quote:
Originally posted by Ratso:
""yeah, you could say something absurd like: the US cut off the petrolium supply to Japan, and isolated them from trade with other western nations, forcing their industry into the ground and provoking an attack against our conveniently placed obsoleet ships so that we would have an excuse to go to war.""
Or you could be even more absurd and ignore the fact that Japan had invaded China 10 years earlier and the US (in concert with the League of Nations) took economic measures to restrict Imperial Japan's warfighting capability.
But the point is made that its sometimes difficult to determine which Power may actually be at fault. After all, you could be the victim of a lack of education or outright misinformation.
There are some who believe this line of thinking might be applicable to current events. Take a look at
http://counterpunch.org/flyingbombs.html and see that the conspiracy theories have already begun. The US does have a history of going to war over suspiciously convenient provocations (The loss of the Maine in Havana harbor, for example, giving cause for the Spanish American war) but using civilians for this purpose would require some incredibly cynical operatives in the govt. apparatus. We'll just have to see if the conspiracy theorists can come up with anything like proof.