Quote:Original post by Daniel Miller
About the first part: I certainly see how it's mature not to force the taxpayers to spend money on wars, but I fail to see how it's mature to force the taxpayers to spend money on social programs.

That would be an entirely different discussion. But regardless of the actual legitimacy of forcing people to pay taxes, I would rather see my tax money be spent on building schools and providing general healthcare plans, than watching it dissappear in a financial black hole named Iraq.

Quote:Original post by trzy
Nope, unfortunately it didn't. Anyone who thinks that the world has generally been more "peaceful" since WWII (whether due to nuclear weapons or any other excuse, including US dominance or UN power) needs only to look at all the conflict that has happened since in southeast Asia, in Africa, in the middle east, and even Latin America.

Wars have mainly shifted to other geographical regions. As for post-WW2 Europe, it certainly is more peaceful than pretty much ever before in history. We've come to a situation, were an internal war in Europe has become de-facto impossible. That's an important step forward in the maturity process I was talking about earlier. Make everybody so economically dependent on each other, that even the smallest war would financially ruin everybody.

Quote:Original post by trzy
That's a cheap shot and the point about the US being "young" relative to Europe is pretty much invalid in this context. The history of the US prior to its colonization extends to Europe, so our society is in most ways just as old as yours. It just happens that some of us moved to a different location.

There's much more to it, and you know it. The US was created with the idea in mind to be 'different' to Europe. And God knows, they have succeeded ;) It was essentially a restart into a completely different direction, with very different approaches.

Quote:Original post by trzy
Second, do social programs in Europe pre-date the US? Europe didn't learn any lessons regarding useless military budgets until after WWI and WWII. The US hasn't faced the same disasters and hardships as Europe in the aftermath of those wars,

Exactly. A large scale war on the US homeland would certainly calm down a lot of those gang-ho war mongers over there.

Quote:Original post by trzy
but we're certainly not too "young" to understand what went wrong with Europe.

What do you mean with "went wrong" ? The events the lead to WW1+2 ? Of course, everybody knows that, they're well documented. It's not about WW2, it's about the development process that happened afterwards. Germany is a perfect example: they shifted from a militarist, nationalist and expansionist country (with quite a few similarities to the Bush lead US) to a social democracy where the life of a human being is valued much higher than in the US: from wellfare, over public healthcare, to rehabilitation of criminals. Interesting development, isn't it ?

Interestingly, the Third Reich originally emerged from the desolate social perspective of many people during a huge economic depression. Had there been more advanced social programs in action back then, Hitler wouldn't have had a chance in hell to get to power.

Quote:Original post by trzy
Even today, the US has a strategic military presence in Europe which I don't see nations like Germany complaining too strongly about.

For economic reasons, especially for retail. US military personel == consumers. Germany doesn't give a shit about the military "protection" (or lack thereof) of the US. Germany is very well equiped to defend itself, even if that means asking for help from EU partners. And we all know what usually happens if the US wages a war on its own: total chaos, and complete failure to achieve the mission target. "Make Iraq a peaceful democracy", remember that ? The US is not a reliable partner. If it suits them financially and/or strategically, they will betray you. They have shown that behaviour again and again in the past. Germany would be very dumb to rely on US "protection".

Quote:Original post by trzy
NATO would also be pointless without American involvement. NATO arguably provides a counterbalance to Russia to this very day and we may soon discover that it will serve useful against China.

You Americans still have a real psychological problem with Russia, don't you ? To tell you the truth, after all the events the happened in recent years, I'd rather trust Russia than the US. I personally see NATO as obsolete anyway. I'd prefer the EU signing an extended military defense treaty with Russia and China, and drop the US completely.

Quote:Original post by trzy
Of course I realize that. Part of the reason is our global military presence. If I were president, I would propose the radical idea of withdrawing from Europe entirely, which would have a huge impact on the policies of your side of the pond. I would also seek to minimize our presence in Central Asia, which has been needlessly iritating Russia and Iran (although I wouldn't trust the Russians to completely withdraw), and would seek to explore ways to lower our presence in east Asia.

Sounds reasonable.

Quote:Original post by sprite_hound
I don't believe any European nation is now relying on American or any other nations funding for military spending, though I must admit to be fairly ignorant of this matter.

That's pretty much correct, although we're all heavily relying on each other within the EU (an EU wide military force is still under discussion, and would be a good thing). While a single nation might not have a "self sufficient" military (whatever that means), together we have all we need to defend ourselves against all realistic attack scenarios. That ranges from small attacks on our (now pretty large) borders into ex-Soviet parts, up to a possible larger scale nuclear response through Britain and France (and Germany, I don't believe for a second that Germany doesn't have it's own 'hidden' nukes somewhere).

Quote:Original post by Yann L
Wars have mainly shifted to other geographical regions. As for post-WW2 Europe, it certainly is more peaceful than pretty much ever before in history. We've come to a situation, were an internal war in Europe has become de-facto impossible. That's an important step forward in the maturity process I was talking about earlier. Make everybody so economically dependent on each other, that even the smallest war would financially ruin everybody.

It's only impossible in the forseeable future, but the forseeable future never extends very far. That's an important lesson to keep in mind. In half a century, things can change dramatically, especially if any political/economical disasters or crises happen in that time frame.

As for learning lessons about playing along with your neighbors, I don't see Canada, the USA, and Mexico being any more likely to go to war than Europe. It's been that way for a very long time.

Quote:

Quote:Original post by trzy
That's a cheap shot and the point about the US being "young" relative to Europe is pretty much invalid in this context. The history of the US prior to its colonization extends to Europe, so our society is in most ways just as old as yours. It just happens that some of us moved to a different location.

There's much more to it, and you know it. The US was created with the idea in mind to be 'different' to Europe. And God knows, they have succeeded ;) It was essentially a restart into a completely different direction, with very different approaches.

Kind of. The US borrowed heavily from the ideas of the French Revolution. Except that it arguably didn't work as well for the French... America carried on what Europe started in the 18th century and was destined to succeed because of its location.

Quote:
What do you mean with "went wrong" ? The events the lead to WW1+2 ? Of course, everybody knows that, they're well documented. It's not about WW2, it's about the development process that happened afterwards. Germany is a perfect example: they shifted from a militarist, nationalist and expansionist country (with quite a few similarities to the Bush lead US) to a social democracy where the life of a human being is valued much higher than in the US: from wellfare, over public healthcare, to rehabilitation of criminals. Interesting development, isn't it ?

You mean the development process that America played a crucial part in? After WWI, the US was opposed to the harsh terms of the Treaty of Versailles. After WWII, it was evident that the US had to step in and rebuild Europe. God knows what would have happened had it been left alone. Well, actually, we do know: the Soviets would have rebuilt you in their image. Bad blood between European nations would have continued to simmer under the Russian boot.

Quote:
Interestingly, the Third Reich originally emerged from the desolate social perspective of many people during a huge economic depression. Had there been more advanced social programs in action back then, Hitler wouldn't have had a chance in hell to get to power.

I don't buy this argument. It's inconclusive. Would those social programs survive WWI? Could they have even existed in the pre-WWI Europe? The further back in history you go to propose your changes, the more drastic the assumptions you have to make about what else would have changed, and the more meaningless the conclusion.

Quote:
If it suits them financially and/or strategically, they will betray you. They have shown that behaviour again and again in the past. Germany would be very dumb to rely on US "protection".

Oh, please. Europe behaves exactly the same way. Even now, Germany are backstabbing their EU neighbors and cutting a deal with Russia over a gas pipeline. And this is the neutered Germany which still has a complex about its nationality but is a relative economic giant. Let's see what happens when that situation equilibrates. The EU is doing well, and I'm happy for it and hope it continues, but I'm not so optimistic as to write it off as a guaranteed success just yet. In the long term, that is.

Quote:You Americans still have a real psychological problem with Russia, don't you ? To tell you the truth, after all the events the happened in recent years, I'd rather trust Russia than the US. I personally see NATO as obsolete anyway. I'd prefer the EU signing an extended military defense treaty with Russia and China, and drop the US completely.

I guess it must be an illogical overreaction. China? The oppressive communist China? The same China who sends troops to Sudan to protect its oil interests but refuses to do anything about the Darfur genocide? The same China that's selling weapons to Mugabe? The same China that runs operations in Africa which are decades behind in workers' rights? The same China which oppresses Tibet and will eventually have Taiwan, as well? Ah, yes, and the China which is destined to one day have a military capable of projecting force around the globe, considers itself to be the center of the world, and is deeply suspicious of the West.

As for Russia, they've been nothing but trouble for about a century if not more. Arguably, they simply don't understand democracy. Sure, they understand it. Russians are just like everyone else and want the same thing. They're bright and hard-working people, too. But the Russian political system just doesn't really get democracy. If you want to sign an extended defense treaty with a nation which is likely to have bombed its own civilians and blamed it on the Chechnyans to start a war, then be my guest. The US lied about Iraq but I'll have you remember that EU member nations went along with us. Nevertheless, we haven't yet staged terrorist attacks on our own people (though we've thought about it.)

The US has treated Russia poorly in the post-Cold War era. This is partly why they still hate us so much and act the way they do. I read an interesting article in The Nation (I think) which pointed out that by rubbing the Russians' faces in the dirt after we "beat" them, and by slowly encircling them in Central Asia and Europe, we can only expect them to act the way they do. I agree only to a point. We've done a lot of wrong to them but the way they continue to behave is unexcusable.


Good luck on any partnership with those two countries. You'll need it!

Quote:Original post by sprite_hound
You're last sentence appears an implicit threat. We "ought to be careful" in disagreeing with policy? You yourself admitted to maximAl's point that social spending contrary ideologically to (generalised) American beliefs. No one in any post above that (or in this thread) has insulted America or Americans, apart from that "cheap shot" that you immediately respond to in kind.

It wasn't a threat. But maybe this statement shows that you're irrationally paranoid about Americans?

Sounds dumb? Yeah, that's just what I thought when I read your paragraph. Well, actually, I was more amused :)

I said you "ought to be careful" because I was assuming you'd be interested in making sound arguments and being a nice, thoughtful person. Maybe that's too much to ask.

Quote:Original post by Daerax
Russia Criticizes US Plans to Build Missile Defense Shield in Europe

the world not so big as it used to be

There are three things about this situation I don't like:

1) The US peddling this anti-missile system abroad. It's really a one-sided deal and attempts to give more legitimacy to spending money on the shield.

2) That Poland and the Czech Republic are going to accept this crap rather than developing their own anti-missile systems/ICBMs/nukes if they feel they need them. I'd like to see Europe develop its own systems. Not because I'm mean-spirited and think they'll fail, but because I have a personal interest in Europe's security as much as America's. Of course, it would also be nice, for the purpose of this debate, if Europe took responsibility for its own missile defense and counterbalance to Russia's nuclear threat.

3) The Russians are being assholes like usual instead of responding with some tact and at least making it seem like they give a shit about their neighbors. Yes, they had to respond somehow, but I feel justified in criticizing them for their attitude about this. Everyone just loves the angry anti-social guy in the room.... :P

Quote:Original post by trzy

Quote:Original post by LessBread

Quote:Original post by trzy
Afr0m@n: The war stayed cold because of the US counterbalance, especially in Europe during the decades before ICBMs became widespread.

The war didn't stay cold between superpower proxies...

Nope, unfortunately it didn't. Anyone who thinks that the world has generally been more "peaceful" since WWII (whether due to nuclear weapons or any other excuse, including US dominance or UN power) needs only to look at all the conflict that has happened since in southeast Asia, in Africa, in the middle east, and even Latin America.

It's been a slow burn for the most part.