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No end to US hubris

Jango

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AS President Obama ponders over the proposal to send US arms to Ukraine, perhaps a little introspection and humility are in order.

Consider the fallout from recent American interventions. After over 13 years of brutal warfare in Afghanistan, US forces have been pulled out, leaving the field to the Taliban. Hundreds of billions of dollars and thousands of lives after the 2001 invasion of this broken country, very few of Washington’s war aims have been met.

In Iraq, the prospects for peace are even more remote. Toppling Saddam Hussein and defeating his army was the easy part. Years of a bloody insurgency have led to a disintegrating country, rife with ethnic and sectarian conflict. Large swathes of Iraq are under IS control while the Shia-Sunni bloodshed, unleashed by the US-led invasion, continues to take a heavy toll.

Libya has been completely destabilised by the US-led campaign to remove Qadhafi. Although a thuggish dictator, he had managed to hold his country together. Now, groups of heavily armed militants battle for power. The ongoing civil war has no end in sight.

Many Americans retain an unhealthy appetite for war.
Yemen today is in a state of turmoil, with Houthi tribesmen in control of the capital, and threatening to once again partition the country. They have seized control of the arms supplied by the Pentagon to fight Al Qaeda amounting to some $400 million.

And arms from Qadhafi’s arsenals are being sold from the Sinai to Mali, fuelling the conflicts there. In fact, one reason for the Islamic State’s military success lies in its capture of American arms supplied to Iraq.

Going back even further, American intervention in Vietnam prolonged an internal conflict and caused hundreds of thousands of unnecessary deaths. I still recall the iconic photo of an American helicopter flying out of Saigon, with desperate civilians clinging to its undercarriage as the Vietcong advanced on the South Vietnamese capital.

So to suggest that the record of American intervention is a disastrous one would be no exaggeration. Although most Americans are reluctant to accept that their military has suffered a string of defeats, the reality is that time and again, US forces have had to pull out in the face of mounting casualties. Lebanon and Somalia are only two examples of quick US withdrawals when a number of troops were killed.

And yet many Americans retain an unhealthy appetite for war. Witness the pressure President Obama came under to launch air strikes against Syria last year. Hawks in Tel Aviv and Washington continue to criticise Obama for not ordering an aerial campaign to destroy Iran’s nuclear infrastructure.

Perhaps the huge success of Clint Eastwood’s American Sniper at the box office offers an accurate insight into the American fixation with war. Based on a book by Chris Kyle, a US soldier, the true story depicts the ‘heroism’ of a sniper as he slaughters scores of Iraqis at long distance. Apparently, each kill is accompanied by loud cheering in American theatres. The director and the author have erased all doubts and guilt from their human killing machine. All Iraqis are described as ‘savages’, thus making it easy for the audience to applaud their death.

Returning to Ukraine, the reality is that no American leader would have even considered getting involved in conflicts on the Soviet Union’s doorstep during the Cold War. Thus, although there was widespread sympathy for the Hungarians in their uprising in 1956, Washington watched silently as it was brutally crushed by the Red Army.

Older readers will recall how John Kennedy reacted to Moscow’s clumsy attempt to instal missiles in Cuba. The world was poised on the brink of nuclear devastation as the two superpowers faced each other in those tense days in 1962.

So to imagine that Russia will accept the Washington-inspired coup against an elected pro-Moscow president on its borders, and the arming of his pro-West successor, without reacting to the provocation is to ignore Russian sensitivities and history. Either that, or the idea is to deliberately goad Putin into further escalating the conflict.

The reality is that there are no vital American interests at stake in the region. Ukranian voters do not constitute a significant voting bloc in America; there is no oil; and there are no shipping lanes to protect. And most importantly, American corporations and banks have no financial stakes there.

So why go down this route at all? The answer probably lies in the US desire to cut Putin down to size. The Americans have been infuriated by Russia’s refusal to endorse an anti-Assad resolution in the UN Security Council authorising military action. The current collapse in oil prices through US and Saudi actions is clearly aimed at hurting Russia.

Since the Second World War, the US has been involved in literally scores of overt and covert operations and shooting wars. Most of these interventions have ended badly. Isn’t it time for Obama to pause and reflect before launching yet another misadventure?

irfan.husain@gmail.com

Published in Dawn February 7th , 2015

No end to US hubris - Newspaper - DAWN.COM

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Hits it right on the spot...
 
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US is a warfare state. Always has been, always will be.
and China isn't??? well maybe not in modern times, but China has been built through conquest for thousands of years :D

I think we should keep our nose out of people businesses though, but imagine a world if the U.S was pacifist it would probably be worse off.
 
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and China isn't??? well maybe not in modern times, but China has been built through conquest for thousands of years :D

I think we should keep our nose out of people businesses though, but imagine a world if the U.S was pacifist it would probably be worse off.




How is the world would be worse since majority of the war in the last 30 yrs all US instigated?
 
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How is the world would be worse since majority of the war in the last 30 yrs all US instigated?

some might say justified wars. at least it wasn't ww3.
i can't imagine if the soviets won. i don't think you could even voice your opinion without being sent to a gulag.
be grateful you can speak freely. is the big bad US of A going to come and silence you???

US has been more beneficial to the world than it has caused harm.

but mainly its

g13fl.gif
 
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some might say justified wars. at least it wasn't ww3.
i can't imagine if the soviets won. i don't think you could even voice your opinion without being sent to a gulag.
be grateful you can speak freely. is the big bad US of A going to come and silence you???

US has been more beneficial to the world than it has caused harm.

but mainly its

g13fl.gif





Whatever happen during the Cold War, it end after soviet collapse but US continuously at war ever since with many different nations.

Whatever happen during the Cold War, it end after soviet collapse but US continuously at war ever since with many different nations.



Why you need to post a picture and waste the space to make a point?
 
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some might say justified wars. at least it wasn't ww3.
i can't imagine if the soviets won. i don't think you could even voice your opinion without being sent to a gulag.
be grateful you can speak freely. is the big bad US of A going to come and silence you???

US has been more beneficial to the world than it has caused harm.

How about we talk after the Cold War...

Libya, Iraq, Syria, A-Stan haven't really been because of Russia, the big bad boogeybear which American kids are frightened with when they go to bed.
 
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How about we talk after the Cold War...

Libya, Iraq, Syria, A-Stan haven't really been because of Russia, the big bad boogeybear which American kids are frightened with when they go to bed.


Libya I didn't support
Iraq I really didn't even know who Saddam was and how it was to live under his regime as Iraqi, and the whole WMD never existed so......I wouldn't of supported action knowing that.
Syria I don't support FSA and I kinda admire Doctor Bashar Assad
Afghanistan is a terrorist nest like Pakistan so it needs to be cleansed, but I think if we had left them alone it they wouldn't be a threat to the States.

the real terrorists supporters/funds are coming from the rich oil gulf countries so we really shouldn't of invaded Saudi Arabia :D

but yeah we stuck our nose in the Middle East and made a mess of things, but radical Islam a problem that won't go away if you bury your head in the sand it'll just fester and spread.

like I said I wish we wasn't world police.


the good outweighs the bad in my opinion.
 
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And that's my point. Stop dictating to other countries what they should or shouldn't do.




And the good is...?

the good.
pretty sure U.S has been the worlds biggest aid donator for decades.
all the technological advances thanks to Americans.
helping win both world wars, stopping the evil Nazis and Imperial Japanese

there has been a lot of good. I'm no expert and not the right person to explain it, but if you look around you'll find it.
 
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And that's my point. Stop dictating to other countries what they should or shouldn't do.




And the good is...?




No good come out of any war, look at Egypt elected another hard line despot Muslim brotherhood, turn around they overthrew him in less than one yr just to elect another military general to run Egypt, all the bloodshed at the end Egypt ruled by another military general.
 
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who is the next enemy of Israel after Iraq, Syria, Libya, Egypt and Iran..
please come forward so that US can see and attack you..
 
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and China isn't??? well maybe not in modern times, but China has been built through conquest for thousands of years :D

I think we should keep our nose out of people businesses though, but imagine a world if the U.S was pacifist it would probably be worse off.

Without the U.S., this world would actually have world peace. There is not a doubt in my mind. World doesn't need any empires anymore.

The world needs China as the main power because it concentrates on economic development instead of global empire and spreading false democrazy. It is only when the rise of China happened did other poor countries start to develop.

the good.
pretty sure U.S has been the worlds biggest aid donator for decades.
all the technological advances thanks to Americans.
helping win both world wars, stopping the evil Nazis and Imperial Japanese

there has been a lot of good. I'm no expert and not the right person to explain it, but if you look around you'll find it.

Aid only to buy pawns to keep the barbaric empire going. Not aid based on good intentions to help people.

America did jack to beat the Nazis. It was the Soviet Union.

And no, US wasn't indrectly responsible for beating the Nazis either.
 
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Without the U.S., this world would actually have world peace. There is not a doubt in my mind. World doesn't need any empires anymore.

The world needs China as the main power because it concentrates on economic development instead of global empire and spreading false democrazy. It is only when the rise of China happened did other poor countries start to develop.



Aid only to buy pawns to keep the barbaric empire going. Not aid based on good intentions to help people.

America did jack to beat the Nazis. It was the Soviet Union.

And no, US wasn't indrectly responsible for beating the Nazis either.


world peace O.O really?? why wasn't there world peace before the U.S.A was even a country?
if it isn't the US meddling it would be just be another power like the USSR,Nazi, etc.

it's a dog eat dog world.
 
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world peace O.O really?? why wasn't there world peace before the U.S.A was even in a country?
if it isn't the US meddling it would be just be another power like the USSR,Nazi, etc.

The world would be a lot more peaceful if the U.S. wasn't an empire. Proxy wars all over the world due to US interference to keep the empire going.

I don't see any difference between Nazi Germany, USSR and USA. Same empire sh*t, different arseholes doing it.

I am anti-empire.
 
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