American Isolationism vs. Interventionism

[Dachs]

Taken back power. Plausibly, yeah. I don't have a crystal ball, obviously.

Look, by the time he fell, Musaddiq had alienated basically every possible basis for support that his dubiously constitutional regime had: he pissed off the clerics by proposing land reforms; he pissed off the shah by, uh, duh; he pissed off the army by trying to rein it in; he pissed off the nationalists by sucking at getting concessions from the Brits; he pissed off the Tudeh by using armed force to break up their demonstrations. He had maybe a year left, probably less.

 

[G-Max]

What about that Latin American country that we did the same thing with in 1954?

How about prolonging the civil war in Angola until free elections were held, only for the Communists to be voted into power anyway?

Look, I'm not saying that we shouldn't intervene. After all, with great power comes great responsibility, and we're the world's sole superpower. I'm just saying that a lot of the time, we have more in common with Hancock than with Spider-Man.

 

[Formaldehyde]

It is very easy to rationalize all the atrocities the US has committed in its quest to spread freedom and liberty through assassinations and overthrow of democratically elected governments, even though they were obviously just doing so because US corporations had been nationalized for exploiting the local resources and the populace. After all, those who commit these atrocities typically think the ends justify the means. Take the torture and murder of innocent Muslims since 9/11, for instance.

 

[G-Max]

Hey Formaldehyde, there's a guy at politicsforum.org who has the same avatar as you (but without the word "Formaldehyde" written on it). Any relation?

 

[Formaldehyde]

Nope. It is from a fairly popular cult movie though.


Link to video.

 

[G-Max]

Yeah, I knew about the movie. The CoD4 mission "No Fighting in the War Room" gets its name from a documentary or something about that movie, which is, in turn, a paraphrase of the quote "This is the war room! You can't fight in here!" (or something to that effect).

Edit: I've just learned that this was my 1,000th post, thus earning me Emperor status. Awesome.

 

[Verbose]

The Musaddiq thing is a really terrible example if you want to say that bad things happen when the United States intervenes in the affairs of foreign countries, because Musaddiq was in the process of getting his dumb ass couped before Kermit Roosevelt and a suitcase full of cash showed up.

But how does that follow? If anything it seems to suggest the US was just meddling unnecessarily and should have left things bloody well alone.

US does what it does, and the Iranians by and large considers the US a bunch of bastards for it to this day. It's at least one of these things which means the Mullahs general spewing against the US has a hope of getting some traction with very large groups of Iranians. "Remember Mossadegh" kind of 'fing...

US waits and sees, Mossadegh goes down on Iranian initiative, and at very least they don't look askance at the US 60 years later due to this. Might still do so over other stuff of course, but at least the US doesn't have to drag this particular pelikan around in the eyes of Iranians.

Yes, well, things probably would have turned out badly in Iran anyway, but how did the US profit by getting its fingerprints all over the situation? And the Shah to prop up, further endearing itself to the Iranians?

 

[Formaldehyde]

Just remember. They don't hate our government due to all its past reprehensible acts. They hate it because they hate freedom.

And here's the war room clip:


Link to video.

 

[G-Max]

how did the US profit by getting its fingerprints all over the situation?

We didn't. British Petroleum did

 

[Verbose]

We didn't. British Petroleum did

Well... Has anybody told the Iranians? If that observation not just a case of sour grapes?

Or differently put, to the US, in this particular case: Why oblige BP?

 

[NedimNapoleon]

Isolationism usually, at least, if we're going to intervene to "Protect our interests" by installing dictators, its better we just stay out of it.

Bringing freedom to a country isn't something that should be done lightly, but there may be cases where its totally ridiculous and we might have a case to invade.

I agree with Domination

 

[berkut]

If america conquered the world the ilegal imigrants would be no longer ilegal, and they would still be stealing your jobs. lol

 

[Formaldehyde]

The solution seems simple. Either the average American income needs to be drastically reduced, or the average world income needs to grow drastically to make up the difference. Or both...

 

[Dachs]

What about that Latin American country that we did the same thing with in 1954?

How about prolonging the civil war in Angola until free elections were held, only for the Communists to be voted into power anyway?

Look, I'm not saying that we shouldn't intervene. After all, with great power comes great responsibility, and we're the world's sole superpower. I'm just saying that a lot of the time, we have more in common with Hancock than with Spider-Man.

Dude, I just had a problem with the specific example you picked.

But how does that follow? If anything it seems to suggest the US was just meddling unnecessarily and should have left things bloody well alone.

US does what it does, and the Iranians by and large considers the US a bunch of bastards for it to this day. It's at least one of these things which means the Mullahs general spewing against the US has a hope of getting some traction with very large groups of Iranians. "Remember Mossadegh" kind of 'fing...

US waits and sees, Mossadegh goes down on Iranian initiative, and at very least they don't look askance at the US 60 years later due to this. Might still do so over other stuff of course, but at least the US doesn't have to drag this particular pelikan around in the eyes of Iranians.

Yes, well, things probably would have turned out badly in Iran anyway, but how did the US profit by getting its fingerprints all over the situation? And the Shah to prop up, further endearing itself to the Iranians?

Again, not really what I was saying. Besides, "blowback" is unmeasurable and extremely unpredictable.

 

[GhostWriter16]

The solution seems simple. Either the average American income needs to be drastically reduced, or the average world income needs to grow drastically to make up the difference. Or both...

What is this referencing?

 

[Formaldehyde]

The comment directly above it?

 

[kochman]

Formy is basically a full blown socialist... so, it means that he fully believes that class envy is the reason for most of the world's problems. Karl would be proud.

 

[Formaldehyde]

You mean a full-blown centrist? People who generally disagree with reactionaries aren't all "socialists"? Most conservatives even do. Take Obama and most Democrats, for instance.

And are you trying to discuss me instead of the topic again?

 

[kochman]

Centrists don't believe that when we all have the same amount of things our problems will go away. That is fairly radical.

 

[Formaldehyde]

I never claimed that. I claimed that if everybody makes about the same income no matter where they lived that this particular problem would likely go away.

You actually disagree with that? Or would you prefer to continue to simply create my opinions for me?