So duty is only a true duty of which you like the outcome? How convenient... In my opinion that something good can very well lead to something bad is a fact of life. If it becomes utterly meaningless by this, well then I guess there is no meaning in good.
lolwutt????
So we shouldn't be dutiful to an ideology because that can lead to bad results; instead we should have blind duty to our nation. Because it's not like
that lead to anything unpleasant.
Yeah, and if Germany had won, suddenly Guderian or Manstein would have fought for the glory, right?
Supposing that truth is relative and Nazism becomes right if it's victorious, sure. But those are some pretty dubious premises.
This reply demonstrates nicely that you didn't understand a word of what I was saying.
No, I think he understands it far more clearly than you do.
The glory of being the strongest and hence most awesome. It's really simple.
Ah, so you are in fact a social Darwinist. Thank you for putting things into perspective; obviously you're not going to object to Guderian exacerbating the Holocaust because there's nothing objectionable about that to you. If Hitler had the power to massacre people he disapproved of, then according to you, he was right.
So, basically, you disapprove of them when they do things you don't like, and approve when they do things you like. And then you claim that what you approve of is moral, what you don't is immoral.
Yeah, it's almost as if I'm operating on an objective ethical system in which some things are consistently good and some things are consistently bad.
You have as much right as anyone else to pass judgment, of course.
The topic creator is asking for our input. I'm giving it. Nothing posted so far has sufficiently rebutted any of my propositions.
@kiwitt: ... If we're talking about military skill, the only valid objection would be if you admired an incompetent. Just ignore the self-appointed moral policemen, they are no better than you to judge.
I take it you're in favor of abolishing court systems then? Otherwise your position of disallowing objective judgment for actions seems fairly hypocritical.
The problem with the morality of war is that the victor decides on that.
No, he doesn't. Aristotle, St. Thomas Aquinas and Immanuel Kant were not victorious conquerers. Moreso than that, they did not "decide" on the truth, they discovered it through their rational processes.
What I argue is that morality is hard to evaluate,
Certainly difficult to evaluate; but that's not the same as indeterminable. The fact that it's difficult to ascertain is the very reason why I'm open to counter-arguments.
Need I remind that the Allies also did they share of massacring during WW2?
According to me, they're guilty of doing wrong for that. According to you, they're not because might makes right and they're the victors.
That as the war came to an end, it was a race for grabbing as much as either (soviets and americans and british) of the allies could?
The critical difference being that the Western Allies allowed self-determinance not long after the war was over, in contrast to the Soviets, whose perpetual military occupation was of no critical difference to the Nazis.
If our "christian" morality (which condemns murder and violence as a tool for domination), is to be bough into war, then any general will be condemned. Their very job involves pushing their own soldiers into likely death, often deliberately sacrificing them as pieces in a strategic game in order to gain some advantage, all the while white trying to get enemies killed in a sufficient scale to cause them to submit to the victor.
Good point; it's not like there's been centuries of determining a doctrine of Just War or anything.
It seems to me that the "clean" televised wars such as the latest one in Iraq
lolwut? I turned on the news right now and just heard about a bombing in Iraq. If there ever was a war that the media collectively decided not to profit off of by using graphic imagery, Iraq wasn't it.
Ever since Augustine of Hippo christians have been trying to reconcile christian morals with war - and failing, as the continuation of the controversy shows.
Disagreement does not equal indetermination.
The problem is intractable. Condemn all war if you will, that at least would be a coherent position.
So your position is that we must either (a) make everybody agree to a single ethical system perpetuated by a successful conquest, (b) acknowledge that there is no objective morality, or (c) condemn all war as being wrong. At least, that appears to be what I'm getting from your post; correct me if I'm wrong.
I have edited your exact phrase as it would apply to Guderian or Manstein
And thus missed the point entirely. I respect Franz Josef as a human being and monarch despite his flaws, but the flaws in the same equation are too severe for me to absolve Guderian or Manstein.
I suspect you condemn all Germans for their participation (albeit slight in many cases) in the atrocities.
To some degree.
How about you also condemn Churchill for allowing the firebombing of Dresden
I do.
or Roosevelt for the bombing of Nagasaki and Hiroshima,
I condemn Roosevelt for plenty of things, but not things he didn't do. You mean Truman. But that's a far more complex matter, given the ambiguity on whether or not the Japanese were going to surrender. Overall I would say that Nagasaki was certainly immoral, whereas Hiroshima is a bit more complex (and not particularly relevant to this issue either).
or Stalin for the killing of Polish intellectuals.
I do.
Under your logic, you might as well condemn the Generals and all the other soldiers of these leaders as well, as they participated (albeit slight) in these atrocities as well. as mentioned earlier atrocities were are continued to be carried out in war.
Yep.
And yes I see adultery and participating in one of the worst atrocities as similar. i.e. The Generals (Guderian and Manstein), were not the instigators of the major atrocities, so their involvement was way down the scale in comparison to Hitler's other more fervent supporters.
Already covered this repeatedly. If your goal is to wear me out by repeating your same position over and over again, as opposed to actually addressing the arguments themselves, then don't bother asking this forum for its input.
"Adultery to a decent man" can be compared to "killing innocents and being a General", in only a matter of degrees. Like I said before, your "Franz Joseph" probably made hundreds/thousands of good and decent decisions, but the mere fact he committed adultery and very likely on numerous occasions with his mistress, show what level of "lip service" he gave to "honour".
Adultery isn't anywhere near the same level as wars of conquest and genocide. If you want me to concede that Guderian and Franz Josef were both sinners, then I agree. If you want me to concede that we can therefore respect them plus Hitler and Stalin the same insofar that they were not perfect, then I disagree. There's varying levels of respect for the varying actions of people.
Similarly, my generals would have made many hundreds/thousands of good military decisions and only a handful that are seen as repugnant means they only played "lip service" to "rules of engagement". To me adultery is repugnant as well, as it dishonours your wife.
No objection to adultery being repugnant.
Respecting your Franz Joseph, means you can put aside his adultery.
No, it doesn't. That's what you don't seem to be getting. I'm not excusing Franz Josef for being an adulterer; I merely think that his personhood, taken as a whole, is more positive than negative, which is not the case for Guderian or Manstein.
In a Christian sense, I am incapable (and therefore refuse to attempt) to judge the souls of everybody mentioned in this thread so far, because nobody can truly understand the intentions in another person's heart when he acts, and assuredly not in the same manner that the other person does. So in this sense, I have no opinion on how good of a man Guderian, Manstein, Hiter, Stalin, Franz Josef or anybody else was.
However, in a legal sense (which is to say, who I am to assign moral culpability to, given the evidence before me), then I would surely say that Guderian and Manstein are guilty of engineering World War II (thereby exacerbating the Holocaust, which they were aware of and did nothing to stop despite it being well within their power to do so); and I would also surely say that Franz Josef is guilty of adultery, and though I despise marital infidelity, that's no where as serious a crime as those of the German officer corps.
