5 ms·

>When I was in the Marines, they told us that we shouldn't need to be there, but politicians from the 80s/90s left things such a mess after trying to stop the S

by anm89 7y ago

>When I was in the Marines, they told us that we shouldn't need to be there, but politicians from the 80s/90s left things such a mess after trying to stop the Soviets, that now we had to go try and clean up the mess created 20 years prior. This is of course true but you can play this fallacy out forever. The right thing to do in the 80s was not to meddle. Then after that we should have cut our losses and stopped meddling. And now 40 years later we are cleaning up failed clean up attempts on failed clean up attempts. At every point in this chain, the correct move is to admit you can't be world police and stop meddling.

Udik 7y ago
> you can't be world police Off topic, but the whole concept of "world police" is just spin. A police force is one that enforces equally laws established by others. You cannot be at the same time the one who establishes the rules and who decides when and where to use force against those who break them. This is just arbitary use of violence.
ggm 7y ago
left things such a mess after trying to stop the Soviets So much contained in this one sentence. People need to go look at what backing an insurgency against a repressive but modernising government does and ask questions.
- pjc50 7y ago
  The effect of backing the mujahadeen on the actual Afghans was, I'm sure, never in the picture. (Anyone remember the Living Daylights where James Bond teams up with the Oxford-educated Afghan head of the local islamists to beat the Russians together?)
  - ggm 7y ago
    One might say the whole effect of the domino theory was to justify US military intervention against Russia and every single place they did, it backfired. Iran, the oil backed coup of the 1950s led to Pahlavi, hatred and fear which in turn led to Kohmeni in Paris. Simply letting the Iranians nationalise the oil industry would probably have been better long-term. 1953 to 2020, US oil interests stuffing up peace...
    - wahern 7y ago
      > One might say the whole effect of the domino theory was to justify US military intervention against Russia and every single place they did, it backfired. A few counter examples: Greece, [South] Korea, Malaysia, Philippines, Indonesia. Chile is another well known example, though IMO U.S. involvement is wildly exaggerated. AFAIU, it was conservatives in the Chilean Congress that engineered and pushed for the coup. The prospect of American support (e.g. a wink from the CIA) simply made it a marginally easier sell among the people whose heads might roll if it failed. None of which is a defense of the Domino Theory or a comment on the merits of intervention. The take away from all of this, IMO, is to avoid grand strategic theories and goals--context matters.
      - ggm 7y ago
        If you think Phillipines or Indonesia worked, I think you're wrong. Both have systemic corruption, massive structural issues and lingering left wing and Islamic rebellion. Indonesia killed millions in their counter communist reaction. Greece I grant you, "worked" within the limits you aren't a left wing Greek. The US wound up having to play in Greece and Turkey simultaneously, nobody is happy in the middle east really.
        ggm 7y ago
        I suppose they "worked" in as much as US economic benefits ensued.
        wahern 7y ago
        > If you think Phillipines or Indonesia worked, I think you're wrong. Both have systemic corruption, massive structural issues and lingering left wing and Islamic rebellion. Both of those countries would have had systemic corruption and massive structural issues either way, just as they had before. U.S. intervention doesn't really figure into it. Anyhow, the goal was to stop the spread of communism, not lift people out of poverty. The genocide of "communists" (i.e. Chinese and other outgroups) in Indonesia was absolutely abhorrent and a gross moral failure on the part of the U.S. But from the perspective of American geopolitical interests intervention wasn't a failure. It almost certainly wasn't even necessary, either, but that's beside the point. Non-intervention has its own problems, too, as exemplified by Cambodia, Rwanda, and Syria[1]. Intervention vs non-intervention is a false dichotomy. To reiterate, context matters. [1] I've said before on HN that I think Obama's refusal to directly intervene in Syria showed exceptional leadership, notwithstanding his about-face; indeed, because of his about-face. But that doesn't absolve the U.S. of its sins for having created the conflagration in the Middle East that resulted in the Syrian conflict. What Obama finally accepted, but everybody else refused to admit (including his own advisors), was that the U.S. was politically incapable of making the necessary commitments. Had the U.S. been capable--i.e. if the context were different--then greater intervention would have been the correct thing. What makes his decision so profound to me was that he accepted that reality at a moment when denial was easiest--when everybody felt it was the morally righteous thing to do (and arguably was), everybody wanted it, and when after it inevitably led to more bloodshed nobody would have ever blamed him, neither contemporaneously nor in the future.
dx87 7y ago
I don't know if it's really fair to say that after 9/11 we were playing world police when we invaded Afghanistan. They were harboring Al Qaeda who had been carrying out smaller scale attacks on US assets for a while, culminating with 9/11. At that point you can't just ignore them and hope they stop; they'd been escalating violence for years.
- craftinator 7y ago
  We invaded Iraq because of 9/11, not Afghanistan. That came later.
  - aibara 7y ago
    What? The U.S. invaded Afghanistan first, in 2001. Iraq came in 2003.
  - krapp 7y ago
    We were always going to invade Iraq, as soon as GWB and Dick Cheney were elected it was inevitable. 9/11 just provided a convenient opportunity to manufacture the pretext by implying links between Iraq Intelligence and the hijackers.
  - deleted 7y ago
    [deleted]
- boomboomsubban 7y ago
  What you describe sounds a lot like the police breaking into a house to arrest an alleged criminal. >At that point you can't just ignore them and hope they stop; they'd been escalating violence for years. If you can't ignore the problem, then drastically escalate the violence on your own?
  - pjc50 7y ago
    Very much like this: https://www.forbes.com/sites/erikkain/2011/08/31/actor-steven-seagal-sued-for-driving-tank-into-arizona-home-killing-puppy/#ffc3b7474894 https://www.forbes.com/sites/erikkain/2011/08/31/actor-steve...
clarkmoody 7y ago
The only winning move is not to play.
- ghisler 7y ago
  Thanks for registering WinRAR. <3
pbhjpbhj 7y ago
"World police". I used to buy that, but the more I've learnt the more it seems it was just "corrupt this country for our own ends", covert control seemingly to support megalomania. USA has certainly done a good job of pretending to be the good guy, whilst simultaneously arming bad guys and killing to support Capitalist and tyrannical goals.

by anm89 7y ago

Udik 7y ago

> you can't be world police Off topic, but the whole concept of "world police" is just spin. A police force is one that enforces equally laws established by others. You cannot be at the same time the one who establishes the rules and who decides when and where to use force against those who break them. This is just arbitary use of violence.

ggm 7y ago

left things such a mess after trying to stop the Soviets So much contained in this one sentence. People need to go look at what backing an insurgency against a repressive but modernising government does and ask questions.

pjc50 7y ago
The effect of backing the mujahadeen on the actual Afghans was, I'm sure, never in the picture. (Anyone remember the Living Daylights where James Bond teams up with the Oxford-educated Afghan head of the local islamists to beat the Russians together?)
- ggm 7y ago
  One might say the whole effect of the domino theory was to justify US military intervention against Russia and every single place they did, it backfired. Iran, the oil backed coup of the 1950s led to Pahlavi, hatred and fear which in turn led to Kohmeni in Paris. Simply letting the Iranians nationalise the oil industry would probably have been better long-term. 1953 to 2020, US oil interests stuffing up peace...
  - wahern 7y ago
    > One might say the whole effect of the domino theory was to justify US military intervention against Russia and every single place they did, it backfired. A few counter examples: Greece, [South] Korea, Malaysia, Philippines, Indonesia. Chile is another well known example, though IMO U.S. involvement is wildly exaggerated. AFAIU, it was conservatives in the Chilean Congress that engineered and pushed for the coup. The prospect of American support (e.g. a wink from the CIA) simply made it a marginally easier sell among the people whose heads might roll if it failed. None of which is a defense of the Domino Theory or a comment on the merits of intervention. The take away from all of this, IMO, is to avoid grand strategic theories and goals--context matters.
    - ggm 7y ago
      If you think Phillipines or Indonesia worked, I think you're wrong. Both have systemic corruption, massive structural issues and lingering left wing and Islamic rebellion. Indonesia killed millions in their counter communist reaction. Greece I grant you, "worked" within the limits you aren't a left wing Greek. The US wound up having to play in Greece and Turkey simultaneously, nobody is happy in the middle east really.
      - ggm 7y ago
        I suppose they "worked" in as much as US economic benefits ensued.
      - wahern 7y ago
        > If you think Phillipines or Indonesia worked, I think you're wrong. Both have systemic corruption, massive structural issues and lingering left wing and Islamic rebellion. Both of those countries would have had systemic corruption and massive structural issues either way, just as they had before. U.S. intervention doesn't really figure into it. Anyhow, the goal was to stop the spread of communism, not lift people out of poverty. The genocide of "communists" (i.e. Chinese and other outgroups) in Indonesia was absolutely abhorrent and a gross moral failure on the part of the U.S. But from the perspective of American geopolitical interests intervention wasn't a failure. It almost certainly wasn't even necessary, either, but that's beside the point. Non-intervention has its own problems, too, as exemplified by Cambodia, Rwanda, and Syria[1]. Intervention vs non-intervention is a false dichotomy. To reiterate, context matters. [1] I've said before on HN that I think Obama's refusal to directly intervene in Syria showed exceptional leadership, notwithstanding his about-face; indeed, because of his about-face. But that doesn't absolve the U.S. of its sins for having created the conflagration in the Middle East that resulted in the Syrian conflict. What Obama finally accepted, but everybody else refused to admit (including his own advisors), was that the U.S. was politically incapable of making the necessary commitments. Had the U.S. been capable--i.e. if the context were different--then greater intervention would have been the correct thing. What makes his decision so profound to me was that he accepted that reality at a moment when denial was easiest--when everybody felt it was the morally righteous thing to do (and arguably was), everybody wanted it, and when after it inevitably led to more bloodshed nobody would have ever blamed him, neither contemporaneously nor in the future.

dx87 7y ago

I don't know if it's really fair to say that after 9/11 we were playing world police when we invaded Afghanistan. They were harboring Al Qaeda who had been carrying out smaller scale attacks on US assets for a while, culminating with 9/11. At that point you can't just ignore them and hope they stop; they'd been escalating violence for years.

craftinator 7y ago
We invaded Iraq because of 9/11, not Afghanistan. That came later.
- aibara 7y ago
  What? The U.S. invaded Afghanistan first, in 2001. Iraq came in 2003.
- krapp 7y ago
  We were always going to invade Iraq, as soon as GWB and Dick Cheney were elected it was inevitable. 9/11 just provided a convenient opportunity to manufacture the pretext by implying links between Iraq Intelligence and the hijackers.
- deleted 7y ago
  [deleted]
boomboomsubban 7y ago
What you describe sounds a lot like the police breaking into a house to arrest an alleged criminal. >At that point you can't just ignore them and hope they stop; they'd been escalating violence for years. If you can't ignore the problem, then drastically escalate the violence on your own?
- pjc50 7y ago
  Very much like this: https://www.forbes.com/sites/erikkain/2011/08/31/actor-steven-seagal-sued-for-driving-tank-into-arizona-home-killing-puppy/#ffc3b7474894 https://www.forbes.com/sites/erikkain/2011/08/31/actor-steve...

clarkmoody 7y ago

The only winning move is not to play.

ghisler 7y ago
Thanks for registering WinRAR. <3

pbhjpbhj 7y ago

"World police". I used to buy that, but the more I've learnt the more it seems it was just "corrupt this country for our own ends", covert control seemingly to support megalomania. USA has certainly done a good job of pretending to be the good guy, whilst simultaneously arming bad guys and killing to support Capitalist and tyrannical goals.