But it is US and UK soldiers using US and UK machinery firing into Russia. — Manuel

No, It isn't. Ukrainians are totally capable using those weapon systems themselves. Besides, Ukraine has had cruise missiles and artillery missiles for a long time.

And besides, those U2 planes shot down over Cuba, the air defence was Soviet Army units. Just without their uniforms on. And these "advisors" were also in Vietnam. For example Israeli Air Force fought Soviet Pilots and their aircraft (posed as Egyptians) also.

Imagine Russian missiles being shot with Russian technology from Cuba into the US. What would happen? — Manuel

Imagine the US invading Cuba or Mexico, then these countries attacking Florida Keys or municipalities near the Rio Grande. If they have a possibility to do that, why not?

Sorry, but it would be something that really could happen, if the US chose to invade those countries.

We stood at the precipice of annihilation during the Cuban missile crisis or on the few occasions when a detection error almost set off a nuclear exchange. The current situation doesn't seem remotely close to those situations. — Echarmion

Exactly.

Remember that then in Cuba it was Nuclear weapons themselves in Cuba that caused the uproar. Conventional Scuds (which were new during that time) weren't the problem. And ATACMS and Storm Shadow still have what is considered a short range. It would be different if the systems were medium range and could everywhere west of the Ural mountains. Storm Shadow has a range of 250 km range and ATACMS 300 kilometers. Moscow is about 450 kilometers from the Ukrainian border and it would be very perilous for Ukraine to use either weapon system on the Ukraine-Russian border (and have the launcher, be it on ground or an aircraft in reach of many Russian weapon systems).

This is the same game that Russia has played from the beginning of the war. And in a similar way, we ought have not given Ukraine a) any weapons, b) any missiles be it ATGM/SAM/SSM, c) any tanks, d) any fighter aircraft. And since this micromanaging of the weapon system has been going on with usually with too little too late, Ukraine hasn't been able to use them in a decisive way.

Perhaps Russia would have accepted that Germany gives bodybags to Ukraine.

And anyway, it's quite delusional to accept the Kremlin line. During the Cold War there were no limits on just what would be given to a country fighting the other Superpower. This kind of silly talk that Putin says didn't and wouldn't fly then.

The proper answer when Putin rattles his nuclear sabers is to just comment: "We have nuclear weapons too" and simply leave it there.

How do Europeans sleep, knowing they're the playing chips with which the US and the UK are pursuing these types of escalations? — Tzeentch

People of the UK are Europeans, actually. :wink:

To have peace, simply prepare for war: Si vis pacem, parabellum. Deterrence stops Putin. Appeasement won't.

For example the Swedes sent all of the residents living in Sweden a booklet called "In case of crisis or war" just a few days ago. It is published in many languages and also English, which can be read here:

In case of crisis or war



It's very similar to what the Finnish government educates to it's citizens in the case of war or crisis. And an interesting booklet for the American prepper to view how Europeans think about preparedness. Sweden and Finland both have this thing called "total defense". What I like is that the Swedish government dedicated one page to pets that people have.

If you have pets

You are responsible for the care and wellbeing of
your pet in the event of crisis or war. Make sure you
have supplies at home to last at least a week.
In the event of an air raid, you may bring your pet to protective
structures like cellars, garages and metro stations. If you must leave
your pet at home – and it can manage free access to food – leave
additional food and water.

Yes, I think we Europeans might be genuinely worried about Trump leaving NATO - much like how a fat private fears PT. Yet, PT is the only way to whip said private back into shape. — Tzeentch

Or then just leave the service. Let somebody else do the job that is better capable. Just go to your job at McDonalds or the supermarket. They have no problem of their employees being fat and the PT done on breaks (if there's any PT) are quite easy and meant for everyone.

Have all Europe accept Finlandization and Russia will be no problem.

Now would be the best time, since there is no concrete threat to Europe yet. — Tzeentch

Yes, there's just one hot war in Europe, if you mean that by "no concrete threat". Because the Russian hybrid attacks (last few days ago) and the bellicose rhetoric of Russia sure feels like some kind of a threat.

About NATO being the US' strongest alliance I am not so sure, though. — Tzeentch

You mean there's a stronger alliance around? Russia and North Korea are an alliance, but when it comes to let's say Iran, It doesn't feel like China and North Korea or Russia are allies in the manner of attack on one is an attack on all. China, even if supporting Russia, has officially stayed neutral in the Ukrainian conflict and hasn't liked the nuclear sabre rattling of Russia.

Personally, I think Europe has dropped down on Uncle Sam's priority list, in favor of the Five-Eyes Alliance, Japan and South-Korea. These countries have a far clearer overlap with US strategic goals and challenges. — Tzeentch

Many Americans are what I class as the "Pivot people". America has to Pivot! Well, perhaps not from defending Judeo-Christian heritage in the Middle East, but still, Europe! Bye bye Europe.

But let's just think of how "clear" these goals and challenges are:

- First, there's nothing like the NATO in the Far East. SEATO failed, the countries didn't see eye to eye and the US simply gave up. These countries do train to operate jointly at the level as NATO countries do. They usually hold exercises occasionaly with the US, but not with each other. What is the American solution? AUKUS. Which actually isn't anything new at all as the countries have already defense pacts with each other. How well South-Korea and Japan are doing together? Not so good as Germany and France.

- Which of these Far Eastern allies have the capabilities of the UK or France? None, even if Japan has a big navy. It's one thing to prepare for domestic security and defending in one's own territory, another thing to train for out of the area operations. NATO can do that, Far Asian allies of the US aren't capable of that.

- Which of these Far Eastern countries are rearming to meet the Chinese threat? Nothing like the rearmament in Europe is happening in the Far East, except China.

Hence the real question is, how many would be willing to fight alongside the US if Taiwan would be invaded? Totally different from the question of how many NATO countries would fight if Poland was attacked. Especially when the US policy is "Strategic Ambiguity".

Hence if the US intervenes in a Chinese retaking of Taiwan, likely the American President will scream for the NATO losers to join in.

I guess Russia-EU relations will return to normal now that Trump is taking office. Gas and oil will begin to flow again? The US will lose whatever influence it ever had over Europe. Europeans hate America anyway, so that's probably a good thing for everyone. — frank

No, they won't and no, it's not a good thing for everyone. Democratic values like a justice state are worth defending. And so are things like the UN Charter. If we abandon those ideals of Enlightenment that have given us the present, it won't be better. First of all, Russia will not stop. Finlandization isn't nice. Russia is not a country that will say "Fine, we got what we wanted and now we'll leave you alone." Nope, once they have power, they will then start to meddle in our own domestic politics. The government has then to go after people that have made critique of Russia and Putin and supported the "Nazis" of Ukraine. That's the next step in "Finlandization" if Russia wins. It's an Empire, who just loves to be important.

Yet only a total failure will launch "Finlandization of Europe". But that would mean that Trump and his crew really turn out to be surrender monkeys and force the Ukrainians to sign a surrender deal. Let's be honest: Trump gave the Taleban the key to military victory with the Doha Peace deal, so there is the fear of that. When Trump has declared that he would end the war in 24 hours, then perhaps there's the wanting for a quick peace arrangement. And it's easy to choose just which party is more vulnerable at pressure. European states are looking at who would take the leading role, if a country like Poland would lead a "coalition of the willing" to support Ukraine. But let's remember that this is still the lame duck period of Biden now.

Trump's attack on the "deep state" is just about securing his control over the government. He doesn't share the ideological sentiments of his supporters. Putin's fight against the US is over, I think. Trump and Putin are pals. — frank

For the populist/conspiracy theorist, it's not about ending "deep state" and strengthening the democratic institutions, it's basically having their control over the deep state, because they are the good guys. Would Trump start eradicating the Patriot Act? Of course not! When he's in charge, those kind of acts are just good. And I fear that many Trump followers think this way too.

I think we're entering a new global era. The US will continue to shrink off of the world stage. China will continue to grow and learn. All eyes will turn eastward. — frank

In my view, the likely outcome is that the US will continue to shrink off (voluntarily, actually) and NOTHING will replace it. China isn't going to replace the US. It has only a few allies and then trade ties. We won't start to learn Chinese, English will stay as the universal language for at least a Century, if not two. China doesn't have that ideological ambition that drove the West to conquer the World. They are too satisfied about themselves. Besides, the country faces large problems with it's population growth and likely is too confident about centally controlled economy it has.

It's not going a collapse like during the Bronze Age or something, it likely is a withering away and simply more actors on the global stage, just like more countries have launched satellites into space, not just the two Superpowers as in the 1960's. For example Hungary is sending (few hundred) troops to Chad, not as part of some international mission, but as a bilateral agreement with the Chadian government. Like Russian Africa Corps in the Sahel. I guess that Orban has been bitten by the Imperialism bug.

Russian Africa Corps (ex Wagner) African fighter. Likely in the Sahel region.


When the US loses war in this way, it does have an effect on the US. I've always said that then we just have to enjoy the decadence. Not a bad time to live, actually.

I think Trump might come to the aid of the British, but not the EU. Trump sees the EU as weak and unworthy of respect. — frank

The real fight is about influence. Russian tanks won't be physically occupying West European Capitals. (Theoretically they could go "as peacekeepers" or something hilarious like that to the Baltic States, but even that is unprobable as it might be so that NATO wouldn't chicken out). But Russians can reach their objectives of breaking the Atlantic tie and to severely weaken NATO. That is the real goal of Russia here.

And they can succeed because if Trump really sees that the biggest enemy is the deepstate in the US, that "makes forever wars" and Putin says that he is now fighting the US. Aren't then the objectives totally in line here with the same objectives?

In my view, the populist idea is simply learning the wrong lessons from past conflicts: that sometimes it actually is worth wile to intervene even if Smedley Butler's old ideas are sometimes true, when the war goals are bizarre and a simple reaction to the people's demand for revenge.

Well, Ukraine didn't wait for long. First ATACMs attack on an ammo dump in Karachev. Which Putin says that NATO and the US are fighting Russia (While Trump insists that all the talk of Russia being a danger is "deepstater talk").

These limitations of use of weapons is similar thinking just like during the Vietnam war where the US made limitations for itself. How Joe Biden has been so afraid of Putin, when the other way around Russians haven't been afraid of him.

Cable lines cut in the Baltic Sea. Between Germany and Finland and also Sweden and Lithuanina, so it's that time of the year for some hybrid attacks.

In terms of his thinking, I would guess the key factors would be:

-His role in history/legacy and the relative success of annexing Crimea and the intervention to save Assad in Syria
-The conviction that it would be something like the "three day special military operation," that would quickly topple the government.
-The fact that Belarus had just had a popular revolt, requiring Russian forces to be moved in, and that they also had to send troops into Kazakhstan just a month earlier (and similar events had played out across the old satellites).

Stuff like gas resources and pipelines seem ancillary based on everything written about him. The historical narrative and prestige also takes center stage in his own speeches and writings. — Count Timothy von Icarus

I agree with this. Putin doesn't care a shit about economics or the economy. He didn't care when the Russo-Georgian war started, he doesn't care now. Command economy is his solution to everything.

However, my point remains that NATO leans completely on the American security apparatus, and at this point in time it is clear that the Americans will not commit to the defense of any nation in Europe, since it must focus on the Pacific and China. — Tzeentch

Don't think that Europeans aren't taking Trump seriously. They genuinely believe that Trump and his gang could take the US out of NATO. It's a genuine possibility that could happen: Americans could be perfectly capable of shooting themselves in the foot and breaking their strongest alliances, then wake up and notice that they aren't anymore the Superpower they used to be. If the US goes into isolationism, it simply will be a richer and larger version of Canada. People don't have anything against Canada, they might even know the name of the Canadian prime minister, but that's it. Who cares about the policies that Canada is pushing in it's foreign policy. It something quite irrelevant for Europeans.

Europe is in fact defenseless. And instead of acting accordingly, we do everything possible to follow Washington's line towards further confrontation with Russia. — Tzeentch

Isn't Poland acting accordingly? They are on the track to have the strongest military in Europe. Finland is arming itself and the military is excercising it's forces on a level not seen since the Cold War.

For Europe, the change happened actually in 2014. Then it change, as can be seen from this chart prior to the 2022 invasion:



From that lowpoint of 2014, the change on defense spending has been dramatic the closer the country is to Russia.



So the idea that lax Europe is just winging isn't current anymore. The change has already happened.

The Russians perceive our behavior as a clear sign that we are no longer interested in peace — Tzeentch

And some do think that Ukraine is lead by drug addicted nazis too! Yes, the propaganda works like a charm.

On the first page of the thread I wrote this post, arguing why America doesn't necessarily lose wars, but instead tends to fight wars in which a decisive military victory is not the goal. — Tzeentch

I'm sorry Tzeentch that I didn't notice your first reply as I guess the pages changed. But here's some comments. First of all, if military victory isn't the goal, then your talking about the "forever war" narrative.

Sorry, but if Osama bin Laden would have been in Sudan, the US would have attacked Sudan. And from Sudan of today, we can see what a similar quagmire it would have been once the US would have taken control of that large heterogenous country with multiple problems. And then I guess you would be making the same argument just why the US wants to disruption in Africa and the resources of Sudan.

But the simple truth is that OBL was in Afghanistan and since so many thousand Americans had been killed in the successful 9/11 attack, it couldn't be a job for the NYPD and the FBI to hunt down the ring of terrorists. As in the earlier bombing of the Twin Towers. Sorry, but that's the reality. That is the reason why the war and occupation of Afghanistan. Otherwise the neocons wouldn't have that opportunity to enlarge US dominance as they intended. Just like the successful operation of Hamas of breaching the wall and creating havoc gave the opportunity for the Netanyahu seemingly go with the "generals plan" in Gaza. Yet without "Al Aqsa flood", there wouldn't be plans to move everybody out from northern Gaza etc.

Hence US policy many times is a reaction to events that were made by others, and only then someone starts to think how this event can be used to further our own objectives and agenda. Still, it's a reaction to an event caused by others. And that is crucial here to understand.

Simple - the US is a maritime power that must dominate global trade and divide the Eurasian continent in order to maintain global dominance.

Being the most powerful maritime power and having strong maritime powers as its allies, domination of maritime trade is a given. However, the goal is to dominate global, and not just maritime trade. — Tzeentch

Yet notice one thing that has been true throughout the entire span of history: transport in trade by water is far more efficient and less costly than transport by land. One cargo ship can carry several cargo trains of produce. Ancient civilizations emerged on large rivers and the Mediterranean was such a lucrative sea for trade. It's just simply physics. Silk road and China's new land routes simply cannot compete with international shipping.

Trying to join NATO was arguably the crudest and most risky way of doing so, and hedging the survival of the country on a distant maritime power was rather naive given the track record of said power, and that is a criticism that applies to virtually all NATO members.

We should know better than to trust Washington. — Tzeentch

Finland and Sweden in my view waited for the right moment. Before 2022 there simply wouldn't have been a consensus to join NATO. If a conservative adminstration would have rammed through NATO membership, it would have become a right-left issue. Now it wasn't. Era of post-Finlandization ended when Putin attacked Ukraine on a wide front.

At least in NATO there are other countries too. Notice how the UK and for example Poland gave security guarantees for Finland during the application process to NATO membership. European NATO members aren't totally irrelevant.

And the "US allies" like South Vietnam, Afghanistan or present day Iraq aren't in the same category. The influencing attempts of the US go through the normal channels, not with some Finns that have lived all their life in the US making great careers in Washington DC then transcending to the country to solve our problems. And the US marines here on training aren't possibly attacked by some fringe Finnish group firing rockets at military bases.

Was then defending South Korea from Northern attack worth it?
— ssu

I don't know. — T Clark

Let's then just think about this.

South Korea produces a lot of stuff. I personally like K-pop. The country is finally a democracy after the 1980's and it's one of the most prosperous countries in the World.

North Korea suffered large scale famine in the 1990's. It's a totalitarian state where family members are prisoned of people who successfully defect. I remember a Finn that actually visited the country. Not only had he a "minder", a person that looked at just what he did and talked with North Koreans, he had TWO minders, who basically were looking at each other and wouldn't talk to the foreigner in fear that they would say something wrong. After all, you cannot leave a member of the security apparatus alone with foreigners. The Juche ideology would still reign and likely the ruling family too even if the whole Peninsula would be part of the People's Democracy.

So would it be better that there wouldn't be a South Korea? You see, if the US wouldn't have raised a finger when North Korea attacked, the whole "South Korea" would be a distant memory as the the Republic of Mahabad in Iranian history. We would happily consider Koreans these inhabitants of the Hermit Kingdom.

And since this war was actually fought by the United Nations and the US, it definitely shows that countries are worth saving from aggressors. Similarly in the case of the Gulf War. Would the World be a better place if Saddam could have simply taken Kuwait and had then equivalent oil reserves to Saudi-Arabia? If this would have been something that the US wouldn't have done anything about, then you likely would have a nuclear armed Iraq with one of the largest armies in the world. Because prior to the Gulf War, Iraq did have a functioning nuclear program. It didn't have after the war that, especially after Clinton's operation Desert Fox in 1998. So yes, the "war is a racket" thing comes to play with the 2003 invasion.

The fact is that sometimes the US does the right thing by intervention. And this is why it's alliance with Europe has survived through the times. Even if it has done things like the 2003 invasion of Iraq.

But you weren't our allies. You were countries that we were friendly with but with which we had no binding military relationships. Do you expect us to send US troops to Finland if Russia decides to invade? — T Clark

Your troops are here today. I saw US marines in the navy garrison I was in last Sunday at the mess hall in the food line. We are now a member of NATO and those marines were taking part in "Freezing Winds" exercise that is now ongoing. We weren't earlier your allies. And I remember the CIA yearbook having a picture of us being "likely allies" of the Soviet Union. So that much trust in our non-alignment. Yes, it was a culture shock for me some years ago (before we were in NATO) to see in the same garrison's soldier home full of young British soldiers waiting for their pizzas. The last foreign troops that you could see in Finnish garrisons were during my grandparents time, they were from the Wehrmacht and the SS. But they were in the North, yet in the summer of 1944 German soldiers camped in my now summer cottage, an old farmhouse built in 1914 by my great grandparents. During the Cold War my father told that the only foreign soldier that he saw in Helsinki was a US Marine in the US Embassy when he renewed his visa to the US. But many then thought there were Soviet soldiers in Finland.

There was never any realistic chance of Russia joining NATO. — T Clark

As I've said, you would have had larger than life politicians on both sides for that to have happened.

It was never realistic that we could somehow keep countries bordering Russia outside the Russian sphere of interest. — T Clark

With Finlandization, we got our everyday life to be out of the Russian sphere of interest. So defending your country and in 1944 preparing to fight an insurgency kept Stalin out. And the Finnish Communists were idiots btw, they couldn't stamp out Finnish democracy without the Red Army in the country. So as @Count Timothy von Icarus put it so well:

You know who thinks Poland should be in Poland's sphere of influence? Poles. And the same sort of thing goes for Czechs, Finns, Ukrainians, etc. — Count Timothy von Icarus

I fully and wholeheartedly agree with this.

It certainly doesn't work that way in the US. We have the Monroe Doctrine and haven't shied away from sticking our noses in our neighbor's affairs. — T Clark

Well, you didn't go to war with the French when they had their adventures in Mexico. In fact, the French intervened in Mexico twice, in the 1830's and then in 1861–1867 again. The Monroe Doctrine was given in 1823, so the French didn't care a shit about your doctrines back then. (And of course, they still are all around the American continent btw, which the Monroe doctrine accepts.) Oh, the US did disapprove the French actions in Mexico during the second intervention. However Abraham Lincoln wouldn't want to go to war with France then, because it would have been too easy for the French then to give overwhelming support to the Confederacy.

So the idea that it's OK for Russia to meddle in affairs because you meddle in affairs isn't a counterargument. State meddles in other states things all the time, actually. But violence is something else than just the typical influencing attempts embassies make.

What is the US's vital national interest in Taiwan? — T Clark

In a larger sense, what is the vital national interest to see China as a threat? Last country it invaded was Communist Vietnam, a country the you had just fought with.

The main problem is that just as Domino Theory or the "We have to occupy this country or otherwise it will be a terrorist safe haven"-theory aren't really discussed. And not explained to those that would (or could) understand a complex politics.

The US should understand that basically it's very crucial for it to have the dollar in the role it has now. Those countries, who aren't friends of the US, aren't keen to use it as a "reserve currency". But those who are your allies are OK with the present system. Why not? They get safety and prosperity. The system works for them. Especially in the age of populists like Trump, it's actually difficult to reason the obvious, that global trade does bring prosperity. That if you cut the alliances, stop globalization, stop trade and so on, you will just create a World that sucks even more than the present.

This is a fair critique. In particular, the widespread looting that occured during the second invasion poisoned public opinion against the US. — Count Timothy von Icarus

From the experience of Bosnia and the Balkans, the US Armed forces understood what it would take. And Chief of Staff of the Army general Eric Shinsheki publicly stated how many troops would be needed in the post-war occupation. This was too high for the great visionary Rumsfeld, who fired Shinseki. Later at the so-called "Surge", the levels came to the level what Shinseki had originally stated. Iraq of course had internal problems being such a divided country with so much bloodshed and internal strife all of it's present history, so Divide et Impera could work. With Americans, this meant basically a Sunni insurgency and a separate Shia insurgency against the Americans. At least the Kurds were friends.

And so the idea was to use the Iraqi army for stabilizing unrest. That was the fatal flaw. — Count Timothy von Icarus

Was there this kind of thinking? Paul Bremer really didn't do so with his CPA order number 2:

After the invasion, several factors contributed to the destabilization of Iraq. On 23 May, L. Paul Bremer issued Coalition Provisional Authority Order Number 2, dissolving the Iraqi Army and other entities of the former Ba'athist state. Ba'athists were excluded from the newly formed Iraqi government.

Yes. Why not simply fire tens of thousands of professional soldiers without no thought given to what they would do. It really was the Sunni's themselves that thought that they would at least as bureaucrats be used. But no. So Americans dissolved the security apparatus totally. Then riots ensued. As the great visionary Rumsfeld said in April 2003:

"The task we've got ahead of us now is an awkward one ... It's untidy. And freedom's untidy. And free people are free to make mistakes and commit crimes and do bad things. They're also free to live their lives and do wonderful things. And that's what's going to happen here,"

And it did happen: an insurgency and an Civil war ensued. And then happened something that shows just where the reasons lie for the US losing wars: The US forces in Iraq basically won the campaign against Al Qaeda in the Sunni heartlands. Without any direction from Washington politicians and left to their devices, the military itself took the initiative and used the ancient old tactic of simply picking part the insurgency by making deals with some of the groups. Hence there was the "Sunni Awakening" that basically pacified the Sunni areas with "Sons of Iraq", earlier insurgents. But here came the politicians, and not only American politicians to ruin the issue. While Obama had made it a campaign promise to get the pull the forces out, the Iraqi prime minister Nouri al-Maliki, whose power relied on secterian policies, decided that the "Sons of Iraq" were a threat and disbanded everything that the US military had worked so much to form. So now for the second time, now not Bremer, but al-Maliki, disbanded armed Sunnis and didn't integrate them into the security apparatus they were willing to join (under US military). So again another insurgency. As the US had left, then now just called ISIS emerged from the again unhappy Sunnis, who later rapidly occupied large parts of Iraq and Syria. Because why the Shia officers and soldiers try to fight Sunni insurgents in Sunni towns that weren't friendly places for them in the first place? Hence all that effort had been flushed down the toilet and the US military had to come back to Iraq to fight ISIS.

Something like this usually happens when the politicians don't have a long term answer on how to win an insurgency. It's something that happens so frequently in many places. The West "comes to the rescue" and stabilizes the situation for some time. The enemy regroups. Then the focus wanes, and then finally the Westerners leave. And the place is in worse place. And this then makes the idea of "forever wars" so tempting. But it doesn't have to be like this. Insurgencies can be won, but they aren't won militarily without political insight and dedication. This reminds me of how the British understood how deal with a war where the other side won't surrender: then simply make the insurgents part of your team. If the British put the Boer population into concentration camps, then they also put them into leading positions after the war. Hence it isn't an accident that prime ministers of the new South Africa were for a long time Boer leaders who had fought the British. And hence you got one of history's strangest political friends, Chuchill and Jan Smuts, who the latter had been the Boer interrogator of captured Churchill. Roles change.

(Former prisoner-of-war (Churchill) and his former interrogator (Jan Smuts))


But if the US military had the idea of "Sons of Iraq", did the US do like the British did with the Boers or Russia did in Chechnya and picked a former Taleban leader to lead Afghanistan? Hell no! They chose not only an Afghan that had worked abroad, but basically a person, Ashraf Ghani, that had lived for very long in the US would be a great example of an immigrant to the US, a person that made a great academic career in the right American academic places: studied in American University in Beirut and later in Columbia university, then taught in Berkeley and Johns Hopkins and finally landed on a job in the World Bank. Then after nearly a quarter of Century out of Afghanistan, Ghani landed in the now occupied Afghanistan in an UN position and finally made it through in the Hamid Karzai administration. So this kind of person was seen by American leadership as a person to deal with all the problems that Afghanistan had. Well, the end was exactly what could be assumed from such a person. The Taleban kindly asked him to go away and he kindly responded by quickly leaving Afghanistan with all the millions he could take with him. Which he naturally denies to exist.

Yet Ashraf Ghani isn't the first of these fluent English talking people, who could well survive in the cocktail parties of Washington DC and are seen as a crucial players, yet who would have huge problems in the actual politics of the country the US picks them for. Many can remember the charlatan Ahmed Chalabi, that played an important part for the Americans in Iraq. Didn't stay long in actual Iraqi politics.

(Oregon high school yearbook, places where Afghan presidents start earning their spurs)


(Ahmed Chalabi with the visionary secretary of defense, Paul Bremer behind the two)

Hah! I wanted to use the Hitler card. :grin:

(Ok, sorry, back to having an interesting discussion...)

Yet the issue really is just what for example Ukraine did wrong? You can argue that it did the greatest mistake, as Mearsheimer pointed out, is that it gave it's nuclear weapons back to Russia. But back then I think the West and the US wouldn't have been happy for that. In fact the US was extremely happy that Ukraine also gave an enormous amount of shoulder fired SAMS (MANPADS) away too. Then the threat they posed was to get into the hands of terrorists! Cold war was over, you know. So Ukraine trying to hold on to a nuclear deterrent and put a lot of effort to make them into an effective weapons system (something that is totally possible for Ukraine), would have made Ukraine a pariah state in the eyes of the West. Besides, back then many Ukrainians loved Putin. Russians were brothers.

Baltic countries surely understood the writing on the wall: all of them have Russians / Russian speaking minorities. They are, just like Finland, extremely close to St. Petersburgh and Moscow, hence they are strategically close to the heart of Russia. And then they are tiny nations: Estonia has the population similar to Maine as is a bit bigger than Maryland. The city of Narva is as close to St. Petersburgh as Philadelphia is to Manhattan, New York. Hence without there being NATO, it isn't hard to tell how risky it would be to Estonia.

Even if the negative consequences were very low (or non-existent), are you saying that the West would not be justified in taking over North Korea by force?

I agree that coercion should be the last resort, but it seems to be a resort; and seems to be a valid resort to stop societal structures that are really immoral; and this entails some version of imperialism, even if it is a much weaker version than the standard ones historically. — Bob Ross

When both the US and North Korea have nuclear weapons, then the question would this:

How many Americans and what percentage of North Koreans population is a justifiable sacrifice to erase the North Korean dictatorship out of existence? And if with Americans the death toll less than have died of Covid (less than 1,2 million), let's say just Hawaii and the Bay area were destroyed, then how many North Koreans would it be enough to revenge the lost Americans?

Your countries' motivation was to make things better. The US's should have been not to make them worse. — T Clark

Why say that? You haven't made things worse. They would be far worse without you. Remember that the US is actually very popular in Europe.

I agree that the US had the wrong narrative in Vietnam. It just wasn't worth it. — T Clark

Was then defending South Korea from Northern attack worth it?

Your narrative might have been right for you, but it wasn't right for us. — T Clark

So just where do you put the line for defending democracy and your allies? Is the UK worth then defending? Is Canada? I am personally glad that for example the tiny nations of the Baltic could avoid the present situation of Moldavia, Georgia or Ukraine.

Are you suggesting this is a good reason for expanding NATO? — T Clark

Are you familiar with the actually discourse when NATO expansion happened? It was totally different from where NATO is now when Sweden and Finland joined. Look, there were no plans to defend the Baltics. That was too escalatory or offensive! A NATO member (likely Germany perhaps) saw making actual warplans to defend the Baltic States too escalating for Russia. NATO didn't train it's forces as it does now in the Baltic States. Russia had a special observer status in NATO. And as @frank pointed, people genuinely talked about the prospect of Russia joining NATO. Unfortunately, there is a route of application to the organization, which Russia wouldn't take. It would have to get the blessing from all other nations to join in and face a road the Sweden had. Russia simply then should have been controlled by democrats, not KGB people. In the end, war in Kosovo ended these hypothetical ideas. So in reality the "window of opportunity" to join NATO already ended during the Yeltsin years.

Saying the US should have acted consistent with our own national interest, including to promote stability in Europe, rather than the interests of nations formerly in the Russian sphere is not "going with Kremlin's line." — T Clark

But you did promote stability in Europe. Or do you think that without NATO and US involvement, that Russia would have been peaceful and not tried to get it's empire back? That is naive. This should be easy to understand when Putin says that the fall of Soviet Union was the greatest tragedy in the 20th Century. Russia would have simply far more easily taken back a lot more than it has now attempted. Likely the Baltic States would be Russian satellites and the Ukraine would be a rump satellite state with Novorossiya being a part of Russia (which btw the latter can still happen). Europe simply would be far more unstable than now! Does that help your national interest?

I agree completely. Taiwan is not worth war with a country with a huge military and nuclear weapons. I feel the same way about Taiwan that I do about Finland. No, that's not true, I feel a lot more sympathy and common cause for the people of Europe. Taiwan is a fake country occupied by the losers in the civil war in China with delusions of grandeur. The US should never have staked its "reputation" on supporting it. — T Clark

I think people who want to be independent ought to have their independence and simply the UN charter ought to be respected. It is as simple as that. NATO is an European security arrangement that works and it has created stability in Europe. SEATO and CENTO didn't work and these areas are still volatile. Alliances simply work. They aren't a burden, just as international cooperation isn't a hindrance.

Taiwan is risking war with China. Just like Ukraine was risking war with Russia, South Vietnam was risking war with the North, etc. — Tzeentch

Just like Poland was risking war with Germany in the late 1930's. Just like Denmark, Belgium, the Netherlands, Luxembourg and Norway were also risking war with Germany, for that matter. And not only did they risk it, they got the war Hitler. How badly done from them! Especially the Poles, didn't they get the memo (Mein Kampf) that they were Untermenschen and should move away somewhere else and give their lands to the German Übermenschen?

Should the UK have a right to dictate India's military alliances and attack India to prevent new ones? — Count Timothy von Icarus

Would the UK even want that? I don't think so. Britons are past their Empire. They've accepted it. Even can laugh at it like Monty Python. Just like the Spanish understand well that they don't have the Empire they formerly had. But Putin doesn't think so. That's the huge difference.

Also, arguing for "spheres of influence," what is this, 1938? You know who thinks Poland should be in Poland's sphere of influence? Poles. And the same sort of thing goes for Czechs, Finns, Ukrainians, etc. — Count Timothy von Icarus

Exactly. This ought to be the point. And many past Empires have understood this.

Historical spheres are part of history. Those politicians referring to history and historical spheres are usually quite dangerous: when there isn't any current obvious link or relationship, you can then refer to history and things like "historical spheres of influence".

We'd need a global government for that. — frank

Ever heard of the UN? Something like the Security Council is what humans can possibly do.

Two nation states can become one (even if that usually is a difficult and painful integration), but not many. Nations states can in the end form only a loose confederacy of states. Even the European Union is a de facto confederacy, even if it desperately tries to act like an federation or an union.

. I thought Finland was considered one of the Baltic states. Pardon if that is considered an insult. It wasn't intended to be. — T Clark

It wasn't. Finland is seen as part of the Nordic countries. Scandinavian countries are Sweden, Norway and Denmark. Something similar to all the different names for the British Isles.

From your point of view, I can see this is important, but from the perspective of US national security it shouldn't have been the main consideration. — T Clark

And this really is the crux of my argument.

US usually acts without at all thinking of the objectives of other actors. They don't matter to you. Hence the US has it's own narrative of what is going on that is different from the reality on the ground. This creates a fundamental inconsistency, when the other side doesn't at all have the objectives the US thinks it has. In the Vietnam war it was the Domino theory and the prevention of Communism spreading in the South East Asia, which isn't the way the Vietnamese saw it. North Vietnam saw the conflict as a war to unite their country. The North Vietnamese soldier wasn't fighting for the spread of Communism, he was fighting for Vietnam. The Marxist-Leninist rhetoric simply hid this from the Americans.

In Afghanistan it was "War against Terror" and the idea of the country not becoming a haven for terrorists, while the local geopolitics and the objectives of countries like Pakistan was totally ignored. And this was the crucial mistake. American administrations simply choose outright denial of reality as their policy with Pakistan. Pakistan had formed the Taleban, it assisted it all throughout the war. OBL was living basically next to a Pakistani military camp. And in the end it assisted the Taleban to take over the country, a military operation that was a spectacular success. Pakistanis even publicly rejoiced over this. Yet for the US, Pakistani was an "ally in the war on terror" and never went to accuse of Pakistan of anything. Why? Because Pakistan was a nuclear state. Attacking Pakistan and then the situation would be even worse! Hence Americans choose simply denial.

The Caption from 2007: "President Bush says he gains influence with world leaders by building personal relations with them. Pakistani President Pervez Musharraf got a dose of that diplomacy at the White House last fall, when Bush hailed him as a friend and a voice of moderation. "The president is a strong defender of freedom and the people of Pakistan," Bush said that day, side by side with Musharraf.


This shows how absolutely delusional US leaders can be in believing their own narrative. Yet for Pakistan the real objective with Afghanistan is to keep it out from the Indian sphere of influence. Their (the Pakistanis) main external threat is India. This had nothing to do with "war against a method" the US was proclaiming it all to be about. In Central Asia the US came, had bases everywhere and then withdrew totally.

NATO enlargement is the same. People forget what the discourse around NATO was in the 1990's was like. I do remember. It was that NATO was an old relic that had to renew itself to basically be a global actor (policeman). The Cold War was over. Having territorial defense and a large reservist army was WRONG, outdated, relic from a bygone era! Yet for the countries applying to NATO is was Russia, Russia and Russia. It never was anything else. Yet for Clinton it wasn't. He got votes from the Polish and Eastern European communities (surprise) and it was all about a new security network. The US also got new allies for the War on Terror when countries like France didn't join (remember Freedom Fries?). This is totally and deliberately forgotten and ignored by those going with Kremlin's line, that the objective was to poke Russia. The US didn't think about Russia. Russia was done, it couldn't fight it's way out of a paper bag as it had severe problems just with Chechnya. That was the thinking at that time.

Only now the reality is understood in Europe and NATO has gone back to it's roots to be a defensive alliance. Yet Trump during his last administration started with the 90's rhetoric, which showed just how clueless he can be.

After the dissolution of the USSR, any expectation that Russia would give up it's influence, even hegemony, in the region was unrealistic. We knew this, but American triumphalism won out over common sense. — T Clark

@T Clark, no you didn't know it. This is pure hindsight. Please read what hubris filled ideas were in the US during the Yeltsin era. It wasn't triumphalism, it was the idea that the Cold War had ended. Then you focused on 9/11 and the global war on Terror. All things were looked at from that prism. Hence when Russia occupied Crimea, this came out from nowhere to the US intelligence agencies. There were no assets in the region, the system was focused on hunting muslim terrorists. The denialism can be seen from the many times that the US wanted to "reboot" the relationship with Russia, even if Russia had attacked Georgia with it's "breakaway regions with peacekeepers" masquerade. The attempted reboots are also forgotten in the "US actions did it" narrative.

The real hubris is that you believe in your own narratives that you have created for your own domestic political consumption. The idea of all the conflicts the US is engaged are "forever wars" to support the military industrial complex is actually one of these ideas. But so was the idea that Pakistan was an ally in the "War on Terror". Or that the Islamo-Fascists like the Taleban hated American democracy and would want to attack you... and that's why you were fighting in Afghanistan. To believe one's propaganda, a narrative that one loves, is pretty damaging when the actual reality is different.

Again, I don't fault the various countries for making the decisions they did. I just think that thumbing our noses at Russia was a dangerous idea. — T Clark

You get my reasoning, great! But then the next question. Why then thumb your noses at China?

Just then leave China alone. Why all the fuss about Taiwan? Why not have good relations with China? Is Taiwan a reason to have war with China? They have nuclear weapons too. A lot more than North Korea and are making more of them as we speak.

There ought to be consistency in your actions. When the political discourse in the US isn't accurate about the situation abroad, then this creates a fundamental problem: what the US president says to be the objectives, will really be the objectives of the state and the US armed forces. Now, if that isn't close to the reality on the ground and is made up propaganda, because it's just something that reaffirms popular beliefs that aren't fixed in the real world, you will continue to lose.

What made these different?

Certainly not the comparative military strength of the opponents. Saddam had a million men under arms, a military with a wealth of relatively recent combat experience, and Iraq had spent lavishly on high the Soviet and French equipment (and this was before the huge technological/qualitative gap between NATO and Russian equipment widened). But the result was an out and out rout. 147 Coalition servicemen were killed while Iraqi casualties were somewhere between 200,000-300,000, with perhaps 50,000 killed in action. — Count Timothy von Icarus

The last US win, the Gulf War, is very telling here. First, the US created a huge coalition, which had as it's members countries like Syria (one armoured division), Morocco and Pakistan. The US worked in the UN (something that now it doesn't do) and got an OK from the Soviet Union. The US took really seriously the Iraqi army and massed a huge army, that still was around from the Cold War. The huge Reagan build up of an Army intended to fight in Central Europe then liberated Kuwait. Secondly, the objective was clear (liberation of Kuwait) and the US did listen to it's Arab allies. Just listen what Dick Cheney said in 1994:



Which just makes it all so confusing. You didn't even have different people then Invading Iraq, you had the same guy that gave the above interview just a few years earlier going against his own words. But then I guess, he hadn't been the CEO of Halliburton yet. So yes, I do accept and understand the "war as racket" argument, but not all wars are rackets of Halliburton. Other countries can have agency in wars too.

A clear difference with the GWOT is the goal of state building and a transition to liberal democracy, but this wasn't the case in Vietnam (where the US backed a coup and the state was far from a liberal democracy) nor in Korea (an authoritarian dictatorship at the time of the war; also, militarily, a draw). — Count Timothy von Icarus

Yet Korea finally did become a democracy in the 1980's and thanks to the Koreans themselves. And if some Americans are quick to say that now the US and Vietnam have good relations, how better would it be if there would be a South-Vietnam? Who knows.

In fact the "state building" had success in the Balkans. Or has at least until now (as we are talking about the Balkans). But then the forces deployed to for example Bosnia were far bigger to size when compared to the invasion force that went to Iraq, a far larger country with a larger population. But large forces weren't needed because the great Rumsfeld said so. And were is Iraq actually now? Not with the best relations with the US, but it didn't become the Islamic State. Even if that was close.

Even if there are the examples what are successes, where it has been very beneficial that the US has stood up and has assisted it's allies or fought wars, the view that involvement in foreign conflicts is a swindle persists. And especially in the realm of Trump.

As I noted, Russia is historically paranoid about invasion, but as they say, just because you're paranoid, doesn't mean they aren't out to get you. — T Clark

Well, you could also have a long list of when Russia has attacked it's neighbors. After all, it was Catherine the Great who said "I have no way to defend my borders but to extend them.”

Imperialism is typically argued as a purely defensive action. Just Finland as an independent nation and as part of Sweden has had I guess up to 17 wars or so with Russia since the founding of the state. Yet no denying in what Napoleon and Hitler attempted.

He's right though, isn't he? The US makes a schizoid global leader when there's no existential threat to keep things on track. The world needs an emperor. Not exactly like a Dune emperor, but similar. — frank

The World definetly doesn't need an Emperor. Centralized powers have their weaknesses. Far better is that there's simply countries that tolerate each other and don't start wars, even if they disagree on matters. That would be the ideal.

Do you live in the Baltics? — T Clark

Close, but no cigar. I live in Finland.

Living where you do, you may know more about this than I do. I remember back in the early 1990s when Bill Clinton and the rest of NATO started expanding NATO. Even back then I thought it was a graceless response to a world changing action. — T Clark

The fact is that if the applicant countries themselves wouldn't have been active, NATO enlargement wouldn't have happened. That's the reality which the anti-US narrative (that it was totally Clinton's idea) totally forgets. In fact, behind closed doors the US asked if for example in the case of the Baltic States Finland and Sweden could give them security guarantees. Totally horrified about the prospect, Finland (and likely Sweden) refused and urged the countries to be accepted into NATO. For the applicants their reason to join NATO was Russia. But for NATO especially the 90's were the time when the organization tried to find a purpose (something on the lines that Trump later has talked). One also should understand that in NATO there's Article 1, that member countries refrain from using violence at each other, which is important. Hence for example Greece and Turkey haven't had a border war. NATO is an European security arrangement and there simply is no counterpart for it in the EU realm.

Remember that actually many European countries really have put their defense 100% in the participation in the joint defense of NATO. It's really an international organization, which was totally evident on just how long Turkey let Sweden to wait to get into NATO. And note how many times US Presidents have been disappointed in NATO, the "No Action, Talk Only" club sometimes when the US wants allies to participate in some endeavor.

I don't necessarily think we should have "linked Russia into Europe." I just think it was a big mistake to move NATO right up to Russia's borders. We reacted very aggressively to Russian weapons in Cuba back in the 1960s. Why would we expect to Russia to feel differently? What benefit did the west get out of it? — T Clark

You do understand then that many other countries, like the Baltic States, would have been treated the same way as Ukraine and Georgia by Russia and likely Russian military bases would be back in the Baltic states, if these countries wouldn't have used the window of opportunity they had. Just look at Moldova. It has a frozen conflict with Russian "peacekeepers" the example how Russia has meddled also in Georgia:

The Russian Federation maintains an unknown number of soldiers in Transnistria, an unrecognized breakaway state internationally recognized as part of Moldova. This Russian military presence dates back to 1992, when the 14th Guards Army intervened in the Transnistria War in support of the Transnistrian separatist forces. Following the end of the war, which ended in a Russian-backed Transnistrian victory and in the de facto independence of the region, the Russian forces stayed in a purportedly peacekeeping mission

The Baltic States wouldn't be independent and so charming that they now are if it wasn't for NATO memership. And is that for you think irrelevant? Well, not for the Balts and not for my country either. Just as I like that there is a South Korea, and not that the whole Peninsula is part of the Democratic People's Republic of Korea, I also like that the Baltic States are independent and not under the thumb of Putin.

It always seemed to me that was just a rationalization for political and propaganda purposes. Maybe I'm wrong. — T Clark

Just look at what the Russians actually do in the occupied territories. Russification of the population is no joke. That they have now publicly annexed territories that they (Russians) even don't control yet. That tells about their objectives quite clearly. It's not just words, it's the actions.

There are a lot of hawks still around. I kept expecting Israel to attack Iran with strong US military support. — T Clark

Let's see what Trump does. When it comes to Israel, it feels like the US is the ally of Israel, not the other way around. I personally view the reason for this is the large pro-Israeli Evangelist vote in the US. It's not the American Jewish (who can also oppose the policies of Israel), it those waiting for Armageddon and the rapture.

I have a fantasy that Europe will step up to take a bigger military and political role in the world, especially in Europe. — T Clark

Hate to be the pessimist here, but you are correct. It is a fantasy. Poland is already doing it, and Germany and other Western countries can happily assume that Polish rearmament will be enough. Remember that during the Cold War WW3 was going to be fought out in Germany and very close to the border of France etc. Now there's Poland there, so I don't think that a real turnaround will happen. Here I accept that I'm a bit of a pessimist, as I said.

Something's a bit off ↑ here.

NATO isn't seeking to take over countries. Countries seek to be part of NATO for defense and have to qualify (which can take some years). — jorndoe

The difference between an organization that is voluntary to join and an organization that you are forced to join (like the Warsaw Pact) should be obvious. But the way many talk of NATO enlargement is if it has been just a plan of the US (or in US, the objective of the Foreign Policy blob) with the applicants being passive "victims". It's always puzzled me, but I think it's the idea that the US treats all countries the same way. That how the US treats and has treated Panama, Guatemala or Haiti is similar how it treats Ireland, Belgium or France. The obvious fact that it doesn't in a similar fashion, just as France has treated differently former colonies in the Sahel and member states in the EU. Another example is how China treats West European countries and compare it to how the act towards the Philippines.

The attitude of Putin towards democracy and democratic leadership with term limits is shown perfectly clearly in this comment. Something that people should notice.

Thanks, @TClark.

One thing I have thought about a lot, starting in the early 1990s - Gorbachev gave us the gift of a new eastern Europe and western Asia. How did we handle it? Even knowing Russia's historical paranoia about being surrounded and invaded, we immediately started expanding NATO right up to it's borders. Now it's enclosed by hostile countries backed by the US and western European militaries. No wonder Putin is furious. We blew it. — T Clark

This is the line that has been discussed again and again especially the Ukraine war thread (which btw started before the large scale Russian invasion started).

But did you really blow it?

I can look at this from a different angle as my summer cottage is very close to the Russian border. Please understand that the US isn't almighty, it's just one actor in Europe. The World doesn't circle around the US. Russia itself is the really big actor here. The Soviet leadership avoided the largest wars when the USSR collapsed, but the problem was that Russia knew just one thing, that it was an Empire. It has all these minorities, a large Muslim population and many people who really aren't European. How could this be a nation state? The new leadership especially under Putin couldn't see itself as a "humble" European nation state, because Russia simply isn't a nation state. If there was a theoretical window of opportunity to link Russia into Europe, it would have been immediately when the Soviet Union collapsed. Yet that would have needed larger than life politicians both in Moscow and Washington DC, but those political Houdini's didn't exist. That door closed during the time of Yeltsin, not Putin. And with Putin, the KGB took hold of the power in Russia. With the Kursk accident, Putin's Russia was back in the old ways.

Yet the self flagellation of the West is only possible when one ignores totally what Putin and the Russian leadership themselves have said to be the reason for war. NATO enlargement is one of Putin's lines, but so is the artificiality of the state of Ukraine and it being natural of Ukraine being part of Russia. Just how delusional this talk would be if the UK prime minister would say similar things about Ireland? That it's an artificial country and should be back in the UK. I think that many Irish would be alarmed of the kind of crazy talk. But it somehow isn't crazy when Putin says it.

Also please understand that key players in the NATO enlargement were the new countries themselves. And when Putin made the large scale attack on Ukraine, it was the Finnish street, the people, that changed their ideas of NATO in a heartbeat and the politicians followed. Without the invasion, both Finland and Sweden would be happily outside NATO. The Baltic States and Poland (correctly) understood that for Russia, the collapse of Soviet Union was another Times of Troubles and the country could soon get over it as they did once oil prices went up. Hence it was for the "near abroad" countries this brief opportunity to get out of Russia's stranglehold.

The OP brings to mind the ongoing discussion here on the forum - "In Support of Western Supremacy, Nationalism, and Imperialism." That thread displays the US's superpower mania at a scale that dwarfs even our past adventures. The fact that that kind of fantasy still holds power always confounds me. The worst part is that the desire for military solutions to political problems is still strong in mainstream political leadership. — T Clark

Bob Ross likely wanted to stir up a heated debate, luckily didn't get banned. Yet I don't think there's a US superpower mania. The last true excess were the neocons, who didn't themselves believe at first they got the power. They themselves were encouraged by the last war that the US won: the liberation of Kuwait back from Iraq. That is now the time that I see as the pinnacle of US power, which lead the neocons to go crazy later. Trump actually destroyed them (the neocons) in my view, although he can appoint them into his administration. He simply walked over Jeb Bush and nobody still goes with the line that President Bush "just got bad intel with Iraq". That is something thanks to Trump.

Yet Trumpism might go overboard too much on the other side. If the US really thinks Russia attacking Ukraine happened because of US actions and hence it's the US that has to "de-escalate", really think twice what you are doing. Luckily Trump has admitted that things have changed. Above all, Ukraine hasn't yet been giving the treatment that the Republic of Aghanistan and South Vietnam got. But this outcome can still happen. A Dolchstoss given to Ukraine with Europe just watching from the side just what the hell happened is the worst outcome. But that hasn't happened.

The value of those policies is monetary, in service to the military industrial complex (MIC). The fantasy held by people not directly involved in the service to MIC is a result of successful propaganda disguised, among other things, as nationalism or patriotism. — DingoJones

Perhaps for Dick Cheney and Haliburton, but not for the North Vietnamese soldier fighting the Americans. Or the young Afghan men that we called the Taleban. For them it's not the military industrial complex or profits, it's a war to defend your country against an outside aggressor. The simple fact is that in war the enemy is has different objectives than you and you cannot assume that he has similar aspirations and objectives as you do.

It was very telling that when Kissenger (of all people) got the Nobel peace prize for "for jointly having negotiated a cease fire in Vietnam in 1973", his North Vietnamese counterpart Lê Đức Thọ refused to take the prize because of a totally logical reason: the war was not finished, it was just an armstice. This just shows the total difference in the thinking of the two belligerents.

A controversial Nober peace prize:


This is even more clear in the idea when the tool of sanctions is raised or when the military response is retaliatory and limited in scope. For the US politician an economic slowdown and the voter having economic difficulties will mean losing the next election. For leaders of a country that is attacked or sanctioned by the US, it won't. For them the conflict is usually truly existential, and thus economic hardship won't matter so much. The Houthis in Yemen are a perfect example of this. As the Yemen civil war has now gone on for a decade and the Saudi intervention failed, but did achieve to bomb the country back to being as poor as in the 1970's, the Houthi government can hardly care about some retaliatory bombing of the US when the Houthis attacked international shipping. They know that an US invasion force won't come to fight them in the mountains.

Trump wrote Wednesday in a post on his Truth Social platform. “Matt will end Weaponized Government, protect our Borders, dismantle Criminal Organizations and restore Americans’ badly-shattered Faith and Confidence in the Justice Department.”

Gaetz said in a post on X that it would “be an honor to serve” in the role. — CNN

How delusional are these people? Which Criminal Organizations they are talking about? Which Weaponized Government? Might not be speaking of the DoD. Repeal the Patriot Act or what? Very unlikely.

As I estimate, Trump and the Trump yes-men will create a huge clusterfuck of government inability. Yes, the Trump voters just like that, but in the end nothing will happen. Trump will just have a temper tantrum because nothing has happened. He will fire people as long as there is loyal Trumpists willing to take the position.

Universally the only department that can successfully make for example large cuts is the military as the organization is trained to take orders from above. No other government service or department actually works that way. Typically, and I'll use my country Finland here as an example (as this really is an universal response), if the government wants to cut the budgets of municipalities or provincial government, the first response is always to shut down public libraries. Why? Because Finns just love libraries even to day! In short, government bureaucracy will fight any administration by simply making it hell for the ordinary citizens in order for the citizens in response to get angry at the administration.

Heck, it's just four years.

Nearly a month has gone from the last commentary on this thread. It seems quite bleak for Ukraine at this time. As still a lot of things can happen, there are also worrisome signs that Trump team might want a similar peace deal like the Doha agreement in February 2020. It's very unlikely that Trump will truly pressure Russia, because that would totally go against everything he has communicated. The last thing the Trump voters would want is an escalation, further commitment and more money put into the war. When US Presidents (Obama, Trump) have promised to draw down something, that isn't the best negotiation stance to have with an enemy that can simply wait out and continue.

Hence I started a thread Why Americans lose wars as there are parallels to Afghanistan and the Vietnam war.

Of course, I may be wrong. And hopefully I would be wrong, actually...

legitimate, legal and accepted by the people as I tried to convey. But we have to still remember that violence is still violence, even if we hope that the threat of violence works for those willing to break laws and the rules of the society.

Actually a very interesting commentary on Trump's future administration.

Speaking to an Australian crowd, Niall Ferguson makes a well thought argument on what the Trump administration policies will be like. The acceptance of there being really the "Axis of evil", an anti-US coalition, and not as just mere wordplay as during the times of Dubya Bush, is going to be a crucial part in making Trump's foreign policy or what it's going to have to deal with. This discussed contrasted to Mearsheimer's views makes it worth listening to.

In being an educator you need to assume that the person to be educated has no knowledge of the subject which you profess. Therefore you need to start from the basics, make them very clear, and then move on to the specifics. You are doing the opposite, starting form some very specific assumptions, but then you cannot show any general principles which would support these specific assumptions. — Metaphysician Undercover

Well, I view anarcho-capitalist libertarianism as a prime example how once a successful ideology (that is liberalism here in question) has achieved it's logical and most justifiable goals, the next "waves" in the thinking that want to go further, simply in the end make it all very silly. Just look at where modern feminism is now after second, third and fourth waves after the Suffragettes. Not many women support the objectives of the fourth wave.

the state's existence depends on fear and people's misguided assumption that there are some things - protecting our basic rights - that the state does best. Upon recognizing that this is simply false - that the state police are really awful at their job (due to lack of competition) - as well as unjust is the first step. — Clearbury

Lack of competition of what? The legality of the laws and legal system?

I think Max Weber understood correctly what is at stake with a state and with it's legality. For Weber the state is defined as a community that successfully claims a monopoly over violence within a geographical area and this state is then required to have legitimate and legal authority that is accepted by the people.

That isn't a transactional issue you simply can choose to buy. It isn't a situation that could be modeled as an oligopoly. And this is where it comes down to the aspect that humans don't act in a society as individuals thinking of just themselves, but as groups that have bonds. If you don't accept that authority of your state, but the vast majority of the people do, tough luck. If nobody accepts the authority of the state, well, the state collapses more quickly than the Soviet Union did. And you will quickly have to reinstate something before it becomes a fight.

When that legality or the legal system simply doesn't exist anymore, people are right to fear.
Even a brief collapse of the states authority makes people different. Just look how people behave when governments collapse or in many countries when a hurricane or earthquake hits the country. It really comes down to the social cohesion in the society. If there isn't that cohesion or it is low, then it's OK to steal from the supermarket. Then it's OK to take from "the rich people". And on the other side, then it's OK shoot a looter.

In order for there to be some kind of transactional service you buy or sell, you simply have to have firm institutions at place. And this is the problem here with the idea of competition of security: you really understand this isn't similar to hiring that electrician. And it really isn't simply the same thing as buying a security firm to watch over you. Security firms providing a service means that there has to exist institutions that uphold the contracts and overall laws. Yet when those institutions don't exist, the "security firms" are quite different: if they have the weapons, they have the power. Will they create and uphold institutions that basically weaken their current position? Likely no. This is the major problem.

Most people have no idea just how bad the police are at solving crimes, for we rarely if ever need them. — Clearbury

Well, in my country they write books and make documentaries about unsolved murders. That's how rare unsolved murders are in my country. I guess last Century there was about ten-twelve or something like that in my country of 5 million. Less than 20 murders were done last year, to give you a comparison. But when my car was broken into, they didn't do anything. Something for the insurance company. Hence the severity of the crime is where police focus.

The effectiveness of the police emerges from the whole society itself. Do people respect the police or are they criminals themselves. As my wife is Mexican and I've been in Mexico many times, I can assure you that police and the societies are very different from Finland, even if the friends and family of my wife are as honest and hardworking as Finns are. It all comes down to those institutions, social cohesion, customs of the land. These all make theoretical micro level ideas of safety as a service very remote from reality.

Even as individuals we are not allowed to protect our own rights if we so wish. I have a right to punish those who violate my rights, but the state prevents me from exercising that right. — Clearbury

Punishment is far different from defense. Defending your life or home is legal. Giving punishment is really another thing. That's really not a right for you to become the judge and make your own laws.

Is it in public schools? That’s a no-no for me. — Bob Ross

If over 90% of the people belonged to the same church, why not? Besides, nothing makes people less religious than you make the religion something close to the government. The clergy really doesn't have to compete in any way for the people. They can behave like government employees.

I am not sure I followed, but my point is that people should have the right to bear arms. — Bob Ross

Right to bear arms is in many countries. It really doesn't have to be in the constitution.

I didn't steer the conversation towards Trump, and it is not necessary to do so to contend with the OP: I am merely entertaining all avenues of conversation that present itself to me. — Bob Ross

Hey, nobody hasn't used the Hitler card yet. Or have they???

That proponent of a mixture of nationalism and socialism has to appear sometime.

Of course,

If you have a thread called "In Support of Western Supremacy, Nationalism, and Imperialism." sooner or later it becomes a Trump thread. There is already a Trump thread.

The loving father when he and she were younger :kiss:

What about it? — Bob Ross

State religion. The Monarch being the head of the Church should make it obvious.

No one should be shoving a particular religion down the throats of children at a public school—that’s not how it should work. — Bob Ross

Lol. Nobody that doesn't belong to the church isn't forced to participate in the classes, yet even today 65% of Finns do belong to the state church and just seven years ago 71% belonged to the Church. When I was in school (in the 1980's) well over 90% of Finns belonged to the Lutheran Church, so it would have been quite stupid not to have religion taught at school for all those that belonged to the Church. Even then children that didn't belong to the Church or were of other religious background naturally were exempt of it.

And btw have you noticed something in the symbolism of the flags of the Nordic countries?


So sorry to upset you, but Christianity has been a fundamental part of what has been called Western culture. If you forget that, you are quite selective in what for you Western culture etc. is about.

I don’t know about that...only three countries that I am aware of have a constitutional right to bear arms: that’s the US, Mexico, and Guatemala. — Bob Ross

That then is quite meaningless, more of an oddity if firearms are mentioned in the Constitution or not. Mexico has quite strict gun laws, similar to other countries and gun ownership is actually quite low with the country being at 60th place of firearms per capita (Guatemala is at number 70). Then you have countries like Switzerland that has a lot of guns and with a militia that has the (government owned) assault rifles at home.

Yes. I 'hire' electricians. If an electrician just decides to change a lightbulb - without asking me - and then bills me and threatens me with violence if I do not pay, then that's UNJUST. — Clearbury

That's totally reasonable. But not all things are so easy to buy as the service when your lightbulb has gone out. Safety and the perception of safety in a community is one. This is why it's not anymore just a service that an individual can decide to have or disregard. For example, you can go on a trip without travel insurance, but what about your car insurance? That's also for when you drive lousily and wreck somebody else's car. Of course, you can opt not to have a car.

But when it comes the issue of public safety, it isn't just a service you buy. And you cannot opt out like not having a car (and thus not paying the car insurance).

I'm not sure what you mean. Do you mean the act against the "instrumentalization of migration", where Finland cut the rights to asylum seekers if pressured by a state actor (read Russia) allowing and assisting people to seek asylum in Finland? Well, as some Finns are quick to bow to direction where power is (and thus show their arse to the opposite side), someone wrote here that perhaps Finnish border laws are seen positively by the Trump people soon populating the political offices in Washington DC.

If you refer to what larger problems Finland has avoided (and have been issues close to constitutional law), then it's different. I think the real issues that Finland has avoided is authoritarianism and ethnic conflict. In the 1930's right wing extremism basically rallied up by fear of communism didn't result in authoritarianism that many Eastern European countries descended into, but the democratic system prevailed. In fact the 1930's saw the social democrats coming back to power (as the party's left wing had made the bid to join the Russian Socialist Revolution in 1918). The other notable thing that didn't happen is that there wasn't any ethnic conflict between Swedish speaking Finns and Finnish speaking Finns. The reason is obvious from this: the Swedish speaking considered themselves Finns and didn't relate or yearned for Sweden and only the far right talked about Swedish speaking Finns as being Swedish. Then also Sweden, which had for a moment occupied the Åland Island didn't at all have any desires for Finnish territory, hence the old country that we had been a province to accepted us as independent neighbors. And now the relations are very warm between the two.

This is an equivocation. — Bob Ross

It isn't. Nationalism simply includes ultranationalism and jingoism.

There’s no trolling intended: there are good forms of nationalism, imperialism, and supremacy. Liberals just get butt-hurt when people use the proper terminology, because they conflate it with the bad forms. — Bob Ross

And trolls just love to get others butt-hurt, it's the objective.

What??? Patriotism is not anti-democratic. I don’t know why you would suggest all forms of nationalism, like Patriotism, are against democracy. — Bob Ross

Read carefully. I was talking about Marxism, not patriotism. Marxism-Leninism starts with ideas of violent revolutions, class enemy and the attitude towards other political systems is not veiled in the thinking.

The Communists disdain to conceal their views and aims. They openly declare that their ends can be attained only by the forcible overthrow of all existing social conditions. Let the ruling classes
tremble at a Communistic revolution. The proletarians have nothing to lose but their chains. They
have a world to win.

Because it is the only set of values that separates church from state; gives people as many equal liberties as possible; has the right to bear arms; and is merit-based (or at least used to be). Any society which is missing some of things is not as good (I would say). Maybe we can disagree on the 2nd amendment; but the others seem obviously better than any alternatives. — Bob Ross

Seems you confuse American set of values with Western set of values. Forgot the Church of England? Nordic countries like Norway, Denmark have state religions, Sweden just cut the link in 2000 and in Finland the link to Lutheran Church is quite strong still starting from religion taught in schools. And only a few countries in the World don't permit citizens owning firearms. Then to say that meritocracy happens only in the West sounds quite strange too.

Trump was a criminal from his beginnings: imagine how the world would differ if he had simply been jailed for his crimes then.

And that leaves the question of what to do when law fails? — tim wood

Democracy or a Republic works only if the citizens uphold the values. Even in school I remember my philosophy teacher reminding us that there's no limit to what a Parliament can decide: it can jail redheads if it wants as it can change the constitution (with 3/4 majority votes, but still). Even for the US Constitution there have been 27 amendments.

The real problem is when corruption is basically made legal. Or where do you put it when Jared Kushner starts a private equite firm and gets an investment of 2 billion from Saudi Arabia? At least Trump is talking about Saudi Arabia very favorably. Naturally there's been the allegations of Hunter Biden, which just shows how usual this is.

Careful what you ask for. Clearbury is prone to designating anyone who asks for such as irrational, and then proceeding to ignore that person for engaging with the reality of the situation, rather than Clearbury's hypothetical situation. — Metaphysician Undercover

Thanks for the "warning", but I'll see if Clearbury responds.

I think this is very typical for those that want to talk especially about anarchism. Anarchism sounds so interesting and refreshingly different from what they are used to in their own society. It's a wonderful blend of freedom and criticism of the societies of the present. However, even if daydreaming might be refreshing, any political ideology has to be rooted in actual reality and judged by what it's implementation really results in. Having premises like "actually we have to have a totally new kind of human being" should ring alarm bells for everyone.

I am familiar-ish with the sorts of case people make for the state. And to date I have been unimpressed by all of them. — Clearbury

The fundamental problem is where you start thinking of anarchism: you start from the individual, yet go for macrolevel solutions that effect communities and societies. Individual rights is a good starting point for a legal system, because the laws should be universal and equal. Yet in your example an individual interacts with another individual and that's your basis for anarchism. This is simply thinking that someone in an Ivory Tower purely thinking at a theoretical level can make.

First of all, people don't roam the land as individuals like siberian tigers or other large predators do. Humans live in groups and form families, groups, clans, societies. You can be all hyped up about the rights of the individual, think yourself as an individual, but you simply don't live alone and act alone. But this is just the start of the problems that this individualism has.

Think for a while of reality, of historical events on how people behave when there is de facto, no government or the government collapses.

When governments collapse, and there are dozens and dozens of examples of this, what is common in those situations?

What is common that then people immediately form groups that basically carry out the role of the government. The first thing is that they understand there's no police to call, then they protect themselves, their families and their property. They can be neighborhood watchgroups, vigilante groups or simply gangs. And they every time face the problem of who pays for the costs if crisis isn't very short. Because simply a few volunteers armed with baseball bats looking out for thieves won't cut it. The "few volunteers" have to have weapons and training, and all that adds to the costs of maintaining this service. And then you're back to square one: the "anarchistic" system has to demand some payment for the costs, hence taxes, and then comes all the issues of who just has power then in the system, and so on.

It's something quite universal:

or indirectly unjust in that it pays for what it is justly doing by unjust means: by taxation. — Clearbury

Here's my problem: are you willing to pay anything for services provided by others? If you need an electrician, is it OK for the electrician to ask for fee that basically feeds himself and his family? Or is that also unjust.

If you answered yes, you would pay for the electrician for his services, then where is the line where this payment becomes "injust", as the government does provide valuable institutions and services and the taxes go to the salaries of those that make them possible. It's again the problem above, something like "security" isn't cheap, it's far more costly especially when there isn't a large organization taking care of it... like a government.

Yeah but you have Stockholm syndrome. You like being stolen from and told what to do by a bunch of pencil-necks, the younger the better. — NOS4A2

You think so?

What can I say. Being happy that my taxes have substantially gotten lower from earlier times. As a young student I remember being taxed 72,5% and even the tax official didn't understand why it was so high (the max at that time). Luckily I was still living with my parents at that time. Now it's gone down, well below 50%. And then I got a free education to an university degree and don't have to pay for my children's education. My health care costs are low, even if I have had health problems on the way. The fact is that when people really get services for their taxes that they otherwise would have to pay, they are OK with it. Even the Republicans have pushed improvements to Medicare and such stuff and the majority of Republicans favour such entitlement programs as social security and Medicare, so don't get your ideological views to forget reality.

And they say I'm living in the happiest country in the World. Guess that makes everyone else's country suck for them a lot more.

If so, how susceptible do you think they would be to more leftist populist rhetoric? — bert1

In the US it's difficult to say as it's been a very long time since the US has seen genuinely leftist parties being popular.

The big transformation that has happened both in the UK, USA and in Europe is that the leftist parties (social democrats, labour etc) have been losing their voters to populist movement. This basically shows that they haven't answered to a segment of their voters. For example in the UK you had your own populist movement (Brexit) which was taken up with both a populist party (UKIP) and a wing of the conservative party. In his election win years ago the Brexiteer Boris Johnson admitted that he had gotten traditional labour votes, which just showed this drift. But then the conservatives and Boris fumbled it up and these voters went back to Labour.

Yes. We're in weird times. I haven't quite put the puzzle pieces together to understand what it means. I've considered the possibility that there's been a lot more lead in the drinking water than anyone realized. — frank

"Weird times" is an indicator that there is a genuine possibility of things getting really worse. I remember a letter written by my great grandfather to his brother in 1916. He had been walking with the local priest and discussed the political situation. The priest couldn't simply understand what collective insanity had taken over people in 1905 where my great grandfather had responded that those times could indeed come back. In two years Finland was in bloody a civil war.

For the educated and informed people the observation of "insanity taking over people" is an alarm bell, the canary in the coal mine dying. That means many people don't think the traditional politics (of the moderates) isn't working and drastic changes are needed.

ssu As for DNC populism, what would that look like? I associate populism with right-wing politics typically, but I suppose you could have a left-wing version that encourages victimhood and dependency, — bert1

Left-wing populism exists.

Best example of that in your continent was Hugo Chavez and the politics of Venezuela. It starts from basically dehumanizing your opponents and claim how super powerful these evil people of the elite are. Leftist populism would forget the woke humbug and DEI and simply focus on the working man, the real honest people that "make the true America". It's quite similar to the Trumpist rhetoric (no surprise there), but the politics is of course leftist. And that leftist rhetoric makes Republicans howl.

And that the real purpose: to make Republicans outrage. Outraging your opponent is the key to get the angry people enthusiastic about your cause. Populism nurtures hatred. It's about changing the Overton window in politics.

What has happened is that with the "New Left" thinking so much that all the woke nonsense is important, they've simply forgotten their own base, the workers and the less educated people. That's why the real divide in US policy goes by education. Well educated people still think they can get a good job and the system works for them. But if a blue-collar worker in the rust-belt, the whole system seems to have forgotten you totally. That's the people Trump went for an got.