What war crimes??? ('Waltz')

[stj]

Mannerheim did not save Finland from the Soviets even once, much less twice. A border revision could have gotten him out of the Winter War. This is a fact. That is exactly what happened after the Finns lost. He didn't need to lose a war to get a settlement! In the end the Soviets won WWII but Finland still wasn't lost.

The idea that Mannerheim saved Finland is like saying Ronald Reagan won the Cold War. Mannerheim and Reagan both wasted oceans of blood and mountains of money on a mad crusade for nothing. Rewriting history to claim these people somehow won when they were murderous fools fighting their own scarecrows is detestable.

Mannerheim's favorable press comes from winning the civil war in 1918 for the Whites. He was the Finnish counterpart of the Freikorps who suppressed socialist revolution. They did it by things like murdering Karl Liebknecht and Rosa Luxemburg. And by sponsoring right wing groups like the Nazis. Hitler no more created himself than Osama did.

The Japanese were not finessed by cunning Soviet diplomacy. They were beaten at the battle of Nomonhan (if I remember correctly) in 1939.

 

[Timo]

Your "facts" continue to be anything but. How can you argue with a straight face about there being one specific outcome to a thoroughbred "what if" situation?

Geopolitically, it is fairly obvious that the only way to protect Leningrad from an aggressive Germany would have been to take the Gulf of Finland from Leningrad all the way to Turku in Finland and Hiiumaa in Estonia, respectively - the very end of the gulf. There remains no doubt that complete conquest of Finland was Stalin's original plan from the thirties onwards, because extensive Soviet documentation to that effect has been made public after the fall of the USSR. That, my dear friend, is a real fact. Whether a different tack at the Moscow negotiations before the war would have altered the outcome is debatable. Stalin's intentions are not.

The practical reason Stalin didn't end up conquering Finland after all was that he no longer faced an aggressive Germany. He naturally intended to complete the conquest on several occasions during WWII, but every time there were more pressing developments on the main front against Germany, allowing even feeble local resistance to force the Soviets to look elsewhere for a solution. Nations on the direct path of the push to Berlin fared worse, obviously.

Also, Mannerheim did not murder Liebknecht or Luxemburg (although "execute" would be the better word, because killing of criminals guilty of high treason was fully in accordance with the German law of the time). Nor did he sponsor any right wing groups. Mass murder was practiced by both sides of the Finnish civil war, but this is true of all civil wars; any thuggism on Mannerheim's part would be comparable to Lincoln's, since there was no chain-of-command connection between the political or military leadership and the murders.

Apart from that, no disagreement with your latest post. The last two lines of it, that is.

Timo Saloniemi

 

[Odon]

Stalin invaded Poland along with the Russia (funny how the UK never declared war on them)

Hardly strange, as Britain could only fight one war at a time.

 

[Locutus of Bored]

CaptainHawk1 said:
I'm watching Waltz right noew and something bothers me. Dukat says he's going to be charged for War Crimes.

What war crimes? Not to support Dukat or anything, but as far as the DOminon War is concerned, what war crimes did he commit?

I don't think this has been mentioned yet, but Dukat was complicit in the deception that attempted to destroy the entire Bajoran system in 'By Inferno's Light.' Attempted mass genocide would surely count, would it not?

 

[3D Master]

Temis the Vorta said:

In my view Federation is not nearly so "good and noble" as it makes itself out to be, as illustrated by their mistreatment of Dukat, the Female Founder, and it's guilt yet lack of accountabliity regarding the genocide disease issue.

The DS9 writers tried to have it both ways. I love the series, but they could have been more forthright and honest about things. For instance: there's a GOOD case to be made that the Dominion was acting in self-defense against the Alpha Quadrant powers, which had suddenly appeared in their territory simply because they discovered a wormhole to Dominion Territory. That doesn't give them some automatic right to trespass. The war could have been ended before it began if only the Feds had stayed out of other people's back yards. But no, they had the "right" to explore wherever they wanted. No wonder they're always getting into squabbles.

Uh, sorry, but first of all, the Federation never tress passed in Dominion territories until after the Dominion made the first aggressive moves. Before the Jem'Hadar held Sisko and Ferengi hostage (on a world not inside Dominion space I might add), the Federation never crossed the Dominion borders.

Further, in order for the Federation not to tress pass, they first have to know there's something there to tress pass into; and the only way to do that, is to explore and make contact with the people living there.

The simple fact is, that the Dominion could have simply sent a communique to the Federation and civilian exploration ships that held Dominion territory, and told them; "Stay out of that, we don't want you there, and if you do, we'll consider it an act of war and react accordingly." The Federation would have obliged them and stayed out.

The Dominion, however, never gave them the opportunity, they very simply said: "Hmm, they're getting a little closer to our borders as we'd like after stumbling through that wormhole, time to destroy them all."

If the Federation would not explore, it would mean they'd be stuck inside their borders, waiting till the galaxy goes up in flames by natural forces, or be destroyed by some non natural enemy that they can't defend against. Without exploration, after all, there would be no Federation to begin with.

If another government doesn't want them in their territory, all they have to do is say so, and the Federation will leave.

 

[Timo]

Before the Jem'Hadar held Sisko and Ferengi hostage (on a world not inside Dominion space I might add), the Federation never crossed the Dominion borders.

How could we tell? Obviously, Sisko wouldn't have ventured very far into the Gamma Quadrant, since that wasn't his mission - he was just the gatekeeper. But Starfleet and the Klingons sent starship after starship into Gamma, and it is more likely than not that those vessels did trespass. (Indeed, if, say, the Maryland disappeared in the immediate vicinity of the wormhole mouth, outside Dominion holdings proper, Starfleet would probably think very differently about Gamma exploration in general.)

It is fully possible that all the victims of Jem'Hadar strikes listed by their spokesman in "Jem'Hadar" were in fact intruding into Dominion territory as definied by its pre-encounter laws and treaties. It is also possible that the space around the wormhole was Dominion territory, even though the Dominion had no military forces in that neighborhood - space is big, after all, and not all of it is worth constant patrols.

So this argument about who threw the first stone doesn't really hold much weight. We cannot know the exact nature of the earliest transgressions as regards Dominion law and treaties, and we don't even have full information as regards Federation or Bajoran law and treaties.

Timo Saloniemi

 

[DanCPA]

I don't see Dukat committing any "war crimes" But he was a leader of the opposing party, so the feds make a show trial to demoralize the other side

 

[Yassim]

Tighs Eye said:
I don't see Dukat committing any "war crimes"

I'm going to guess that wiping out the Federation citizens in the DMZ was contravening the terms of the treaty.

If not, I'm not sure what all the excitement in "The Maquis" was about.

 

[Timo]

Whether going against the terms of a treaty is "contravening" or merely "withdrawing" might have some relevance on the legality. No doubt Dukat denounced all of his treaties and obligations with the Federation (and with Bajor) the first thing after taking power, blaming the other side for breach of contract and thus establishing that his withdrawal was a fully legitimate step.

It's generally not considered a war crime if one goes to war despite formerly having a peace treaty. It's only recently come to be considered a war crime to be the aggressor party. Otherwise, it's just a breach of contract, nothing more. But of course, the legislation of the two warring sides will always differ on such issues. I doubt the Feds would bother charging Dukat with treaty violations if they could nail him with charges of "crimes against humanoidity" or whatever.

Timo Saloniemi

 

[Mr. Laser Beam]

Colonel Green said:
Well, when he came to power he pretty much ethnically cleansed the Federation/Cardassian DMZ of all Fed settlers, even though only some of them were Maquis

Only some?

 

[Timo]

For all we know, less than one percent.

I know Eddington in his hubris wanted to control entire planetfuls of those colonists and tie their destinies to his, but even he was ready in "For the Uniform" to admit that not everybody under his influence was an actual Maquis insurgent.

In contrast, there apparently were plenty of Maquis who had never lived in the DMZ. We have no reason to think that for example Eddington or Chakotay or Torres or Paris had a DMZ background before joining the movement.

Timo Saloniemi

 

[DanCPA]

Yassim said:


I'm going to guess that wiping out the Federation citizens in the DMZ was contravening the terms of the treaty.

Picard made it clear to the Indian leader that any federation born people that stayed behind were no longer citizens of the federation

 

[Yassim]

But then in "The Maquis", both the Cardassians and the Federation were worried that the activity in the zone would lead to war. That wouldn't be true if those colonists were independent of the Fed, would it?

I know it contradicts what Picard said, but there it is.

Maybe there are two DMZs.
Or different writers with different ideas about drama.

As for war crimes being "victor's justice", what other kind of war crimes are there?

 

[DanCPA]

They were worried about war because humans were killing Cardassians and vice versa...

With sympathizers, you might get a federation starship attacked by a cardassian war ship and voila, interstellar war

 

[Yassim]

But the dialogue in "The Maquis" says that the Cardassians sending arms to the DMZ is a violation of the treaty. If there are no Fed. citizens there, who cares?

Picard makes it clear to those native Americans that, from here out, they are on their own, and if the Cardassians make trouble... that's too bad.

(But in Picard's episode, it was about being on the wrong side of the DMZ... which was an idea that never got revisited)

I think the show left the status here deliberately grey because -
- they wanted the leeway.
- it's not that interesting.

I think your idea is a bit of a stretch. I think the Federation clearly had a legal stake in the proceedings.

 

[Timo]

Yes, it should be understood that the single colony planet Dorvan V in "Journey's End" is not related to the Demilitarized Zone or the Maquis storyline in any apparent way. It is simply an alternative possible fate for a planet in the general region: it becomes Cardassian property lock, stock and barrel, quite unlike the colonies residing in the DMZ.

There may have been other types of fate we didn't witness, too: planets completely evacuated because of the border arrangements, planets with their populations swapped (like the original idea for Dorvan V was), planets granted special privileges or imposed special limitations.

But basically, the setup is this: there is UFP space, and then there is Cardassian space. A certain intermeshing volume containing each type is declared the Demilitarized Zone, and neighboring planets there adhere to their native legislations but have to yield to the fact that their parent governments cannot send military forces to their aid. A certain percentage of the people living in that area decided to form the Maquis underground military. A bigger percentage no doubt stayed out of it. The Maquis operate in the DMZ, but also outside it, including the vicinity of DS9 which does not lie in the DMZ or even particularly close to it.

Outside the DMZ, there are the sovereign territories of the United Federation of Planets and the Cardassian Union, where the respective native laws apply; Dorvan V happens to be in Cardassian space and thus obeys those laws even though the inhabitants are former Feds.

The actual border between UFP and CU apparently meanders in and out of the DMZ. And the Badlands in turn seem to extend both into and out of the DMZ, possibly intersecting on UFP, CU and neutral space and perhaps also other national spaces like Tzenkethi or Breen.

That's a bit different from (and much more complicated than) the Romulan Neutral Zone where any and all presence by either party is completely forbidden.

Timo Saloniemi