should last me until I get home. It's about the same size as Les Miserables, but thinner paper, so it might actually be a bit longer...*flips through it*...1483 pages, not including the index. The title:
The Rise and Fall of the Third Reich
I've only read the Foreword so far, but it's written by a guy who actually lived through Nazi Germany, having seen the Nazis as a threat as early as the 20's. The Foreword only introduces the book, and explains how it was written with the help of a staggering amount of Nazi records captured by the Allies in their march through Europe. With their customary efficiency, the Nazis left almost an hourly record of their rise and fall since the early days; there was much additional stuff to be found as well, like the German Naval records dating from the founding of the modern German Navy--in the 1860's--to April of 1945--when the records were found.
Anyway, the book was copyrighted in 1960. I can't remember if the Russians had the bomb at that point, but the last paragraph of the Foreword made me sit up and take notice:
"In our new age of terrifying, lethal gadgets, which supplanted so swiftly the old one, the first great aggressive war, if it should come, will be launched by suicidal little madmed pressing an electronic button. Such a war will not last long and none will ever follow it. There will be no conquerors and no conquests, but only the charred bones of the dead on an uninhabited planet."
Since I've had time to kill, I thought I'd put some thoughts down on e-paper, and this just provides me with a stimulus for doing so.
War does usually make for startling advances in new ways to destroy each other. The Second World War was no exception, and was perhaps the biggest turning point in killing technology. Say what you will about the invention of cruise missiles, plastic, and high-tech bombers. World War I began the transition, but technology had only advanced to the point where it was necessary to sit entrenched for years, the only result being massive casualties. World War II finished the breakaway from the Napoleonic style of battle that consisted of standing volley lines and bayonet charges on a grassy battlefield.
With World War II came astounding new technologies: infantry weapons like the M1 that didn't require manual loading; fighters and bombers leagues beyond bi- and triplanes in speed, maneuverability, survivability, and payload; tanks that were more than large, slow targets; ships and subs more lethal than before. And above all, in our pursuit of an end-all, do-all, kill-all means to end the war we created the spectre of Armageddon: the atomic bomb. Little more is required to send chills down a person's spine than to see a photo of a mushroom cloud, to watch a video of the Bikini Atoll demonstration, or to see the remains of Hiroshima and Nagasaki. Anyone who sees such things and doesn't have the slightest tingle of fear is a fool.
Even with such power possible, we still felt unhappy with our new toy. Destroying a city at a time wasn't enough. We began advancing the technology to the point where now we can range from a small, localized attack to a strike similar to releasing a piece of the Sun on a huge portion of the planet. That was perhaps due in part to the theft of the technology by the Russians, who were understandably uneasy about the possibility of being subjugated by the only nation in posession of such weapons. Since they soon had a bomb of their own, we just had to go one better; "in the name of science," "to protect ourselves from Russian attack," whatever the reason, we were just insecure--a species trait. Soon we couldn't progress any farther along the kill-power road, so we just started building more, the end result being the power to shatter the planet numerous times over. Shirer (the guy who wrote the book I'm reading) saw this coming as early as the late 50's, as I'm sure anybody with a brain did too.
Granted we've progressed beyond the days of mutually-assured destruction, at least insofar as the Cold War and the Soviet Bear are concerned. But my case remains: World War II was a time of speedy advances in the killing trade, and at the same time it was the jumping-off point for issues that still trouble us today, the advent of atomic strikes far from being the least of them.
-------------------------------
Now that I've sufficiently harped on the facts of atomic weapons and how humans are the only species that actively pursues new and "better" ways to kill itself, I'll end with saying that I can't wait to get home at the end of the month, and that I'm eagerly anticipating both the 4th and the 6th like you wouldn't believe. See you all in about two weeks! ;-)