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Provost Harrison
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The farce is strong with this one.
Feb 2000
time: 05:20
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Isn't a move towards peace a good thing. The populations of the European nations are averse to war and see it as a last resort and really don't want to resort to it when necessary. But then there is that side of the human persona, greed, that fuels war, the arms race, sets one population against another. The desire to have more, and the capacity of a demagogue to play on that. Americans seem to be strange on this account, they seem to revere their leaders like a monarch or a beloved dictator, which seems quite alien to Europeans. Every action should be questioned, every motive scrutinised. I think we are heading in the right direction. It is slow, but perhaps with a bit of investment and nurturing of other populations of the world they will not constantly have to resort to war for scarce resources, ones which are in oversupply in the western world.
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Ecthy
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Zhonghuà Rénmín Gònghéguó
Mar 2000
time: 06:20
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Provost has a point. We don't WANT TO BE powerful. The author puts military weakenss like a weak point in our societies, while that is just nonsense.
And GP, instead of trolling (didn't you read Siro's remark? I bet you didn't even read the article), you might actually consider replying to my points.
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chrono353
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cooperation leads to exploitation. i see this already among eu members. tho i dont think competition is a good idea. i think what ph says is mostly true. except I think the inherit rabid desire for power in europe is still there. maybe not as large as the problem, but the whole eu revolves around this concept of obtaining more power from its members.
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Ecthy
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Zhonghuà Rénmín Gònghéguó
Mar 2000
time: 06:20
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I'm not. I have given examples for the author's negative attitude earlier, just noone bothers thinking about it.
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DanS
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Kickball Capital of the World
Jan 1970
time: 00:20
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KH: They are on the hook to do the dishes, if liberal Western values are to be spread throughout the world (that's what we're all after, right?). If they don't want to put the money into direct offensive capability, there is plenty of other stuff to do besides. Everything from being peacekeepers to helping build democratic institutions to giving direct food or monetary aid.
Ecthelion: The SU was communist. They get no props from us. Even if you think...
"while it was just the will to live on and safe lives on both sides."
...this wasn't the way the U.S. looked at it. Rather, it was a "crusade". This fits nicely with his power/weakness thesis.
One of the interesting points of the article was when he wrote about Roosevelt's attitude toward Europe. As a child of the Cold War, it was the first time it has really dawned on me that the U.S. would have looked at Europe in a different light once upon a time.
Very interesting. I think I'll go read the book he referenced.
Last edited by DanS on 22-06-2002 at 22:40
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Ned
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of Aptos, CA
Oct 1999
time: 21:20
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quote:
Originally posted by BeBro
Lazy German as I am, I only read Siro´s summary. Some thoughts:
While it is true that Europe´s military is not as strong as the US military, I do not think that the second part of that quote is correct.
I´d rather say this aversion has not much to do with our military, but with Europe´s "warlike" history - Europeans had the most devastating wars on their own soil, Americans had not.
Especially Germany was rather "pacifistic" after WWII, first under pressure from the Allies, who did not want a new threat from Germany again, then because we accepted und understood our role in WWII, and so the post-WWII Germany tried to make sure that it would never become a threat for its neighbours again. Our "pacifism" was mainly self interest, the end of WWII teached us something...
But after the unification the will to use military is higher than ever after WWII. Amazingly the decisions to participate with military force on the Balkan, or in Afghanistan were made by our "left" Schroeder government - their political background is classically much more "pacifist" compared to our conservatives.
You can complain that most of the German troops do "only" peacekeeping, but also this is "exercise of military power" and a drastic change from Germany´s "no troops outside NATO territory"-policy before the 1990ies...
I think the main difference to Amerika is that we see the military option as the last option, not necessarily the best one, and not isolated from political or economical efforts. "Exercise of military power" as the author says does perhaps reduce or even take away certain threats (which is of course important, therefore you´ll not find a single whining from me about US troops in Afghanistan), but it rarely solves entire conflicts.
Perhaps the will to use military is higher when you have the stronger military like the US, I can´t answer that, but sometimes a use of military force can rather create new problems, so the question if Europe should do that more is a bit pointless for me - we will do it, when it serves our interests, and when it solves more problems than it creates, but not to appear simply as military giant... |
Ah. There is still hope!
Welcome aboard, ally.
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Ned
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of Aptos, CA
Oct 1999
time: 21:20
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The Euro's, as well as the Japanese, Australians, New Zealanders and Canadians, are living under a defacto Pax Americana. They live within US alliances with an America strong enough and willing enough to defend them against any serious threat. It is little wonder that none of the countries feels the need to invest heavily in their military.
Yet all these countries feel they are a part of a larger community with the US and want a real say in what we do and how we do it in addressing the world's problems. If the US fails to address this need for the allies to have a say, there will come a time when the hostility of the "protectorate" against America will become so great as to again fracture the world into hostile and competing powers.
For the time being, periodic trips by our president to visit the capitals of our allies may be sufficient to hold the structure together. But, in the long term, we have to begin thinking about more formal structures, where the allies have a real say and have a corresponding "obligation" to support the decisions of their fellow allies.
The UN is obviously not this vehicle. Perhaps Nato is. But if it is to become the new security structure for countries operating under PAX Americana, perhaps should be expanded to include Japan, South Korea, Australia and New Zealand at a minimum.
Then there is the issue of Israel.
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KrazyHorse
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Macedonia
May 2001
time: 00:20
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quote:
Originally posted by DanS
KH: They are on the hook to do the dishes, if liberal Western values are to be spread throughout the world (that's what we're all after, right?). If they don't want to put the money into direct offensive capability, there is plenty of other stuff to do besides. Everything from being peacekeepers to helping build democratic institutions to giving direct food or monetary aid |
We may all be after it, but as has already been said, the Euros don't feel like you're going after it the right way. The path we take to get to our goals is usually what's fought about between friends, and if they don't think your method is worthwhile (or even worse, is counterproductive), then they have no obligation beyond sitting back and sniping from the sidelines.
They already do put men and money into peacekeeping. foreign aid, etc (much more than you guys do). Plus, the Americans are playing imperialist right now. Imperial powers have to pay for their own militaries. It's usually what ends up dragging them down...
You can't spend money on things that you've decided are in your interest and then ask others to chip in when they don't feel those things are in their interest. To a large extent, the Euro countries did get a bit of a free ride when you were protecting them from the SU (they knew they needed help doing it, and were quite willing to admit it, mostly). Things are different now. There's no need for a united front facing East, and there's much more disagreement as to "what's next"...
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GePap
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of the Big Apple
Nov 2001
time: 23:20
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While the article is good, I don't buy it's premise for a second. There is a current, and rather old notion of overhyping the power of the US, or the power that the great powers have had over the last 300 years. Even the notion of 'Pax Americana' is sort of hypocrtical. How many millions have died from internal and external wars during the last decade? Hell, I can think of at leat one attempted genocide in which 1,000,000 people died. If this is a Pax Americana, I want my money back. Lets get a more hypothetical. Lets say China and India go to war tommorrow- that is, 1/3 of humanity decides to go to war. What if anything could the US do to stop this war from coming, or do to stop it? What if then this war drew in all of central and south Asia and Russia. Again, what could the US do? invade, economic sanction? Nuking them? MOst state in this world, and there are 180 of them, still act mostly for local or regionl reasons, becase as powerful as the US is, it is still thousands of miles away from most states, and while it has a large and powerfull military, the limits of this are becoming increasingly clear. Hell, think of it, the whole might of the US vs. an NGO, Al qaida. No brainer, right? What the hell could a group with an anual budget of what, 100 Million at most, and this is probably an absurdly high number, vs. the pentagon (which it hit) with a 280 billion budget. Yet almot a year later, everyone in the US is still quacking in their boots in fear of hypothetical attacks, and for all the huff and puff about Sadam, last time I checked, he is still in power, and we have not moved any hardware into position to ge him out. It might be many more months to get rid of him. If the US is so obviously and absudly powerful, a regular superman, why is sadam, after almost a year and 1/2 (God, its been that long since dufus 'won'!!!) of Dubya, still in power?
Is the US the strongest state in the world? No doubt. Does that mean that it can do anything it wants, at any time, anywhere in the globe, and that it will see its will imposed in any corner of the world? Absolutely positively not. The Europeans and Japanese are weaker (thought it is because they refuse to spend the money on military, not because of any inherent weakness) but because of this they act more sanely than us (even if they do act hypocritically), because they have come to see the limits of power in the moden world, something the US has yet, and in fact, refuses to do.
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22-06-2002 19:03
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