Is the U.S. a moral country?

[Phil1111 911]

jakee

... “might is right” to be the measure of morality.

The land of the free has done as much as anyone to actively suppress the spread of democracy where it is inconvenient for American economic prospects. Where would Iran be without US and UK ‘assistance’ for example?

If "Might was right" and economic interests were the MO of the US it would own Kuwait, Iran, and every other country where US troops have occupied the capitals.

They would have entrenched dictators and constitutions that enabled dictators to operate. You seem to view the UK and the US through an opaque window. That distorts the rainbow of all international relations, actions, into black and white. Where the UK's Iranian actions are:
https://www.nytimes.com/2011/12/04/opinion/sunday/irans-first-great-satan-was-england.html

Hey, history has moved on. Today Japan, Germany are among the US's best allies. Blaming the US for the worlds problems. Is the MO of Cuba, Russia, Iran, N. Korea. Even Vietnam has moved on.

Your thinking should include both sides of a historical perspective on the use of boogymen. i.e. the USA.

...and the UK.

[gowlerk 1,914]

Quote

Your thinking should include both sides of a historical perspective on the use of boogymen. i.e. the USA.

...and the UK.

The UK has long had an inflated sense of it's place in world affairs. The USA inherited it from there. It comes directly from their ability to project power. Battleships, aircraft carrier groups, fusion bombs, Lord it's hard to be humble when you have so many ways to kick serious butt.

Always remember the brave children who died defending your right to bear arms. Freedom is not free.

[jcd11235 0]

wmw999

Me, I answered “boobies,” because … What’s most worth protecting?

Wendy P.

Agreed!

Math tutoring available. Only $6! per hour! First lesson: Factorials!

[nolhtairt 0]

DJL

We may have made the wrong move here and there. A few of our choices have backfired.

Agreed. I believe the US tries to do the right thing but inevitably, mistakes are made.

Getting Iraq out of Kuwait seemed like a good idea worth pursuing, but not regime change of Iraq the second time.

Afghanistan is absolutely a shit hole I wish we'd get out of. We've wasted more than enough time and resources trying to help a fragile government defend itself against the Taliban, and now ISIS. The Taliban is the most stubborn group of assholes I've ever seen. They just don't ever give up. You'd have to kill every last single one of those motherfuckers and it's just impossible. We got Osama Bin Laden. Mission should have pretty much ended there.

Team America - World Police coming to save the motherfucking day, fuck yeah!

[jakee 1,255]

Phil1111

If "Might was right" and economic interests were the MO of the US it would own Kuwait, Iran, and every other country where US troops have occupied the capitals.

They would have entrenched dictators and constitutions that enabled dictators to operate.

You seriously need to go and reread my first post. I said th US is not consistently moral in its international dealings. That doesn’t mean I think that they are always evil, just that they have sometimes done evil.

Your own statement above confirms this. The US did entrench and support a dictator in Iran (among other places) therefore your logic follows that in that instance they did think might was right.

Similarly the support of Germany and Japan post-war was a defence against the USSR, not an altruistic action. For evidence see how allied nations that weren’t on the new border of the USSR didn’t get the same assistance.

I’m honestly not sure here how you can complain about not seeing both sides when you bristle so badly at the suggestion that the US isn’t always the good guy

Do you want to have an ideagasm?

[jakee 1,255]

nolhtairt

Getting Iraq out of Kuwait seemed like a good idea worth pursuing, but not regime change of Iraq the second time.

Afghanistan is absolutely a shit hole I wish we'd get out of. We've wasted more than enough time and resources trying to help a fragile government defend itself against the Taliban,

I always thought that was the biggest shame of the Iraqi fiasco, that after the invasion of of Afghanistan there was a real chance to bring some stability and security to the country for enough time to start to build something that could stand on its own two feet. The coalition had numbers and resources, tha Taliban were friendless and beaten. You couldn’t design a better way to throw all that away than invading Iraq. It created an amazing recruiting tool for a new insurgency and it stripped the ability to deal with one all at the same time.

And the crazy thing is that’s not just hindsight. I thought it at the time, as did many others. Yet the decision makers somehow convinced themselves that invading Iraq would bring nothing but flowers and goodwill. Maybe a foreign policy built on hopes and dreams is as dangerous as one built on genuinely bad intentions.

Do you want to have an ideagasm?

[DanG 1]

I was in Afghanistan when we invaded Iraq. I couldn't believe we would do something so stupid at the time, and I still can't.

We had the opportunity to at least partially un-fuck Afghanistan and we blew it. we've had some success in the Middle East in the past (the peace accord between Egypt and Israel comes to mind) but we seem to step on our own dick more often than not.

As to this poll, I think it is about the dumbest poll I've seen here in a while. "The US" is not some monolithic entity. It is made up of 325 million people. Some are moral, some are not. Sometimes the government acts in a moral way, sometimes it doesn't. Just like every other group of people.

- Dan G

[yoink 321]

People are moral or immoral - not geography.

Like Wendy says, how you consider it depends on how you personally align with the current leadership of that country and its current culture.

Take sex outside of marriage; some of the US consider that to be immoral. Personally, I don't. That doesn't make me immoral or them moral - it's just a personal opinion.

[kallend 1,623]

jakee

***

Getting Iraq out of Kuwait seemed like a good idea worth pursuing, but not regime change of Iraq the second time.

Afghanistan is absolutely a shit hole I wish we'd get out of. We've wasted more than enough time and resources trying to help a fragile government defend itself against the Taliban,

I always thought that was the biggest shame of the Iraqi fiasco, that after the invasion of of Afghanistan there was a real chance to bring some stability and security to the country for enough time to start to build something that could stand on its own two feet. The coalition had numbers and resources, tha Taliban were friendless and beaten. You couldn’t design a better way to throw all that away than invading Iraq. It created an Amazon recruiting tool for a new insurgency and it stripped the ability to deal with one all at the same time.

And the crazy thing is that’s not just hindsight. I thought it at the time, as did many others. Yet the decision makers somehow convinced themselves that invading Iraq would bring nothing but flowers and goodwill. Maybe a foreign policy built on hopes and dreams is as dangerous as one built on genuinely bad intentions.

The DZ.COM archives show clearly who in 2003 thought the Iraq invasion was a good thing, and who thought it crazy. Some of them still post here.

...

The only sure way to survive a canopy collision is not to have one.

[jakee 1,255]

DanG

I was in Afghanistan when we invaded Iraq. I couldn't believe we would do something so stupid at the time, and I still can't.

What I find most mindboggling is that the US and UK couldn't even persuade the western members of the UN security council that an invasion was justified, yet still thought that the bombing campaign and military invasion itself would garner support and goodwill from the Islamic middle east.

And this was all being pushed by people whose job it was to know about geopolitics, and they just wished away the likelihood of this direct, causal link between an unjustified invasion of a middle eastern majority Muslim nation and a massive fundamentalist Islamic backlash. It's hardly butterfly effect / crystal ball gazing stuff.

If I was that bad at my job I'd be fired within weeks, and the consequences (probably) wouldn't even have involved one person dying.

Do you want to have an ideagasm?

[TriGirl 268]

jakee

***I was in Afghanistan when we invaded Iraq. I couldn't believe we would do something so stupid at the time, and I still can't.

What I find most mindboggling is that the US and UK couldn't even persuade the western members of the UN security council that an invasion was justified, yet still thought that the bombing campaign and military invasion itself would garner support and goodwill from the Islamic middle east.

And this was all being pushed by people whose job it was to know about geopolitics, and they just wished away the likelihood of this direct, causal link between an unjustified invasion of a middle eastern majority Muslim nation and a massive fundamentalist Islamic backlash. It's hardly butterfly effect / crystal ball gazing stuff.

If I was that bad at my job I'd be fired within weeks, and the consequences (probably) wouldn't even have involved one person dying.
It was partly because the president at the time was trying to keep a campaign promise (Bush II campaigned on holding Iraq to the terms of UN Res 1441). Unfortunately, the fight against al-Qaeda et al jumped to the top of the priority list. Afghanistan stability and development should have stayed there, but the other part of the equation was that the president was so desperate to strike back at the nation that "tried to kill [his] daddy" that he didn't give appropriate consideration and evaluation of the new mess in Afghanistan. A better leader would have subjugated his own desires for the good of others; Hussein could have waited. We messed up Afghanistan by using it as a proxy to fight Soviet expansion. We had a chance after 9/11 and again failed those citizens for personal gain.

See the upside, and always wear your parachute! -- Christopher Titus

Shut Up & Jump!