Only as an adult was I able to form my own opinion.
Without a strong military in the past we would certainly not be here today and without a strong military now, who knows what other nation might decide to attack our sovereignty.
It's childish to be anti military - it shows you do not understand the interconnectedness of our society - good and bad.
I don’t believe it’s “childish” to have serious concerns about the military.
That a military is necessary for ensuring the security and continuing stability of the US is of little importance when the real issue is based on a tradeoff, an equilibrium. What are we gaining and what are we losing?
The current situation of the military industrial complex is complicated, but it is nevertheless clear that is is extremely inefficient (and thats by design). I'm not sure if incorporating AI tech into the military is going to change this, when the fundamental incentives remain the same.
Other countries antagonize the US because of its military interventionism. If the US had lower military spending, other countries wouldn't feel the need to be aggressive.
It's childish to be pro military. It shows you think arbitrary lines on a map determine who's good or bad.
What you're suggesting is the geopolitical equivalent of "ignore the bully and they'll get bored and go away". And you call others childish?
There is no question that the US has acted like a bully in Southern America, but you ignore that other countries have acted the same way in other parts of the world[1], and with far more disastrous results[2].
If you want to dig into records, then the ground under my feet has seen a Russian invasion roughly every 50 years for as long as written records go, that is, every generation has had to resist a Russian attack and suffer the consequences. The war in Ukraine is like a replay of so many wars before, from its artificial justifications to the incredible violence against victims.
When kids study history in school, one of the sources they have to analyze and put into context is a letter from a Russian nobleman to the czar after another successful conquest. In the letter, he boasts that when he was travelling from one city to another on the way back to Russia, he didn't see a single living person left. They had successfully burned everything down and killed everyone.
Centuries have passed, but nothing has changed. Russians use the same tactic in Ukraine, massive artillery walls slowly crawling forward, reducing entire cities to total rubble as if they had been hit with a nuclear bomb[3].
Pax Americana is currently the only thing preventing me and hundreds of millions of other Europeans from sharing the same fate. Russians do not dare to invade as long as they don't know if Americans would press the nuclear button or not. My freedom to live in peace and unharmed, speak my language and practice my culture, directly depends on the missile silos tucked away somewhere between the cornfields of Iowa. How about that for a perspective?
[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_wars_involving_Russia
[2] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Circassian_genocide
[3] https://www.rferl.org/a/maryinka-aerial-shattered-landscape/...
No. The argument is not that having some other country as hegemon would be better than the US. The argument is that any single country being overly powerful is a negative, and a more multipolar would would be healthier.
"The US should maintain enough military capacity to prevent/repel an invasion of the continental US" is not particularly controversial. But the US "defending" countries halfway around the world is not healthy for either.
> Pax Americana is currently the only thing preventing me and hundreds of millions of other Europeans from sharing the same fate. Russians do not dare to invade as long as they don't know if Americans would press the nuclear button or not. My freedom to live in peace and unharmed, speak my language and practice my culture, directly depends on the missile silos tucked away somewhere between the cornfields of Iowa. How about that for a perspective?
Russia has spent the past year failing to conquer a country of 40 million, without any involvement from those missile silos. If they tried to invade Poland or Finland they would crumble even quicker. The only countries with a legitimate fear of a Russian invasion are the same countries who have shown zero willingness to protect other people's "freedom to speak their language and practice their culture" when it comes to Russian people living within their (present) borders.
I don't find that convincing, given that the main claimants to this "multipolar world" are totalitarian dictatorships.
> Russia has spent the past year failing to conquer a country of 40 million, without any involvement from those missile silos. If they tried to invade Poland or Finland they would crumble even quicker.
This is not a view shared by any experts on the ground. Russia still maintains enough potential to cause immense damage to Poland, Finland, and all other of its neighbours, even if they ultimately lose. Rebuilding Ukraine will take many decades and countless billions, and the vast areas Russians have mined will take many centuries to clear. The mines will maim and kill tens of thousands of people - some of who haven't even been born yet - long after the war has ended.
> The only countries with a legitimate fear of a Russian invasion are the same countries who have shown zero willingness to protect other people's "freedom to speak their language and practice their culture" when it comes to Russian people living within their (present) borders.
This is complete bullshit, straight from Russian propaganda. Human rights are protected in Europe better than anywhere else in the world, and particularly well in places like Finland and Sweden that are rushing to prepare for war with Russia.
Please do tell where Russia stands in global rankings of human freedom, and where do Finland or Sweden stand.
Russia could certainly cause severe economic damage and kill many people, sure. But find me one credible expert who, given what we know now, supports your "hundreds of millions" claim.
> Human rights are protected in Europe better than anywhere else in the world, and particularly well in places like Finland and Sweden
Which is why the EU has been making increasingly strident criticisms of the way the Baltic states treat their Russian minorities (at least prior to the current war), and why Ukrainian efforts at EU membership stalled.
> Please do tell where Russia stands in global rankings of human freedom, and where do Finland or Sweden stand.
Depends whose "global" rankings they are. The likes of Freedom House show a clear bias once you dig into the details - apparently China not permitting schools to teach in Tibetan is a travesty, but Estonia limiting how much schools can teach in Russian is not worth knocking a point off for.
Since mid-2023, everyone from think-tanks like the German Council on Foreign Relations to chiefs of defense of Europe have been ringing an alarm bell over Putin's ambitions beyond Ukraine. The population of Germany and Poland alone pushes the number of people directly at risk of Russian aggression over 100 million.
> Which is why the EU has been making increasingly strident criticisms of the way the Baltic states treat their Russian minorities
They haven't. The sob story about Russians being mistreated everywhere was a smear campaign to sabotage the entry of Eastern European countries into the EU. Its heyday was around the end of accession negotiations in early 2000s. As of 2024, nobody takes that seriously anymore. Russians too have recognized ineffectiveness of that narrative and have stopped pushing it.
> Depends whose "global" rankings they are.
Indeed. Only a severely brainwashed person would put Russia anywhere near Finland or Sweden when it comes to human rights. You can reply with shallow rhetorical arguments, but there's as much to discuss here as with the Flat Earth crowd. It's not a good faith discussion beyond this point.
And the winner, by unanimous decision…..
MOOOOOOOOOP SIIIIIIIII
You think there's a serious risk of a Russian tank column making it to Frankfurt? Lol. Lmao even.
> As of 2024, nobody takes that seriously anymore. Russians too have recognized ineffectiveness of that narrative and have stopped pushing it.
If no-one takes it seriously that's because no-one expects western countries to be principled any more. The language laws are real.
> Indeed. Only a severely brainwashed person would put Russia anywhere near Finland or Sweden when it comes to human rights.
Sure. Finland and Sweden have much better human rights records than Russia, agreed. But they're not the countries that rely on the US nuclear umbrella for defence (joining NATO is not the same thing as being dependent on it); the countries that do have rather murkier records.
Tank column? I don't know. But Russia may very well attack the Suwalki gap and hit German cities with long-range missiles to terrorize Germans into dropping support for Poland and Lithuania, while threatening that any German response will unleash nuclear armageddon, as they are currently trying to break the morale in Ukraine. The distance from Suwalki gap to Frankfurt is roughly the same as the distance between active frontline in Ukraine and Lviv (~1000 km), the city that had to enter 2024 under Russian missile attacks. As someone put it succinctly, Russia is shooting missiles at cities 10 Belgiums away from the frontline - with no intention of stopping anytime soon.
> If no-one takes it seriously that's because no-one expects western countries to be principled any more.
The human rights situation in Russia has deteriorated so much in the past few years that their complaints towards the EU can only be taken as a joke. Russian diplomats risk getting laughed out of the room (like Lavrov already experienced) if they raise the issue. Russia has left the European Convention on Human Rights, not to mention "lesser" things like decriminalizing wifebeating, destroying the last remnants of freedom of speech and free expression, turning blind eye to anti-gay pogroms taking place in southern part of the country, systematically persecuting Russian human rights activists, and carrying out ethnic cleansing by conscripting and sending ethnic minorities to die as cannon fodder in pointless "meat attacks" in Ukraine.
Russia is approaching North Korea at a fast pace. Ironically, in the entire world, Russia is one of the worst places to be in as a Russian - which is why all the top dogs in Russia have their children, wives and mistresses living in safety of the "degenerate" west.
Russia could certainly drop a handful of missiles on Frankfurt if they were feeling particularly stupid. They could not "reduce it to total rubble" or kill thousands, much less millions, except by using nuclear weapons (if their nuclear weapons even work).
> Russia has left the European Convention on Human Rights, not to mention "lesser" things like decriminalizing wifebeating, destroying the last remnants of freedom of speech and free expression, turning blind eye to anti-gay pogroms taking place in southern part of the country, systematically persecuting Russian human rights activists, and carrying out ethnic cleansing by conscripting and sending ethnic minorities to die as cannon fodder in pointless "meat attacks" in Ukraine.
That changes nothing about whether Russians in other countries are permitted to "speak their language and practice their culture".
> Ironically, in the entire world, Russia is one of the worst places to be in as a Russian - which is why all the top dogs in Russia have their children, wives and mistresses living in safety of the "degenerate" west.
They live in self-reliant countries with strong human rights protection including for Russians - again, not those countries that are dependent on the US nuclear umbrella.
Radicalize and support those minorities. If the country does not do anything, it has a rebellious subversive group being directed by a hostile country. If it does anything it just goes to show how hostile and suppressive those countries are which justifies more official Russian reactions.
Also dont forget that those loyal Russian minorities were part of the imperial oppressive structure by which Russia ruled over its subjects.
Anyone who cares about protecting non-Russian ex-Soviet languages and cultures for principled reasons should care about protecting the Russian language and culture in places where they're a minority, for the same reason.
> Also dont forget that those loyal Russian minorities were part of the imperial oppressive structure by which Russia ruled over its subjects.
The Russian empire transplanted various peoples at various times as a tool of oppression, but that's hardly the fault or responsibility of the poor peasants who got transplanted. And on the ruling side, Stalin the Georgian was every bit as oppressive and imperial as Russian rulers before or since.
Sure, but the Russian Empire in its various forms transplanted those Russian people because they were loyal and could be put into positions of power. If you compare their treatment to that of the German minorities after WW2 they got a very good deal.
If the USA is dictating issues outside its borders, and the affected people have no vote in US politics, then to them, this isn't conceptually different from being ruled by a dictatorship at all.
That would be a first, wouldnt it? We are currently seeing the consequences of the waning of the US unipolar Superpower.
Venezuela had a referendum to annex large parts of its neighbor.
Iran attacked nuclear Pakistan and has its proxies disrupt international shipping lanes and wage war against Israel.
Turkey has its fingers in tons of conflicts and supported its ally Azerbaijan in the ethnic cleansing of Nagorno Karabakh.
China asserts its military dominance in the south China and is depriving other nations thousands of km away of their rights and resources. Never mind that it is also preparing to invade and subjugate Taiwan. ....
Turns out if given power people are jerks, who would have guessed.
No? US intervention has some successes but many failures. The region where the US's dominance was most complete (South America) is also the region where its influence has been most negative. Conversely the most positive side of the US was on show when dealing with Europe during the Cold War era, where there was more of a balance of power.
> Turns out if given power people are jerks, who would have guessed.
Sure. The thing is that that applies to the US too.
"If only everyone put down their guns there would be no need etc etc".
But it's not the world we live in - we live in a military world - that's real and not a hope/fantasy about a different civilisation without war or weapons. We have to have a society suited to the world we live in.
And by the way I remain very much left wing and at the same time extremely pragmatic about the need for a nation to defend itself.
Take any country below the equator and chances are the US has probably used its military against it. That's not defence. You don't collaborate with that actor if you think defence is the goal.
If we set that aside as an aberration, then yes your right.
Would you have been okay with Russia going to Iraq's aid when the USA invaded the second time? You think it's fine if Russia not only fought American troops in Iraq, but bombed the USA as well? That would have been defense by your logic, since that's exactly what the USA did to Iraq in 1991.
Fascinating worldview indeed.
That never happened. The only thing that happened was SH having a talk to a US diplomat who was noncommittal because there was no official position on it yet. Because nobody expected SH to do something that stupid.
You could rephrase ALL invasions as "defense of another". For example, Putin's excuse to invade Ukraine was 'to "protect the people" of the Russian-controlled breakaway republics.'
Otherwise you're just arguing that countries can point at some random object and say "that's under my watch" and bring armies to fight for that thing. In a sane universe that's called an invasion. Whether the invasion is morally justified or not is another matter.
With Taiwan, it's a delicate situation and I'm not familiar enough with it to comment on it.
But I notice you conveniently left out all the times the US just did interventionism because it was convenient. Iraq? Most recently Venezuela? If we go back long enough, how about literally all of South America?
The US has a shit history of intervening in Latin America from the 20th century, no argument there, but it's been several decades now at least since the US overthrow a democracy in that region.
You're right that it wasn't outright military interventionism. In my mind, there's little difference between supporting a coup covertly through the CIA, by providing weapons and training, and invading a country. Maybe we disagree there.
Oh, and where did this happen?
Where did this happen recently for Venezuela?
Isn't because it takes several decades for the secret documents being declassified? Of course the official discourse of USA is that they did nothing. However, we have several accusations of interference in Latin America in a lot of soft coups and more direct attacks like in Bolivia (2019) and Venezuela (a coup in 2002 and a mercenary attack in 2020).
Ah, just like Ukraine thwarted Russian ambitions with its low defense spending pre-2014. Why bother invading a defenseless country, after all?
And those poor sods in the Baltics got invaded by Russia and overthrown after joining NATO, of course, since that needlessly antagonized Putin.
You've conflated two different things here:
1. Military interventionism. Presumably the unjustified sort, like invading Iraq (and not the first time, when the US was pushing Iraq out of Kuwait).
2. Military spending.
These are totally different things. You can spend a lot on your military and not go on military adventures.
If you spend billions on your military, you're gonna be looking for ways to solve problems with it.
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I think it's fair to say there are two types of countries: those with territorial ambitions and those without.
Military power in the hands of the former is terrifying.
Marijuana criminalization is necessary and it's childish to criticize it, because without drug controls, cocaine would flood the streets.
Life imprisonment without chance of parole is necessary and it's childish to criticize any use of it, because some specific criminals merit it.
Government censorship of any kind of speaker for any kind of content is necessary and it's childish to criticize it, because specific types of information (classified national security information, for example) require it.
Even worse than taking this kind of children's storybook view of the world is applying it to the US military among all militaries, with an incredibly long undeniable track record of incompetence and war crimes.
The USA is not under threat from anyone. This would still be true if the US military was a tiny fraction of its current size.
The USA does, however, use its vast military to attack other countries without provocation, seemingly to protect commercial interests.
I don't think it's "childish" to be suspicious of the US Military. I worry about the mentality in the USA that everyone needs to protect themselves all the time with firearms. I don't understand why everyone seems to be scared that someone else is going to do bad things to them if they're not armed to the teeth. I suspect this is projection.
That is demonstrably false.
In fact, should Texas ever actually secede from the Union they would very quickly find out exactly how much our enemies dislike us.
Hard to believe someone actually typed that sentence.
> In fact, should Texas ever actually secede from the Union they would very quickly find out exactly how much our enemies dislike us.
Go on...?