A lot of interesting points there, GUEST. I wouldn't say, though, that Saddam "defeated" George Bush the elder, rather that he took a nasty defeat himself (inevitably)...but avoided being destroyed in the process. Saddam is one of the world's great survivors.

I particularly like your point about America's "enemies" merely being "dictators who aren't under our control". Exactly. Dictators who ARE under America's control are called "friends and allies".

The USA was the only country in World War II capable of completing a successful A-bomb project. The Germans made a pretty feeble attempt in that direction...notably discouraged by Hitler, who wasn't even interested in the concept! Incredible, considering he was developing very effective V-2 rockets which would have been perfect for delivering the bomb to the target without any possibility of interception.

The British would have liked to develop A-bombs, but they didn't have the monetary or material resources to do it during the war.

It hadn't even occurred to Stalin, and would probably not have occurred to him later, had not the Americans done it first, obliging him to catch up fast! This was why some of the key nuclear physicists begged Truman NOT to openly test or use the bomb...in other words, not to open Pandora's box, and create a new and terrible arms race.

One wonders what would have happened if they had kept it under wraps? Unfortunately, given the general climate in central Europe, I fear that a 3rd World War would have arisen between the Russians and the West, fought on a conventional basis...and that would have caused many millions of casualties, even without the bomb.

The A-bomb, in a peculiar way, prevented that by simply raising the stakes too high for anyone to contemplate.

The domestic health of the Soviet Union was set back tremendously by the huge effort they put into achieving nuclear parity, and that was a tragedy for the Russian people. It would have been set back similarly by a conventional war between Russian and the West.

Looks like a no-win situation, whatever way you add it up.

The only win-win situation would have been: mutual friendship and respect between nations despite their differing philosophies, trade, good relations, and disarmament on both sides...

Naw...WAY too sensible, right? They kill people who are that sensible.

- LH