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"World's policeman", that's what you tell little kids America was doing. America didn't invade Iraq or Afghanistan for world peace. There were strong economic a
by the_gipsy 11mo ago
"World's policeman", that's what you tell little kids America was doing. America didn't invade Iraq or Afghanistan for world peace. There were strong economic and strategic motives behind those invasions.
At the same time, soft power is also vanishing.
- pfdietz 11mo agoStrategic motivation? If one assumes the US is going to be globally involved, yes, but that's begging the question. Economic motivation? Not so much now, with the US being a dominant oil producer, and with petroleum itself losing importance. Even then, it's questionable if this could justify the full cost of the US military. I think the original motivation was two fold: it was a combination of some sort of moral obligation to defend the "free world" from authoritarians, and (after WW2) a desire to keep small countries (and recent WW2 enemies) from deciding their only option for defense was their own nuclear deterrent.
- amanaplanacanal 11mo agoI don't see much evidence that's the US wants to defend the world from authoritarians. Some of their closest allies are authoritarian countries.
- pfdietz 11mo agoExpansionist authoritarians, which in the post war world was communists. Why would the world need defending from non-expansionist authoritarians?
- amanaplanacanal 11mo agoMaybe. They seem to actually like expansionist authoritarians now. Evidence being the Russia Ukraine peace effort.
- pfdietz 11mo agoAnother thing the US did in the post-war world was apply economic leverage to dismantle European empires. This can also be viewed as defending nations against external coercion.
- tim333 11mo ago"strong economic and strategic motive" behind Afghanistan? They did it to get Bin Laden basically. America are like a slightly corrupt and violent world police.
- torginus 11mo agoSo they invaded Afghanistan to grab a Saudi national hanging out in Pakistan?
- tim333 11mo agoMostly https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Afghanistan#US_invasion_and_Islamic_Republic https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Afghanistan#US_invasion_and_Is... Apparently the invasion was Oct 2001 and Bin Laden hiked over into Pakistan in Dec 2001
- pfdietz 11mo agoI think it had something to do with 9/11 being an act of war from Afghanistan against the US. Nations are responsible for the actions of groups inside their borders against other nations.
- torginus 11mo agoIt was not an act of war since Afghanistan didn't have an official government - in practice the Taliban ran things - but the attacks were carried out by the Al Qaeda which was spread over the Middle East. The Taliban might have been sympathetic to it but they were not actively supporting them or had any official collaboration with them.