Is it time to retreat as the cop on the world stage? Is the U.S. shouldering the responsibility that other nations are capable of handling? My personal opinion is, let Europe, China, and Russia deal with the world. Screw it, it's time for change.
The US largely has retreated from being the worlds' policeman. With one exception - the first Gulf War - we've been avoiding it for decades. IMO, that's a bad thing and no we most certainly do not want the USSRRussia/China to replace us. [edit] Based on your opinion, I wonder if you actually watched the video you posted?!?
Ok, in that case would you care to explain the reasons for your opinion? What you think the upside is?
I think the upside is fewer commitments and other nations taking responsibility for their own national security. Sheesh, it's been over 60 years and we still have troops in Europe. Why?
And what happens if they choose not to? If this is just a fantasy exercise, sure, I agree that it would be great if other nations take responsibility for their own security. But since I know they won't, I think we should continue to. That's misleading; falsely implying consistent troop levels, which it isn't. The current level of US troops abroad is the lowest since before WWII; about 1/3 of the typical peacetime lows during the cold war and 1/8th of what it was during the Vietnam/Korean wars. For Germany in particular we generally had on the order of 250,000 throughout the cold war and we currently have 37,000. http://www.heritage.org/research/re.../2004/10/global-us-troop-deployment-1950-2003 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_military_deployments#Europe
I think they would if left to fend for themselves. It's not our responsibility to assure their independence and protect their borders. That's 37,000 too many. Again, why do we even have that many in Europe? The money we spend on their security could be spent on our social welfare. What about South Korea? Why can't they fend for themselves?
The question is no longer if the US wants to be the cop of the world. There are already sufficiently strong other guys who do no longer want to be ruled by this particular cop. So, the question is if this now only wannabe cop recognizes this, and starts to behave reasonably, accepting the interests of others, or if he wants to make a fight to retain his power, by killing others. In the last case, the situation does not look good for the survival of humanity, at least if the predictions about a nuclear winter are correct.
I don't think peace is only an American initiative. Stability serves many, which is why they should pick up the responsibility. Again, Europe, Russia,and China need to take part in world security.
I have seen claims in the net that he likes the videos of drones hitting human targets, and takes them home to use them as porn. But, first, this was not a credible source from the start. Then, sources who make claims about leading political figures are in general not credible, because personal defamation is a well-known technique in informational warfare, and personal defamation is quite successful, because many people tend to believe them. In this sense, in my personal evaluation a source which distributes such claims as facts already loses credibility for this fact alone. So, quite general, given that to become the POTUS would be the dream for any homicidal maniac, the probability of the POTUS being one will be much higher than the average citizen being one. But, given that it is nearly impossible to distinguish true evidence from defamation, I think one should not take such claims seriously.
I suppose we can shelve that along the one that claims he is gay and the other that Michelle is a transsexual. But you are correct, it would be an advantageous position for murder
If the U.S.A. is the world's policeman, does the world seem a safer place with the current policeman? Gen. Schwarzkopf: “The job of the military is to kill people and break things ." Maybe the military ain't the best police force? Maybe there is a different agenda than most of us would desire?
I think that our power has been used, in general, to stabilize regions and actually fend off aggressors around the world, for the most part; but it has also been used to further an economic agenda from time to time. That's why we find ourselves protecting the likes of the Saudi--stability and oil--we can do business with them.
LOL...well I see you are still spewing your Russian propaganda. Please Register or Log in to view the hidden image! And who would those "sufficiently stronger guys" be exactly? Your beloved Mother Putin? I don't think so. Mother Putin is a a two bit punk with a case of terminal penis envy, and aspirations of world domination and glory and who is also under international sanctions for his illegal invasion, occupation and annexation of his neighbors lands. He is neither fit by temperament, intelligence, or ability to become the world's policeman. That is but one of the many unfortunate realities for you comrade. Letting Putin run the roost would be like turning the keys of the jail over to the inmates. I'm sure the criminals would love that, but in the real world that ain't gonna happen. Most people just are not that dumb. Mother Russia can't govern itself much less play world policeman. Two, the US isn't a wanna be. It is the world's preeminent military and economic powerhouse. And that's a very simple, self-evident fact and it works well with its neighbors and friends. It doesn't invade them an annex them as does your beloved Mother Russia. What has happened since WWII is a gradual move towards world governance, and I think that is a very good thing. Since WWII most world policing has been done my many nations not a single nation. Rare is the event where the US acts unilaterally. However, the US does play a critical role in executing international police actions because the US has the biggest and most powerful military and the largest economy. It has the most resources. It is a democracy and it is transparent and for nearly a century it has earned a great deal of trust around the world as an honest broker. So it is a logical choice to be the world cop. Within the US its role as the global cop has been debated for many decades. There is a cost to being the world's policeman (e.g. Iraq & ISIS). It isn't all roses. It's expensive. So America has been a reluctant world policeman and a world policeman only out of necessity as pointed out in the OP video. The fact is we need to move more towards world governance. That means we need everyone to step up to the plate. Everyone needs to participate. We need to work together. Something countries like Russia and China have been unable to do.
This is reasonable for the past. One can make this point for US policy after WW II, in Germany and Japan, which have become stable and non-aggressive countries. Similarly, it is not unreasonable to describe in such a way the Korean war and the support of Taiwan. Unfortunately, there is no longer any such stabilization in actual behavior of the US. Iraq, Afghanistan, Libya, Syria, Ukraine - everywhere where US is engaged now, the consequence is instability, a failed state, nothing even close to the success of Western Germany, South Korea or Japan. The turning point was IMHO winning the Cold War. Before, the US policy was more adequate than the policy of the Soviet Union. Once the Soviet Union disappeared, they were the winners, and everybody was ready to accept them, not only as the winners, bur also because what they have proposed - free markets, democracy - was much more reasonable than the alternative, planned economy, state ownership of everything, and communist party rule. So, the world was ready to accept US rule. In 1989 (Honecker yet ruling East Germany) I have had a lot of conversations with Armenians, Russians, and Lativans, thez were all much more radical than Gorbatchev against the communist rule, and in favor of Western freedom. And I have supported this too. But it is obviously one thing to care about freedom, free markets and democracy and so on if you want to win the people in the fight against communism, and another one what your really want to do. So, after 1989 the West did what he really wanted to do, and this was something completely different. And after 9/11 it became completely totalitarian, with the PATRIOT act, Guantanamo and all this.
OK. Except, the US has never ruled the world, nor had it ever had any intention of ruling the world or desire to rule the world. The US isn't in anyway like the Mother Russia you so adore. The unpleasant fact for you is America and her allies have made Afghanistan a much more stable and civil place to live. Today Iraq and Afghanistan both have stable and functional governments as a direct result of America's intervention. Terrorists can no longer use Afghanistan as a place to foment terrorists plots and al-Qaeda is all but extinct. Those are facts Schmelzer. Because of US actions, Iraq is no longer ruled by a brutal dictator and now has a functioning democracy. The US under the Baby Bush administration fucked-up Iraq's reconstruction. But Iraq was nonetheless reconstructed and at great expense to the American taxpayer. And as previously pointed out to you, the US has not been involved in Libya other than to conduct a few airstrikes for the benefit of its European allies. The US never committed to reconstructing Libya. Unfortunately for you Schmelzer, facts do matter. Additionally, prior to Russia's illegal invasion of subsequent occupation and annexations of portions of Ukraine, the US was not significantly involved with Ukraine. It gets back to this, "facts do matter thing" which seems to eluded you. The Ukraine was and has been self-governing and Russia upset that governance when it illegally invaded the country and annexed a portion of that country using the exact same excuses Hitler used when he invaded and annexed the lands of his neighbors. Communism is dead. There is nothing to fight against. What the West did, including the US, was to aid the former Soviet states into forming new governments. What the US did was to provide Mother Russia with financial aid and that aid continued until Russia began illegally invading its neighbors and illegally annexing their lands. The US isn't by any means totalitarian and that's very self evident. So for you to say otherwise very clearly demonstrates gross ignorance or gross dishonesty - take your pick. Please Register or Log in to view the hidden image!
No. I will find agreement with you that the regimes in Iraq and Afghanistan were horrible and worth to be hated and despised. But they were stable, and much more stable then what is now, where above countries are simply in a civil war. Al Qaeda is stronger today when it was 2001. In Afghanistan, they have been guests of the Taliban. In Syria, with US support, they have controlled own territories, what they never had in Afghanistan. [Boring NATO propaganda deleted without need of comment]
