History Channel - this is how you do history.

I have really enjoyed The History Channel. It has produced many excellent multi-episode shows about The French Revolution, Man: The Story of Us, The Men Who Built America, and a series on all American Presidents, to now American Pickers, Pawn Stars, American Restoration. They're all good show, but come on, is Big Hoss getting a sweet deal on Clark Gable's condom box really history? Steve McQueen is the coolest guy of ever-all time, but Rick Harris's man-boner for all things McQueen is getting old, and I don't care if Frank gets the goddamn enamel Standard Oil sign for a good price either. History Channel has become another piece that celebrates consumerism. It just focused on history and pop culture.

If you want good history, you need to go to the American Heroes Channel. I know, what a dumbass name for a channel, but it's history programming is aces. The latest piece of history-wood inducing programming is the multi episode Apocalypse WWI.

It's 4 one hour episodes did an excellent job of going beyond the conventional narrative. Each episode is built around one year. The first episode centers on 1914, and focused mainly on the politics of the period in regards to the interrelations of the English, Russian, and German monarchies. It touches on the shaky nature of the Austrian Empire regarding the various slavic ethnicities. Lastly the heavy role of nationalism throughout European nations goes a long way toward explaining how the assassination of an heir would spiral from regional political quarrel to a full blown global conflict. If the lesson of WWII is the folly of appeasement, then the lesson of WWI is its contrary, the rush to fight for national pride.

The final episode is excellent in its exposition of the nationalism, and need to punish the Central belligerents, that pollutes the conditions Treaty of Versailles, and other peace accords, as a harbinger of what is to come. In the century since WWI we have emphasized the lessons of WWII, and lost sight of the lessons of WWI.

Santayana was right - over and over.

Those who fail to learn the lessons of history........

I saw this. I have to say, if there's one phrase that should discount Mr. Chalabi and the future of Iraq - more precisely the future of the territory formerly Iraq - it should be "Cheney's old pal." I'll leave it to the linked piece to detail all of the red flags regarding Mr. Chalabi. I will say again that Mr. Cheney, and the rest of the neo-cons, should never again be consulted on foreign policy. I mean, how wrong do you have to be before you stop getting invited to give an opinion?

I have an idea, and it's regarding the old "appeasement" argument. History tells us that the mistake the world made in the 1930s was appeasing Hitler, and that's a good lesson. That's not the only lesson that history teaches us, and it's not the most important. We have so overemphasized the appeasement lesson to the detriment of others. After the assassination of the Arch Duke Ferdinand in 1914 the world rushed headlong into World War I. That's pretty much the opposite of appeasement. We have fallen woefully short of appreciating that lesson.

To be clear, in the dichotomous political climate we live in today, I'm not advocating 1930's style appeasement, but I do think that somewhere between appeasement, and "We have to show these guys we mean business." is where the sweet spot is.

Take the latest development in the Russia/Ukraine crisis - the shooting down of MH17. There is little doubt that it was done by the separatists backed by Putin's Russia. Most of the information released indicates that the separatists received the hardware and training to show down aircraft from Russia. That said, there is still an investigation to do, and separatists hindering the efforts to do that only make them look more guilty, but can we start by talking to credible people about the area, and groups involved? That's be a good idea. One more thing, can we talk about what has happened in past comparable occurrence, and not the political mythology?

What I'm saying is that maybe we should heed the lessons of the advent of WWI, and not jump to conclusions, and make decisions that are not thought out thoroughly. There are 3 really big crises going in the world right now; Russia/Ukraine, Israel/Palestine, and the continuing fracture of Iraq and Syria and ISIS. Making a snap decision, and then building a case supporting that to show everyone "we mean business" is foolhardy, and short sighted. Cherry picking information and building up those that support that cheery picked data is what wasted lives and US fortune in the Iraq fiasco. If there's a lesson history can teach us it's that. Being so recent you'd think it'd be reasonably clear. We need to gather information first, THEN make a decision.

So please, stop talking to Dick Cheney.