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The USSR was a totalitarian communist empire openly determined to conquer and enslave the entire world. The USA was a champion of liberty that pursued strategi

The USSR was a totalitarian communist empire openly determined to conquer and enslave the entire world. The USA was a champion of liberty that pursued strategies intended only to defend the free world against the USSR. Your moral equivalency game indicates you're either ignorant of recent history, or that you're on the other side.

deleted 12y ago
[deleted]
mercurial 12y ago
I hope this is sarcasm. Sure, the USSR was a totalitarian state. That said, both sides pursued an aggressive, expansionist policy via proxy. The "champion of liberty" installed thoroughly repressive regimes all over South America which had little to envy to the Soviet Union. It didn't prove itself above manufacturing border incidents to trigger the Vietnam war, either. Was the USSR worse? Certainly. But this doesn't make the US the good guy in the story.
- redacted 12y ago
  The propaganda of the Cold War is breathtaking in its effectiveness. The USSR are the bad guys, comic book villains out to destroy the world. The US are plucky do-gooders, fighting to save the world from evil yet again (after single handedly winning WWII). There is no room for nuance. There is no grey area in perhaps the greyest of all conflicts since the Great Game. Both the US and USSR inflicted terrible damage to nations all over the world through proxy wars, intelligence agency coups. The ramifications of those conflicts are still felt throughout Latin America, the Middle East, and South East Asia. And that all gets swept aside by "The USA was a champion of liberty that pursued strategies intended only to defend the free world against the USSR." Read the Wikipedia article on "Covert United States Foreign Regime Change Actions" [0], and see how many of those nations benefited in the long run, and how some incredibly brutal regimes were installed or propped up throughout the third world, simply because they weren't communists. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Covert_United_States_foreign_regime_change_actions http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Covert_United_States_foreign_re...
  - joeclark77 12y ago
    You should have said "the anti-American garbage that leftist teachers are feeding to grade-school kids is breathtaking in its effectiveness" but in order to do that, you'd have to have some understanding of the true (not the political) version of history. What's really amazing is that you think your 1960s, nihilistic, self-loathing, theyre-all-the-same cynicism is thoughtful and original, and you assume that the reason I disagree with you is that I haven't heard of such a notion before, and must not be as educated as yourself...
    - mercurial 12y ago
      Well, even without opening a history book (sadly, "leftist teachers" did not get rid of Allende all by themselves), one would think that the US military adventurism of the last decade would have equipped US citizens (I'll go out on a limb and assume you are one) with a healthy dose of skepticism. Governments have most often been waving various pretenses to make their actions look good. Manifest destiny, the white man's burden, the necessity to bring the socialist paradise... "Championing liberty" is just one of them. But you don't "champion liberty" by setting up something like the School of the Americas[1], or selling arms to Iran to fund Contras terrorists[2]. This is a different concept, which is "protecting your interests by whatever means available". 1: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Western_Hemisphere_Institute_for_Security_Cooperation http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Western_Hemisphere_Institute_fo... 2: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Contras http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Contras
rdtsc 12y ago
Please. I lived in Soviet Union and United States for decades (in each). Not it wasn't a totalitarian evil empire. It was an empire. It didn't tollerate criticism of its government but: * It provided free healthcare * It provided free housing * Crime rate was law * It provided free and quality education (from kindergarten all the way to the highest degrees) > The USA was a champion of liberty that pursued strategies intended only to defend the free world against the USSR. Wait, are you being sarcastic. I am confused. Poe's Law in full effect here, ladies and gentlement.
- joeclark77 12y ago
  Ignoring the genocides and the gulags for a minute, let's simply explore your theory that the USA and USSR were morally equivalent. The USSR conquered and imposed brutal slavery on every eastern european nation. The USA did not conquer any of the western european nations. We didn't even conquer Cuba. If we had the military power, why wouldn't we?
  - rdtsc 12y ago
    > The USSR conquered and imposed brutal slavery on every eastern european nation. Slavery, like US had up until the mid 1800 and with the following oppression and segregation laws? Or the country that based itself on ethnic cleansing and genocide of countless American Indians. > The USA did not conquer any of the western european nations No but it raped all the South American states and some East Asian states (Vietnam, Laos, Cambodia). Also Middle East. Started Wars. > We didn't even conquer Cuba. Sure tried. And send saboteurs to plant IEDs, blow up bridges, plants. Destroy machinery. Can you say "War Of Terror" (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cuban_Project https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cuban_Project) > If we had the military power, why wouldn't we? Ok USSR didn't conquer Australia. They had the military power. Why didn't they. Probably didn't want to. And didn't care about.
  - trhway 12y ago
    >your theory that the USA and USSR were morally equivalent. mid-20th century significant share (if not half) of the world population was enchanted with the ideas of socialism/communism with those ideas symbolizing justice and freedom (not mass oppression as it ultimately turned to be). In that respect, _back then_, they were morally equivalent or at least close to it. We know better _now_, after observing of many decades of that failed experiments. >The USSR conquered and imposed brutal slavery on every eastern european nation. The USA did not conquer any of the western european nations. They all had their respective zones of occupation in Europe, Korea, Japan after the WWII. With time socialist regime in USSR zone turned to be the regime of "conquest and slavery", while capitalism in the western zones, South Korea and Japan happened to be more freedom conducting. For example South Korea wasn't fan of being occupied by US (for example among others http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Autumn_Uprising_of_1946 http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Autumn_Uprising_of_1946 ) and it took decades for it to ultimately start benefiting from having been occupied by US instead of USSR. Again, back then, it wasn't that clear for huge number of people, and it took decades for the differences to appear clearly. >We didn't even conquer Cuba. If we had the military power, why wouldn't we? you think it is easier to fight in Cuba jungles than in Vietnam one or that Cubans would be less fierce fighters than Vietnamese?

deleted 12y ago

[deleted]

mercurial 12y ago

I hope this is sarcasm. Sure, the USSR was a totalitarian state. That said, both sides pursued an aggressive, expansionist policy via proxy. The "champion of liberty" installed thoroughly repressive regimes all over South America which had little to envy to the Soviet Union. It didn't prove itself above manufacturing border incidents to trigger the Vietnam war, either. Was the USSR worse? Certainly. But this doesn't make the US the good guy in the story.

redacted 12y ago
The propaganda of the Cold War is breathtaking in its effectiveness. The USSR are the bad guys, comic book villains out to destroy the world. The US are plucky do-gooders, fighting to save the world from evil yet again (after single handedly winning WWII). There is no room for nuance. There is no grey area in perhaps the greyest of all conflicts since the Great Game. Both the US and USSR inflicted terrible damage to nations all over the world through proxy wars, intelligence agency coups. The ramifications of those conflicts are still felt throughout Latin America, the Middle East, and South East Asia. And that all gets swept aside by "The USA was a champion of liberty that pursued strategies intended only to defend the free world against the USSR." Read the Wikipedia article on "Covert United States Foreign Regime Change Actions" [0], and see how many of those nations benefited in the long run, and how some incredibly brutal regimes were installed or propped up throughout the third world, simply because they weren't communists. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Covert_United_States_foreign_regime_change_actions http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Covert_United_States_foreign_re...
- joeclark77 12y ago
  You should have said "the anti-American garbage that leftist teachers are feeding to grade-school kids is breathtaking in its effectiveness" but in order to do that, you'd have to have some understanding of the true (not the political) version of history. What's really amazing is that you think your 1960s, nihilistic, self-loathing, theyre-all-the-same cynicism is thoughtful and original, and you assume that the reason I disagree with you is that I haven't heard of such a notion before, and must not be as educated as yourself...
  - mercurial 12y ago
    Well, even without opening a history book (sadly, "leftist teachers" did not get rid of Allende all by themselves), one would think that the US military adventurism of the last decade would have equipped US citizens (I'll go out on a limb and assume you are one) with a healthy dose of skepticism. Governments have most often been waving various pretenses to make their actions look good. Manifest destiny, the white man's burden, the necessity to bring the socialist paradise... "Championing liberty" is just one of them. But you don't "champion liberty" by setting up something like the School of the Americas[1], or selling arms to Iran to fund Contras terrorists[2]. This is a different concept, which is "protecting your interests by whatever means available". 1: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Western_Hemisphere_Institute_for_Security_Cooperation http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Western_Hemisphere_Institute_fo... 2: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Contras http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Contras

rdtsc 12y ago

Please. I lived in Soviet Union and United States for decades (in each). Not it wasn't a totalitarian evil empire. It was an empire. It didn't tollerate criticism of its government but: * It provided free healthcare * It provided free housing * Crime rate was law * It provided free and quality education (from kindergarten all the way to the highest degrees) > The USA was a champion of liberty that pursued strategies intended only to defend the free world against the USSR. Wait, are you being sarcastic. I am confused. Poe's Law in full effect here, ladies and gentlement.

joeclark77 12y ago
Ignoring the genocides and the gulags for a minute, let's simply explore your theory that the USA and USSR were morally equivalent. The USSR conquered and imposed brutal slavery on every eastern european nation. The USA did not conquer any of the western european nations. We didn't even conquer Cuba. If we had the military power, why wouldn't we?
- rdtsc 12y ago
  > The USSR conquered and imposed brutal slavery on every eastern european nation. Slavery, like US had up until the mid 1800 and with the following oppression and segregation laws? Or the country that based itself on ethnic cleansing and genocide of countless American Indians. > The USA did not conquer any of the western european nations No but it raped all the South American states and some East Asian states (Vietnam, Laos, Cambodia). Also Middle East. Started Wars. > We didn't even conquer Cuba. Sure tried. And send saboteurs to plant IEDs, blow up bridges, plants. Destroy machinery. Can you say "War Of Terror" (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cuban_Project https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cuban_Project) > If we had the military power, why wouldn't we? Ok USSR didn't conquer Australia. They had the military power. Why didn't they. Probably didn't want to. And didn't care about.
- trhway 12y ago
  >your theory that the USA and USSR were morally equivalent. mid-20th century significant share (if not half) of the world population was enchanted with the ideas of socialism/communism with those ideas symbolizing justice and freedom (not mass oppression as it ultimately turned to be). In that respect, _back then_, they were morally equivalent or at least close to it. We know better _now_, after observing of many decades of that failed experiments. >The USSR conquered and imposed brutal slavery on every eastern european nation. The USA did not conquer any of the western european nations. They all had their respective zones of occupation in Europe, Korea, Japan after the WWII. With time socialist regime in USSR zone turned to be the regime of "conquest and slavery", while capitalism in the western zones, South Korea and Japan happened to be more freedom conducting. For example South Korea wasn't fan of being occupied by US (for example among others http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Autumn_Uprising_of_1946 http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Autumn_Uprising_of_1946 ) and it took decades for it to ultimately start benefiting from having been occupied by US instead of USSR. Again, back then, it wasn't that clear for huge number of people, and it took decades for the differences to appear clearly. >We didn't even conquer Cuba. If we had the military power, why wouldn't we? you think it is easier to fight in Cuba jungles than in Vietnam one or that Cubans would be less fierce fighters than Vietnamese?