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MonsieurChoc posted:There was something like a 5-10 year period, before Stalin took over, where the Soviet Union could have turned out well. No one says that the US wouldn't have failed if John Adams hadn't become a dictator and dissolved the republic, because it didn't happen, because our system of government never allowed things to get that point despite the non-democratic tendencies of the Adams administration. I feel like this common argument that country X would have been better if person Y had been in power instead seems lazy and relies too much on Great Man theories. History appears to show that revolutions almost naturally lead to dictatorships most of the time, even when those revolutions were borne out of democratic principles (English Civil War, French Revolution, Chinese Civil War, Russian Revolution, etc.)
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Oct 24, 2015 06:52
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Effectronica posted:Didn't say that. Why don't you insist that there was no genocide in Rwanda, just massacres, Fojar? I mean, it's not funny, but it is in line with your demonstrable brainpower. Does intervention for only immediate moral concerns make sense if the costs of such actions are difficult to predict and may produce more damage for little reward? I think we may have an exaggerated view of what the US is really capable doing with interventions, and how much real long-lasting effect they have. We come into countries that have complex ethnic or religious histories, structural governmental flaws and deep states that extend beyond single dictators, and believe that our actions make a serious dent in solving these problems with a few airstrikes? That one dead dictator really makes any difference? We like to feel good about removing dictators, about stopping horrible atrocities, but I feel that we really only act reactively and we have a bad habit of treating only the most obvious, egregious threats while ignoring the underlying, more implicit structural problems that allow these threats to occur, usually letting them resurface as soon as the bombs and troops leave. America Inc. fucked around with this message at 13:10 on Oct 25, 2015 |
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Oct 25, 2015 12:38
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farraday posted:Did it now? Exactly which part of the intervention in Rwanda led to the Congo Wars? I'm not saying that it was wrong to intervene in Rwanda, but intervention also lead to unforeseen consequences that resulted in massive loss of life. This is a common theme in our interventions, well-intentioned or not. My main point is that I wonder if our modern foreign policy is too short-sighted and results in great expenditure of life and resources with little long-term benefit. E: We like to focus on big headline issues like the dictator or terrorist organization that is in vogue this decade but we don't focus on issues that may have more long-term effects like women's education, employment, corruption, or infrastructure. America Inc. fucked around with this message at 13:47 on Oct 25, 2015 |
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Oct 25, 2015 13:24
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farraday posted:So again, you wonder if the long term consequences of stopping genocide are worth it. We only come when a problem has become too obvious to ignore, and then we do little to prevent the next one from happening.
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Oct 25, 2015 13:50
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