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It's all about oil, land and water. Ideology is about your country being the best. Everything else is irrelevant.

• berntb 10y ago
  That seems naive in an anti-naive way? :-) When I look at the foreign policy of my country (Sweden), it seems a large part of it is decided as part of internal political posturing. Tail wagging the dog, etc. I'm not as knowledgeable about the US politics, but it seems to not be as bad -- but still a large influence.
  • acqq 10y ago
    > a large part of it is decided as part of internal political posturing I agree that not "everything" on the lowest level (single politicians) is simply "oil" but even looking at your example the motivation on the lower level is surely to keep the power and influence by these who already have it and to get the power and influence for these who don't have it. The next step is to ask what the power and influence does in total, what are the interests of the whole systems.
  • blahi 10y ago
    There's quite the difference in priorities, objectives, means and constraints between some small and insignificant country and the world's hegemon.