5 ms·

Nearly 3/4 of the World’s Dictators Receive US Weapons and Military Assistance

73 points by radmuzom 5y ago

Ancalagon 5y ago
Horrible but also kind of ironic that compared to all these authoritarians, US capitalism is on such a level that the US literally has to make and arms it’s own enemies to practice use of it’s full force. Reminds me of the big bad bully on the play ground giving the skinny kid a baseball bat and saying “go ahead, hit me I dare you”. (I realize both of these scenarios sound awful, please don’t downvote me for being completely socially unaware).
AtlasBarfed 5y ago
Well, who else actually uses them? Democracies (or those governments advertising themseles as such) generally don't bomb their own people with such aplomb and enthusiasm. ANd what about all those useful torture outsourcing orgs that the CIA needs so badly to fight its phantom war on Terrorism? Look people, who is going to keep the lower classes in the outer parts of the empire down? We can't do that directly, it's too expensive, annoying, there's press conferences, sometimes CNN starts broadcasting about international news to the populace. All annoying and counterproductive to the voting powers and their corporate lords. And of course, who's going to shadow fund all your actual wealth while you pull down a meager (by elite western standards) 175k salary in congress? The Saudis only care about the big fish like presidents (that's why there's a presidential visit TO Saudi Arabia near the end of every US President's administrations). Oh, sure, it's "illegal" to get that money. Fine, let us just use Citizens United to funnel the money to your lobbying buds who will totally set you up.
jollybean 5y ago
This is almost a non-argument. The world is a complicate place. We prefer that people have basic freedoms, but that's not always going to be the case. Singapore is an 'autocracy' and so was Korea up until recently. So is Kuwait. We want 'order' first, which can enable a bit of prosperity, and then the slow grind to basic freedoms, it's generally the only path. Almost all revolutions end up with fairly bad tyrannies. Singapore is much better managed that India or Russia, which are both nominal democracies.
- datenarsch 5y ago
  > We want 'order' first, which can enable a bit of prosperity, and then the slow grind to basic freedoms, it's generally the only path. Why did you invade Iraq then plunging it into total chaos and support ISIS in Syria against the Assad regime? Why did you overthrow the Gaddafi regime in Libya. All of these actions have led to an incredible destabilization and power vaccuum in the entire region, completely destroyed the 'order' you claim you want, led to the rise of terror groups in the region and to a migration crisis of epic proportions.
  - post_from_work 5y ago
    >>>Why did you invade Iraq then plunging it into total chaos and support ISIS in Syria against the Assad regime? Why did you overthrow the Gaddafi regime in Libya. Both of these governments were attempting to sell oil for something other than US dollars. Threats to the Petrodollar system are NOT tolerated by the Galactic Empire. https://www.theguardian.com/business/2003/feb/16/iraq.theeuro https://www.theguardian.com/business/2003/feb/16/iraq.theeur... https://www.cse.unsw.edu.au/~norman/CurrentAffairs/DeeperNew.html https://www.cse.unsw.edu.au/~norman/CurrentAffairs/DeeperNew... https://thenewamerican.com/gadhafi-s-gold-money-plan-would-have-devastated-dollar/ https://thenewamerican.com/gadhafi-s-gold-money-plan-would-h... https://www.rt.com/news/economy-oil-gold-libya/ https://www.rt.com/news/economy-oil-gold-libya/
    - jollybean 5y ago
      This is total nonsense. Iraq was already destabilized with daily NATO air missions overhead for a decade, Libya and Syria were plunged into civil war long before any kind of intervention. The Americans don't like it when you mess with their petrodollar, but they're not going to fight a war over it. FYI not answering the complicated questions about 'why USA invaded Iraq', but rather pointing out the 'Petrodollar' conspiracy is a canard. If you're looking for an indirect strategic issue to talk about you can just say 'Energy Security' was a factor, which of course it is, but it's still only one factor.
      - 5y ago
Gunax 5y ago
At the risk of garnering controversy, I understand why and even support it. The reality is that there is seldom a great choice in many places. It's usually choosing between two or more dictators. When the US supported South Vietnam, it's not that they condoned everything south vietnam did, but had to make a tactical choice between lesser evils. I guess my takeaway is there is a pragmatic versus idealistic debate here. Ideally America really does want liberal democracies -- if every other nation was a France or Korea, we would be better off. But there is a pragmatic reality that funding non-free leaders may be a local maximum of stability.
- animal_spirits 5y ago
  I can agree with this take. While it's true that there is a large financial incentive, I think it is easy for us with our cozy lives in modern developed countries to forget how dangerous, corrupt, and unstable many developing nations are.
- burntbridge 5y ago
  >When the US supported South Vietnam, it's not that they condoned everything south vietnam did, but had to make a tactical choice between lesser evils. But why get involved at all? The US didn't have to do anything. Most of the reason the U.S. gets involved in anything has to do with geopolitics. If there are human rights issues or "freedom" issues then this is just a bonus for justification purposes. I highly recommend the Ken Burns documentary "The Vietnam War". I'm old enough to remember all the propaganda we were fed, it is just amazing how much we were lied to.
dragonsky67 5y ago
From the outside, it looks to me like any time the US is involved in another country, you just have to follow the money. The US never does anything for altruistic reasons, it's always to their benefit. I'm always nervous when our country makes new treaties or agreements with the US, there is always a sting in the tail.
G0ther 5y ago
I am wondering, what does liberal freedoms mean when the public opinion i.e the measurement of what's good and what's bad is in the hands of the media be it conservative or liberal? also why would the US be interested in the stability of other countries really? because they're good people and I have to take your word for it? or? supporting a dictator means no other voices / opinions come out in that country i.e ensuring it's all good there and no secret societies / enemy forces will ever ally in that place. democracy is a liability for the developed nations unless the local public opinion is soaked into the western ideas. there is no reason for the US or anyone to have good intentions for any "other" country and even when they have they have no right to intervene in the local politics and good intentions doesn't include supporting dictators bringing order is not better for the people of that place it's only good for the safety of the US or whomever is supporting that dictator not to mention the enormous power the US holds that can literally in a year or so just assassinate the dictator and put a liberal one. I think there were wikileaks about hijacking Iran's elections and putting Khomeini seamlessy that without that leak nobody's would have probably even knew about it. assuming the US is interested in the wellbeing of other nations is really just naive and silly. the US itself has millions of people in the streets, drug addicts, homeless etc.. they could have started to help these people if they had any good intentions the money, the power, and the brainwashing machines - the media - all exist and can help these people. but yet again, things don't work like that and never had been. the capitalists don't care if a million or 2 or 4 are homeless. they know the US us under their complete control. other regions, might not be. so offering help, humanitarian aids or such. is only a way of changing the public opinion to look good. supporting a dictator on the other hand is a way to eliminate any possible opposition that might pop up.

73 points by radmuzom 5y ago

Horrible but also kind of ironic that compared to all these authoritarians, US capitalism is on such a level that the US literally has to make and arms it’s own enemies to practice use of it’s full force. Reminds me of the big bad bully on the play ground giving the skinny kid a baseball bat and saying “go ahead, hit me I dare you”. (I realize both of these scenarios sound awful, please don’t downvote me for being completely socially unaware).

AtlasBarfed 5y ago

Well, who else actually uses them? Democracies (or those governments advertising themseles as such) generally don't bomb their own people with such aplomb and enthusiasm. ANd what about all those useful torture outsourcing orgs that the CIA needs so badly to fight its phantom war on Terrorism? Look people, who is going to keep the lower classes in the outer parts of the empire down? We can't do that directly, it's too expensive, annoying, there's press conferences, sometimes CNN starts broadcasting about international news to the populace. All annoying and counterproductive to the voting powers and their corporate lords. And of course, who's going to shadow fund all your actual wealth while you pull down a meager (by elite western standards) 175k salary in congress? The Saudis only care about the big fish like presidents (that's why there's a presidential visit TO Saudi Arabia near the end of every US President's administrations). Oh, sure, it's "illegal" to get that money. Fine, let us just use Citizens United to funnel the money to your lobbying buds who will totally set you up.

jollybean 5y ago

This is almost a non-argument. The world is a complicate place. We prefer that people have basic freedoms, but that's not always going to be the case. Singapore is an 'autocracy' and so was Korea up until recently. So is Kuwait. We want 'order' first, which can enable a bit of prosperity, and then the slow grind to basic freedoms, it's generally the only path. Almost all revolutions end up with fairly bad tyrannies. Singapore is much better managed that India or Russia, which are both nominal democracies.

datenarsch 5y ago
> We want 'order' first, which can enable a bit of prosperity, and then the slow grind to basic freedoms, it's generally the only path. Why did you invade Iraq then plunging it into total chaos and support ISIS in Syria against the Assad regime? Why did you overthrow the Gaddafi regime in Libya. All of these actions have led to an incredible destabilization and power vaccuum in the entire region, completely destroyed the 'order' you claim you want, led to the rise of terror groups in the region and to a migration crisis of epic proportions.
- post_from_work 5y ago
  >>>Why did you invade Iraq then plunging it into total chaos and support ISIS in Syria against the Assad regime? Why did you overthrow the Gaddafi regime in Libya. Both of these governments were attempting to sell oil for something other than US dollars. Threats to the Petrodollar system are NOT tolerated by the Galactic Empire. https://www.theguardian.com/business/2003/feb/16/iraq.theeuro https://www.theguardian.com/business/2003/feb/16/iraq.theeur... https://www.cse.unsw.edu.au/~norman/CurrentAffairs/DeeperNew.html https://www.cse.unsw.edu.au/~norman/CurrentAffairs/DeeperNew... https://thenewamerican.com/gadhafi-s-gold-money-plan-would-have-devastated-dollar/ https://thenewamerican.com/gadhafi-s-gold-money-plan-would-h... https://www.rt.com/news/economy-oil-gold-libya/ https://www.rt.com/news/economy-oil-gold-libya/
  - jollybean 5y ago
    This is total nonsense. Iraq was already destabilized with daily NATO air missions overhead for a decade, Libya and Syria were plunged into civil war long before any kind of intervention. The Americans don't like it when you mess with their petrodollar, but they're not going to fight a war over it. FYI not answering the complicated questions about 'why USA invaded Iraq', but rather pointing out the 'Petrodollar' conspiracy is a canard. If you're looking for an indirect strategic issue to talk about you can just say 'Energy Security' was a factor, which of course it is, but it's still only one factor.
    - 5y ago

Gunax 5y ago

At the risk of garnering controversy, I understand why and even support it. The reality is that there is seldom a great choice in many places. It's usually choosing between two or more dictators. When the US supported South Vietnam, it's not that they condoned everything south vietnam did, but had to make a tactical choice between lesser evils. I guess my takeaway is there is a pragmatic versus idealistic debate here. Ideally America really does want liberal democracies -- if every other nation was a France or Korea, we would be better off. But there is a pragmatic reality that funding non-free leaders may be a local maximum of stability.

animal_spirits 5y ago
I can agree with this take. While it's true that there is a large financial incentive, I think it is easy for us with our cozy lives in modern developed countries to forget how dangerous, corrupt, and unstable many developing nations are.
burntbridge 5y ago
>When the US supported South Vietnam, it's not that they condoned everything south vietnam did, but had to make a tactical choice between lesser evils. But why get involved at all? The US didn't have to do anything. Most of the reason the U.S. gets involved in anything has to do with geopolitics. If there are human rights issues or "freedom" issues then this is just a bonus for justification purposes. I highly recommend the Ken Burns documentary "The Vietnam War". I'm old enough to remember all the propaganda we were fed, it is just amazing how much we were lied to.

dragonsky67 5y ago

From the outside, it looks to me like any time the US is involved in another country, you just have to follow the money. The US never does anything for altruistic reasons, it's always to their benefit. I'm always nervous when our country makes new treaties or agreements with the US, there is always a sting in the tail.

G0ther 5y ago

I am wondering, what does liberal freedoms mean when the public opinion i.e the measurement of what's good and what's bad is in the hands of the media be it conservative or liberal? also why would the US be interested in the stability of other countries really? because they're good people and I have to take your word for it? or? supporting a dictator means no other voices / opinions come out in that country i.e ensuring it's all good there and no secret societies / enemy forces will ever ally in that place. democracy is a liability for the developed nations unless the local public opinion is soaked into the western ideas. there is no reason for the US or anyone to have good intentions for any "other" country and even when they have they have no right to intervene in the local politics and good intentions doesn't include supporting dictators bringing order is not better for the people of that place it's only good for the safety of the US or whomever is supporting that dictator not to mention the enormous power the US holds that can literally in a year or so just assassinate the dictator and put a liberal one. I think there were wikileaks about hijacking Iran's elections and putting Khomeini seamlessy that without that leak nobody's would have probably even knew about it. assuming the US is interested in the wellbeing of other nations is really just naive and silly. the US itself has millions of people in the streets, drug addicts, homeless etc.. they could have started to help these people if they had any good intentions the money, the power, and the brainwashing machines - the media - all exist and can help these people. but yet again, things don't work like that and never had been. the capitalists don't care if a million or 2 or 4 are homeless. they know the US us under their complete control. other regions, might not be. so offering help, humanitarian aids or such. is only a way of changing the public opinion to look good. supporting a dictator on the other hand is a way to eliminate any possible opposition that might pop up.