by Greg Slack

Created on: March 08, 2010   Last Updated: March 09, 2010

The difference between WWII and what we face today is a multitude of factors. All of them equally relevant and each a difference in and of itself. Here I will try and give a brief summary of the major differences we can all see readily enough if we choose to look objectively.

We knew who the enemy was in WWII.

This is a prime factor in our apparent division over the wars in both Afghanistan and Iraq. We have so many choices in news and so many differing opinions on it, the true enemy is often unclear.

With networks owned by large corporations each with their own agendas (no matter how subtle or obvious), we often get nearly polar opposite reports from each news program.

Watch Fox news and you get one version, watch MSNBC and you get another. Agree or disagree with either networks political leanings, the fact still remains they both cater to their respective owners wishes to some degree. And this makes the country divided in what they believe as well as how they feel about the conflicts.

In WWII we knew the bad guys and most knew categorically they were evil. We had two forms of media back then, radio and press, and they were usually reporting without prejudice to one political party or another. If not, at least they put it aside in that time of war.

In WWII our allies were well known and vocal.

Again this is a huge difference compared to today. We went into Iraq and had very little international support. We were often times labled warmongers by much of Europe and the rest of the world.

While they debated our actions much of our news media would cast doubts upon any and all who dared speak out against the conflicts. Any allies we had outside of the UK were usually very quiet about it.

We also cannot forget we were told so much about so many different Allies and enemies, their identities and affiliations often became muddled together. The Taliban was what? Al Qaeda was who? Names, groups, political regimes, all of it was updated by the minute and often one report would be nearly in direct opposition of the last.

In the end we had half the population thinking Bin Laden was leader of the Taliban and Al Qaeda was the Afghan government who oppressed the people there.

WWII had no such information overload and this resulted in perhaps slower reporting but less conflicting and confusing stories. It was easier to remember a few bad guys and a few good guys when they were just a few.

The Great Depression.

Just before we got involved in the war, The Great Depression had

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