Ed, I agree.

BP, no, that's not what I'm saying.

I'm actually hoping i'm wrong. I'm sure it would be easier to forgive me for not believing while still doing the right thing than believing and doing all the wrong things. That aside i would hate to see all the wars and killing over religious beliefs in the world be for absolutely nothing if i was right. I'd rather be wrong, if that makes any sense.

Yep, if we puny humans can forgive and forget, I am sure God can too.

While we'd like to think that wars are fought over dominance or religious differences, most of them are fought over material gain. While the historians usually mischaracterize them as "ethnic cleansings" or some other such trash, wars are usually fought for natural resources, territorial advantage, or simply "more land". They are normally egotistical in nature, and while the historians look for "just causes", they seldom analyze the true reasons for them.

Basically what I said.

I would disagree a bit with that... you stated that there was a profit motive for the Crusades, but my point was more that all wars are mischaracterized by history. Japan, for instance, didn't bomb Pearl Harbor because of it's differences with Washington's policies... it was done because the U.S. cut off oil and steel shipments to them, and being a traditional nation of traders, have no natural resources of their own to fall back on. The action was designed to prompt other nations to "pick up the slack" and trade those items with Japan... esentially, a threat to nations who refused. American steel companies were having their heads handed to them by the Japanese steel companies, so they cut them off. The rest is history... sort of ...

while that is true, it is not their reason for starting the pacific war. They saw an opportunity to do a 'one strike kill' so to speak, in order to weaken and/or remove the growing American presense in the pacific. remember, the grand scheme for Japan's whole reason for war in the first place was to assimilate the near east, install puppet governments and effectively create slave asian nations. They didn't want others interferring with their plans. btw, alot of people don't realize many many many English, Canadian and Australians did most of the fighting in the pacific war prior to 1943.


attacking pearl harbor didn't get them oil, it bought them time. one huge mistake though: they didn't get our aircraft carriers. as it so happened, and as luck would have it, ALL aircraft carriers were on mission and not in the harbor that day.

years LATER in the war, yes, the American strategy was to strangle Japan of it's resources and lessen it's ability to wage war.

I'd say you can't really get much more off topic than this. someone could start a WW2 history thread if they want.

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I would disagree a bit with that... you stated that there was a profit motive for the Crusades, but my point was more that all wars are mischaracterized by history.

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That was my point, Ed...