4 ms·

Two regs, less than 30 min old, both trying to launder the bullshit Kissinger did. Odd. > hese are the hard decisions one grapples with as Secretary of State.

Two regs, less than 30 min old, both trying to launder the bullshit Kissinger did. Odd. > hese are the hard decisions one grapples with as Secretary of State. SoS of an imperialist country. During a time of America's greatest atrocities. And during a time where no one could challenge US hegemony. There is no statecraft to be learned here. There is nothing to learn from him other than what a piece of shit he is.

paisawalla 5y ago
I mean, just admit that you don't want this hegemony to exist on the first place. Let people decide if they've enjoyed the dividends that have flowed from being the uncontested center of the world for a century. But let's not pretend that there's some alternative world out there where we could have had clean hands, but not ended up in some communist dystopia where most of us wouldn't be here, because our parents or grandparents were liquidated.
- cwkoss 5y ago
  > but not ended up in some communist dystopia where most of us wouldn't be here, because our parents or grandparents were liquidated. Wow, that really took a quick turn from apologism into weird tinfoil-hattery
  - lowkey_ 5y ago
    I'm not the above commenter, but I imagine this take is not so tinfoil-y. It's due to the Cold War we were experiencing around that time, and the fact that U.S. hegemony was only checked by a truly evil force (in its good nature, to be apologist). The USSR would have loved for the United States to end up the same type of place, with many millions dead or permanently interned in camps. I imagine you're younger than to have experienced that type of fear, but it was real fear and a real threat. The questionable and bloody decisions our government made was largely to fight that threat and ensure that wouldn't happen to us.
    - whydoibother 5y ago
      Your comment is so ignorant of history. The US was full of paranoid nutjobs who wanted to nuke everyone. How many millions died directly due to the US govt's horrible policies? Stop acting like we were the good guys, that cold war propaganda doesn't hold up if you look at history. Indonesia, Vietnam, how many countries in SA, and how many covert actions we don't know about. Nothing the USSR did compared to that. Nothing the USSR was doing warranted the US inflicting the horrors we have around the world.
  - paisawalla 5y ago
    Yeah, this is has just been the history of revolutionary communism everywhere it's been tried. IMHO completely worth fighting against, even with imperfect measures. I don't blame the Chileans for stopping it, and we were right to help. The alternatives were known to be far worse. btw Allende was in office for 3 years before he was deposed.
    - whydoibother 5y ago
      What has the history of capitalistic rulers been? Mass genocides, undermining the sovereignty of other countries, prolonged wars that rob from the citizens, nuclear destruction. IMHO completely worth fighting against, even with imperfect measures. Also, the Chileans didn't stop it. The far-right in Chile, aided by the right-wing CIA, overthrew a democratic government and installed a military junta for decades. You are straight up fascist scum if you think that was justified.
    - cwkoss 5y ago
      > history of revolutionary communism everywhere it's been tried. "revolutionary" is a clever way of excluding all of the successful models of socialism - like the scandanavian countries which consistently rank as the happiest countries on the planet.
      - paisawalla 5y ago
        Yes, it's a good way to stick to the cases where communism has been tried at 10-100M+ populations, and not get distracted by tiny, ethnically homogeneous, and as-arguable-as-not socialist countries like Norway or Sweden. Those too are hardly models for the US, but not for the reason that they required mass slaughter of one-third their populations.
      - lowkey_ 5y ago
        As a Swedish citizen, I would like to note that we are not socialist — basically nobody in the country wants to be claimed as some example of socialism. The highest income tax rate is nearly equivalent to that of the US. :)

paisawalla 5y ago

I mean, just admit that you don't want this hegemony to exist on the first place. Let people decide if they've enjoyed the dividends that have flowed from being the uncontested center of the world for a century. But let's not pretend that there's some alternative world out there where we could have had clean hands, but not ended up in some communist dystopia where most of us wouldn't be here, because our parents or grandparents were liquidated.

cwkoss 5y ago
> but not ended up in some communist dystopia where most of us wouldn't be here, because our parents or grandparents were liquidated. Wow, that really took a quick turn from apologism into weird tinfoil-hattery
- lowkey_ 5y ago
  I'm not the above commenter, but I imagine this take is not so tinfoil-y. It's due to the Cold War we were experiencing around that time, and the fact that U.S. hegemony was only checked by a truly evil force (in its good nature, to be apologist). The USSR would have loved for the United States to end up the same type of place, with many millions dead or permanently interned in camps. I imagine you're younger than to have experienced that type of fear, but it was real fear and a real threat. The questionable and bloody decisions our government made was largely to fight that threat and ensure that wouldn't happen to us.
  - whydoibother 5y ago
    Your comment is so ignorant of history. The US was full of paranoid nutjobs who wanted to nuke everyone. How many millions died directly due to the US govt's horrible policies? Stop acting like we were the good guys, that cold war propaganda doesn't hold up if you look at history. Indonesia, Vietnam, how many countries in SA, and how many covert actions we don't know about. Nothing the USSR did compared to that. Nothing the USSR was doing warranted the US inflicting the horrors we have around the world.
- paisawalla 5y ago
  Yeah, this is has just been the history of revolutionary communism everywhere it's been tried. IMHO completely worth fighting against, even with imperfect measures. I don't blame the Chileans for stopping it, and we were right to help. The alternatives were known to be far worse. btw Allende was in office for 3 years before he was deposed.
  - whydoibother 5y ago
    What has the history of capitalistic rulers been? Mass genocides, undermining the sovereignty of other countries, prolonged wars that rob from the citizens, nuclear destruction. IMHO completely worth fighting against, even with imperfect measures. Also, the Chileans didn't stop it. The far-right in Chile, aided by the right-wing CIA, overthrew a democratic government and installed a military junta for decades. You are straight up fascist scum if you think that was justified.
  - cwkoss 5y ago
    > history of revolutionary communism everywhere it's been tried. "revolutionary" is a clever way of excluding all of the successful models of socialism - like the scandanavian countries which consistently rank as the happiest countries on the planet.
    - paisawalla 5y ago
      Yes, it's a good way to stick to the cases where communism has been tried at 10-100M+ populations, and not get distracted by tiny, ethnically homogeneous, and as-arguable-as-not socialist countries like Norway or Sweden. Those too are hardly models for the US, but not for the reason that they required mass slaughter of one-third their populations.
    - lowkey_ 5y ago
      As a Swedish citizen, I would like to note that we are not socialist — basically nobody in the country wants to be claimed as some example of socialism. The highest income tax rate is nearly equivalent to that of the US. :)