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falcor84today at 3:42 AM2 repliesview on HN

Yes.

Absolutely.

If there are invaders who are killing everybody around me and telling me that they'll stop and generally let me be if I surrender and agree to live in a democracy, I expect that I'll be very inclined to accept. Maybe afterwards, if I see it's not working out, I may still consider guerrilla resistance down the line, but I don't see the benefit of fighting and most likely dying just for the sake of defiance, and to then allow any survivors a chance to continue in their resistance for another decade or so, until eventually they might be able to start rebuilding a nation from the rabble.

In what world is surrender, keeping our lives and infrastructure, not a more rational approach?

EDIT: To be clear, while I occasionally have pacifistic thoughts on pretty spring days, I'm not arguing for pacifism here - fighting is absolutely rational when you have a clear path to victory, but if you don't, then I think it's just an absolute waste of human lives.


Replies

WalterBrighttoday at 6:25 AM

Fighting is rational when the alternative is being killed.

FDR made a big mistake announcing that he was going for unconditional surrender. This resulted in Germany fighting to the bitter end. Hitler dragged it on to the last few hours - he knew what was going to happen to him when the war ended.

trick-or-treattoday at 8:24 AM

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