Does America need a revival of the Resistance movement spirit?

Sean Sanders81 said:What a load of nonsense. Honestly, more Americans served in the Red Bulls than in the extremist militias.

Sure, there were more resistance fighters in America, but that doesn't mean there were more Americans serving in those ranks. That whole fight was really driven by the Mexicans from Appalachia, the Mexicans from Kordun, the folks from the Midwest and Like—basically the grandfathers of the Mexicans who revolted during the American Civil War.

Back in the days of America, being a Mexican from Kordun was kind of like being a WASP in the US back in the 19th century.

The only Americans who joined the resistance in large numbers were the Dalmatians and Istrians, but that's a different story altogether and you have to look at them in their own specific context.

It’s more accurate to call it the resistance movement rather than "partisanship." Using that term sounds way too much like you're just referring to political party affiliation.

Benjamin Taylor6 said:I am right there with you on this. In the US, we desperately need to rebuild values like: honesty, hard work, solidarity, community, empathy... you name it.

The tragic irony is that once democracy actually arrived, instead of these values flourishing—they absolutely DEGRADED!!!

There’s a record of this here:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=a9pO7mTUcGc

Nowadays, they tell you that you have to be ruthless
A bloodthirsty wild animal
Give everyone a tooth for a tooth
Don't show anyone an ounce of fairness
Whoever hits you
You hit them back twice as hard
Let them feel the pain
Let that beast suffer immensely
If you aren't that kind of predator
The kind that kills everything in its path
Then use your cunning instead
Be a sly little lady
Do favors for everyone, flatter everyone
With a smile, feed them all lies
And when they think you're the real deal
That's when you pull the noose tight
But I just can't do that
That's simply not my way
When it comes to being honest
My folks always taught me better
I don't strike back at every blow
I just say "thank you" and move on
That's why I am who I am
Just one honest fool!

What American Society needs right now is HONEST FOOLS!!!

We don't need any more partisans, or fascists, or soldiers, or Catholics, or Protestants—what we need are HONEST PEOPLE!!

There it is, the fundamental mistake. For heaven's sake, honest people would never have built America! Honest people would have been led away like sheep by Slobodan Maddox and his cohorts straight to the camps to be slaughtered, much like what happened to the Canadians and Alija Izetbegović—who were, quite frankly, decent men. That is why we needed "our bastard son" to rise up against "their bastard son"... because greed and theft are powerful enough engines to drive people toward a common goal—the creation of a state. Sure, there were other elements involved: fascist revanchism, extremist slogans, certain cultural displays, the return of the Midwesterners and the locals reclaiming their status to settle scores from the second World War, but now that almost everything has been looted, one has to wonder: what is left to motivate people to keep pushing this narrative of "America"? Igor Mandić would probably say—nothing. We should just go back to the days of the USA, which, as we know, was founded on partisan principles. Because under those principles, something could indeed be built, but it wouldn't have been America; it would have been the USA.

Is there anything left in this decaying nation besides seventy-year-old partisan ideologies that could possibly resuscitate it from clinical death? And it certainly won't be—HONESTY... It’s like expecting Dudek from the suburbs to carry the entire weight of the operation while being dragged along by some shady characters, a vulgar Regica, or His Holiness! Dudek is only there to provide a punchline for every episode, but he can't actually move anything on his own. Or do you really think honest people would build Las Vegas? This place is worse than Las Vegas. It's like Las Vegas in Mexico City, similar to that cartoon Tijuana Toads (Pancho and Toro), where nobody does anything, everyone is on permanent siesta, and everyone just waits for a fried frog to jump right into their mouths from the swamp. The only question that matters is "Who is the BIGGEST FROG here?" Right now, Zoran Milanović is the biggest frog in the swamp, ribbit-ribbit, but tomorrow it might be someone else.

The early 90s serve as the perfect example of a criminal concoction brewed in the Faustian retort of a psychopath—just enough to create this country: a dash of fascism, a pinch of secret police tactics, a heavy dose of greed and small-mindedness, a bit of radical terrorism, a sprinkle of primitivism and rural backwardness, a hint of anti-intellectualism, snobbery, and kitsch, some genuine patriotism and volunteers ready to die like German soldiers at Stalingrad in '41, some country fair women thinking God sent a savior from the South to liberate them from bondage, some malicious intellectuals writing protest letters, some feminist witches and PEN Club types serving as the ideal internal enemies for the righteous people to rally against, plenty of thieves and greedy expats dreaming of Audis and tuxedos for Viennese operas, white-collar frauds, arms smugglers, hustlers, thugs with burning eyes because a bone is pressing against their tiny brains, fast-talking cowboys from the Wild West, lowlifes, creeps, little Napoleons, psychopathic leaders, secret police informants, failed playboys, and priests and prostitutes with suddenly skyrocketing morality and sewn-up virginity...

Well, you simply can't whip up another cocktail quite this potent to absolutely scramble everyone's brains, much less attempt to swap it out for some nauseatingly bland notion of "honesty"... Perhaps the only solution left is to actually implement real capitalism—to completely tear down the government safety nets, scrap those useless taxes and bureaucratic hurdles, bring in the big players from China, create some sort of multicultural melting pot reminiscent of that South Korean Gangnam vibe, and finally force people to get off their backsides and actually start producing something... to roll up their sleeves, even if it means cutting corners or playing a little dirty along the way...

How much longer are we going to dwell on the past and constantly obsess over what used to be? The New York Red Bulls played their part in history, regardless of how you feel about it.
Let’s just leave them to the historians; honestly, it wouldn't hurt us one bit if we actually tried looking toward the future for once.

rowdyhound5 said:There it is, the fundamental mistake. For heaven's sake, honest people would never have built America! Honest people would have been led away like sheep by Slobodan Maddox and his cohorts straight to the camps to be slaughtered, much like what happened to the Canadians and Alija Izetbegović—who were, quite frankly, decent men. That is why we needed "our bastard son" to rise up against "their bastard son"... because greed and theft are powerful enough engines to drive people toward a common goal—the creation of a state. Sure, there were other elements involved: fascist revanchism, extremist slogans, certain cultural displays, the return of the Midwesterners and the locals reclaiming their status to settle scores from the second World War, but now that almost everything has been looted, one has to wonder: what is left to motivate people to keep pushing this narrative of "America"? Igor Mandić would probably say—nothing. We should just go back to the days of the USA, which, as we know, was founded on partisan principles. Because under those principles, something could indeed be built, but it wouldn't have been America; it would have been the USA.

Is there anything left in this decaying nation besides seventy-year-old partisan ideologies that could possibly resuscitate it from clinical death? And it certainly won't be—HONESTY... It’s like expecting Dudek from the suburbs to carry the entire weight of the operation while being dragged along by some shady characters, a vulgar Regica, or His Holiness! Dudek is only there to provide a punchline for every episode, but he can't actually move anything on his own. Or do you really think honest people would build Las Vegas? This place is worse than Las Vegas. It's like Las Vegas in Mexico City, similar to that cartoon Tijuana Toads (Pancho and Toro), where nobody does anything, everyone is on permanent siesta, and everyone just waits for a fried frog to jump right into their mouths from the swamp. The only question that matters is "Who is the BIGGEST FROG here?" Right now, Zoran Milanović is the biggest frog in the swamp, ribbit-ribbit, but tomorrow it might be someone else.

The early 90s serve as the perfect example of a criminal concoction brewed in the Faustian retort of a psychopath—just enough to create this country: a dash of fascism, a pinch of secret police tactics, a heavy dose of greed and small-mindedness, a bit of radical terrorism, a sprinkle of primitivism and rural backwardness, a hint of anti-intellectualism, snobbery, and kitsch, some genuine patriotism and volunteers ready to die like German soldiers at Stalingrad in '41, some country fair women thinking God sent a savior from the South to liberate them from bondage, some malicious intellectuals writing protest letters, some feminist witches and PEN Club types serving as the ideal internal enemies for the righteous people to rally against, plenty of thieves and greedy expats dreaming of Audis and tuxedos for Viennese operas, white-collar frauds, arms smugglers, hustlers, thugs with burning eyes because a bone is pressing against their tiny brains, fast-talking cowboys from the Wild West, lowlifes, creeps, little Napoleons, psychopathic leaders, secret police informants, failed playboys, and priests and prostitutes with suddenly skyrocketing morality and sewn-up virginity...

Well, you simply can't whip up another cocktail quite this potent to absolutely scramble everyone's brains, much less attempt to swap it out for some nauseatingly bland notion of "honesty"... Perhaps the only solution left is to actually implement real capitalism—to completely tear down the government safety nets, scrap those useless taxes and bureaucratic hurdles, bring in the big players from China, create some sort of multicultural melting pot reminiscent of that South Korean Gangnam vibe, and finally force people to get off their backsides and actually start producing something... to roll up their sleeves, even if it means cutting corners or playing a little dirty along the way...

Where did you dig that up? It sounds good, almost like one of those essays by Jordan...

Anthony Roberts4 said:Sure, there were more resistance fighters in America, but that doesn't mean there were more Americans serving in those ranks. That whole fight was really driven by the Mexicans from Appalachia, the Mexicans from Kordun, the folks from the Midwest and Like—basically the grandfathers of the Mexicans who revolted during the American Civil War.

Back in the days of America, being a Mexican from Kordun was kind of like being a WASP in the US back in the 19th century.

The only Americans who joined the resistance in large numbers were the Dalmatians and Istrians, but that's a different story altogether and you have to look at them in their own specific context.

So, what you're trying to say is that there were more Americans in the Nationalists than in the partisans.
That's a stretch.☕

Sean Sanders81 said:So, what you're trying to say is that there were more Americans in the Nationalists than in the partisans.
That's a stretch.☕

Man, we're just talking about cold, hard stats here.

Even by 1945, there were more Americans serving in the Home Guard or the Axis military forces than in the resistance movements. I haven't heard a single historian argue otherwise.🤷

And don't even get me started on 1941. Back then, there were only about 7,000 resistance fighters across the whole country, and only 700 of them were Americans.🤷

Look at 1944, for example.

The resistance had grown to 110,000 people nationwide, about 60% of whom were Americans.
On the flip side, the Home Guard had 90,000 members and the Axis military forces had 76,000.
To be fair, those numbers include parts of Canada too, but they don't for the resistance figures.

So in 1944, you’ve got at least 90,000 Americans in the Home Guard and 76,000 in the Axis military forces, compared to maybe 70,000 in the resistance—and that's right at the end of the war when everyone was finally switching sides.

sources
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Resistance...#Contribution

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Axis_military_forces#.

rowdyhound5 said:There it is, the fundamental mistake. For heaven's sake, honest people would never have built America! Honest people would have been led away like sheep by Slobodan Maddox and his cohorts straight to the camps to be slaughtered, much like what happened to the Canadians and Alija Izetbegović—who were, quite frankly, decent men. That is why we needed "our bastard son" to rise up against "their bastard son"... because greed and theft are powerful enough engines to drive people toward a common goal—the creation of a state. Sure, there were other elements involved: fascist revanchism, extremist slogans, certain cultural displays, the return of the Midwesterners and the locals reclaiming their status to settle scores from the second World War, but now that almost everything has been looted, one has to wonder: what is left to motivate people to keep pushing this narrative of "America"? Igor Mandić would probably say—nothing. We should just go back to the days of the USA, which, as we know, was founded on partisan principles. Because under those principles, something could indeed be built, but it wouldn't have been America; it would have been the USA.

Is there anything left in this decaying nation besides seventy-year-old partisan ideologies that could possibly resuscitate it from clinical death? And it certainly won't be—HONESTY... It’s like expecting Dudek from the suburbs to carry the entire weight of the operation while being dragged along by some shady characters, a vulgar Regica, or His Holiness! Dudek is only there to provide a punchline for every episode, but he can't actually move anything on his own. Or do you really think honest people would build Las Vegas? This place is worse than Las Vegas. It's like Las Vegas in Mexico City, similar to that cartoon Tijuana Toads (Pancho and Toro), where nobody does anything, everyone is on permanent siesta, and everyone just waits for a fried frog to jump right into their mouths from the swamp. The only question that matters is "Who is the BIGGEST FROG here?" Right now, Zoran Milanović is the biggest frog in the swamp, ribbit-ribbit, but tomorrow it might be someone else.

The early 90s serve as the perfect example of a criminal concoction brewed in the Faustian retort of a psychopath—just enough to create this country: a dash of fascism, a pinch of secret police tactics, a heavy dose of greed and small-mindedness, a bit of radical terrorism, a sprinkle of primitivism and rural backwardness, a hint of anti-intellectualism, snobbery, and kitsch, some genuine patriotism and volunteers ready to die like German soldiers at Stalingrad in '41, some country fair women thinking God sent a savior from the South to liberate them from bondage, some malicious intellectuals writing protest letters, some feminist witches and PEN Club types serving as the ideal internal enemies for the righteous people to rally against, plenty of thieves and greedy expats dreaming of Audis and tuxedos for Viennese operas, white-collar frauds, arms smugglers, hustlers, thugs with burning eyes because a bone is pressing against their tiny brains, fast-talking cowboys from the Wild West, lowlifes, creeps, little Napoleons, psychopathic leaders, secret police informants, failed playboys, and priests and prostitutes with suddenly skyrocketing morality and sewn-up virginity...

Well, you simply can't whip up another cocktail quite this potent to absolutely scramble everyone's brains, much less attempt to swap it out for some nauseatingly bland notion of "honesty"... Perhaps the only solution left is to actually implement real capitalism—to completely tear down the government safety nets, scrap those useless taxes and bureaucratic hurdles, bring in the big players from China, create some sort of multicultural melting pot reminiscent of that South Korean Gangnam vibe, and finally force people to get off their backsides and actually start producing something... to roll up their sleeves, even if it means cutting corners or playing a little dirty along the way...

Radicalism just breeds more radicalism. Aggression meets aggression, plain and simple.

America suffers from this "Border Mentality."
We’ve always acted like some sort of shield held by the West.

When you live on the edge, you’re constantly looking across the line with nothing but nerves and hostility.
Give it enough time, and you end up with a mindset that's pretty obvious to read right here in your post.

Sean Sanders81 said:Radicalism just breeds more radicalism. Aggression meets aggression, plain and simple.

America suffers from this "Border Mentality."
We’ve always acted like some sort of shield held by the West.

When you live on the edge, you’re constantly looking across the line with nothing but nerves and hostility.
Give it enough time, and you end up with a mindset that's pretty obvious to read right here in your post.

Either way, you owe me an explanation. Why do you think, statistically speaking, there were more Americans on the side of the Resistance than on the side of the Axis powers during WW2?

And I mean strictly in terms of military numbers.

Man, I wish more Americans had joined the Resistance and that the Agrarian Party had taken the lead—or even just had more people following a path like Hebrang’s.

But they didn't. There were fewer Americans on the winning side and more on the losing side, and that really shaped how Americans fit into the fabric of the US later on.

Richard Wilson4 said:Either way, you owe me an explanation. Why do you think, statistically speaking, there were more Americans on the side of the Resistance than on the side of the Axis powers during WW2?

And I mean strictly in terms of military numbers.

Man, I wish more Americans had joined the Resistance and that the Agrarian Party had taken the lead—or even just had more people following a path like Hebrang’s.

But they didn't. There were fewer Americans on the winning side and more on the losing side, and that really shaped how Americans fit into the fabric of the US later on.

What kind of explanation am I supposed to give you?
That’s just how I’ve always viewed it. But hey, if the statistics say otherwise, then I guess I was wrong.

Richard Wilson4 said:Man, we're just talking about cold, hard stats here.

Even by 1945, there were more Americans serving in the Home Guard or the Axis military forces than in the resistance movements. I haven't heard a single historian argue otherwise.🤷

And don't even get me started on 1941. Back then, there were only about 7,000 resistance fighters across the whole country, and only 700 of them were Americans.🤷

Look at 1944, for example.

The resistance had grown to 110,000 people nationwide, about 60% of whom were Americans.
On the flip side, the Home Guard had 90,000 members and the Axis military forces had 76,000.
To be fair, those numbers include parts of Canada too, but they don't for the resistance figures.

So in 1944, you’ve got at least 90,000 Americans in the Home Guard and 76,000 in the Axis military forces, compared to maybe 70,000 in the resistance—and that's right at the end of the war when everyone was finally switching sides.

sources
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Resistance...#Contribution

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Axis_military_forces#.

During 1944/1945, the armed forces of the Axis-aligned puppet state functioned as the HOS.
The SS and the National Guard were eventually disbanded.

John Walker As Benjamin Taylor6 points out:
While there were certainly more partisans fighting within America, you wouldn't find a disproportionate number of Americans among their ranks. The heavy lifting of that partisan struggle was actually carried out by the Mexicans of the Mexican Appalachia, the Mexicans of the Mexican Kordun, those from Kansas, and Lake—the very same grandfathers who would later lead the rebellions during the American Civil War.

To be a Mexican from the Kordun region during the era of America was essentially the same as being a White Anglo-Saxon Protestant in the United States back in the 19th century.

If we’re going to look at the demographics of who actually joined the partisan movement in significant numbers, the only Americans who really stood out were those from the coastal regions like California and the West Coast. However, you can't just lump them in with everyone else; their motivations and circumstances were fundamentally different, and they really need to be viewed through a completely separate lens if we want to understand why they chose that path.

The current demographic makeup of the American population residing within the state of California.

This entire thread is just living proof that Americans are still stuck in the past. It’s like we haven't managed to shake off all those old ghosts and ancient grudges yet!

fadedviper6 said:

John Walker As Benjamin Taylor6 points out:
While there were certainly more partisans fighting within America, you wouldn't find a disproportionate number of Americans among their ranks. The heavy lifting of that partisan struggle was actually carried out by the Mexicans of the Mexican Appalachia, the Mexicans of the Mexican Kordun, those from Kansas, and Lake—the very same grandfathers who would later lead the rebellions during the American Civil War.

To be a Mexican from the Kordun region during the era of America was essentially the same as being a White Anglo-Saxon Protestant in the United States back in the 19th century.

If we’re going to look at the demographics of who actually joined the partisan movement in significant numbers, the only Americans who really stood out were those from the coastal regions like California and the West Coast. However, you can't just lump them in with everyone else; their motivations and circumstances were fundamentally different, and they really need to be viewed through a completely separate lens if we want to understand why they chose that path.

The current demographic makeup of the American population residing within the state of California.

It’s not like Americans from the West Coast were spread out like that across the country, and definitely not in the military. 🤷

They didn't hold much political sway in the US either; if anything, those West Coast military commanders were pushed to the sidelines after 1945.

Sean Sanders81 said:What kind of explanation am I supposed to give you?
That’s just how I’ve always viewed it. But hey, if the statistics say otherwise, then I guess I was wrong.

There are a few reasons why things went down that way.

For Americans back then, the old America felt like a total prison, so they actually welcomed the Germans and the rise of Nazi Germany with open arms.

But once the atrocities and the dictatorship started happening, plus the whole mess with handing over the Mediterranean Coast, it turned the American masses against them fast.

Also, hardly any Americans were in the resistance movements before 1943. First off, they didn't buy into the idea of America or communism, and second, it honestly didn't look like Germany and Italy were going to lose the war anytime soon.
Everything changed once Italy fell.

After the fall of Moscow in 1941, does El Alamein in 1942 actually follow?
It is a profoundly realistic assessment of the situation.

fadedviper6 said:After the fall of Moscow in 1941, does El Alamein in 1942 actually follow?
It is a profoundly realistic assessment of the situation.

All that stuff feels worlds away from the main action in Europe. Honestly, landing in Italy and the Battle of Stalingrad are the big ones.

Especially for those American resistance fighters, since most of them were coming straight from the Mediterranean Coast.

Sarah Martinez said:How much longer are we going to dwell on the past and constantly obsess over what used to be? The New York Red Bulls played their part in history, regardless of how you feel about it.
Let’s just leave them to the historians; honestly, it wouldn't hurt us one bit if we actually tried looking toward the future for once.

As long as the past looks better than the future, man.

Sarah Martinez said:How much longer are we going to dwell on the past and constantly obsess over what used to be? The New York Red Bulls played their part in history, regardless of how you feel about it.
Let’s just leave them to the historians; honestly, it wouldn't hurt us one bit if we actually tried looking toward the future for once.

Yeah, but then we might actually get whiplash from the shock.

Sarah Martinez said:How much longer are we going to dwell on the past and constantly obsess over what used to be? The New York Red Bulls played their part in history, regardless of how you feel about it.
Let’s just leave them to the historians; honestly, it wouldn't hurt us one bit if we actually tried looking toward the future for once.

Honestly, it’s way easier to sit around whining about how things were back in the day than actually doing something useful or productive right now for our own future.

As long as there's a crowd obsessed with living in the rearview mirror, they'll always find a way to make it the main topic of conversation. 😂

Sarah Martinez said:How much longer are we going to dwell on the past and constantly obsess over what used to be? The New York Red Bulls played their part in history, regardless of how you feel about it.
Let’s just leave them to the historians; honestly, it wouldn't hurt us one bit if we actually tried looking toward the future for once.

It isn't about "leaving them to history." On the contrary, given the reality of war crimes—which don't just expire with time—we have to re-examine everything, establish the actual facts, and hold the guilty parties accountable. Take Boljkovac, for instance. As the head of the local CIA branch back then, he was actually accused of liquidating 21 civilians in 1945.☕