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Is it time for America to forge a new foreign policy?
- Thread starter Stevicus
- Start date
So, are you suggesting that US foreign policy is some kind of holy crusade and a mission from God? Well, I have noticed those among my fellow Americans who believe such things, although how many of them actually believe that today? How do they define "evil"? How do they know what is "evil"?
I wasn't sure.
My argument was not entirely against the projection of American power, but to acknowledge that there are limits as to what we can do. It largely depends on what America actually wants to do in the world and what kind of foreign policy would be best to achieve that goal. That's what I was asking in my OP. I wasn't necessarily asking for a critique of my ideas (although it's always welcome) but more of what others might have thought.
What do Americans actually want to do? How do we consider our role in the world? Is it even beneficial for America? Is there anything tangible that the American people can gain out of this?
If we want to maintain our role as Captain America and the world's policeman, then we'd be better off shoring up our own defenses and working on our own economic situation in order to have the resources, national unity, and public support to maintain such a policy. Our leadership has crippled America's economy and diminished our ability to project our power over the past 40 years. So if that's what our leaders want to do, then they've been doing a lousy job of it. Now, we're at the point where it's all we can do just to avoid domestic terrorism and the threat of internal insurrection.
Well, it was still an atrocity, even if the Japanese were worse. One doesn't really excuse the other.
But that aside, the other question is whether any of this served any genuine long-term national interests for America.
You said that if the US had no occupied the Philippines, it would have been a geopolitical mistake, but for whom? For the Philippines? For China? For Japan? Certainly not the U.S. We had no obligations to the Philippines prior to the Spanish-American War, and there was certainly no threat coming from Asia anytime soon (not in 1898).
Okay, but what are you really saying here? Are you suggesting that America had some kind of moral obligation to occupy the Philippines?
Would the Japanese have seen it that way? Would the British, Dutch, or French stand by and allow the Philippines to be taken by the Japanese? They apparently had no problem with us taking it.
Argue that who should have been unhindered? The Japanese? Reminder: Both the US and Japan were lesser powers at that time. Sure, we were up and coming and on the verge of becoming a great power, but we were still only "junior" compared to bigshots like Britain. Japan was not our enemy yet, and they were our allies in the Boxer Rebellion and World War I. As long as Japan played ball and didn't tread on other nations' colonies, the other major powers ostensibly tolerated their imperialist expansion. The only real exception was Russia, but that's mainly because Tsar Nicholas was a doofus and allowed himself to be goaded into war by his German cousin, Kaiser Wilhelm.
A lot of Americans want the same thing, although perhaps for different reasons. But the reality is, the rest of the world modernized and grew up, while America has largely stagnated. We're not the America we used to be 70 years ago. In many ways, we've changed for the better, but in other ways, we've changed for the worse.
Also, there are many Americans who see no real tangible benefit from any of this. Our government and media paint it as some kind of noble crusade, to bring freedom to other countries and make the world safe for democracy. Our government would have us believe that it's done purely out of the goodness of America's heart, with absolutely no thought of reward or benefit for ourselves. If there was any actual benefit, they couldn't announce it to the people, so the people have to guess and theorize as to what the possible real reasons might be.
One thing most Americans are certain about: They haven't seen any share of America's spoils from war in a very, very long time. The dividend we got from WW2 ran out in the early 70s, and we've been running on fumes ever since.
Audie
Veteran Member
Too many topics
Plus you wrong
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I don't know all of the answers to your questions. What I can say is that WWII and its associated propaganda has been a heavy trip. The fact that Nazis embraced euthanasia and that communists attempted to drive religion out of various countries automatically associated them with Satan. Many modern prophecy books attempt to explain world events in terms of Satan's (as a being not in the general sense) last ditch struggle before the return of Jesus. They do this with great flair, weaving world events and arcane imagery from Revelation together. They go to lengths to demonstrate that the Bible has predicted things such as WWII. You shouldn't underestimate how influential all of this has been. Even putting that (Soteriology) aside multiple large Christian denominations consider Satan to be an active opponent of God's will even if they aren't into protestant Soteriology. There is a Chick tract talking about communists coming to take away everyone's Bible's and showing Satan to be behind it..
The last several decades have been a cold bath in humanism and naturalism, and there has been a reaction from the ministry. You've seen bits of it in the creation science movement, but that isn't the whole picture. People perceive good vs. evil and a fight between the two. What can be viewed as point of view can also be described in other ways.
This doesn't affect diplomats generally or most senators or most officials, but it does affect the voting public. WWII did seriously mess with the US public. We (not me but 'We' in a general sense) believe in good vs evil, because we think we experienced it in WWII and in the struggle between democracy and dictatorships which came in the communist movement. Does this mean we believe in taking over the world no, but we do believe in defending it from evil influences. That impacts foreign policy.
I can see what you're saying, although the same viewpoint comes through even in secular circles. Perhaps not painted in such melodramatic terms as "good vs. evil" or bringing Satan into it, but I did mention those who are ultra-patriotic and the image in popular culture of "Captain America" fighting a never ending battle for truth, justice, and the American way. (Okay, that was Superman's line, but either way, our perception of the world, as encouraged by the media and our political leaders, has been very cartoonish, with comic book superheroes and supervillains.)
I understand your point that there are those who have created the same perceptions using Biblical imagery and symbolism, and that also seems to work towards the same basic goal.
I'm not convinced that this would be a rational approach to resolving questions of foreign policy. However, assuming that God is on America's side and we have some sort of mission from God to oppose Satan's evil in the world, then don't you think that those who believe it would want America to be successful in that crusade? Don't they want America to be on the winning side? Or do they assume that it's already a given since God is already on our side? If that's the case, why should we bother to do anything at all, since we're already destined to prevail?
Regardless of whatever one proposes as our foreign policy goals and objectives, whether it's to fight Satan, to make the world safe for democracy, or possibly even try to live and coexist with our fellow humans in peace, our foreign policy needs to be constructed in such a way as to be most likely to succeed in whatever goal we set for ourselves. From what it looks like at present, our current foreign policy goal is the destruction of America, which is a suicidal course. How can we fight Satan if America self destructs?
My opinion is that the older generations are much more strongly affected, because they lived through or close to the time when America was fighting a scary dystopic future and immediate threat. Newer generations aren't so influenced by past wars. Many more people no longer believe that war is necessary, but in the past war was a means of finding truth, finding yourself, a rite of passage. It was considered honorable to fight and kill and conquer not just to defend. Modern wars are harder or impossible to justify as defensive wars, and Europe has ceased from making colonies. Fewer people publicly argue for culling the weak in the West..almost no one. Its a different sort of West, more unified on a global scale, less unified locally. West is no longer a direction and is in various places such that it has become a confusing term. People have changed.
...so America is a bit like a tool forged for a different situation. We were well formed to face the problem of the 1940's. Now that problem is gone, but we've been slow to recover.
Well, as you say, WW2 had a profound effect on how we look at things, but some 20 years after that, diminishing returns started to set in. More and more people stopped believing that America was some supreme guardian of freedom and justice. Many people reacted against public policy and the things our government was doing.
Also, war itself was challenged, as more people didn't think it was honorable to fight and kill. Peace, love, and non-violence were favored - and these concepts appeared more in line with the tenets of Christianity.
People wanted truth over what they saw as the lies of the establishment. They rejected concepts like Manifest Destiny. They questioned America's perceived "righteousness" and "goodness," and they questioned whether we had any right to judge or take action against other nations, considering that we were no better than anyone else. However, there were still those who believed that such a course was weak and dangerously naïve.
Terrywoodenpic
Oldest Heretic
The battle for world domination.
Involves power, influence and respect.
America Has never had more than one of the three at the same time.
However what the word neede more is Peace and the ability to trade freely.
This is better achieved when no one country can dominate all others.
Today there are bigger issues to contend with than wars.
There is little point in tooling up for war when the only prize is the ashes of Global Warming.
There is no reason at all why the world should not function perfectly well with more than one political system in place.
However what we see in both China and Russia is not Communism, both are now Hybrids. However both rely very much top down processes.
Both the American and Russian systems basically rely on corruption. both politically and financially. with China the problem is more with how to control and direct a people that are largely free to become entrepreneurs and oligarchs, while maintaining complete state control, and for the benefit of the people.
All three countries would be far better off sorting out their own systems, while continuing to trade freely.
Involves power, influence and respect.
America Has never had more than one of the three at the same time.
However what the word neede more is Peace and the ability to trade freely.
This is better achieved when no one country can dominate all others.
Today there are bigger issues to contend with than wars.
There is little point in tooling up for war when the only prize is the ashes of Global Warming.
There is no reason at all why the world should not function perfectly well with more than one political system in place.
However what we see in both China and Russia is not Communism, both are now Hybrids. However both rely very much top down processes.
Both the American and Russian systems basically rely on corruption. both politically and financially. with China the problem is more with how to control and direct a people that are largely free to become entrepreneurs and oligarchs, while maintaining complete state control, and for the benefit of the people.
All three countries would be far better off sorting out their own systems, while continuing to trade freely.
Yes, diminishing returns. This has not been uniform across the country and seems (to me) have contributed to the differences between conservatives and progressives. At the extremes some continue to worry about the red communist threats, and and at the other extreme some seem completely oblivious as if it never happened. I have heard that the love and peace movement of the 60's talked about destroying all of our weapons even as other groups talked about strengthening our military. Today I still hear "Freedom is not free" and "Give peace a chance" in my two ears. I wonder if newer generations are cognizant of this cultural struggle? Think they will be anything like the baby boomers?
So blame the gun maker not the gun users.
This is an interesting point. Although thinking on this, there may have been a brief window at the end of WW2 when America had all three: Power, influence, and respect. I think that we might have squandered it due to a national obsession over communism. Russia and China were our allies in WW2, and there's no practical reason we could not have continued to have a friendly and cooperative relationship.
Our reasons for starting the Cold War were purely ideological and emotional, driven mostly by the irrational belief that the Russians and/or the Chinese were plotting to take over the world - like some kind of evil mad scientist. Our perceptions of those countries were comic-book caricatures. With our leaders going off like paranoid nutcases bellowing about some imaginary "communist conspiracy," it doesn't seem conducive to gaining influence and respect in the world.
I can see this, although it depends on what "trade freely" actually means. Nothing ever literally means what the words might imply. A lot of global capitalists talk about "free trade," but all they really mean is among the few elite. It never really trickles down to the masses. The same people who zealously advocated "free trade" with Mexico are the same people who want to build walls at the border and restrict people's travel between countries. The term "free trade" implies that business wants to have a free hand to do whatever it wants on an international scale, but they also simultaneously want to keep rigid control over the people.
Could members of the United Auto Workers travel to China and recruit workers from automobile plants to join their union and demand wages equal to that of US or European auto workers? If not, why not? Shouldn't there be the ability to "trade freely"? Or does that only apply to the wealthy?
I agree. Maybe someone should tell this to the leaders of the world, although they don't seem to be listening.
As for one country dominating all the others, perhaps the concept of "country" needs to be explored and examined more deeply.
It seems that you're advocating a kind of "class equality" among all countries, although that might require equality among individuals as well. Capitalism and nationalism share some overlap in which both advocate social Darwinism in their own particular way.
Except when you want the ability to "trade freely." That seems to be a major sticky point. If a nation or faction thinks they got a raw deal, then they will fight.
I'm not sure that having different systems is really the problem here. Systems largely rely on faith, regardless of what form they take.
Historically, I can't see that there's ever been any actual basis for any real dispute with either China or Russia. We don't have a contiguous land border with either of those countries, so there's never been any land or territorial disputes. When we purchased Alaska from the Russians in 1867, they were more than happy to get rid of it - and many Americans at the time thought we had been suckered into buying a useless "icebox." (It just goes to show that the popular wisdom of any age is never really that "wise.")
America is geographically distant from both China and Russia, separated by large bodies of water, so it's highly improbable that either country could have marshaled enough force to invade and conquer the United States - nor could we have done it to them (although we did send troops to both countries in failed attempts at intervention, something that they've never really forgotten, even though most Americans have). However, it is also apparent that they have built up and improved their military forces to the point where they could very well be a physical threat to US territory. But we also all have nukes, so it would be a case of mutual suicide.
But the bottom line is, there's absolutely no possible basis or pretext for the US to go to war with either China or Russia except...other countries. Smaller, weaker countries which couldn't hope to defend against these behemoths, so they have called upon America's help. And America comes running, like some white knight out to save a damsel in distress. Indeed, this view has been the cornerstone of US foreign policy since World War II.
I've heard those who, in an abstract way, believed in the same cause of peace and love, although they also held the view that the hippies and peaceniks were too naïve and sheltered that they didn't really understand the mechanisms of the world we lived in. They were thought of as too young and idealistic, and even many of the Boomers changed their views over time.
The interesting thing about it is that, regarding WW2, we look upon the "Greatest Generation" (as some call it) as being the heroes of that era. They endured the Great Depression and World War II, making sacrifices and enduring hardships, while the Boomers were viewed as the beneficiaries of all of that. But perhaps they might have been seen as "ungrateful" by their elders.
metis
aged ecumenical anthropologist
Thanks for this.
Personally, I don't excuse dishonesty whether that be from Trump, Biden, or myself.
Many consider US untrustworthy as an ally because their foreign policy changes radically with change of parties. So you can suddenly be left high and dry when a new president comes.
Colt
Well-Known Member
Yes, that's a problem. Some policy remains consistent.
Audie
Veteran Member
You think the USA is more corrupt than China?
if there were no guns there would be no gun users, think you're going to supply a whole bunch of weapons and then blame the recipient for using them, idiocy.
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I wouldn't say "radically," although I get your point. However, my primary complaint about both parties is that, overall, they've advocated mostly the same policies. They also both share the same perceptions of the world. The main difference seems to be that liberals and progressives are more inclined to support diplomacy and other peaceful methods, while the conservatives seem to be more hawkish. But even then, in practice, neither party has been very consistent.