I just want to highlight that this is the third time I correctly predicted the future. — Benkei

?

sometimes seems like people read one sentence and then don't care before answering. — Christoffer

Sadly, that is to be expected. Not everybody cares as much as you do.

Some of your interlocutors just put out vague faint generalities that they are unable to support with facts? They don't read what you write? They argue from a position of ignorance and adopt a cavalier attitude? You can safely conclude that they don't care in the least about the issue being discussed. It's as simple as that. Because if they truly cared they would care about facts and logic, they would pay attention.

As a rule of thumb, people care very much or very little for some event or crisis depending upon their potential personal exposure and proximity or distance to the crisis. So for instance, the exposure of someone living in Australia to the Ukraine war is minimal and implies from Australians a certain detachement. They won't inform themselves about it very much, why should they? But naturally, they might care and know more things about koalas and kangaroos. While someone positioned in or near Ukraine would naturally care more and might be a bit better informed about what's happening in Kiev (but perhaps less so about kangaroos).

Was looking for this, came out two days ago, but, worth a read. He's the best one of them all, but I'm quite biased.

Chomsky's take on the issue:

https://truthout.org/articles/noam-chomsky-us-military-escalation-against-russia-would-have-no-victors/

. Do you forget that Russia has been twice rebuffed upon expressing a desire to join NATO? (Molotov's proposal that the USSR join NATO in 1954, and Putin's expression of interest in the early years of this millenium). The U.S. did never want another "superpower" within NATO precisely because NATO is an expression and an appendage of U.S. hegemonic policy, and was determined to have no rivals within the "alliance". — Joseph Zbigniewski

Russia isn't a superpower, not with Ukraine at least, and then this idea about US never wanting Russia in NATO simply is against the historical facts how things went. NATO membership was a possibility, but nobody had interest in it.

As I replied to @Manuel of the same issue, here it is again:

Vladimir Putin wanted Russia to join Nato but did not want his country to have to go through the usual application process and stand in line “with a lot of countries that don’t matter”, according to a former secretary general of the transatlantic alliance.

George Robertson, a former Labour defence secretary who led Nato between 1999 and 2003, said Putin made it clear at their first meeting that he wanted Russia to be part of western Europe. “They wanted to be part of that secure, stable prosperous west that Russia was out of at the time,” he said.

The Labour peer recalled an early meeting with Putin, who became Russian president in 2000. “Putin said: ‘When are you going to invite us to join Nato?’ And [Robertson] said: ‘Well, we don’t invite people to join Nato, they apply to join Nato.’ And he said: ‘Well, we’re not standing in line with a lot of countries that don’t matter.’”

And that's actually how close it was. Or how far it was, as you would have needed larger than life politicians to sell that membership both to Russians and Americans. But you see, Americans thought they won the Cold War and didn't need Russia. And Russia can go always back into remembering Napoleon and Hitler.

I'm really not making it up when I say people were truly thinking of Russian partnership in NATO. Russia was in the partnership-for-peace program. It was the time of "new threats" for NATO when people laughed about thinking of article 5. Now Putin has molded NATO back to it's original form. If pre-2008 NATO didn't care anything about issues like defending the Baltic states from a hypothetical attack from Russia, now they sure do and also train for it.

Sadly, that is to be expected. Not everybody cares as much as you do. — Olivier5

Yeah, I might rage off, but that may be because I care a lot about stopping a tyrant, some seem to care more about winning an argument.

To stop something, the actual truth is more important than holding an ideological ground. I was against NATO before all of this, I didn't think Sweden should join. But Putin changed the game 180.

So for instance, the exposure of someone living in Australia to the Ukraine war is minimal and implies from Australians a certain detachement. — Olivier5

Well, according to nuclear war predictions, the least fallout would be in Australia, or New Zealand with an average of -35 degrees celsius. So a cozy atomic winter future for anyone who would even survive the worst outcome. So no wonder you could be detached down under. :sweat:

First it was cultural figures, students and scientists in Russia who opposed the war.

Now you start having grumblings from the corporations too:

Russian energy giant Lukoil calls for immediate end of Ukraine war

MOSCOW, Russia — Russian oil giant Lukoil on Thursday called for an immediate halt to fighting in Ukraine, one of the first major domestic firms to speak out against Moscow’s invasion of its pro-Western neighbor.

The board “expresses its concern over the ongoing tragic events in Ukraine and its deepest sympathy to all those affected by this tragedy,” the company said in a statement.

“We stand for the immediate cessation of the armed conflict and fully support its resolution through the negotiation process and through diplomatic means,” its note added.

Enlarging the war in Ukraine to an all-out war was the beginning of the end of Putin. The Russian military wasn't so efficient as he thought, likely because the operation to annex Crimea in 2014 went so well. How long it will take, nobody knows...

Another article warning about passing on false information and trying to be an expert when you're not. :grimace:

Yeah, I might rage off, but that may be because I care a lot about stopping a tyrant, some seem to care more about winning an argument. — Christoffer

I suspect, and this is not a criticism, that you also have skin in the game, literally. Your life could be affected.

I was against NATO before all of this, I didn't think Sweden should join. But Putin changed the game 180. — Christoffer

NATO is better than the alternative. It's a mess right now though, with rather weak US leadership since a very looooong time. If NATO is a US puppet, it's one that the spoiled child has misplace under her bed.

I accept your characterization of the events in question, save for the fact that when Russia expressed interest in 1954 it was indeed a "superpower" by any definition of that word. What you ignore, however, is the fact that is not accepted by some here: that NATO has always danced to the tune whistled by the U.S., and Russia was not willing to enter the alliance under those circumstances. Russians, thinking theirs a "great country" would require parity with the U.S. if Russia were to become part of NATO, something the U.S. would never allow.

As for NATO developing to represent an "appendage of U.S. hegemony", this was something that Charles de Gaulle expressed concern about before the signing of the North Atlantic Treaty in 1949. I am sure that @Olivier5 can verify this with a bit of research. That the U.S. currently enjoys de facto suzerainty within NATO is evidenced by the fact that neither France nor Germany wanted to allow either Georgia or Ukraine to become NATO members for fear of provoking Russia, but George W. Bush (so filled with the American "mythos" that he stank like poopie) wanted it, wanted NATO to grow eastward, and so both countries were promised eventual membership (France and Germany be damned), and the path to membership was initiated. What happened? Georgia was invaded, and now Ukraine is invaded. What else did Bush think was going to happen? Is this not essentially the point that @Isaac was trying to make in his lengthy interlocution with @Christoffer?

There is also an aspect of this situation about which I have not made mention: the cultural aspect to which @schopenhauer1 alluded above:

Russia would have to conform to a bunch of standards it has never really had to try to live up to, as far as democratically... — schopenhauer1

This is a complicated and difficult aspect of the current situation. I am not of a mind to delve too deeply into it, but basically, both NATO and the EU are emanations of "Western Culture" (a "cultural block" of the world), meaning that they are the products of "Enlightenment" thinking. They have as a tacit, unstated purpose to spread the values of the Enlightenment to the entire world. To "make the world safe for democracy", as it were. In my opinion (as I analyze the world), there are other "cultural blocks" which reject the thinking of the Enlightenment to varying degrees, which cultural blocks include: the Fundamentalist Islamic Block, the Liberal Islamic Block, the Hispanic Cultural Block, and that of which Russia is a part, the Oligarchic/Aristocratic Cultural Block. Russia would be willing to join NATO only so long as it didn't have to adopt Enlightenment values (which after all, are not appropriate for all peoples and all cultures around the world, just ask the Taliban) lock, stock, and barrel. As I say, I don't want to get too deeply into this complicated and nuanced aspect of this thing, but there you have a brief statement of it.

As I have said, I did not intend to become a "member" of your online community, but rather to comment on a couple of topics that have been raised here. Accepting things generally as they appear, I am in no way a philosopher, and probably would not have much of value to add in general (probably not smart enough). Therefore, after I sign off now, I will probably not be participating any further, having said what I wanted to say.

My complements on an interesting website and an interesting discussion.

:point: "It’s easy to understand why those suffering from the crime may regard it as an unacceptable indulgence to inquire into why it happened and whether it could have been avoided. Understandable, but mistaken. If we want to respond to the tragedy in ways that will help the victims, and avert still worse catastrophes that loom ahead, it is wise, and necessary, to learn as much as we can about what went wrong and how the course could have been corrected. Heroic gestures may be satisfying. They are not helpful." :up:

+"There is nothing to say about Putin’s attempt to offer legal justification for his aggression. Its merit is zero.

Of course, it is true that the U.S. and its allies violate international law without a blink of an eye, but that provides no extenuation for Putin’s crimes."

Everyone should just read the interview. Summarizes a lot of what some of us have been trying to get across here.

Of course they do do dominate NATO but nevertheless, this organisation, a few weeks ago still, seemed to have forgotten its mission and lacked in coherence. When i say the US leadership was weak, I count in there their shoddy business in Ukraine and other places, bypassing Europe. So I guess we agree that this crisis finds the atlantic alliance in a rather poor shape, with potential for disunion, temporary suppressed in a union sacrée against the bear. Let us hope this crisis leads to a rejuvenated alliance where European voices are heard a little more. Even those who don't speak English very well... One can always hope.

:up:

He's very sharp.

Agreed, it's a finely balanced analysis.

Cue him stacking the premises in such a way until you agree that the only correct answer can be the US. Never mind history and facts! — Benkei

I really don't think we should get involved in this one directly. :chin:
Now paint the best air defense we have, paint it NATO blue and end it before it goes nuclear. :fire:

"There is nothing to say about Putin’s attempt to offer legal justification for his aggression. Its merit is zero.

Of course, it is true that the U.S. and its allies violate international law without a blink of an eye, but that provides no extenuation for Putin’s crimes." — Baden

Of course. But why should Russia be a ninny?

Russians, thinking theirs a "great country" would require parity with the U.S. if Russia were to become part of NATO, something the U.S. would never allow. — Joseph Zbigniewski

This is a very, very important point! Because Russia didn't have parity. It's economy is small.

Here you would have needed "larger than life" politicians on both side for this to work. On the US side there should have been someone that understood that there were no Americans tanks on the Red Square when Soviet Union collapse: the US didn't win the Cold War. The Soviet experiment just utterly failed and collapsed by itself. The Cold War was only part of it. Hence US should have understood that Russia can bounce back, as Russia usually does, and has to be dealt with silk gloves, special treatment. The Americans just saw a failing state, nothing else.

Hence in Russia, there wasn't such truly wholesome soul searching as had happened in (West) Germany and Japan after WW2. How everything before had absolutely and horribly failed. Nothing like that happened in Russia. The Soviet Union collapsed because the biggest member, the Russian Federation under Boris Yeltsin, was against the whole union after the Putsch.

(For our country's leadership this was a total "WTF-happened?" -moment. The Finns sent their foreign minister to Moscow to end the Cold War era agreements with the Soviet Union, only to return when there was nobody in Moscow on the Soviet side. So they had to sign new agreements with Russia and unilaterally terminate some parts of the peace treaty like the article that no weapons could be bought from Germany and other stuff like that.)

Also Russian politicians would have had to understand that the Empire was truly over. That once countries opt for Independence, they are away. It's really a divorce. The end. A hard, bitter issue for Russia to swallow and then find try a new place in the World afterwards. The only way to climb to parity would have been for Russia to create an economy comparable to German or Japan, which actually could have been possible. At least theoretically. But in order to do that in Russia, people like Sergei Brin ought to have stayed in Russia and not moving to the US to establish Google. Not to give the economy to the looting oligarchs. As from the Chinese example we should understand: It's the economy, stupid!

That the U.S. currently enjoys de facto suzerainty within NATO is evidenced by the fact that neither France nor Germany wanted to allow either Georgia or Ukraine to become NATO members for fear of provoking Russia, but George W. Bush — Joseph Zbigniewski

Well, those were the words of one President, words that perhaps a Republican President like Trump could have forgotten. Just look at how long Turkey has had EU membership talks....for many decades now! Is Turkey going to be an EU member? No.

The basic fact is that Putin doesn't understand NATO. The "No Action Talk Only" club is actually similar to EU in that actually the European members want it like that. The European countries want to keep the US in Europe. This is what many don't understand. US liked the idea of European integration, but so did also the Europeans! Hence NATO worked were CENTO and SEATO failed. Yet NATO members can either join or abstain from any mission the US wants them to join. Let's just remember how utterly dissappointed the Dubya Bush administration was at "old" Europe. Or how first Obama tried to get the Europeans to spend more in defense and then Trump wanted the same. Nope, didn't happen.

It only happened now thanks to Putin! How Vladimir Putin could finally transform Germany is one of the huge dramatic events that are happening just now.

Yes yes but what for? What is the end game here? What are the goals of the great nations of the world right now, isn't it more power and domination over the others, in some sort of an international squid game? Is that what the human race was meant for? — FreeEmotion

What else?

Human existence is a mixed bag, and living on a planet where resources are scarce and relatively hard to obtain, this mixed bag is all it can be.

What is amazing is how philosophically unprepared most people seem to be for this. They are operating on the conviction that life on earth not only should be heaven, but that it _can_ be heaven. And that the only reason why it isn't is because some people are just evil.

They keep having those WW II memorials, saying "so that things like that would never happen again", but they never actually analyze why those things happened in the first place. And more, they fail to understand that merely remembering them is _not_ going to prevent them from happening again.

Of course, bringing up heavy existential topics in the abstract at a time like this will by many be judged as nothing other than perverse ... but it's the same in peace times, when nobody wants to think about such things because they're enjoying themselves too much.

So it's never the right time to think about heavy existential topics, while time marches on.

From the NY Times

"The sanctions “are severe enough to dismantle Russia’s economy and financial system, something we have never seen in history,” Carl B. Weinberg, chief economist at High Frequency Economics, wrote this week.

The real problem is that Russia has always had this border issue: there aren't any obvious geographical borders, but flatland from Europe to Asia. And hence they've always been insisting on having more territory for defense and see springboards everywhere where they are threatened. And of course, the threat of the enemy serve authoritarian regimes well. — ssu

*sigh*

Why is the notion of "protecing your own country" so hard to understand when it is applied to Russia?

From the NY Times

"The sanctions “are severe enough to dismantle Russia’s economy and financial system, something we have never seen in history,” Carl B. Weinberg, chief economist at High Frequency Economics, wrote this week. — frank

And the NY Times etc. think that the Russian government hasn't taken this into consideration?

Does nobody play chess? In chess, in order to win, one has to be willing to sacrifice all figures except one.

*sigh*

Why is the notion of "protecing your own country" so hard to understand when it is applied to Russia? — baker

Simple answer: Because it's constantly changing it's borders! It has problems to know just where it's country ends. Just look at Ukraine now and what Putin is saying about the country.

Russia's defense of it's country has been for others Russia's invasions and imperialism. Is that hard to understand?

Fixed it — Isaac

CIA-trained Ukrainian paramilitaries may take central role if Russia invades – YahooNews

The Biden administration weighs backing Ukraine insurgents if Russia invades – WashingtonPost

The CIA is overseeing a secret intensive training program in the U.S. for elite Ukrainian special operations forces and other intelligence personnel, according to five former intelligence and national security officials familiar with the initiative. The program, which started in 2015, is based at an undisclosed facility in the Southern U.S.
“The United States is training an insurgency,” said a former CIA official, adding that the program has taught the Ukrainians how “to kill Russians.”
The program, which does not appear to have ever been formally aimed at preparing for an insurgency, did include training that could be used for that purpose.
The Biden administration has reportedly assembled a task force to determine how the CIA and other U.S. agencies could support a Ukrainian insurgency,

According to former CIA Russia analyst Michael van Landingham, “Russia is going to lie anyway, and try and shape a narrative”, which may well be the case. But the West seems to be making every effort to catch up, if not surpass, the Russians.

For example, while some stories of Ukrainian resistance seem genuine, many of the most popular ones have been exposed as fake.

Ukraine: The fake images 'showing Ukrainian resistance to the Russian army' – The Observers

Ukraine conflict: Further false images shared online – BBC

7 FAKE NEWS Stories Coming Out of Ukraine – Truth Unmuted

Ukrainian border guards massacred for telling Russian warship to “fu.. off”? – FAKE
Russian planes flying over Kiev? – FAKE
Laughing Russian troops parashooting over Ukrainian farms? - FAKE
Luhansk power station explosion? – FAKE
Zelenskiy visiting troops on the frontline? – FAKE
First Lady of Ukraine takes up arms against the Russian army? – FAKE
Ukrainian woman explaining how to drive abandoned or stolen tanks from the Russian army? – FAKE
Ukrainian girl fighting a Russian soldier? – FAKE
Ukrainian jet pilot shooting down Russian planes? – FAKE
Ukrainian ground forces downing Russian aircraft? – FAKE
Ukrainian drones destroying advancing Russian columns? – FAKE

These and many other stories belong to myths spread on platforms like Twitter, Facebook, and TikTok and are viewed millions of times (one of them 24+m times) across the globe.

So it does look like mankind cannot live without myth. Ancient mythologies are being swapped for new and people seem to be only too happy to live in a make-believe world shaped by narratives churned out by the global mass media ….

With Russia, the levels are the following:

1. CONSTANT
2. ELEVATED
3. MILITARY DANGER
4. FULL

Now Putin is at 2. Or something like that. — ssu

A Russian military expert commenting on Putin's statement said that he couldn't parse it: the term that he used, though it sounded official, wouldn't actually mean anything to the military. So either Putin was bluffing, or he did issue some kind of an order, but we have no idea what it really was.

President Putin continues to escalate – putting Russia’s nuclear forces on high alert, threatening to invade Finland and Sweden.

I haven't heard that from the Russians. That I would put in the "hyping fear" category. — ssu

I think this was in reference to this:

In the other hand, we have a population dying in their houses because Putin does not recognize the Ukranian sovereignity. — javi2541997

Democarcy comes with a cost. Everyone is responsible. Nobody is innocent.

Incidentally ssu, in previous episodes Aimen Dean dismisses the inside job conspiracy theory about the Russian apartment bombings, and he's a person who knows a lot about the North Caucasian jihad. — jamalrob

I listened to that podcast earlier, and I don't know what to think of it. Not that I was fully on board with the "conspiracy theory," but the way they presented the story was just bizarre. They were talking about a bombing in Moscow as if it was the only one. In fact, there were a total of four apartment bombings in ten days, two of them in Moscow. But the incidents that are thought to provide the strongest evidence for the conspiracy theory were the bombings that didn't happen. You can read more about them in the Wiki article and elsewhere. Yet somehow Thomas and Aimen appear to be completely unaware of any of this context.

I did listen to the latest Russia episode. It's interesting, but again, there are these superficial glosses on the US role in supposedly instigating "color revolutions" in the former Soviet sphere. Seeing this complex and varied dynamics as a game between Russia and the big Western powers is the exact reflection of Russian establishment's thinking, and I think it's delusional. Supporting NGO's and such may have had some influence on events, but it wouldn't have been decisive.

It won't interest anyone outside of the small circle of opera lovers, but... Never mind nukes. Anna Netrebko, very big-name Russian diva, just got kicked out of the Metropolitan Opera in New York for her continuing loyalty to Putin--probably permanently. A joint project with the Bolshoi was also dropped. — Bitter Crank

And Valery Gergiev has been kicked out of everywhere. Two of the greatest musicians of our time. Sad. (Although, truth be told, they sold their souls to the devil a long time ago, and I've been avoiding them ever since - not that it mattered to anyone but myself.)

Simple answer: Because it's constantly changing it's borders! It has problems to know just where it's country ends. Just look at Ukraine now and what Putin is saying about the country. — ssu

*sigh*

Russia's defense of it's country has been for others Russia's invasions and imperialism. Is that hard to understand?

That's what I'm talking about. So many people simply refuse to look at the matter from Russia's perspective. In fact, they refuse to acknowledge that there are perspectives at all. To them, there is just their own perspective, which is The Truth, and all else is wrong.

If one is going to think in such ways, then why bother with philosophy?

In the real world, NATO is front and center here. In the world of imperialist propaganda, NATO has nothing to do with it, Russia’s stated concerns are ridiculous, and anyway, every country has the right to join a defensive alliance! – CounterPunch

The way I see it, there are two fundamentally opposed views in international relations: (1) continentalism which believes in a free and independent European continent, and (2) Atlanticism a.k.a. Transatlanticism which aims to tie Europe to America.

Continentalism represents the interests of individual continents, in the present context, Europe. Atlanticism represents the interests of America (and its client states like Britain) and has had various manifestations from general cooperation with America to political union of America, Britain, and other countries (see Atlantic Union).

NATO is a manifestation of Atlanticism. It was proposed by America and it was created by America. NATO is a creation and instrument of US interests.

Atlanticism manifested itself most strongly during the Second World War and in its aftermath, the Cold War, through the establishment of various Euro-Atlantic institutions, most importantly NATO and the Marshall Plan.

the North Atlantic Treaty is a product of the US' desire to avoid overextension at the end of World War II, and consequently pursue multilateralism in Europe. It is part of the US' collective defense arrangement with Western European powers
Established in the aftermath of World War II, NATO implements the North Atlantic Treaty - Wikipedia

In his speech to Congress, Eisenhower, the first Supreme Allied Commander Europe, made it very clear that the principal objective of the NATO project was US self-interest:

I have no end to serve, except the good of the United States, and that is the reason I have the courage to appear before this body to express my convictions …. I have one object in view – the good of the United States … We are approaching this problem from the welfare of the United States …. First of all, in Western Europe exists the greatest pool of skilled labor in the world. In Western Europe exists a great industrial capacity second in its capacity only to that of the United States … Now if we take that whole complex with its potential for military exploitation and transfer it from our side to another side, the military balance of power has, in my mind, shifted so drastically that our safety would be gravely imperiled … We would be cut off in short from areas from which we draw the materials that are absolutely essential to our existence, our way of life … Take such items as manganese, copper, uranium. Could we possibly think of existing without access to them? … The Western European complex is so important to our future, with them our future is so definitely tied that we cannot afford to do less than our best in making sure that it does not go down the drain … - New York Times, Feb. 2, 1951

As stated by state secretary Dean Acheson, NATO was also connected with America’s desire for "closer European political unification", hence the US Marshall Plan that stipulated European economic cooperation.

Similarly, in a statement to Europe’s OEEC Council (Organization for European Economic Cooperation that administered Marshall Plan funds), Marshall Plan administrator Paul Hoffman said that the US Congress could not finance the Marshall Plan without European economic and financial integration.
Statement by Paul Hoffman at the 75th OEEC Council meeting (31 October 1949).

It can be seen that from the very start, NATO went hand-in-hand with European unification under US hegemony, the idea being that Europe was a source of natural resources and a market for US goods hence it could not be allowed to fall into someone else’s (i.e., Germany’s or Russia’s) hands.

This was reiterated by NATO general secretary Stoltenberg on Sep 15 2000, whom the NATO website describes as “a strong supporter of greater global and transatlantic cooperation”. So, ATLANCICISM and GLOBALISM.

Incidentally, the post of NATO Secretary General is held by a European, allegedly to balance the influence of America who controls NATO’s military command. However, if we look at the profiles of secretaries general we immediately see that they are people with close links to America and, in general, are strongly pro-American.

The very first NATO sec gen (1952–1957) was the Briton Hastings Ismay who was a close US ally and who infamously announced that NATO’s aim was to “keep the Americans in Europe, the Russian out, and the Germans down”. Ismay was succeeded by the Belgian Paul-Henri Spaak (1957-1961) who had lived in New York in the 1940’s when he served as chairman of the first session of the UN General Assembly. In particular, he had also served as president of the US-funded European Movement which aimed to achieve the political, economic and monetary Union of Europe. The Dutch Dirk Stikker (1961-1964) had been involved in the creation of NATO and other US outfits. The Italian Manlio Brosio (1964-1971) had been ambassador to Washington …. Anders Rasmussen (2009–2014) was a strong supporter of America’s Iraq War. Stoltenberg has been discussed already.

From inception NATO’s secretaries general have been staunch supporters of Atlanticism, i.e., of the propensity to act in harmony with US interests. It follows that the post is a European civilian front for an essentially US military organization representing the interests of the US. Indeed, in addition to their Atlanticist credentials, NATO secs gen act as advised by the NATO Military Committee, whose current deputy chair is the American Lt Gen Lance Landrum, USAF, and in collaboration with the Supreme Allied Commander Europe (SACEUR), currently the American Gen Tod Wolters, USAF, who is nominated by the POTUS (in this case, Donald Trump).

The White House on Friday tapped an Air Force general with experience overseeing all U.S. and NATO air forces throughout Europe to lead U.S. European Command and serve as Supreme Allied Commander.
President Donald Trump selected Air Force Gen. Tod D. Wolters to serve as the top American commander in Europe and lead all NATO forces on the continent.
Wolters now serves as commander of U.S. Air Forces in Europe – Air Forces Africa based at Ramstein Air Base in Germany. In his role, he also serves as the chief of NATO’s Allied Air Command – Stars and Stripes

I for one don’t believe in globalism and world government but in continentalism in the sense of continents being independent and treated democratically and equitably, which is why I reject America’s imperialist New World Order.

In any case, America’s global dominance is indisputable as is the fact that America is the dominant element in a number of (US-created) international organizations like NATO:

With the world's most powerful military, a huge economy, and a leading role in international institutions such as the UN and NATO, the USA is a superpower. The rise in power and importance of China and re-emergence of Russia will continue to challenge the global dominance of the USA ...

The USA's international influence – BBC

In light of these facts and of US actions against Russia, it is clear that the focus of international attention should be not on Russia but on America who has demonstrated once again that it has complete dominance over most of the world, and especially over Europe, financially, economically, politically, and militarily. The events also show that America controls the international media which it uses for its own propaganda, all of which signals a trend for mankind to get closer and closer to world government controlled by Washington and Wall Street, a situation that in my view is not only inconsistent with genuine democracy and freedom, but extremely dangerous.

Especially in view of the growing polarization and radicalization of US politics, it is not difficult to think what might happen if we had a world government run by certain US presidents …. :smile:

Protesters in Greece set flame to NATO flag during anti-war rally - Newsflare

I don't see how the world is "at peace" when there are wars of various degrees of intensity in Syria, Ethiopia, Yemen, etc. and when people are suppressed, persecuted, and killed in many countries around the world. — Apollodorus

And in the first world as well.

The only difference between dying slowly from overwork exhaustion and poverty (as is the fate of more and more people in first world countries) and dying in a bomb explosion in a war is how quickly it happens.