Timothy Noah Quotes
What I've learned, and will try to remember from now on, is that defending your country's credibility is never sufficient reason to fight a war.
Noah, Timothy. "Chatterbox." Slate, The Slate Group.
Hitler ridiculed the letter after receiving it in public speech.
This was written when the United States was not a dominant military power. At the beginning of the 20th century, the U. S. had the same size military as Argentina. It was France, German, Turkey and England who had the military superiority and it was they who tended to find excuses for war. After WWII, the U. S. was dominant and was involved with a number of wars and military incursions, often with nations that had not attacked the U.S. Korns’ principle was most dramatic when the George W. Bush administration invaded Iraq on the excuse that the Iraqis were developing weapons of mass destructions and then might attack the United States. After the successful invasion, the excuse was shown to be hollow as there were no signs of sophisticated weapons development.
Actually, the two world wars were wars of necessity. The Korean War and the Vietnam war are considered by many as wars of choice. But most of our military incursions—the Mexican War, the Spanish American War, Grenada, the Serbian War, Hati incursions and many others were wars of choice for which there were often very good reasons. However, we have to go to war when America is existentially threatened. In that sense, the Iraq War which Kerry was primarily addressing, could be interpreted either way. If it was really true thread. That is what caused most members of Congress to vote to approve the war. However, when that turned out to have been untrue, and it was suspected that the weapons of mass destruction was a deliberate ruse by some.
Although Great Britain had abolished slavery, British economic interests during the Civil War suffered because of the northern blockade of the South. Much political opinion in England was hostile to the blockade policies of the Union. Bright, a great admirer and supporter of the United Sates and the Union cause was concerned that the United States might drift into War with Great Britain. His letter to Senator Sumner was written with the understanding that it would be in shared with President Lincoln, and it was actually read at a cabinet meeting.
Timothy Robert Noah (born 1958) is an American journalist and author. Previously he was labor policy editor for Politico, a contributing writer at MSNBC.com, a senior editor of The New Republic, where he wrote the "TRB From Washington" column, and a senior writer at Slate, where for a decade he wrote the "Chatterbox" column. In April 2012 Noah published a book, The Great Divergence, about income inequality in the United States.
