Comments on: How Democracies Lose Small Wars

By: Dan Hardie

Dan Hardie — Tue, 01 Jun 2004 00:26:14 +0000

I won’t be posting for a while, which I’m sure is a relief. But here are some replies to your numbered arguments. I shall try to send you some econometric papers I’ve found on the incidence of African wars, if you’re interested. (2) I think you’re right that Merom takes small wars to be guerilla wars, on the grounds that the balance of conventional forces is normally so lopsided as to guarantee an easy win for the more advanced country. This is very Martin Van Creveld (in his book ‘On Future War’ – UK title- or ‘The Transformation of War’). I suspect Merom has been strongly influenced by Van Creveld, who is worth a look. I found him stimulating but crushingly teleological- states can never beat guerrillas, hence all states are more or less doomed. He does instance Malaya and Northern Ireland as the two exceptions. Malaya, he says, was unique because the imperial power had made a pledge to get out as soon as the war was won; he can’t really explain why N. Ireland wasn’t lost by the British. There are at least two other probable causes of the proliferation of guerrilla wars- one is that many wars begin with the grievances of non-state groups, which start without regular armies; another is the decline and collapse of the state in many parts of the modern world, especially Africa. Saddam started 2003 with a state and with a regular army, and took a decision to fight a guerrilla war because, as you say, he didn’t have much of a chance fighting conventionally. But, apart from the Saddam Fedayeen, many of the participants in the current Iraq guerrilla war either took the decision because they don’t have a state to fight for (the jihadis), or because the state has gone tits up, and they’ve moved into banditry (the ex-Iraqi army guys). I think the Falklands was an anomalous case in a lot of respects. Certainly since 1945 wars between two sets of regular forces have become less common, but they have occurred. The two Sino-Indian wars, the three Indo-Pakistani wars all involved at least one democracy; also the NATO-FRY conflict, with the admixture of the KLA; others, eg the Turkish-Greek war, were between dictatorships. (3) Most of the British wars you refer to in the 1919-39 period were fought in the immediate aftermath of WWI and were in important respects continuations of the War. Yes, but they were fought and in only two cases (Russia and Ireland) were domestic opposition to war significant factors in ending the wars. Sudan/Somaliland dragged on into the ‘30s; Palestine was fought in the 30s; the same decade saw very high levels of violence in British-ruled India and Burma. Ireland seems to fit Merom’s model perfectly. It fits it quite well in part: the British fought a notably brutal campaign in Ireland, 1919-21, answering the brutality of their IRA enemies, but both popular and elite opinion was divided on whether this campaign was justifiable, and this was a factor in bringing the British to the negotiating table and making considerable, though not unlimited, concessions. But there was a simultaneous IRA campaign in Northern Ireland, which was defeated with great brutality (brutality which was none the less tolerated by the British public) and there were subsequent IRA campaigns which were defeated without large-scale brutality (WW2, 1957-62); and the most recent, most sophisticated IRA campaign ended after more than thirty years with no better result than a draw, arguably a defeat, against a British state which, after 1972, drew back from brutality. Merom needs a theory that can explain these conflicts too. On the brutality question, I can think of a number of very brutal small wars where democratic electorates didn’t get terribly worked up. Britain in Iraq in the 1920s, where poison gas may have been used; Britain in Kenya (row over Hola camp killings, no prosecutions, lots of dead Kenyans elsewhere); France just about anywhere in black Africa, including the successful 1994 rescue of many of the worst Rwandese genocide planners; any Indian counterinsurgency campaign; the Reagan era Special Forces operations in Central America. Some of these were kept from public view, but some weren’t. The US in Vietnam is often given as an example of a democracy not tolerating brutality, but I wonder if that was true. One junior officer served less than three years’ house arrest for My Lai, before being pardoned due to massive popular demand, and no-one else was ever convicted. As to ‘free fire zones’, ‘Project Phoenix’, the denial of Geneva Convention rights to all NVA prisoners, the routine use of torture- these were policy, and in my experience very few Americans even have much idea that they happened. The Vietnam war was unpopular because it was expensive, badly managed and killed lots of draftees. (4) With the exception of Malaya (which I’ll discuss below), the postwar British examples you mention are what I’d call very small wars, undertaken by the state using spare capacity in the professional armed forces, funded without the need for any special authorisation, and not involving large casualties. But this begs some questions: why were some states in possession of professional armed forces? Why did some democracies spend much more on defence, and thus have much more ‘spare capacity’, than others? After 1962, the British forces were volunteer only- as far as I can tell, they were unique in Europe, except for the Irish, until the French and Dutch went professional at the beginning of the ‘90s. The Americans and Australians ditched the draft after Vietnam, in the early ‘70s. In the 1950s, there were no problems with committing British, American or Australian conscripts to high-casualty wars (Korea). In the 1960s, when conscript wars did become a political problem, several English-speaking democracies made the shift to professional forces, and thus maintained the ability to fight wars, while the French surmounted this to a degree throughout the post-war period by having forces (the Foreign Legion, Algerian and Vietnamese troops and ‘La Coloniale’) who were either foreign mercenaries or French professionals. And the same question recurs with regard to defence spending. Since the end of the Cold War the Americans under Clinton spent 3% of GDP on defence, and are somewhere over 4% since 9-11; the British spent 2.7% under Major and have fluctuated between 2.5% and 2.7% under Blair; the French spend around 2.7%; the Germans 1.7%, and the Italians 1.1%, much of which goes on the Carabinieri. Even given US-UK-French spending on nuclear weapons, we are clearly looking at huge differences in military capacity, exacerbated by the German continuation of conscription. If some democratic states can fight ‘very small wars’, it’s because they spend enough on defence, and have professional armies. Why don’t all democracies do that? I can think of reasons (low level of non-military govt. spending; popularity of military spending with electorate or with elected representatives, eg the siting of bases as a form of US federal ‘pork’; perceived strategic threats) but all these reasons are, I think, outside the ken of Merom’s model. (6) On Clausewitz, I had trouble with the expression of this, and clearly need to revise it. What I meant to say was that whereas Clausewitz and his successors see unity between state, military and society as natural and war as the military pursuit of the interests of society, Merom sees wars (at least small wars) as activities undertaken by the state, but liable to fail because of the opposition of society. I disagree with you, and more importantly, so do Peter Paret and Sir Michael Howard, Clausewitz’s leading translators and exegetes. Clausewitz didn’t see ’ unity between state, military and society as natural’- it was something historically quite new and extraordinary, and wouldn’t necessarily endure. He was one of a number of Prussian military and political reformers, led by Scharnhorst and Gneisenau, horrified by Napoleon’s defeat of Prussia and the other German states. Seeking an answer for this, Clausewitz’s peers- and he was very much a junior member- came up with the idea that Revolutionary and Napoleonic France had had a society which identified with the nation to a degree hitherto unprecedented, which the state was able to translate into military power by spending more on weapons, and conscripting more men, who behaved with unusual fanaticism on the battlefield. ‘On war’ makes it clear that there can be many possible conflicts of state, society and military. Yes, many Germans after Clausewitz took the view that the state was always right, and you could just shut up. It’s like the difference between Hegel and Fichte. I’d recommend Howard’s short book ‘Clausewitz’. (5) ..the problem of winning a small war without resort to brutal means requires that the resources committed be sufficient to achieve overwhelming military superiority. You need to define ‘overwhelming military superiority’. I also think that this can’t be done in terms of numbers of troops plus spending. I would, modestly, like to argue for the virtues of the model I gave in a post above, giving regard to strategic aims, civil and political conditions among the local civilians, military capacity and training and doctrine.

By: Dan Hardie

Dan Hardie — Mon, 31 May 2004 18:12:09 +0000

As a footnote, one must doubt Merom’s point that since GDP spent on wars never exceeded 3% of GDP, cost was never a factor in deciding to exit, or never start, such a war. Tolerance for the costs of a war will depend on other factors: eg how it is financed (eg the inflationary means of financing the Vietnam war chosen by Lyndon Johnson in 1965-7, followed by his 1968 fiscal clampdown, may have diminished support for the war); or on the overall proportion of GDP spent on non-military government spending: higher non-military spending will tend to lead to a) lower military spending in peacetime and thus reduced military capacity at the start of a war; b) to less ‘wriggle room’ to fund a war by special allocations. (Merom’s calculation of the cost of the Algerian war strikes me as extremely dubious, since he should at a minimum include any wartime increase in civil spending in Algeria.) On cultural matters: WW1 did indeed increase distaste for war among democratic societies, but did not prevent most of the same societies from making a similar or greater war effort twenty years later. WW2 had different cultural effects in different ex-combatants. German culture is to a very large degree pacifist even today, and even non-pacifists have a much lower tolerance of the possible use of armed force than many British or American citizens do. The same kind of cultural effects may well have occurred in Japan, the Benelux countries or Scandinavia. British, American, Australian and New Zealand electorates- and possibly also the French- appear to feel that WW2 was ‘justified and successful’, and this, to a considerable extent, counteracts the pacific influence of WW1. Other democracies- India, for example- do not attach great cultural importance to either World War. The delayed cultural effects of the Holocaust have probably discredited the idea among most democratic electorates that ‘western’ societies have a right to impose their rule upon darker-skinned people. Cultural pacifism or bellicosity should be seen as changeable and historically contingent: US support for war and tolerance for casualties probably decreased with the failure in Vietnam or the election of a President derided as a ‘draft dodger’, and probably increased with the September 11th attacks; support for war in Afghanistan is probably higher than support for war in Iraq, since the first is seen as a matter of vital self-defence, and the second is not. Again, Geoffrey Blainey is the best guide to this process.

By: Dan Hardie

Dan Hardie — Mon, 31 May 2004 18:08:34 +0000

I can see what you’re saying much more clearly now, and I think the definition of ‘very small wars’ is important. I still disagree with both yourself and Merom. I’ll post notes to your specific numbered points later. If I can summarise what Merom is saying, and how you dissent from him: Merom: Any nation fighting a small (usually guerrilla) war will only stand a chance of success if it fights with brutality. (Brutality means any combination of free-fire zones, death squads, torture or retaliation against civilians.) Democratic electorates will not long tolerate brutality by their armies: thus democracies are fated to either lose, or never start, small wars. It is this distaste for brutality which explains the historical un-success of democracies in fighting small wars since WW2; they have not suffered military defeats nor had to withdraw on grounds of economic cost, since no small war has ever exceeded 3% of GDP in its costs. Clausewitz regarded war as an instrument of state policy, and believed that the military and society generally accept the state’s definition of war aims, but this is too simple. Quiggin: Any nation fighting a small war will only stand a chance of success if it fights with brutality, or commits overwhelming military force to the struggle. (Overwhelming military force is not really defined, but appears to mean a high ratio of troops to the local civilian population backed by spending sufficient to give commanders the supplies they asked for.) Democratic electorates are very unlikely to authorise the defence spending necessary to fund such campaigns. The underlying reason for this unwillingness is a general cultural distaste for war, increasingly prevalent in the democracies since WW1. Hence democracies are unlikely to be able to win any wars except ‘very small wars’, undertaken by the state using spare capacity in the professional armed forces, funded without the need for any special authorisation, and not involving large casualties. I agree with Merom about Clausewitz. My take on this: Brutality is one way of fighting a guerrilla war, but does not guarantee success, and may even diminish the chances of success. It is not the sole rational choice of a country engaged in a small war. It does also not necessarily disenchant the electorate: some wars fought by democracies using brutality have evoked disgust among electorates, other have not. Whether a democracy wins a small war depends on more than tolerance of brutality or the willingness to fund overwhelming force. Other factors include: ~~formulation of an overall political and strategic goal~~ eg ‘establish an independent government and leave’- capable of gaining the support of a majority of the local civilian population; preconditions that make such a goal realistic (eg a certain level of economic and social development); military capacity to undertake offensive operations, which will probably reflect the proportion of GDP spent on defence; military training and doctrine which enable troops to take the offensive against the enemy without alienating the local civilian population. The willingness to fight wars and suffer losses is probably best described by the kind of process sketched by Geoffrey Blainey- in each decision to fight or continue a specific war, both elites and society will be influenced by the prevailing attitudes to war, the experience of recent wars, the current and expected costs in life and money, the importance to them of the stated goals, the character of the current political leadership, etc. Btw, Clausewitz never saw war as a simple instrument of policy (mistranslation into English) and always posited a dynamic relationship between state, military and society, with each actor capable of influencing the others.

By: John Quiggin

John Quiggin — Sun, 30 May 2004 06:18:30 +0000

(1) The point you object to about GDP is mine rather than Merom’s, and I think you have misread it. Merom only quotes GDP data to show that the economic burden of the wars in question was not so great as to force defeat. The relevant sentence in my review reads “ A typical small war will consume between 0.5 and 3 per cent of GDP and will require a commitment of forces equal to a similar proportion of the population (emphasis added). That is, wars cost both blood and treasure. In most cases, for obvious reasons, the two proportions are going to be broadly similar, and it’s a question of which is more convenient to look at in any given case. (2) I think you’re right that Merom takes small wars to be guerilla wars, on the grounds that the balance of conventional forces is normally so lopsided as to guarantee an easy win for the more advanced country. The few examples I can think of confirm this, though the Falklands looked close at times. I think the Falklands was an anomalous case in a lot of respects, and that it’s not useful to try to fit it into a general theory. (3) Most of the British wars you refer to in the 1919-39 period were fought in the immediate aftermath of WWI and were in important respects continuations of the War. Ireland seems to fit Merom’s model perfectly. More generally, I don’t see that any of them are particularly damaging to my claim that antiwar sentiment was greatly enhanced by WWI (4) With the exception of Malaya (which I’ll discuss below), the postwar British examples you mention are what I’d call very small wars, undertaken by the state using spare capacity in the professional armed forces, funded without the need for any special authorisation, and not involving large casualties (6) On Clausewitz, I had trouble with the expression of this, and clearly need to revise it. What I meant to say was that whereas Clausewitz and his successors see unity between state, military and society as natural and war as the military pursuit of the interests of society, Merom sees wars (at least small wars) as activities undertaken by the state, but liable to fail because of the opposition of society. (5) Coming to the general issue, I want to come down to a position something like the Powell/Shinseki doctrine. That is, the problem of winning a small war without resort to brutal means requires that the resources committed be sufficient to achieve overwhelming military superiority. This in turn means that the maximum scale of operations that can be undertaken is smaller than might be supposed on the basis of a conventional assessment of military capabilities. (7) In this model, the Malayan case seems to me to be at the upper end of what a democratic state is likely to be able to manage. The best estimates I can find are that the Communists had about 8000 fighters against 30 000 British and 100 000 Malay troops and that they had the support of about 10 per cent of the population.

By: Dan Hardie

Dan Hardie — Sat, 29 May 2004 22:35:16 +0000

‘between two sets of uniformed professionals’- Make that ‘uniformed regulars’, obviously.

By: Dan Hardie

Dan Hardie — Sat, 29 May 2004 20:16:43 +0000

Many thanks to Brian Weatherson for having corrected the errors made by myself and John Quiggin on Australian Prime Ministers in WW2, and putting us both straight. ‘Merom’s argument is that , in societies, social resistance to the brutality needed for victory in small wars has risen steadily over time since the early 19th century in line with increasing state dependence on society that characterizes democracy. ’ ‘the brutality needed for victory in small wars?’ I strongly suggest that- at a minimum- Sierra Leone and the Malayan Emergency indicate that a small war can be won by a democracy without brutality- if ‘brutality’ means free-fire zones, death squads or Algerian style torture. If brutality means that all wars involve shooting people dead, then democracies were still prepared to fight and win these wars. I suggest that Malaya and Sierra Leone imply that brutality is not sufficient or necessary to guarantee victory in a small war. An alternative strategic approach exists: building up political support among the civil population to weaken the guerrilla opponent, in tandem with targeted military operations against his armed men. The interesting argument then becomes whether such a strategy can be potentially followed in all guerrilla wars or whether certain preconditions must exist for ‘hearts and minds’ approaches to be potentially successful. But brutality=success is just insupportable given the historical record. You also quote Merom as defining a small war by proportion of GDP consumed, but then the guff he comes out with about democracies needing to be brutal to win small wars- and his three case studies of Algeria, the guerrilla war in Lebanon, and Vietnam- suggest that he equates ‘small war’ with ‘war fought mainly or solely against guerrillas’. But going by his first, GDP-based definition, a small war could be fought between two sets of uniformed professionals, both eschewing brutality because they were more or less abiding by the Geneva Conventions- as, say, the Falklands war was. ‘social resistance has risen steadily over time since the early 19th century’- but this can’t be true. Imperial campaigns became more rather than less common in the mid and late 19th centuries- at a time when the French had (post 1871) universal male suffrage, the British at any rate were expanding male suffrage and the Americans (who fought a particularly brutal campaign in the Phillipines) had universal male suffrage bar Southern blacks. World War I as a bar to small wars? The British fought at least six small wars 1919-39- Ireland,involvement in the Russian Civil war, Third Afghan war, Sudan/British Somaliland, Iraq and Palestine. They fought considerably more post 1945; to mention some of the successful ones, if Oman was fought more or less secretly and Borneo kept quiet, Ministers openly boasted of succesful operations in Malaya in the ‘50s and Sierra Leone three and four years ago. Finally, don’t quote Merom’s schema of military, society and state as if he’d invented it himself. It is lifted more or less straight from Clausewitz, whose ‘triad’ is a notable feature of ‘On War’. If I reviewed one of your papers and spoke of ‘John Quiggin’s invention of a concept he calls comparative advantage’, people would giggle.

By: Giles

Giles — Sat, 29 May 2004 01:33:23 +0000

I think that WW1 is the sociological answer misses many subtitles and isn’t very good at explaining the timing – France and Britain continued to fight small wars with casualties in their thousands for 40 years after the end of the First world war. The US, which didn’t suffer large casualties refrain for 20. Looking at it from a resources perspective is much better at explaining the gradual trend. Technology and young men are the main inputs for small wars; – as expected there ahs been a substitution of technology for humans over the period – hence in people terms the threshold for a medium war has fallen while the GDP quantifier remains constant. It may also explain the tail off in small wars after about 1965, the point at which Western population and productivity growth slowed. Increased productivity and population growth also explains the increased propensity of the US to engage in small wars in the 90’s. And it also explains the differing attitude between Europe and the US as to Iraq; on the basis of technology and population growth, the small war/ very small war threshold may be say 0.5% for Europe (low pop, low productivity) while it is say 1.5% for the US. If we say its consuming about 1% now, this may explain why Europeans are acting as though it’s a huge deal while Americans are more worried that it may become a big deal.

By: John Quiggin

John Quiggin — Fri, 28 May 2004 21:49:17 +0000

I’m glad we’re back to civil discussion. I agree with Dan H that Blainey is well worth reading. I’ve cited him, though at second hand, here. Coming to the more general point raised particularly by Giles, Merom’s argument is that , in societies, social resistance to the brutality needed for victory in small wars has risen steadily over time since the early 19th century in line with increasing state dependence on society that characterizes democracy. He takes the fact that the advanced societies normally won small wars in the 19th and early 20th centuries as evidence in support of this. I put more emphasis than Merom on the disillusioning impact of World War I, which had an immediate impact in reducing support for war in Britain and France and a more delayed one elsewhere (particularly in Australia because of the mixed message of the Anzac legend). Over time, WWI has become a central reference point for all who want to point to war as a futile waste – this may be why we have seen recent attempts to make the case that it was, in some sense, necessary or justified.

By: q

Fri, 28 May 2004 19:02:51 +0000

the Anglo-Irish war 1919-21 was a civil war and so doesn’t count. Ooooooh … contentious from at least 5 different angles … you might want to start at 1916 and even the 1921 settlement did not settle all the issues.

By: Giles

Giles — Fri, 28 May 2004 18:55:02 +0000

Dan sorry to keep moving the goal posts but I’m now reckoning the number of British Wars of the size you cite is closer to 70 or 80 looking down this list http://www.regiments.org/milhist/wars/intro.htm Obvioulsy it would be nice if someone would compile stats of every war greater than x but…. However Loses Agreed – Palestine (although this is a bit of a harsh judgement since he brisith were sent there as peace keepers, not to enforce any particular policy of their own). The Boer War – I classify as a defeat in that the British military victory wasn’t sufficient to enable them to dictate future events. Again I think the previous conflicst should be included as part of the main conflict. the Suez war of 1956 – loss Aden 1967-69- maybe The Suez canal operations up to 1954 – agin why a loss –just a difficult police and not really of sufficient size to classify as a war and can really be seen as preliminary to 1956 the Anglo-Irish war 1919-21 was a civil war and so doesn’t count. The Mau Mau campaign – I’m not sure how this can be classified as a loss since the Mau Mau were comprehensively wiped out. I think though you’re clutching at straw by trying to include Greece – if you dissemble major wars include every sub campaign of WW1 and WW2 we soon goning to get to 1000+ wars. And India was a “potential war” not an actual one. So I still think we’re looking a about a 10% loss rate.

By: DCharles

DCharles — Fri, 28 May 2004 14:52:30 +0000

Aaaah. I am happy now. ;)

By: Dan Hardie

Dan Hardie — Fri, 28 May 2004 14:31:05 +0000

q- the British certainly lost the Palestine war, and US pressure was certainly a factor in their defeat- as it later was in Suez in 1956. Iraq and Palestine were separate wars. dcharles- I agree and thank you for your efforts. JQ: I read your para on Merom’s Algeria data as meaning that the war led to an increase of expenditure on Algeria of 1.8 points of GDP from peacetime levels. Okay, you didn’t mean that; I admit to being mystified as to why Merom doesn’t say what the increase following the outbreak of war was. I would have thought Merom should have presented expenditure on Algeria in the last year of peace and then given the data for wartime expenditure; he’d also need to look at increases in, and changes to priorities within, French defence spending. I was annoyed at my own silly mistake on Curtin/Menzies, and at the guy who sneered at me because of it, and consequently came out with the uncalled-for remark about Australian unimportance. Not really true, apart from anything else: Australia was in many ways the most advanced social democracy of the last 100 years, as well as militarily crucial to the defeat of Japan. Obviously this annoyed JQ, and I can see why. My further point about Australia not being fully mobilised for WW1 also seems to have annoyed JQ, who angrily pointed to the ~~truly dreadful~~ Australian casualties. Please believe me that I would never disparage Australian sacrifice in WW1 or WW2 (or Korea, Malaya- the list is very long). Australian willingness to fight for the Empire was extraordinary, and Australian military performance far better than British. But I do say that the Australian polity did not mobilise for war as completely as the major European combatants. Merom, and Quiggin in his review, refer pretty much exclusively to proportion of GDP spent on war as a measure of how ‘big’ or ‘small’ a war was for a country. Using this metric, Australia wasn’t mobilised as thoroughly as Britain. Nor was it if you use other metrics: eg the proportion of manpower in the services and in directly war-related industries. Again, Australian enlistment in the armed forces (voluntary throughout the war) was comparable to the British rate; but the mobilisation of the Australian workforce did not compare to the British ditto, which by the end of the war entailed the effective conscription of pretty much the entire male population plus much of the female population for either war work or military service. (Strictly speaking British military enlistment was voluntary until 1916, but de facto if not de jure pressures worked to get many men into uniform before then.) As I say, that point of mine annoyed JQ- but a) it wasn’t meant to and b) if JQ objects to my classifying Australia as not fully mobilised for war, he needs to address Merom’s reliance on GDP figures as a metric of mobilisation.

By: Brian Weatherson

Brian Weatherson — Fri, 28 May 2004 14:19:25 +0000

I’m not sure how relevant this is to the overall thread, but just for the record it’s worth noting that Menzies wasn’t forced out by Curtin. He lost support within his own party, and was replaced as PM by Arthur Fadden href=”http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Arthur_Fadden” rel=”nofollow”>http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Arthur_Fadden. Fadden’s government collapsed in little over a month (because it lost the support of conservative independents) and then Curtin took over. And, like FDR, stayed in office until he died near the end of the war.

By: John Quiggin

John Quiggin — Fri, 28 May 2004 13:45:15 +0000

dcharles, I agree that I should not have lost my temper with DH, so I will attempt a civil response to one point he makes and see how we go from there. JQ: Acccording to Merom, state expenses in Algeria rose from 1.0 per cent of GDP in 1955 to a peak of 2.8 per cent in 1959 of which about 2/3 were military. So the cost of the war was under 2 per cent of GDP throughout.’ DH: I cringe at Merom’s ignorance. Given that the Algerian war kicked off in 1954, the base year in this comparison ought to be 1953 as the last year of peace, not 1955. My response: This was not presented a comparison with 1955 as a base year. The point is that on the evidence given, peak military expenditure 2/3 of 2.8 was less than 2 per cent, and for most of the war, expenditure was well below this level. I suppose the other reading is possible if you assume that Merom knows nothing about his subject or that I haven’t read his book, but I don’t see why DH feels justified in making these assumptions.

By: DCharles

DCharles — Fri, 28 May 2004 13:29:00 +0000

JQ/DH- There is a long tradition of philosophical debate in which all parties feel valued members of the discussion. Why don’t you two just “kiss and make up” (electronically of course)!