Non sequitur; the point of the article was Britain issuing cheques its ass couldn't cash, on Churchill's urging. Whatever Hitler was after, according to you -- Poland, Pluto, or pixie sticks -- isn't what they're talking about.

You're also looking back with the benefit of hindsight. No one prior to Sept. 1, 1939, could possibly have stated categorically what the Germans would or would not do. History wasn't yet written, and options were still available.

Can you read English? If you can, can you comprehend it? No one said Churchill declared war on anyone. What they're saying is that his outspoken advocacy of military confrontation -- for which his entire career is noted -- limited the options of the government of the day, and with each subsequent decision and event, those options grew ever narrower until Britain found itself in a war it wasn't prepared for over promises it made but had no capacity to uphold. It's intended as a object lesson for NATO today.

Danzig was not German-controlled; it was an open city under League of Nations auspices, with Polish administration of its foreign affairs. "Learn some history," I've heard it said.

Here's some:
Curious request, wouldn't you say, for something "German controlled"...

It's also interesting to note that Hitler, whom you swear was bound and determined to take Poland, did not enter into the Molotov-Ribbentrop Pact with the Soviet Union until August, 1939 -- five months after the British issued the assurances that led to Poland's recalcitrance.

Tough. The entire article acuses Britain and specificaly Churchill of starting WWII. This is being an apologist of Nazi millitarism.

It is not a non sequitur. It is entirely germane to the issue of who was at fault for WWII. British guarentees to Poland were with a broad base of political support based on what the Nazis had already done, that and Hitlers stated aims of conquest to the east. Churchills urgings could hardly be blamed for the labour parties stance on the issue could it.
What dribble. Hitler had already had the anschluss and the conquest of Czeckoslovakia. Claiming that because the people in 1939 could not know your nazi friends intentions with 100% accuracy they had no right or duty to act is again simply being an apologist of nazi millitarism. The British and French had rather good reasons to guess what was about to happen to Poland and stand up so that the nations of Europe were not picked of one by one.

You must truly loath Britain with an unbelievable bitterness to swallow this crap. How does licking nazi boots taste?

Can you read English? If you can, can you comprehend it?
It does not say that Churchills bellicosity limited options. It states that Churchill plunged Britain into two world wars. Your nazi friends actions are potrayed in the article as merely responses to perfidious Albion.
Ooops got that a tad wrong. I guess this proves the nazis were the innocent victims in all this.
However the article states here....
So I guess that round was 1 - 1.

Your point caller? When Joe and Adolf became pals proves what? Oh defend this bit for me please:Explain how a treaty signed in 1919 caused the success of the 1917 revevolution. Too funny. You will swallow anything so long as Britain and America are made too look bad.

No; such an article would set out to justify the claims of German irredentism. It doesn't. It, and corroborating evidence, suggest that the war could have been avoided if the Poles had not felt they had no need to negotiate. The article doesn't say that there would not have been changes to the map of Europe; it suggests that war could have been avoided if Chamberlain's policies had been pursued rather than Churchill's.

No, I'm sorry, it remains non sequitur to the point. You're arguing about the nature of the promise made; they're talking about the fact that it was made at all, regardless of its particulars: that in making it, they embolded the Poles when they had no real ability to back that stiffening of resolve.

A telling point: Germany occupied the unceded portions of Czechoslovakia in the spring of 1939 when negotiations with Poland broke down -- which the authors established occurred because of British and French assurances that turned out to be worthless.

There aren't any to lick anymore. But there are plenty of triumphalistic Western warmongers out there to... well, I'll leave the particulars of how you fete them to everyone's good imagination.

I thought you told us Churchill wasn't PM or even in the cabinet at the time and so therefore wasn't at fault. Changing your mind? If not, then they're not claiming he declared war; he didn't, in fact; Chamberlain did. But they are saying his attitudes made that ultimately unavoidable.

What part of "with Polish administration of its foreign affairs" (like who gets to trade there, say) eludes your comprehension? Particularly in marked contrast to, say, German control of it?

Well, all things being equal, I'd have to say it goes a lot further towards proving the point than disproving it.

Sure. They're saying if we hadn't fought WWI -- an utterly useless war in every respect -- in the first place, it's unlikely the conditions in Russia that led to the fall of the Czar would have been realized. Not to mention the loss of a lot of the other monarchies of Europe at the time.

You cluless muppet. Now it is Britains fault that Germany invaded Czechoslovakia???????
HAHAHAHHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHHAHA
HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHHAHAHAHAHAHAHAH
AHAHAHAHHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHHAH
*breathes*
HAHAHAHHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHHAHA
Oh while your here, show me from the article you posted the above where the author establishes that because the British signed a treaty with Poland this meant the German invasion of Czeckeslovakia was the fault of Britain?

I have seen alot of loonspudery over the years, but this one, that WWII happened because Britain did not appease the Nazis enough is pretty special.

that is not my quote THAT IS WHERE I QUOTED THE ARTICLE YOU POSTED!!!!!!!

Good counterpoint. No, wait, let's hear the rest of your masterstroke:

Well stated. Truly, I find myself at a loss to rebut an argument that might have been made by a chimpanzee. Most primates I've debated with tend to aim higher.

I refer the honourable simian to my previous answer concerning the timing of Britain's assurances to Poland and the timing of the German invasion of the unceded portions of Czechoslovakia.

I know it's not your quote. But you started off by telling us Churchill could barely be heard in the Commons due to his being so low he was practically under his chair. It's been amply demonstrated that he was a public voice, long in cabinet, whose opinions resonated even when out of it and whose influence affected the policies of Chamberlain's government, to the point that its responsibilities were eventually ceded to him rather than to Lord Halifax. Even a brisk review of Churchill's career reveals him as a triumphalistic warmonger who appealed to violence to contain any possible rise by any country not white and English-speaking, and persisted in this attitude even after the great war for democracy he touted WWII to have been was won -- his reactions to Russia and particularly to independence movements in the British Empire bear this out unambiguously.

I'm sorry to be the one to reveal your hero's bloodstained feet of clay, but you'll get over it when you grow up.

Nickel, sorry, you lost debate.

I've defended the point from every attack he's made; apparently "lost" has some different meaning in Polish from the typical meaning in English.

Fact doesn't require fiction for balance.

Fine and well then, but what exactly does this have to do with the European supergrid and Russian political unpredictability with regards to energy supplies? This was a total threadjack weather or not Churchill was right or a slightly unappetizing tunafish sandwich.

I don't know weather you were right or not because frankly its completely unrelated to the title of the thread, except in the holistic lets look at everything sense and completely avoid talking about the subject at hand. If the Churchill comment really was worthy of that large of a post, start another thread so I dont have to dig through a couple of pages of unrelated crap when really I was only interested in the discussion of this supposed supergrid.

And blindness doesn't require injury for realization. An act of the will suffices.

Well ask Gasmon; he's the one who brought up Churchill -- AGAIN. I don't think that guy can go to the can without praising Churchill for the quality of his bowel movement and marveling at the man's planning acumen for the miracle of the bog roll. One tires of hearing a lifelong bigoted warmonger, whose championing of democracy ended wherever brown eyes outnumbered blue, praised to the hilt at every turn.

For that matter, how many of the threads around here are still on track by the second page? Maybe half.

The pipelines to cut out Russia seem to be pretty reasonable outcomes of Russias recent behaviour towards the likes of Ukraine, Belurussia and Georgia. There are many big gas finds in the Central Asian republics that the EU now seems to want to bring to market without Gasprom. At the time of the Georgian affair I thought it was a pretty obvious outcome and downside to Russias action. The idea of interlinking the EUs energy generating capacity has alot of plus points. Id add to that mothballing older coal plants so they are on standbye in the event of a crisis and ensuring nations have large (100 days?) of stored gas available.

Medium to longer term though they will need to make massive increases in there renewables. Its getting underway:

Link

This is a very very example of one of the technologies the hypothisised 'super grid' is supposed to compose of.





Here is a page pumping the idea.



At its heart is HVDC techonology.


http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/HVDC

The technology seems feasible and afforadable but there are the downsides of it availability during darkness, duststorms and the corrosive nature of a dessert enviroment. But most of all the political stability of the nations involved. It is very possibly a good source of mitigating peak gas, and helping to avoid the uncomfortable fact that Russia may not have as much gas as it claims.

Europe (and america) have options, we are not doomed by fate but if we can be by inaction.