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Comment by starspangled | Hacker News Reader

> Are such drastic action appropriate given the current state of the US? The US probably hasn't been this economically dominant since after WWII.

Why is USAID needed most in times when the US is very "economically dominant"?

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Because it takes decades of investment and work to build up international trust and soft power, but as it turns out, it takes all of two weeks for a fool to destroy it.

Look at how that turned out for Bismark's Germany after he was gone. His successors were high on their own supply, and in pursuit of short-term wins, destroyed the careful network of relationships and alliances that he curated.

Beijing is, no doubt, finding this entire folly amusing.

US dominance was built on hard power (war machine). Ditto for Bismarck. Nothing works without the hard power part.

if you are talking about the formation of germany, That was also a lot of soft power and politics to keep socialists from gaining any real political power and a lot of soft power to get all other german states to form into germany.

there where two major wars during that time which mattered for the formation of germany, (the franco prussian war and the austro-prussian war, which was an extent of the politicals about who should form the german state).

So should the world read your comment as a ditching of soft power to use hard power? Is america going to war?

Is that why you made that statement in the context of everything that was built on that hard power being demolished?

I'm not sure what you're asking. I think you're trying to make a point, but it is going over my head.

The world should read "less carrot, more stick" from the Trump admin.

But what stick? The stick doesn't work when they know you aren't going to use it

Reminds me of that scene in The Irishman: "Just show it to him, don't use it."

I think Trump will use the stick.

He caved on tariffs to both Mexico and Canada now, so I guess we'll move on to the next concept of a stick.

Soft power seems like mostly wishful thinking at best and a fraud on the taxpayer at worst. I don't think the noble savages feel forever indebted to their kind and wise master for throwing them a few scraps. Countries align with what interests them. Look how quickly countries all over Africa, South America, Middle East, the subcontinent turn to China and Russia. All the vaccines and condoms in the world aren't going to stop people and countries wanting to get the best price for the things they buy and sell.

USAID also has a fairly sketchy record in funding regime change efforts, so countries cooperate with it on a purely transactional basis, "trust" is zero.

> Because it takes decades of investment and work to build up international trust and soft power, but as it turns out, it takes all of two weeks for a fool to destroy it.

I was asking specifically about how US economic dominance is a factor. Why is USAID more important when US economic dominance is high.

Helping people out before things get really bad and there are more wars abroad is a good investment. That's why the military has generally been supportive of USAID.

In general, it's also better to have friends in the world rather than going around being loud-mouthed jerks that no one likes.

It's also a tiny amount of the budget.

Yes, though it's unclear USAID is fit for that purpose considering it also funds civil unrest and regime change so some might say is a jerk that no one likes. But questions of its effectiveness and efficiency aside, none of that answers my question about US economic dominance. Why is USAID very important when US economic dominance is high.

I was specifically wondering about that particular part of the comment by the original poster, it just seems quite interesting to me what the connection there is.

> considering it also funds civil unrest and regime change

Non crazy conspiratorial source for these huge allegations?

Here's one https://www.bbc.com/news/world-us-canada-26876801

I might be able to find you a Fox News link if that would be more to your liking.

Working against apartheid in South Africa would also count as "fomenting unrest" so I don't know how useful that metric is. Even what you linked is basically equivalent to the US projecting soft power and pro-capitalist sentiment (inappropriate, IMO, but probably within agency mission parameters).

It really doesn't matter if you know how useful that metric is or not, it is what I was specifically talking about and what the parent poster asked about. I'm just glad to be able to blow their mind by proving these "huge allegations".

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