THAILAND AND HUNGARY

Thesis Thailand: This is not an example of a successful revolution because it will probably not have long term effects.
Thesis Hungary: The Hungarian revolution was only successful depending on what time zone you look at. The success of the revolution fluctuates depending on the political, social, and economic states of the country.

The states of these two countries, as well as the basises for their respective revolutions are very similar. Both countries are unhappy with their governments, leading them to revolt. In Thailand, the monarchy is being questioned which led the country to political instability. Similarly in Hungary, the right wing nationalism has started to grow even though it is not represented in their government. Since the people of the Hungary are supporting something different than their government, they too have political instability. These shared political instabilities have caused economic failure in both countries. In Hungary, lies about the economy made by political leaders have led to major inflation and the general failure of the system. Economic growth in Thailand have also been halted because of protests in the center of the city. Finally, both theses have the commonality of neither of their revolutions sticking. In both countries, the revolutions seem to have immediate effects. but neither of them will stay long term.

Personally I prefer Spiderman as far as comics are concerned...

1. If these men live in America, how do they have so much insight into the revolutions in Iran? Assuming that their knowledge goes beyond what they hear on the news. Especially if Internet access is being limited. What is the controversy surrounding last summer's election? What happened in the Islamic Revolution? What exactly is a theocracy? Why is internet access being restricted and what are people doing to get around it (if anything)? is the Iranian government doing anything about the comic?

2. Hungarian Revolution- protests slammed by the government. China earlier this year- limitation on the Internet. Animal Farm- similar to the comic by using writing and art to express opinions on what's going on in the world without saying it out right. Hungarian reporters telling outsiders their stories- the comic comes from America, not Iran so that the whole world can know whats going on.

3. I feel like a revolution so harsh should have been given more space on the page. The article provides little background information on what's going on and only a small paragraph on the actual protests. If the world is really to be told about what's going on, then there should be more information. Now I feel confused as to why the government is cracking down so hard on the student protesters and why they would cut down Internet use. Without help from the article, I am left to assume that it is just because the government is scared of losing control, which would actually make a lot of sense...

Nicole took the only clever idea I had...

I don't think there is a definitive way to measure cultural success because it depends too much on your personal definition of success. For instance, looking at the practicality of a culture as a measure of success is different than measuring success by power. If power was your definition of success, then it would be easy to tell which is the superior culture. All you would have to do is look at which culture has the most money in the world; the strongest economy. Personally, I think that success is relative. I think it depends on what works for a certain group of people. The culture in Africa is entirely different than the culture in America, but the fact that their culture wouldn't succeed in America doesn't make ours better all together. All it means is that our culture works better for us, while theirs works better for them. They are both successful in their own place. If a culture works for the group of people that it belongs to without major problems, then that means it is successful, at least to me. I don't think that people have a right to judge whether other cultures are better or worse than their own, because there's no way they know for sure if they haven't tried it. Judging the success of other cultures never ends well. We know this is true because Hitler thought his culture was the best and looked what happened there. Mass genocide.

I tend to agree with the statement "the (capitalist/communist) countries of the world were wrong to judge the (communist/capitalist) countries of the world based on outsider cultural knowledge. The only sound judgment comes from hard economic, political, or scientific facts." but only if success is a measure of power, as I said before. From a global stand point, it is only fair to judge which society is successful by looking at facts, otherwise you end up with a completely biased opinion. Though in retrospect, they should have had an outsider judge the two societies side by side, that way they could end up with a truly unbiased opinion of which culture was doing better. What is needed is some sort of global jury of completely unbiased jurors. They would be able to judge who was more successful. But this, of course, is just an errant thought because it is impossible to find people without any sort of bias towards the world.

They're like siblings....but countries. YAY RIVALRIES!!

The rivalry of the Cold War resemble the pre- World War I rivalries between the major European powers. During the Cold War, America, China, and the Soviet Union were all up at arms about the nuclear crisis and each country had a different view on the matter. Though America was primarily against the use of nuclear weapons, it still made the point very clear that they would not be afraid to fight back if nuclear war ensued. The Soviet Union, on the other hand, saw almost no problem with using the weapons to start war if they had to (though in the end it was them that backed down). The worst of all was China, who saw no problem in the use of weapons and went as far as to criticize the USSR for backing down. And while this missile crisis was going on, each country, the USSR and the US in particular, were building up their armies so that they could be on top at all times. This resembles the German mindset during World War I. Germany was so set on being the best country that they fortified they spent all of their money fortifying their army. Even further, after World War I Hitler still tried to keep their army strong so that he could win.

Though the conflict inside of the Soviet Union between the communists and the rebels was not an international conflict per se, it still resembles the conflict between colonial countries in Africa and their European counterparts. During Cold War times in Russia, small bands of rebels in Hungary and Czechoslovakia were crushed quickly by the communist leaders of the USSR because they were scared of what could happen. This is very similar to the rebel movements in the African colonies that were quickly squashed because the Europeans were scared of losing control.

Though credit has to be given to the UN for trying their best to make the world safe, I find it almost impossible to see the UN as actually being effective. They can make as many charters and declarations as they want and write as many formal papers about keeping the world safe as they deem necessary, but in the end those words aren’t going to prevent war. They said in the Charter that extreme actions would have to be taken to prevent war, but that seems to be ignoring the fact that extreme actions would in fact be war. Since the first Charter was done written after World War II, the UN has written more statements in the same manner, but still none of them are really taken to heart by the rest of the world. Further, their Security Council seemed to be created more to make a statement about who the UN thought the best nations were rather than who they thought could make sure the world was safe. After reading about the Security Council, though they seem to hold their personal decisions to a high level, they're decisions aren't publicized or really enforced. The Security Council isn't the only council with superficial sounding assignments. There is also an Economic and Social Council who is supposed to keep the world's economy and social problems under control. This doesn't even make sense because it is impossible for one group to keep hundreds of different economies and social climates under control. It's a fine idea, but practically impossible. Though it must be duly noted that the UN tries hard at maintaining peace, the UN is just pretty backdrop put in front international affairs so that the world doesn’t really see how dirty the countries of the world play negotiation games.

The United Nations...with, you know, spirt fingers and stuff

1) The United Nations Charter was about maintaining international peace by ensuring that there was no more war and that all problems were taken care of in a thoughtful and safe way. It was also made to make certain that everyone everywhere was treated equally and fairly.

2) Basically, the Charter said the same thing in big words over and over again: peace good, fighting bad. Everything the United Nations wrote was pristine and careful. They wrote around the same point repeatedly to make sure that there were no loopholes, making for an incredibly repetitive read. What I found the most interesting was the bit about the Security Council. I found it very, well, thought-provoking (thank you thesaurus) that they only five countries that were permanently on the council were the Allies and China. Isn't the United Nations supposed to be neutral with the soul goal of making international peace. Because that was what they had been saying for the past three pages. Anyway, the choosing of the five countries seems incredibly biased to me. Was the United Nations trying to punish Germany and Japan? That would be understandable of course, but the United Nations Security Council doesn't seem like the most politically correct place to make a statement, especially such a political statement as that would be. But in the end, the UN just wanted to make sure that wars were prevented, and everything was taken care of peacefully. And if there were problems, those problems needed to be solved in a manner that would not disturb the peace world wide. Honestly, the said the word peace like 70 times.

3) I don't see any major problems, other than the fact that the five allied countries were singled out and the rest of the world had to try to get on the Security Council. That doesn't really seem fair. What makes those five countries better for security than the others? The fact that they have more war experience doesn't exactly make them better. A balanced council would have all different types of countries with all different types of security backgrounds. And besides, hadn't China just been invaded by Japan? Because that would pretty much be a security fail, which doesn't really help international security matters.

But seriously. If I see the term international peace one more time...

Dropping the Bomb

I think that NBC waited until 1995 to air this peace for the soul reason that it was 1995. The effects of the bomb that they talked about didn't rely on that specific year and nothing that they said was really time specific. The only affect that the air time had on the message of the clip was that it made it seem more serious. Everything sounds more serious or makes more of an impact if its made on a big anniversary, and 50 years after anything is generally a popular time to look back on things. But also, 50 years allows enough time after an event for generations to change. People who may have been too young to form an opinion when the bomb originally dropped were old enough in 1995 to figure out how they really felt about it. The change in generation makes sense as a reason for why the bomb was dropped because its now that new generation that has to deal with the affect of the bomb and what that has done, if anything, to America's general image. But its hard to know if NBC aired it in 1995 specifically because it wanted to let people who may have been uninformed in their childhood have an opinion or because they knew that having it be on the 50 year anniversary would bring in larger numbers. Deciding really depends on whether or not we believe that TV execs are more focused on the money they get or truly informing their viewers, and that is a whole different story.

Research Results

Before I started researching I just wanted to know why World War II had started, and I did find that out and I'll talk about it later, but before I got to that information something else caught my eye. There was an article on the PBS site about POWs. Seeing as I'd never learned about them, I wanted to get some insight as to how POWs were treated during the war. What I found, however, made me regret looking at the information in the first place.

Prisoners of war were treated terribly. According to PBS, they were given rotten food and cold, uncomfortable places to sleep. The Japanese split the POWs into groups of ten people, and if one person did something wrong then the entire group would be taken down to the docks and shot.

After reading that, I continued on my search for why the war was started. And I found it. It was Germany...again. What happened was that Hitler wanted a part of Poland, and after Britain and France so willingly gave him Sudetenland, he figured he might as well just go in and take it without consulting anyone. But apparently, this was crossing the line and taking Poland was too much after taking poor Sudetenland. What's interesting is that even thought there had been severe animosity between the two countries before, Germany and The Soviet Union signed a non-aggression act just five days before Hitler tried to take Poland. Interesting, right? Meanwhile, the French suggested that Hitler should try to negotiate with Poland. But Hitler had had enough of negotiations and decided that he would just go in and take it. Germany invaded Poland on September 1, 1939 and Britain and France declared war on Germany a day later.

Way to go Britain and France! (No Sarcasm)

Giving Sudetenland to Germany was a fantastic idea. The Munich Conference was supposed to maintain peace and thats what it was doing! Everyone knows that giving a country what it wants will prevent war, especially when they know that war will happen if it the agreement didn't appease Hitler. World War I was terrible on everyone involved, so it was logical that Britain and France would not want it to happen again. And if giving Germany Sudetenland was the only thing that could prevent war then obviously measures would be taken to appease.

The Treaty of Versailles, though it might have seemed unfair at the time, was really made when the wounds made during World War I were still fresh so obviously the terms were made a little too harsh. Just because a country builds an army doesn't mean that they are going to start a war, they just want to make the people living there safe. And just to go farther, Hitler knew that France was just waiting to start another war with Germany because they hate each other, so re-militarizing Rhineland was just another way to ensure the safety of the German population. Britain and France made the right choice in overlooking Hitler's rule breaking because they knew that they would do the same thing for their country if it ensured safety.

And though some may argue that giving over Czechoslovakia was fascist takeover, they would really be overlooking the fact that it was just a sacrifice made for the greater good. Part of the Czech citizens are of German decent, so they deserve to be part of the German nation. And as for the people that would have to leave, doesn't that seem like something they would want to do. Even though Czechoslovakia is their home at the time, when Sudetenland becomes an official part of Germany, it would be a terribly uncomfortable place for them to live because they would not fit into the larger population. Their cultures would be different and they would probably want to find a place where they could live comfortably. So really, evicting all those who are not German isn't a way to get rid of the minorities, but rather to make sure that those minorities have a more comfortable place to live.

And finally, Hitler's expansion was not a way that he could spread his territories, but rather a way that he could make sure all people of German decent could have a place that they could live, be comfortable, and be safe.

Really, Britain and France? Really?

Though hindsight is hard to let go of when dealing with Hitler, it is still easy to see the injustice shining through the formal words of the Munich conference. Afterall, who ever came up with the idea that it was a good thing to give a volatile country what they want and make it easier for them to start a war?

The Munich Conference was supposed to be a way to maintain peace in Europe, but what it really did was make Europe a more dangerous place to live in. Instead of scolding and punishing Germany for breaking the rules of the Treaty of Versailles, the representatives from Britain and France just gave Hitler what he wanted. Did they learn nothing from World War I? Had they forgotten that those rules and regulations were put in place for a reason? This is what it seemed like. If the agreements made had only affected those that lived in Germany and not the surrounding area, it probably would not have been as bad. But since the agreements centered around the lives of the Czech people, it is impossible to ignore the injustice.

It seems that everyone in involved in World War I forgot that Germany had lost along the way. They also seemed to forget that Hitler and Mussolini had just supported the fascist side in a war they had no part in. Were Britain and France trying to send the message that fascist take overs were ok? I would implore them to show one instant history then that would show that fascism worked well for everyone involved. And speaking of everyone involved, why was there no representative from Czechoslovakia? Again, the representatives did not stop think that maybe, just maybe, this "non-hostile" take over that they had planned wouldn't work. No one stopped to even consider the fact that they were evicting thousands from their homeland just because they weren't German. And it even seemed like it was a bad thing that there were non-German people in a country that wasn't Germany. Huh, what a concept.

And lastly, though we it is already clear that the participants in the conference did not think, there is one thing that still needs to be pointed out. Were the British and French representatives really not aware that they were allowing Hitler to spread his territories when the borderlines of European countries had already been drawn? Really? And really Britain and France, were you completely oblivious to the fact that Hitler had already started building an army, and that you were just letting it happen? Just a few things to think about...

Things I know about WWII

America, the Soviet Union, France, and Britain were good

Japan, Italy, and Germany were bad (why is Germany always bad?)

America got involved after Pearl Harbor was bombed by the Japanese

America dropped atomic bombs on Hiroshima and Nagasaki

The war went from the late 30s to the early 40s

Millions of people were killed in German concentration camps during WWII

Why did the Germans get themselves into ANOTHER war?

What was this war about?

Animal Farm

Though I cant say that I am particularly fond of the novel, I have to admit that Animal Farm does provide a point of view of the Russia Revolution that is hard to come by. Instead of trying to cover up and give reasons for Stalin's actions like most documents from that era in Russian history tend to do, Orwell presents the series of events through an unbiased point of view. After finding the not so subtly hidden allegory between real life historical figures and the pigs in Animal Farm, its easy to find parallels between the story and the real events. Right from the beginning we can see that Old Major is a combination of Lenin and Marx because he sparks the idea of the Animal Farm and a separate and superior animal WORKER race (making him Marx), starts the revolution, and then shortly dies (making him Lenin). Then, in Chapters 4-6, it becomes clear that Napoleon and Snowball represent Stalin and Trotsky. Snowball shows characteristics of Trotsky like the ability to persuade people through words like Trotsky could do with pictures. Napoleon is more quiet and cunning like Stalin was. At the end of chapter 5, he shows Stalin like tendencies when he sends his secret band of puppies (suspiciously similar to the NKVD) after Snowball and then persuades everyone that Snowball is bad, just like Stalin did with Trotsky. The rest of the story seems to follow history as it is showing the pigs giving themselves more and more power, all the while justifying it by convincing everyone that it is the right thing to do. The animals on the farm have no ability to say their actual opinions, just like the people who did not have power had no voice in the Communist movement. I think that in the rest of the story, we will be able to see that the more the pigs give themselves power, the more they will find themselves becoming the things they hate--the humans.

I think that Orwell wrote this book to show what the Communist movement looked like from the outside. All documents from that era are biased towards Stalin, because he would have killed them if they weren't. Animal Farm provides an unbiased point of view of the events during that time in history, but it also makes the lesson easier to grasp. It's much easier to figure that what happens in the book is bad when reading it about animals because it makes the subject lighter.

Fascism Op-ed

Though the Taliban have been terrorizing the Middle East for years, they do not have the organization or maturity that is needed to become a fascist movement. However, the fact that they are not fascist does not make them any less affective striking fear into the hearts of those they terrorize.

The fascists of the past have always had a certain about them, one that the Taliban does not have. They have always been organized. Instead of going into the middle of town and killing someone to get attention, fascist regimes have taken a more calm approach of persuasion by propaganda, instead of using a fear factor to get their way. While fascists relied more on getting the persuading the government that they were the best and using that as means to get control, the Taliban focuses more on intimidating everyone until they are all so scared that they will give the Taliban what they want. And though both means are affective, they are different enough to keep the Taliban from being a fascist movement.

Although the fact the Taliban relies more on guerrilla warfare to get their point across is one keeps them from being fascist, that is not to say that fascism didn't include some element of violence in fascism. In fact, both groups share the aspect of intimidation. However, where the Taliban have big guns and impulse, Fascist movements have order and a large military. Fascist actions were judicious: every single action was thought out; they would not snap in public if one person did something to make them angry. Fascists also moved in large packs that tried to expand into other countries, where as the Taliban focuses more on gaining control of one small area. The need for expansion is a huge fascist value, one that the Taliban need if they have the urge to become fascist.

One thing that both groups do have in common is some sense of nationalism, though the Taliban does not have the nationalism that it takes to make a fascist state. Whereas in Germany where Hitler and his Nazi Party managed to convince everyone that the only way that Germany could succeed was if everyone was pure German, the Taliban only focus on very extreme Islamic ways. Nationalism can only succeed if there is a large enough group of people that can be unified. In Germany, most of the country fell into the category of perfect human that Hitler outlined, making it easier for his ideas to spread and for him to take over. The Taliban’s views are far too narrow to ever be powerful enough to band an entire country together. Plus, unlike the Germans who were centred in one area, the Taliban are much too spread out to ever be able to completely take over.

Despite both groups sharing some important characteristics in common—having traditional values, being elitist and sexist, and being aggressive—the Taliban lack some of the key ideals that Fascist movements have. So though they are affective in gaining some control of the Middle East, they do not have what it takes to become fascist.

German Propaganda

This piece of propaganda, though perhaps not a poster, was just as effective to the German people because it was a stamp. In some of the propaganda that I've seen from Germany, there seems to be a reappearing theme of the hatred of Great Britain. After translating the German on the bottom (with help from google translate) I learned that it says, "We go against England." Using this, i can only assume that the picture is of the King of England lost at Sea. The King, though supported by a life raft, seems to either be wearing chain mail or he is dressed to look like he has fish scales. He is also wearing a viking hat, perhaps to suggest that he is like a viking and semi barbarian like. The fish seem like they are laughing at him, maybe to suggest that even fish are better than the King of England?

Treaty of Versailles

The Treaty of Versailles consisted of many agreements made between the Allies who won the great war and the losers, ie. Germany, Austria Hungary, etc. Anyway, the treaties put forth two main ideas, complete peace agreements and completely redrawing the map. The idea of complete peace, supported by President Woodrow Wilson, consisted of the creation of the League of Nations. The league of Nations was an organization that was in charge of keeping international peace in check. It was believed that this League could make all the troubles between countries go away. As we can see from the fact that another world war happened just a mere 30(ish) years later, this league worked really well. The second of the two main points of the Treaty was the idea that the Allies got to redraw the map of Eastern Europe. By doing this, the Allies made sure that all of the former powers were split into smaller countries, and all of the people that supported them got their own new country. This caused the problem of minorities, as outlined in our reading, because different types of people were so spread out after the war. This was a problem because each of the new countries supported a different ethnic or cultural group, making the people who had moved during the war minorities.

And just to add, life in Germany was pretty awful after the war. They had to pay for everything. That's what you get for starting a war, Germany, no more money in the state for a really long time. Hello, internal problems. Here's a hint: don't start another war...

The Home Front

Evelyn Blucher's article provides a different point of view on the war than ones that are typically given. From her writing we get the view of a person who would usually be well off in life, rather than that of a king or a peasant or a soldier. She shows us just how hard it was for everyone to live in the total war countries. There was little food, oil, or any other things they used to take for granted. With everything being pushed toward the war, civilians got shoved to the side. Though nationalism was helping the troops fight and win (in some cases, not Germany), it did not help the people within the countries. Blucher's point of view begs the question: what's the point of fighting if there wont be a country left to fight for? Also, when does it become more important for a country to win than for its inhabitants to survive?

Meet Emilie Rocher

Bon soir. My name is Emilie Rocher. I'm 17 years old and I live in a small town just outside of Paris thats too small to even be recognized by most maps. Everyone in town knows each other. All my life I've lived next to Luc Aldridge and we've been best friends since we were little. Everyone said we were going to be married, but that was before the war. Luc got sent away just after the Germans invaded...there wasn't even time to say goodbye. I don't know where he is or how he's doing but I like to write him letters just so he knows that I love him. I write him once a week. I haven't gotten a response yet, but I know he's ok....isn't he?

Nationalism: a Definintion

Nationalism:

the force that binds a group of people together in a nation. It happens when a group of people within a nation have an overwhelming sense of pride in themselves, what the believe in, and or their country. It can sometimes be a positive force for change, as in Japan when the Japanese sense of nationalism helped them become a strong power in the world. When a country believes that they are the best, they will do everything in their power to show this. Most of the time this need to prove themselves put countries on the right track to making themselves better or maybe even taking over other countries, as we saw with imperialism. Nationalism can also be a destructive force, as with the Ottoman empire. Nationalism only works when the entire country bands together as one, and not just a group of people coming together to separate themselves. When the Turks came together in the Ottoman empire, it helped take down the rest of the empire eventually because they no longer identified themselves as an Islamic state as they had for so long. Though nationalism can be used to take over other countries through making them believe that your ideas are better, it should be pure sense of pride to begin with.

Oh, How Time Will Change the Empires...

The main difference between the cultural and political policies of the old Ottoman Empire and the newer Ottoman empire was the role of religion. In the 16th and 17th century, the Ottoman Empire was at the top of the Islamic world. They let other religious groups into their land, but they still maintained power by taxation. The Janissaries not only held a lot of power within the empire, but their ways showed a great deal of Islamic power. The empire used to be huge and independent from other countries. This all changed in the 19th and 20th centuries. The supporters of the Islamic Reform, led for a short time by the Young Turks, called for a secular government and state. This motion sucked the power out of the Islamic leaders and completely changed the places of power in the empire. Even before this, a treaty was proposed to limit the power of the sultan, who had formerly held all power in the empire. This, plus the addition of some western ideas into the empire turned it from being the all powerful Islamic state that it was to a land that was widely accepted by its people as the Turkish State. This was one of the final straws needed to completely disintegrate the former Ottoman empire, which led to its final fall after World War 1.

Meiji Restoration

The reading of Strayer has changed my view of one part of the theory of the Meiji Restoration that I had from the documents in class. Before reading Strayer, I had a view that the Japanese were more arrogant, and felt superior towards the outside world. However, through the reading I saw that out of all the other countries that we have studied, especially China, Japan has been quite open to outside ideas. Of course, they started out rather harsh towards the outside world, this seemed to work for them. Unlike China, they had already urbanized their country without much help from the outside world. One difference between the documents and the reading was that the documents did not attribute any success of the Japanese to the outside world, where Strayer talked more about Japan's encounters with the outside and how they were open to Western ideas. Most of the classes theories talked about about how Japan shot down the world around them and gained power by putting other countries down. Through the reading I have learned that this is not true, and that Japan was a place of peace that accepted Western ideas.