David wrote:ronrat wrote:In some circumstances yes. The Italians were pretty much highly productive and many stayed in the areas. They didn't want to go back and die for Mussolini. At least we interred them and didn't give them a one way ticket to a "shower". A lot of boys of German descent fought in WW 1 for Australia because their families fled German persecution. But WW2 was fought on different ideologies and the Government of the day had no mechanism to handle it all. Our intelligence services were British to the bootsraps and they had their hands full with communists as well. It was natural they would be suspicious of Germans and later the Japanese, both who inflicted casualties in Australian waters (Centaur and Sydney 11). It is better to be safe than sorry. What would you have done differently?David wrote:^ And you think that was OK?
I would not have indefinitely imprisoned people who had committed no crime. But what do you think? If, for whatever reason, Australia and Thailand end up on opposing sides of a conflict, would you be happy to go to say goodbye to your home, the Missus and everyday life and head off to a Thai prison for three or four years? Or do you think that might be going a bit far?
The question isn't whether he'd like it, of course he wouldn't.
The questions is, would Thailand be justified in doing it?
The correct answer is, don't know it would depend on the situation at the time.
Would you like being conscripted and either sent off to fight in a war or sent to prison if you refused? I bet not, that doesn't mean that conscription isn't sometimes necessary.
What's that saying? The needs of the state and the majority outweigh the needs of the individual?
