errantgeek
Posts: 156
Joined: 6/20/2011
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ORIGINAL: Arpig
You really should try to keep track of what you say before you start making claims of who did what first.
Really? Because, this was the relevant portion of my post:
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I hate to put it to you, but if your acquaintances are that high up then they would also know past and current nuclear doctrines and the internal economic and political conditions within the USSR moving into the '80s. That would mean they would know the Soviet Union was obviously and undeniably on the brink of economic and political collapse (and therefore, highly unstable) during the entire Brezhnev era, stalling its own collapse with oil and gas money alone which they promptly blew on Afghanistan and fighting a two-front cold war; which in turn made SDI a completely non-necessary use of funds in the context of winning anything related to the Cold War apart from the "dumbest possible use of funds" award. That would mean they also know the Reagan administration deviated from a playbook that was written in 1947 and revised fairly continually over the next fifteen years, and that very deviation was a high-risk, no-reward play given the doctrinal shift SDI development posed in the context of the Cold War alone, forget about economic and political realities at the time. Besides, they would also know the Soviets were ahead of us in the strategic ABM game, having developed the A-35 system in the '60s and installed it around Moscow by '71 while we were struggling with intercepting theater ballistic missiles in the '80s let alone ICBMs (which even GMD can't reliably intercept), which made SDI a game of high-tech catch-up from the onset even if it had borne fruit.
Where, precisely, did I call anyone a liar? If you're dead set on mistaking (healthy) skepticism for accusations of lying, and seem to expect people to accept unsubstantiated claims on faith and cede the entire argument to you based upon those claims, that's not my problem. Though, let's go with your claims a minute for shits and giggles:
None of that debunks my arguments that regardless of who thought SDI was a Really Good Idea or Really Necessary, it was neither. In fact, the only explanation I can think of offhand in the context of which SDI makes sense is the conclusion that Andropov, who was G.S. at the time of SDI's announcement, was among the last of the Soviet old guard, came into office with one foot in the grave and when he knocked off it was anybody's ball game as to who came to power next. Therefore, a decisive move to collapse the Soviet Union was necessary, and quickly before the Soviet new guard, who were largely nationalists and hardliners, came to power. Luckily, when Andropov knocked off Chernenko became G.S. and knocked off a year later, then Gorbachev (who was a reformer) came to power and promptly cheesed off the hardliners between glasnost and perestroika, and the potential for a coup was still high. Therefore, it was still better to push forward and "force" the Soviet Union to collapse sooner than it otherwise would have.
Except, of course, the hardliners attempted it anyways and the Soviet Army happened to side with Gorbachev and Yeltsin. Which still rendered SDI moot. In fact, if I remember right, Kryuchkov and the rest of the gang of eight were heavily snubbed by the Politburo and Central Committee during the mid-'80s for being hardliners, and they were fucking scary.
Anyhow, the closest I've come to a genuine insult this entire exchange you completely glossed over:
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That's complete, utter revisionist bullshit.
Which isn't an insult at all, but rather calling a poor argument out for being just that. Meanwhile, you on the other hand...emphasis mine:
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You are either incapable of comprehension, or simply being willfully obtuse.
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Let's see. I can take the word of a punk who was in diapers at the time, or the word of people who actually worked in and on the program.....hmmmmmm...
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You know the people who knew it was a ruse from the start, who were in on perpetrating the ruse, in on the planning of the ruse.....you know...people who actually KNOW rather than think they do.
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You certainly are an ignorant little fuck aren't you? Facts are just an inconvenience to you.
You are just spouting rhetoric and buzz words. I've heard everything you've said a thousand times before, Hell I heard it all before you were in Jr. high. You're old hat dude, you have nothing but empty catch phrases and a "nothing good can be said about the other side" attitude that is typical of the inane drivel that passes for political debate with most of you Southrons.
If you actually paid attention to what had happened, rather than to ignore the inconvenient facts, you too would be able to see how well Reagan handled a very dangerous situation. And if you weren't so narrow-mindedly wedded to your ideology, you'd be able to admit that somebody from the other side had actually done something that wasn't an evil plot to destroy all that is good and holy in your world.
Now go away and do some learning, come back when you have a little bit more than "He's a Republican so he's wrong!". We have plenty of others who do that thanks, we don't need another such twat.
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Ah, you silly petulant little child. By your own standard you lost the argument back in post #68 when you called me a liar and questioned the intelligence of both myself and my father.
< Message edited by errantgeek -- 7/8/2011 11:46:05 PM >
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RE: Ronald Reagan - 
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