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Post by JP5 on Oct 20, 2013 0:13:15 GMT
Ah JP5, the old misconception - only the US helps and the rest sit back and do nothing. You could not be further from the truth. You go in and intervene, or interfere, in other countries on your own mandate, others prefer to do it through international bodies like the UN and AU. If I remember correctly there are currently only 2 or 3 UN missions you are actively part of, which is less than my own country! South Africa currently has troops on the ground in 6 African countries on UN and or AU missions. When I served in the SANDF, I regularly served with troops from France, the UK, Bangladesh, Pakistan, Finland, Netherlands, Portugal, Kenya, Nigeria, and others. I never served with troops from the US. It is a fallacy only believed by the American right that America is the only country that does anything militarily to bring peace. Let's look at your missions - Iraq (you invaded without a UN mandate). Afghanistan (a NATO war, NATO, the group you dominate). Uhm, where else do you currently have peace missions? So no. No one is sitting back. No one is expecting you to do it. As a mater of fact, many countries, who do not have your militaries, who do not have your defence budget, do more than you do. AH
BTW, in Iraq...the first Gulf War, we DID have a UN mandate. And the conditions of the end of that war....that Saddam Hussein was supposed to fulfill; he didn't. Therefore, that war was never really ended. |
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Post by ShivaTD on Oct 20, 2013 10:53:13 GMT
Rand Paul is right. And I believe that means that we're also "damned if we do, and damned if we don't." The U.S. doesn't get involved; we get demonized. The U.S. does get involved, we also get demonized.
Think about this fact. There were only three other countries that supported the US invasion of Iraq in 2003 (the UK, Australia, and Poland). Virtually all other nations opposed it at the time. It is true that other countries did become involved after the invasion but that was overwhelmingly based upon humanitarian aid because of the devastation to the Iraqi People because of the war.
I don't think the UK, Australia or Poland, our only three allies, would have condemned the US for not invading Iraq and we know with certainty that no other nation would have condemned us.
As was also noted there is a problem of the UN Security Council but the reason behind that is very evident. The veto power of the five permanent members that they use for political purposes is the problem. The UN Charter needs to be revised to remove the veto power of the permanent members that they use nefariously based upon political agendas. Saudi Arabia was correct. Political agendas by the five permanent members of the Security Council have prevented effective actions related to both Egypt and Syria where they veto anything they don't agree with.
The same thing is true related to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict where for years the US has blocked any efforts to address the situation. We can see the political hypocrisy in other actions like the UN economic sanctions against N Korea for producing nuclear weapons but no economic sanctions against India, Pakistan, or Israel that are identical to N Korea in being rogue nuclear weapon nations. The UN Security Council successfully used economic sanctions against S Africa so why isn't it addressing three other rogue nuclear weapon nations with sanctions that match the ones against N Korea?
Yes, the UN has problems but we know what they are and they can be fixed if we want them to be. The US could lead the effort to revoke the veto power of the permanent members of the Security Council and we should be doing that. Not likely to happen because the US likes being able to use it's veto for nefarious political purposes but it really is what should be done. I believe that the vast majority of member nations would support that measure.
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Post by ShivaTD on Oct 20, 2013 11:18:24 GMT
BTW, in Iraq...the first Gulf War, we DID have a UN mandate. And the conditions of the end of that war....that Saddam Hussein was supposed to fulfill; he didn't. Therefore, that war was never really ended.
www.fas.org/news/un/iraq/sres/sres0678.htm
www.fas.org/news/un/iraq/sres/sres0660.htm
There were no provisions in UNSC Resolution 678 that authorized the ceasefire conditions related to the use of military force in addressing Iraq's WMD's or imposing no-fly zones that actually violated Article II of the UN Charter that prohibits UN member nations from intervening in the sovereign affairs of a nation or violating the territorial integrity of a nation.
Once the conditions of UNSC 678 were met when Iraq withdrew from Kuwait the use of military force, that the US continued to use throughout the 1990's and into the 21st Century, were not authorized by any UNSC resolutions.
Of course even UNSC 678 didn't require the US to become involved in the Gulf War and there wasn't a UN "mandate" for US involvement.
As I noted the combined military forces of Iran and Saudi Arabia were more than adequate to force Iraq out of Kuwait. Iran and Saudi Arabia had very important reasons to form a military alliance to remove Iraq from Kuwait and didn't need the US at all. Iraq represented a regional threat to Iran and Saudi Arabia but didn't represent any threat to the United States. Remember one more important fact. Had Saudi Arabia and Iran been responsible for the removal of Iraq from Kuwait there would have been no missile attacks against Israel by Iraq in 1991. US involvement actually made matters worse and not better because it expanded the conflict.
Additionally it was the continued presence in Saudi Arabia after the conditions of UNSC 678 were fulfilled that ultimately lead to the al Qaeda terrorist attacks of 1993, 1998, 2000, and 2001. We have paid a heavy price in American and foreign lives for not simply leaving Saudi Arabia once the conditions of UNSC 678 were fulfilled.
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Post by ShivaTD on Oct 20, 2013 11:54:11 GMT
US foreign aid is problematic for couple of reasons.
Perhaps Israeli leader Simon Peres summarized it best when he stated, "We take money from poor people in rich countries and give it to rich people in poor countries.” Often much of the foreign aid we provide doesn't actually provide much in the way of assistance to the actual people that need it while in other cases that aid is distributed by those that we would oppose ideologically. If I recall correctly we recently sent humanitarian aid to Somalia and as soon as that aid arrived it was stolen by "al Qaeda" forces. If any of it made it to the actual people in need they would believe that "al Qaeda" was furnishing it and not the United States. At best we made "al Qaeda" the heroes if the people in Somalia. At worst we provided tons of provisions to the "al Qaeda" forces in Somalia.
Next is the problem that it is so little when compared to how much we spend destroying countries and the death tolls we cause to the people of foreign nations. When we kill a citizen of Afghanistan it creates a hatred against the United States because of the relatives and their friends that were personally affected by that death. No amount of humanitarian aid aid will remove that hatred. We spend hundred of times the amount of money killing the citizens of foreign countries than we spend providing assistance to them. The simple math says we lose unless we stop killing them.
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Post by JP5 on Oct 21, 2013 1:54:54 GMT
US foreign aid is problematic for couple of reasons.
Perhaps Israeli leader Simon Peres summarized it best when he stated, "We take money from poor people in rich countries and give it to rich people in poor countries.” Often much of the foreign aid we provide doesn't actually provide much in the way of assistance to the actual people that need it while in other cases that aid is distributed by those that we would oppose ideologically. If I recall correctly we recently sent humanitarian aid to Somalia and as soon as that aid arrived it was stolen by "al Qaeda" forces. If any of it made it to the actual people in need they would believe that "al Qaeda" was furnishing it and not the United States. At best we made "al Qaeda" the heroes if the people in Somalia. At worst we provided tons of provisions to the "al Qaeda" forces in Somalia.
Next is the problem that it is so little when compared to how much we spend destroying countries and the death tolls we cause to the people of foreign nations. When we kill a citizen of Afghanistan it creates a hatred against the United States because of the relatives and their friends that were personally affected by that death. No amount of humanitarian aid aid will remove that hatred. We spend hundred of times the amount of money killing the citizens of foreign countries than we spend providing assistance to them. The simple math says we lose unless we stop killing them.
isn't it quite odd....that while the Democrats were quite vocal about Bush's use of drones.....they and their supporters are quite silent about Obama's escalation of their use? Bush was called a "war criminal" by Democrats and heavily condemned. Bush authorized 50 total drone strikes on terrorists during is entire 8 years. Obama has authorized 400 so far and it's only been not quite 5 years!!!! In fact, haven't YOU called Bush a war criminal? Have you called Obama that? |
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Post by ShivaTD on Oct 21, 2013 13:10:58 GMT
BUT isn't it quite odd....that while the Democrats were quite vocal about Bush's use of drones.....they and their supporters are quite silent about Obama's escalation of their use? Bush was called a "war criminal" by Democrats and heavily condemned. Bush authorized 50 total drone strikes on terrorists during is entire 8 years. Obama has authorized 400 so far and it's only been not quite 5 years!!!! In fact, haven't YOU called Bush a war criminal? Have you called Obama that?
I had previously called for the prosecution of former President Bush (on the "other" forum) by the International Court of Criminal Justice for war crimes and crimes against humanity because the United States had failed to remove him from office and prosecute him for violation of the statutory laws of the United States (that would have enforced the international laws) that prohibit torture by anyone that is an agent of the government in the United States. The CIA and military interrogators committed acts of torture based upon the Title 18 definition where several cases of "homicide" resulted were working under the executive orders of President Bush and under the law he was guilty of murder but went unprosecuted for his crimes.
No hypocrisy here but I have also noted that many take a partisan position on these issues. As far as I'm concerned all US presidents should be required to comply with US statutory laws, US treaties, and the US Constitution and have not waivered one iota on that, ever.
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