4 ms·

The article is in the journal - Responsible Statecraft -- published by the think tank - Quincy Institute. This stuff isn't hard. In terms of rational or irrati

by rsj_hn 4y ago

The article is in the journal - Responsible Statecraft -- published by the think tank - Quincy Institute. This stuff isn't hard. In terms of rational or irrational, it's irrational to fight wars that destabilize the world and that you cannot win. It doesn't matter that you really want to win. It doesn't matter if you think you should win. That's the difference between acting emotionally versus acting rationally. The Quincy Institute distinguished itself by opposing many of our middle east wars for this reason - wars that we lost and that resulted in millions of deaths. The US has attacked or invaded over 120 nations since 1991, and that's not even counting all the color revolutions and coups that we've sponsored to destabalize nations all over the world because we didn't like their governments or we want to create chaos along the borders of our rivals. I'm sure an argument could be made that each of these nations were led by a government that didn't share our values or that did some bad things, but nevertheless it was irrational to follow this course. For example, we destabilized Afghanistan by sponsoring Islamic terror there, incentivizing the Soviets to invade. That was covered in the book "The Bear Trap". The result was the radicalization and destruction of Afghan society, and it also led to the promotion of Islamic terror all over the world, including the creation of Al Qaeda. So this was irrational, even though it felt good to give the Soviets an L at the expense of destroying Afghan society. Similarly we are sponsoring Kurdish terror now to destabilize Iran and punish Turkey, but it is again causing a coalition of nations to form against the U.S. We are currently supporting Myanmar terror groups attacking the Junta in order to cause chaos on China's border, and also radical islamic terror groups in Pakistan that are attacking Belt and Road projects. We dismembered Libya with over 50,000 bombing runs because it was a Russian ally and now the nation which had the highest standard of living in Africa is a Mad Max scene of rival warlords and open air slave markets. We engineered two violent color revolutions in Ukraine to install anti-Russian governments and urged Ukraine to not negotiate and not implement the Minsk 2 agreement, and now we are pumping it full of weapons so that they will fight until the last Ukrainian. We supported contra terror groups in Nicaragua, mined their harbor, and blew up their oil pipelines. It is a wreckage of destroyed nations all around the world, which only hurts our long term interests, and this is why it is irrational.

mlindner 4y ago
Firstly, "millions of deaths" is inflating things. Even the most extreme estimates put deaths in the hundreds of thousands. Most estimates put them in the tens of thousands for Afghanistan and low hundreds of thousands in Iraq. As to your other point a broken clock can be right two times a day. Just because they took the very easy and obvious position of being against the wars in the middle east does not make them a fount of knowledge. The fact that they effectively argue for Ukraine surrendering to Russia shows how little they care about "responsible statecraft". There's a lot of groups that I used to support that correctly opposed the middle east wars but then suddenly flipped to giving tacit support to Russia. From what I can see they are a "tankie" organization as they borrow many of the talking points. If it's America doing it they're against it, which is the common tankie position and if it's some other organization that America is helping defend against, then America is still in the wrong.
mlindner 4y ago
Responding to your edit. Edit: You keep making your post longer and I'm not going to read your additional edits. > In terms of rational or irrational, it's irrational to fight wars that destabilize the world and that you cannot win. The US is not fighting the war. Ukraine is. Additionally, it is Russia that had no way to win this war. There would be a forever insurgency had Russia succeeded as they didn't have enough troops to maintain the peace, assuming they hadn't lost any. > It doesn't matter that you really want to win. It doesn't matter if you think you should win. That's the difference between acting emotionally versus acting rationally. I agree. There was little chance for Russia to win this war and so they shouldn't have started it. > The US has attacked or invaded over 120 nations since 1991 You got a source on that? That's a pretty outrageous claim. > For example, we destabilized Afghanistan by sponsoring Islamic terror there, incentivizing the Soviets to invade. You reversed cause and effect here. The former happened after the latter. Soviets invaded and then we supported the Islamic rebels to successfully win out against the Soviets. If we hadn't history would have taken a very different course. And as usual, one man's freedom fighter is another man's terrorist. And none of that is relevant to Ukraine. Supporting the democratically elected government against an invading imperialist power. > The result was the radicalization and destruction of Afghan society Afghan society was based on tribal warfare, and is still based on tribal warfare. Nothing was changed. I've even heard anecdotes from some of those tribesmen who thought it was still the soviets invading when Americans showed up. > So this was irrational, even though it felt good to give the Soviets an L at the expense of destroying Afghan society. You think the Soviets would have preserved Afghan society had they taken the place over and integrated it into the Soviet Union? Just as minorities suffered in Russia, they continue to suffer to this day. They are second class citizens with their culture slowly being erased. And again, supporting Ukraine in fending off an invading empire does not "destroy their society", it preserves it. Edit: One last reply as you added some nonsense to your post at the end. > We engineered two violent color revolutions in Ukraine to install anti-Russian governments and urged Ukraine to not negotiate and not implement the Minsk 2 agreement, and now we are pumping it full of weapons so that they will fight until the last Ukrainian. Yeah this is pure lies. There was no US engineering of the revolution in Ukraine. It was entirely done by themselves. This type of propaganda you have fallen for is the problem with the nonsense put out by responsible statecraft. They repeat Russian imperialist state-written lies. Secondly, it is the actually the west (mostly Europe) who instead pushed Ukraine into Minsk 2. It is something that Ukrainians hate more than anything and why they push back against any US politician or European politican who says that something else like that is created. https://twitter.com/christopherjm/status/1592427657601650689 https://twitter.com/christopherjm/status/1592427657601650689 Zelensky hates the Minsk agreements and has vowed that he will never allow a "Minsk 3".

by rsj_hn 4y ago

mlindner 4y ago

Firstly, "millions of deaths" is inflating things. Even the most extreme estimates put deaths in the hundreds of thousands. Most estimates put them in the tens of thousands for Afghanistan and low hundreds of thousands in Iraq. As to your other point a broken clock can be right two times a day. Just because they took the very easy and obvious position of being against the wars in the middle east does not make them a fount of knowledge. The fact that they effectively argue for Ukraine surrendering to Russia shows how little they care about "responsible statecraft". There's a lot of groups that I used to support that correctly opposed the middle east wars but then suddenly flipped to giving tacit support to Russia. From what I can see they are a "tankie" organization as they borrow many of the talking points. If it's America doing it they're against it, which is the common tankie position and if it's some other organization that America is helping defend against, then America is still in the wrong.

mlindner 4y ago

Responding to your edit. Edit: You keep making your post longer and I'm not going to read your additional edits. > In terms of rational or irrational, it's irrational to fight wars that destabilize the world and that you cannot win. The US is not fighting the war. Ukraine is. Additionally, it is Russia that had no way to win this war. There would be a forever insurgency had Russia succeeded as they didn't have enough troops to maintain the peace, assuming they hadn't lost any. > It doesn't matter that you really want to win. It doesn't matter if you think you should win. That's the difference between acting emotionally versus acting rationally. I agree. There was little chance for Russia to win this war and so they shouldn't have started it. > The US has attacked or invaded over 120 nations since 1991 You got a source on that? That's a pretty outrageous claim. > For example, we destabilized Afghanistan by sponsoring Islamic terror there, incentivizing the Soviets to invade. You reversed cause and effect here. The former happened after the latter. Soviets invaded and then we supported the Islamic rebels to successfully win out against the Soviets. If we hadn't history would have taken a very different course. And as usual, one man's freedom fighter is another man's terrorist. And none of that is relevant to Ukraine. Supporting the democratically elected government against an invading imperialist power. > The result was the radicalization and destruction of Afghan society Afghan society was based on tribal warfare, and is still based on tribal warfare. Nothing was changed. I've even heard anecdotes from some of those tribesmen who thought it was still the soviets invading when Americans showed up. > So this was irrational, even though it felt good to give the Soviets an L at the expense of destroying Afghan society. You think the Soviets would have preserved Afghan society had they taken the place over and integrated it into the Soviet Union? Just as minorities suffered in Russia, they continue to suffer to this day. They are second class citizens with their culture slowly being erased. And again, supporting Ukraine in fending off an invading empire does not "destroy their society", it preserves it. Edit: One last reply as you added some nonsense to your post at the end. > We engineered two violent color revolutions in Ukraine to install anti-Russian governments and urged Ukraine to not negotiate and not implement the Minsk 2 agreement, and now we are pumping it full of weapons so that they will fight until the last Ukrainian. Yeah this is pure lies. There was no US engineering of the revolution in Ukraine. It was entirely done by themselves. This type of propaganda you have fallen for is the problem with the nonsense put out by responsible statecraft. They repeat Russian imperialist state-written lies. Secondly, it is the actually the west (mostly Europe) who instead pushed Ukraine into Minsk 2. It is something that Ukrainians hate more than anything and why they push back against any US politician or European politican who says that something else like that is created. https://twitter.com/christopherjm/status/1592427657601650689 https://twitter.com/christopherjm/status/1592427657601650689 Zelensky hates the Minsk agreements and has vowed that he will never allow a "Minsk 3".