MovieChat Forums > Heir to an Execution Discussion > This is what I noticed...

This is what I noticed...

posted 19 years ago by cindy-113
9 replies | jump to latest

I think it was obvious that Ivy found out her grandparents did do something against the US. Toward the end of this documentary, she, her father, uncle, and others kept saying "they weren't guilty of what they were charged with." Perhaps not, but they were guilty of committing traitorous acts against the US. It seems to me that Julius and Ethel gave their lives for communism. They were traitors to the US, but not traitors to their own conscience. They truly believed in communism and thought they were doing the right thing. Too bad they didn't live long enough to see what communism really was, and how it destroyed the people of the USSR.

And it's too bad the US has not kept communism/socialism from creeping into our government anyway. It has taken since about 1920 or 1930, but the US is inches away from becoming communist in every way but in name through dictatorial socialist judges.

[–] cubandharma 17 years ago

Cindy, you are so right!! I am a Cuban-American and that is such a litmus test now a days: you see what happens in our universies and then you compare that to what happened in Cuba and you realize that commusnism might be dead but we still have a lot opeople hoping for another try at socialism. The fact that it has never worked doesn't seem to bother them.
The problem is that Fidel is workshiped here in the US by academics who refuse to see the truth of Cuba. Go to therealcuba.com and see pictures of the free health care system. Teh Rosenberg's were ideologues whom condemend us to 50 years of terror under the nuclear threat.
Not just the Venona Project but also the cables declassified after the fall of the USSR that show how both Julius AND Ethel were quilty! No excuse. Just that she Ivy is so innocent still wanting to find a redeaming quality in her gradparents behavior.

[–] Balberith 16 years ago

I totally agree!

P.S.

CUBA LIBRE!!!!!

"A real man would rather bow down to a strong woman than dominate a weak one"

[–] Goomba01 15 years ago

For cryin' out loud people! If the Russians or any other country wanted those plans they were going to get them somehow. If it wasn't the Rosenbergs or some other informant, it would be with some other method. It just stands to reason. You think one country is actually going to be able to manufacture nuclear weapons and the rest of the world is going to sit idly by waiting to be attacked? Get real. What is wrong here is the manufacure and use of nuclear weapons by any country, including the U.S. You think dropping bombs on Japan was a good thing? As far as I'm concerned it was just as evil as any country using them.

"We're not going to Guam are we?--Frank Lapidus (Lost S5 "316")

[–] NicotineNellie 15 years ago

Dropping the bomb on Japan was the lesser of all evils. It saved lives long term. Lots of them, even Japanese. Crybabies never understand that. Nobody from that generation even gives it a second thought. If the Japanese were so ready to surrender, why not surrender after Hiroshima? They had 3 days to do it.

[–] ShelbyTMItchell 14 years ago

A lot of people think of what the Rosenbergs, mainly Julius and the Greenglasses have done. We now have a war going on with North Korea and Iran. See where Ivy Merepol is going with this in what she said in bringiner her grandparents back home. But still, when you think of communism, you think of "Better dead than red."
People in the 1940's and 1950's mainly were afraid of communism. And still are but not like in that era.
Feel bad for her family as both the Greenglasses and the Rosenbergs have continued to shun them over this. Don't blame the sons and their families.
Blame Julius and the Greenglasses. And to a lesser extent, Ethel.
Ethel's only crime, whether she would like it or not, would had been to report her husband.

[–] jbi390 11 years ago

So, after Pearl Harbor we should have just kept the war going? Japan made a pre-emptive strike against the harbor. Or do you know about that part of Japan's warring history?

[–] tedmccarron 13 years ago

Generally I wholeheartedly agree with this post, except for a couple things. As for the comment "Too bad they didn't live long enough to see what communism really was..." are you kidding me? By the time of the Rosenbergs' arrest Stalin had murdered and terrorized millions, as had his predecessor Lenin. They absolutley lived long enough to see the horrors of Communism, in the USSR and elsewhere.

As for the comment "They were traitors to the US, but not traitors to their own conscience", a more accurate sentence would be that they were not traitors to the the evil ideology they followed. Anyone with a "conscience" would necessarily have to be a hardcore anti-Communist.

[–] zephyr-123 12 years ago

"Dropping the bomb on Japan was the lesser of all evils."

What was the point of dropping the other bomb other than to just be sadistic.

"It saved lives long term. Lots of them, even Japanese"

From what I've read, the Japanese were horrified to learn that when these particular bombs are used, the devastation doesn't end after the initial blast. The damage to people and the environment continues into future generations. They couldn't understand how a bomb could keep killing for much time after it had already been detonated.

"Crybabies never understand that."

Having empathy for others, even though they aren't Americans, is not being a crybaby. It's having some humanity. It's easy to say it's no big deal when you didn't have to live in the horror yourself. Crack a book sometime and read what these people experienced instead of just blowing it off.

"Nobody from that generation even gives it a second thought."

Nobody from that generation gave a lot of things a second thought like racism (lynching black people for no other reason other than the fact they were black) and sexism. Children had zero rights and beating the sh!t out of them was common and acceptable. There was a lot of stupidity in those days about a lot of things. You also have to take into account that people in those days even though they were told about the bomb didn't really have a clear picture of what it was or how destructive it was until later. You can see when you look into history about it that gradually people became more and more fightened and incensed about the use of nuclear weapons the more they learned about it. A lot of that generation's "not questioning" was due to not knowing enough about it and not knowing how it actually affected the Japanese who were in or close to the blast.

"You think you know, what you are, what's to come--You haven't even begun." BtVS

[–] smokehill retrievers 10 years ago

Maybe you should actually read some history, rather than recycled whining from Mother Jones or the Huffington Post.

There was virtually zero fallout, by the way since both bombs were air bursts -- though I doubt you know what fallout is, or what causes it. Rebuilding of both cities started immediately and there has been NO health or environmental damage reported beyond what happened in the initial seconds after the bursts. The fact that some health aftereffects didn't show up immediately is irrelevant.

The best casualty estimates from an invasion of Japan range around a million lives, if not more. The nukes accomplished this with a fraction of the casualties.

Japan refused to surrender after the first bomb, so they got a second one. Their poor judgment -- not our problem.

We spent a fortune helping rebuild Japan and its economy afterward, as we did in Germany. You think the Japanese or Germans would have done the same? If it hadn't been for us, both would probably be third-world countries now, if they even existed.

You obviously know little of history, and absolutely nothing about the effects of nuclear radiation.