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Well, intervention in Yugoslavia wasn’t a war started by the US. The Kuwait war was after an invasion by Iraq and at the invitation of the government there, an

Well, intervention in Yugoslavia wasn’t a war started by the US. The Kuwait war was after an invasion by Iraq and at the invitation of the government there, and the US were restrained enough to halt at the Iraq border. The Syrian war was not started by the US, and it has played a minor part there. In fact, it is Russia that has indiscriminately bombed Syrian cities and targeted civilians and hospitals there. Afghanistan was in response to 9/11 and the refusal of the Taliban to end their protection of a terrorist organisation that had repeatedly attacked American targets internationally before their deliberate targeted murder of thousands of American civilians. This does not seem comparable to Ukraine. The Iraq war stands out for me as the unjustified and imperialist war of modern times. It seems to me that the atmosphere post 9/11 was used as a pretence. But even Iraq does seem different: Hussein was a brutal dictator and, at least initially, Americans were welcomed as liberators. In Ukraine we are seeing widespread civilian resistance to the invasion. But Blair and Bush should answer for their war crimes. By far the biggest difference here, I think, is that by being a European war and through the potential for further conflict and nuclear conflict, this war has far larger international ramifications and strategic risks attached to it. To see European cities bombed is to be reminded of what has happened in the past and that it can happen again. That is why it is receiving so much attention.

darebak 5y ago
>By far the biggest difference here, I think, is that by being a European war and through the potential for further conflict and nuclear conflict, this war has far larger international ramifications and strategic risks attached to it. To see European cities bombed is to be reminded of what has happened in the past and that it can happen again. That is why it is receiving so much attention. Bombing of Serbia was a bombing of European cities, specifically bombing of civilian population centers far from the front to terrorize the population. Also without UN approval.
- ardit33 5y ago
  Serbia did commit massive attrocities and genocide against both Bosnians and Albanians in Kosovo. They also had wars with Slovenia, and Croatia. They last gesture was massive ethnic cleansing. The US intervened when things went out of hand. Putin risks to end up like Milosevic, a war criminal.
  - darebak 5y ago
    It did not, if you have any international court verdict that says that Serbia conducted a genocide, I would like to see it. Also Serbia was not at war with Slovenia. Those are the basic facts. Now, even if those things were true, they are claimed by the proponents of bombing, enemies if you will, the same way that Putin is claiming there is a genocide of million Ukrainians in Ukraine. Do you believe your enemies?
    - nickpp 5y ago
      Motives matter too. Bombing of Serbia was to stop a bellicose regime and the humanitarian crisis it was creating. It was like bombing Russia right now, which I'd support fully hearted, if it was a possibility.
      - darebak 5y ago
        It was not. Serbia was establishing order within its territory when NATO bombed it without any approval from the UN, basically doing something just because they could. Remind you of anyone?
        sokols 5y ago
        Saying that Serbia was establishing order within its territory is a bit cynical take. What they did is that they systematically[1] cleansed villages and settlements in order to decrease the percentage of Albanian population in Kosovo. In a way, they were implementing a century old policy of a guy named Vaso Cubrilovic who argued that Albanians should be expelled[2] from the lands Serbia (precursor of Yugoslavia) took in 1913. What NATO did, is stopping exactly this from happening. [1] https://www.hrw.org/report/2001/10/26/under-orders/war-crimes-kosovo https://www.hrw.org/report/2001/10/26/under-orders/war-crime... [2] https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Expulsion_of_the_Albanians https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Expulsion_of_the_Albania...
        darebak 5y ago
- jhasse 5y ago
  > Also without UN approval. With the 5 veto powers, this basically means nothing.
astrange 5y ago
Iraq is somewhat similar except that Russia is the 2000s US, they didn’t bother making an excuse first, they didn’t form a coalition, and even less of Ukraine wants them to be there.
sto_hristo 5y ago
Iraq war while justified by wrong evidence, it was a necessity. Saddam did use WMDs on Kurdish villages - he bombed them with Sarin gas - that is HAVING WMDs. It has nothing to do with imperialism as i don't see any annexations made by the US, nor puppet governments. Ukraine, on the other hand, had territories chipped away from it, separatists backed up Russia for years and years, and now a surprise attack without forward notice. It's completely incomparable to Iraq.
- saiya-jin 5y ago
  Yeah, Saddam did that in 80s, US was still cooperating with him due to Iran/Iraq war (remember that Saddam-Rumsfeld photo? It wasn't staged or some freak coincidence but regular business/military talks and pats on the back). Those attacks didn't stop the cooperation. I don't think anybody powerful really cared about those poor civilians, it was just pretext but in this case a real one. Anyway back to the topic - we europeans look at this war as existential threat to our democracy, its not about just Ukraine anymore. That's why thousands javelins and stingers were provided by US, UK and other states which allowed them to defend till now. After Ukraine, it would be increasing russian circle towards west - baltic states, Poland, Slovakia, Hungary, Romania. Thats 100 million of people who know very well how horrible the life is under russian oppression and terror. Its also in US interests that this pans out with russians losing and stopping their imperialism - Europe is by far the biggest US ally (count 500 million relatively rich people), losing it would mean US power becomes progressively marginal in this world. Nobody free wants that, there are plenty of bullies out there, small and big.
  - pishpash 5y ago
    I mean sure, but then you'd understand why eastward expansion of a military alliance could be construed as an existential threat, too. There's just a lot of unnecessary hypocrisy all around. It should also be said that, who is a bully depends on whose interests one happens to align with. Maybe transatlantic interests are always magically aligned forever but somehow I doubt it. One should wonder why or how that comes about, and at whose expense.
jsmith99 5y ago
The Iraq war was a terrible error but it still can't be compared to Ukraine. America had no plans to colonise Iraq or absorb it into its empire. Despite the enormous death and suffering the war caused, America's aim was naive altruism: getting rid of an unquestionably evil dictator who used WMDs on his own people. There are conspiracy theories that America invaded to steal Iraq's oil but they are not plausible.
- youarethebest 5y ago
  WMDs? That was a lie. They invaded to preserve the dollar regime/oil. Not plausible? I think you've been watching too many Marvel movies where good vs evil is "obvious"
  - jsmith99 5y ago
    How would the invasion preserve the dollar regime? As for the WMDs, I referred to Saddam's history, not to America's discredited invasion pretext.
    - Ambolia 5y ago
      https://usiraq.procon.org/view.answers.php?questionID=000911 https://usiraq.procon.org/view.answers.php?questionID=000911
- yongjik 5y ago
  > America had no plans to colonise Iraq or absorb it into its empire. Well, of course, because then America would have had to give Iraqis the same rights as other Americans, or build a discriminatory system where "real" Americans enjoy more rights than them. Not that colonizing Iraq would have been justified, but since the war wasn't justifiable anyway - the decision to not colonize Iraq was not out of goodwill, but because it was cheaper that way.
- hnhg 5y ago
  It should be assessed on its own merits, including the aftermath, in all its glory, such as: https://www.foreignpolicyjournal.com/2019/09/21/new-study-documents-depleted-uranium-impacts-on-children-in-iraq/ https://www.foreignpolicyjournal.com/2019/09/21/new-study-do... I'd also remind you that we have insufficient evidence to suggest that the aim was naive altruism. It could have been naively ideological: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Project_for_the_New_American_Century https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Project_for_the_New_American_C...
dotancohen 5y ago
> But even Iraq does seem different: Hussein was a brutal dictator and, at least initially, Americans were welcomed as liberators. In some areas in Eastern Ukraine, the Russians have been suffering "genocide" (whatever that term has been redefined to mean, but obviously not systematic murder) and the Russian forces were welcomed as liberators.
- fabian2k 5y ago
  That is Russian propaganda and simply not true. There is no genocide against Russians in Ukraine.
  - dotancohen 5y ago
    Thre is no systematic murder in Ukraine. But this is how the UN defines genocide: > a. Killing members of the group; > b. Causing serious bodily or mental harm to members of the group; > c. Deliberately inflicting on the group conditions of life calculated to bring about its physical destruction in whole or in part; > d. Imposing measures intended to prevent births within the group; > e. Forcibly transferring children of the group to another group. There are credible reports of b. and c. in Eastern Ukraine against Russians. Therefore, by UN definition, genocide. You and I might not like that definition, but Putin has a leg to stand on.
    - fabian2k 5y ago
      This is a pure war of agression, it is an invasion. There is no justification at all for this.
      - dotancohen 5y ago
        That's what the Western propaganda machine pushes (I'm Western too, certainly not pro-Russian) but do you really think that there is no rational Russian justification from the Russian perspective?
        5y ago
mediumsmart 5y ago
>protection of a terrorist organisation that had repeatedly attacked American targets internationally before their deliberate targeted murder of thousands of American civilians. that would be Al-Qaeda which emerged in 1988 out of the afghan mujaheedin who were financed until 1990 with more than 600 Million tax dollars by the CIA to kick out the Russians. Better luck this time? the only thing we learn from history is that we don't learn. 1988 is also the year of the Halabja massacre pinned on Iran first by the US but it turned out that Saddam Hussein (at that time an Ally of the United States) carried out this largest chemical weapons attack directed against a civilian-populated area in history,[2] killing between 3,200 and 5,000 people and injuring 7,000 to 10,000 more, most of them civilians.
namelosw 5y ago
> Hussein was a brutal dictator and, at least initially, Americans were welcomed as liberators If the US attack Belarus with an unjustified casus belli like in the Iraq war, it would still be a huge deal just like the current war in Ukraine - despite everybody knowing Lukashenko is also a dictator. The elephant in the room & the key difference between Iraq and Ukraine: There are substantially more people in the West who consider Ukrainian people are "one of us civilized people" compared to the Iraqi people.
- randomsearch 5y ago
  I agree there would be an similar outcry, but think it’s more to do with location than ethnicity.
aa-jv 5y ago
Yemen?
- randomsearch 5y ago
  I didn’t cover Yemen, because I am not as familiar with the details of the conflict, and from what I do know it seems to be a very complex situation involving many actors.
  - aa-jv 5y ago
    It is literally genocide, being enacted by a fascist totalitarian dictatorship, fully supported by the Western military industrial complex and its host nations. You really should educated yourself about Yemen. It is the worst war-caused humanitarian crisis going on in the world today. Worse than what is happening to the people of Ukraine, by far.

darebak 5y ago

>By far the biggest difference here, I think, is that by being a European war and through the potential for further conflict and nuclear conflict, this war has far larger international ramifications and strategic risks attached to it. To see European cities bombed is to be reminded of what has happened in the past and that it can happen again. That is why it is receiving so much attention. Bombing of Serbia was a bombing of European cities, specifically bombing of civilian population centers far from the front to terrorize the population. Also without UN approval.

ardit33 5y ago
Serbia did commit massive attrocities and genocide against both Bosnians and Albanians in Kosovo. They also had wars with Slovenia, and Croatia. They last gesture was massive ethnic cleansing. The US intervened when things went out of hand. Putin risks to end up like Milosevic, a war criminal.
- darebak 5y ago
  It did not, if you have any international court verdict that says that Serbia conducted a genocide, I would like to see it. Also Serbia was not at war with Slovenia. Those are the basic facts. Now, even if those things were true, they are claimed by the proponents of bombing, enemies if you will, the same way that Putin is claiming there is a genocide of million Ukrainians in Ukraine. Do you believe your enemies?
  - nickpp 5y ago
    Motives matter too. Bombing of Serbia was to stop a bellicose regime and the humanitarian crisis it was creating. It was like bombing Russia right now, which I'd support fully hearted, if it was a possibility.
    - darebak 5y ago
      It was not. Serbia was establishing order within its territory when NATO bombed it without any approval from the UN, basically doing something just because they could. Remind you of anyone?
      - sokols 5y ago
        Saying that Serbia was establishing order within its territory is a bit cynical take. What they did is that they systematically[1] cleansed villages and settlements in order to decrease the percentage of Albanian population in Kosovo. In a way, they were implementing a century old policy of a guy named Vaso Cubrilovic who argued that Albanians should be expelled[2] from the lands Serbia (precursor of Yugoslavia) took in 1913. What NATO did, is stopping exactly this from happening. [1] https://www.hrw.org/report/2001/10/26/under-orders/war-crimes-kosovo https://www.hrw.org/report/2001/10/26/under-orders/war-crime... [2] https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Expulsion_of_the_Albanians https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Expulsion_of_the_Albania...
        darebak 5y ago
jhasse 5y ago
> Also without UN approval. With the 5 veto powers, this basically means nothing.

astrange 5y ago

Iraq is somewhat similar except that Russia is the 2000s US, they didn’t bother making an excuse first, they didn’t form a coalition, and even less of Ukraine wants them to be there.

sto_hristo 5y ago

Iraq war while justified by wrong evidence, it was a necessity. Saddam did use WMDs on Kurdish villages - he bombed them with Sarin gas - that is HAVING WMDs. It has nothing to do with imperialism as i don't see any annexations made by the US, nor puppet governments. Ukraine, on the other hand, had territories chipped away from it, separatists backed up Russia for years and years, and now a surprise attack without forward notice. It's completely incomparable to Iraq.

saiya-jin 5y ago
Yeah, Saddam did that in 80s, US was still cooperating with him due to Iran/Iraq war (remember that Saddam-Rumsfeld photo? It wasn't staged or some freak coincidence but regular business/military talks and pats on the back). Those attacks didn't stop the cooperation. I don't think anybody powerful really cared about those poor civilians, it was just pretext but in this case a real one. Anyway back to the topic - we europeans look at this war as existential threat to our democracy, its not about just Ukraine anymore. That's why thousands javelins and stingers were provided by US, UK and other states which allowed them to defend till now. After Ukraine, it would be increasing russian circle towards west - baltic states, Poland, Slovakia, Hungary, Romania. Thats 100 million of people who know very well how horrible the life is under russian oppression and terror. Its also in US interests that this pans out with russians losing and stopping their imperialism - Europe is by far the biggest US ally (count 500 million relatively rich people), losing it would mean US power becomes progressively marginal in this world. Nobody free wants that, there are plenty of bullies out there, small and big.
- pishpash 5y ago
  I mean sure, but then you'd understand why eastward expansion of a military alliance could be construed as an existential threat, too. There's just a lot of unnecessary hypocrisy all around. It should also be said that, who is a bully depends on whose interests one happens to align with. Maybe transatlantic interests are always magically aligned forever but somehow I doubt it. One should wonder why or how that comes about, and at whose expense.

jsmith99 5y ago

The Iraq war was a terrible error but it still can't be compared to Ukraine. America had no plans to colonise Iraq or absorb it into its empire. Despite the enormous death and suffering the war caused, America's aim was naive altruism: getting rid of an unquestionably evil dictator who used WMDs on his own people. There are conspiracy theories that America invaded to steal Iraq's oil but they are not plausible.

youarethebest 5y ago
WMDs? That was a lie. They invaded to preserve the dollar regime/oil. Not plausible? I think you've been watching too many Marvel movies where good vs evil is "obvious"
- jsmith99 5y ago
  How would the invasion preserve the dollar regime? As for the WMDs, I referred to Saddam's history, not to America's discredited invasion pretext.
  - Ambolia 5y ago
    https://usiraq.procon.org/view.answers.php?questionID=000911 https://usiraq.procon.org/view.answers.php?questionID=000911
yongjik 5y ago
> America had no plans to colonise Iraq or absorb it into its empire. Well, of course, because then America would have had to give Iraqis the same rights as other Americans, or build a discriminatory system where "real" Americans enjoy more rights than them. Not that colonizing Iraq would have been justified, but since the war wasn't justifiable anyway - the decision to not colonize Iraq was not out of goodwill, but because it was cheaper that way.
hnhg 5y ago
It should be assessed on its own merits, including the aftermath, in all its glory, such as: https://www.foreignpolicyjournal.com/2019/09/21/new-study-documents-depleted-uranium-impacts-on-children-in-iraq/ https://www.foreignpolicyjournal.com/2019/09/21/new-study-do... I'd also remind you that we have insufficient evidence to suggest that the aim was naive altruism. It could have been naively ideological: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Project_for_the_New_American_Century https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Project_for_the_New_American_C...

dotancohen 5y ago

> But even Iraq does seem different: Hussein was a brutal dictator and, at least initially, Americans were welcomed as liberators. In some areas in Eastern Ukraine, the Russians have been suffering "genocide" (whatever that term has been redefined to mean, but obviously not systematic murder) and the Russian forces were welcomed as liberators.

fabian2k 5y ago
That is Russian propaganda and simply not true. There is no genocide against Russians in Ukraine.
- dotancohen 5y ago
  Thre is no systematic murder in Ukraine. But this is how the UN defines genocide: > a. Killing members of the group; > b. Causing serious bodily or mental harm to members of the group; > c. Deliberately inflicting on the group conditions of life calculated to bring about its physical destruction in whole or in part; > d. Imposing measures intended to prevent births within the group; > e. Forcibly transferring children of the group to another group. There are credible reports of b. and c. in Eastern Ukraine against Russians. Therefore, by UN definition, genocide. You and I might not like that definition, but Putin has a leg to stand on.
  - fabian2k 5y ago
    This is a pure war of agression, it is an invasion. There is no justification at all for this.
    - dotancohen 5y ago
      That's what the Western propaganda machine pushes (I'm Western too, certainly not pro-Russian) but do you really think that there is no rational Russian justification from the Russian perspective?
      - 5y ago

mediumsmart 5y ago

>protection of a terrorist organisation that had repeatedly attacked American targets internationally before their deliberate targeted murder of thousands of American civilians. that would be Al-Qaeda which emerged in 1988 out of the afghan mujaheedin who were financed until 1990 with more than 600 Million tax dollars by the CIA to kick out the Russians. Better luck this time? the only thing we learn from history is that we don't learn. 1988 is also the year of the Halabja massacre pinned on Iran first by the US but it turned out that Saddam Hussein (at that time an Ally of the United States) carried out this largest chemical weapons attack directed against a civilian-populated area in history,[2] killing between 3,200 and 5,000 people and injuring 7,000 to 10,000 more, most of them civilians.

namelosw 5y ago

> Hussein was a brutal dictator and, at least initially, Americans were welcomed as liberators If the US attack Belarus with an unjustified casus belli like in the Iraq war, it would still be a huge deal just like the current war in Ukraine - despite everybody knowing Lukashenko is also a dictator. The elephant in the room & the key difference between Iraq and Ukraine: There are substantially more people in the West who consider Ukrainian people are "one of us civilized people" compared to the Iraqi people.

randomsearch 5y ago
I agree there would be an similar outcry, but think it’s more to do with location than ethnicity.

aa-jv 5y ago

Yemen?

randomsearch 5y ago
I didn’t cover Yemen, because I am not as familiar with the details of the conflict, and from what I do know it seems to be a very complex situation involving many actors.
- aa-jv 5y ago
  It is literally genocide, being enacted by a fascist totalitarian dictatorship, fully supported by the Western military industrial complex and its host nations. You really should educated yourself about Yemen. It is the worst war-caused humanitarian crisis going on in the world today. Worse than what is happening to the people of Ukraine, by far.