This is just my hypothesis, but I think it's for "brand". They didn't destroyed only books but basically everything, because of this many cities surrendered without even trying to fight back. In that case your civilization was preserved. That's why the mongols were able to conquer so much so quickly, fear build on these horrible actions.
you still need to know what is appropriate to try. Depending on the problem there might be colossal mistakes that you can make just because you don't know what's behind the scenes.
It's the largest single armed conflict since World War II, and yet it has less visibility than the Korean War (2,859,574 casualties [1]), Vietnam War (1,450,000 casualties [2]), or the Iraq War (654,965 casualties [3]). It's even worse known that the deaths through famines induced during the Cultural Revolution in China (400,000, rough estimate [4]).
It has less visibility than those because there were no western nations (and hence western media) involved with boots on the ground. Or planes in the air, for that matter. The other thing is that the bulk of deaths were knock-on deaths from things like famine and disease rather than military violence.
However, it is still a good indication of just how little attention we pay to Africa here in the west, that people in general don't even know that it existed.
Also when British Empire and similar were in Africa stopping the wars and the like it was considered racist so now the done thing is to leave the Africans to it.
'stopping the wars' wasn't considered the racist part. 'taking all their stuff and not giving much back' was.
And for the Congo in particular, their experience under Belgian (well, Leopold II) rule was so horrific that other colonial powers exerted pressure on Leopold to give it up. The death toll in the Congo at that time was about the same as for the recent Second Congo War (plus the war's aftermath). Given the population of the day, it's estimated that the Belgian rule in the Congo halved the population, whereas the recent war 'only' claimed a bit less than 10%. The Belgian rule also left a lot of people maimed without hands, since there were bounties on hands, and the payors weren't too fussy about where they came from. Leopold II is one of history's lesser-known evil kingpins. After Leopold was forced to hand it over for management elsewhere, it became a more regular colonial story of exploitation for little in return.
In short, for Congo in particular, the modern day is better than it's experience in colonial times, even with the recent war.
for me one of the best things in London is the weather, as it never gets too hot, It's sunny but not too much, and it doesn't rain as much as you would expect. But I have to say that I really hate too much sun and heat.
I think they are talking about beautiful natural places where you can spend sometimes alone. It's my biased interpretation, living in London I don't care about musicals, museums (just because they are always full of people) or anything with concrete in it or crowded, I just want a beautiful place where I can spend some time alone.
>So what is your age limit? If 16, why not 15? And if 15, why not 12, or 10, or 7, or 5?
so why 18 then. The age limit is just a line in the sand that is different in differents states and for different things (driving, drinking, having sexual relationships)
