wondering what your thoughts are.
I feel like there is a growing anti-globalisation sentiment (by both liberals and conservatives), which calls for less external engagement, and more focus on domestic policy.

So… three options (that I can think of). would be great to hear the rationale behind each;
Non-intervention (and what does this mean? america as a non-superpower? not our problem)
Limited intervention – define. Perhaps either economic or military (of if you distinguish between the two explain). I assume economic would mean no international trade agreements (TPP and the likes). And military would be no intervention even in places where there is need for one (leave it to the UN? Or whom?)
Full intervention (cant quite define this, was going to go with status quo – but these few years have been a bit ambiguous vis a vis foreign policy, and the bush years were a lesson in how not to intervene)

Poll question: American foreign policy

Poll result (3 votes) Non intervention (1 votes) Vote Limited intervention (1 votes) Vote Full intervention/ status quo(?) (0 votes) Vote Other (1 votes) Vote

Ideally the notion of a super power should be made obsolete by a strong functional international collective working for the collective interests of the planet. Global stability would be prioritized over everything else. Agreements made amongst all before any intervention. No divisive measures. Everything done to increase cooperation on a global scale.

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Big PEMFin H & z's
"I ain't no entertainer, and ain't trying to be one. I am 1 thing, a musician." � Miles

"When the music stops he falls back in the abyss."

Dont we prioritize stability now??

Thats why we support so many dictators

I'm using the wrong terminology. Taking more about balancing environmental factors. When I say global stability I mean the physical globe not geo political declarations.

Solving those issues would require the type of geopolitical arrangements that could as a result solve current ones. But no one nation could lead, it would have to be a collaborative effort. Even then it wouldn't be easy. So much mistrust amongst us human beings.


█▆▇▅▇█▇▆▄▁▃
Big PEMFin H & z's
"I ain't no entertainer, and ain't trying to be one. I am 1 thing, a musician." � Miles

"When the music stops he falls back in the abyss."

because that was the intent of the UN
and the security council is largely encumbered in its actions by the 5 permanent members -
so this would mean at the very least doing away of the veto powers
actually, why does this still exist? for example, there will never be recognition of the palestinian state, even if a majority of countries believe it should have statehood (because america)
there has been no resolution of syria (either russia or china has vetoed)
there was the ukraine issue (china vetoing sanctions on russia, and russia being a permanent member)

but not sure if this still answers the question
say, should this reorganized entity call for military (or other) intervention in a particular country
would the united states then commit its military?


i think there is (instead) perhaps be a need for an international peacekeeping force
kinda like what we have at the moment, but a permanent force with contributions from different countries....
unlike now which is mission-based

not when its under the guise of humanitarian in some machivellian/neocon/imperialist attempt to secure interests/influence

e.g i would say given the scale of the syrian crisis, a military intervention, would be humanitarian
(whether it was done at the very beginning or now when shit is messy)
as was yugoslavia

with pretty much every civil war, even military intervention can be perceived as being humanitarian
.e.g you need the UN mandate to establish NGOs
so how do you draw boundaries?
whats the criteria?

stated goals of the government involved


I have very little faith that our involvement in that part of the world has anything to do with a "humanitarian" mission

what began as our mission to insert more influence into the region (and IMO destabilize the shia/sunni balance that existed before the ouster of hussein) is now basically a perpetual mop up job


then stack on top of it we've drawn Russia and Iran in(which very well could have been part of the plan from the beginning) i now question any move made in that regard


So when repeatedly, our "intervention" is in areas that directly allow us to influence/strengthen economic/geo political influence and glaringly NOT in places that provide no benefit to us then I think that demonstrates our true intentions

besides whats going on in the Sudan and whats going on with Boko Haram


The juxtaposition of the Syrian "civil war" against the Yemen "civil war"


or just Saudia Arabia in general lol

>The juxtaposition of the Syrian "civil war" against the Yemen
>"civil war"

at the begining of the conflict (i.e before it became a quagmire and complicated)
obama policy of non-engagement, or id rather say non-decision making in 2011
(and not just the u.s, to be fair, but as the U.S goes.... so did the rest)
so there's that

>or just Saudia Arabia in general lol
what's the policy with saudi-arabia?
i mean, yes the saudis buy arms from the u.s and the u.s buys oil from saudi
but unless you are saying that there is more to this than that?

i think a better example would be the level of military aid the u.s (used to?) gives egypt

there is no way we are where we are now in Syria

thats what im referring to when i mean a perpetual mop up job


and I absolutely believe sunni extremeism is being allowed to operate in certain areas, possibly even driven/controlled by the Saudi's

and I believe at some level the US is aware of it


and agreed about the egypt thing

same thing

the influence (for syria) probably comes from the arab spring (imo)
certainly the national protests against assad's regime were in that vein
what has allowed the situation to become a complete fuck-up has been the vacuum (of stability)
in the middle east (at least in so far as al-qaeda and isis gaining a foothold in syria)
but, with the luxury of hindsight, perhaps this 6 year war in syria might have been averted
if there had been international intervention (which most countries feared intervention because of the fear of this disintegrating into tribal conflict)
the people wanted assad out, they didnt have the means to do so
what was a national uprising disintegrated with militia groups splintering and blablabla

...i dont know that syria so neatly falls into a sunni-shia conflict/binary that we make it into
its certainly an international quagmire.

but again, i brought this up as an example of non-intervention not leading to a resolution
so this sounds like a damned if you do, damned if you dont?


failure of intervention resulted in rwanda
what is becoming increasingly true of most countries- is that the state is becoming a bit too powerful as a result of modern weaponry
it is almost impossible for citizens to have a 'revolution' even if they are being fully repressed/oppressed etc.
its compounded if the state represents only one group - with power over whateer other groups exist

im saying the current ISIS/sunni extremeist influence in the region would not be what it was without the US invasion of iraq and the subsequent shia/sunni civil war in Iraq




*edit*

im also not saying the syrian war is definitely secretarian, im saying it has evolved into a "west" vs Iran/Russia thing now

>im saying the current ISIS/sunni extremeist influence in the
>region would not be what it was without the US invasion of
>iraq and the subsequent shia/sunni civil war in Iraq


i think im trying to find out what people think is the role the u.s *should* play
we all know about the cold war proxy wars and the results of that as it played out in africa, central and south america etc.
then after the gulf war, there seems to have been a period of non-intervention, no?
(the reluctance to get involved in rwanda, letting nato/un lead the intervention in kosovo etc.

then you have the fuck ups from bush (is it having a republican government that is the problem?)

then the very insecure (i think) and indecisiveness of the obama years

i feel that in the midst of all these responses.... there are some conclusions to be drawn
and that these are questions to ask of the next government
certainly not the extreme of trump's non-intervention (except when its sending mercenaries)
its not clear to me what clinton's policies are necessarily
(her trade policy- or rather recent anti-tpp thing sounds more in alignment with a policy of non-globalism (is globalism a word?)

and we should probably stop
maybe have some introspection
hell i dont know, our track record sucks and thats all I have to go by

we really did a number on things with the whole communism thing

and heres the kicker, maybe it needed to be done? maybe it only partially needed to be done and some peoples hearts were in the right places until they found it was a good living perpetual war


i dont really know, we cause alot of messes trying to be everyones big brother

>and heres the kicker, maybe it needed to be done? maybe it
>only partially needed to be done and some peoples hearts were
>in the right places until they found it was a good living
>perpetual war

i think the cold war was overall bad for every country the u.s got involved in
(i dont have any nuance on this- this was the height of supporting repressive regimes for no other reason than they were against the russians.
or overthrowing governments that showed any signs of supporting communism
it was detrimental on the continent.)

but things have changed - its no longer become so cut and dry (except for bush,- he's special)
so i do think (as you noted) it is time for a more nuanced review of this.

but i dont feel as though the conversation has moved any further from the cold war context
and it should
the obama policy of engagement (well, rather indecision about engagement) is very different from the stupidity of bush
we tend to ignore clinton's era - which i would say was closer to obama's except for the inherited wars
- this was also a time when there was less engagement in international conflicts (rwanda, kosovo etc)
so there are nuances - between the extremes of the cold war and no engagement - i feel like perhaps its the conversation that has not moved forward



-----
.. with regards to south sudan
i dont know if the u.s involvement is overall good (or bad), but i do know that pressure from the u.s has kept our 'leaders' on the negotiating table
- if that hadn't happened we would still be in a never-ending and very stupid conflict
so although i think this is merely a lull and we are only a few bad decisions away from a full resumption of conflict,
the threat of sanctions etc., has resulted in a semblance of peace


the reason i keep asking about u.s involvement (and to be honest, more so international involvement)
is that i see countries (like mine) where the state is very powerful
even if/when the majority of us decide we do not want our leaders
as long as they have the armies on their side, there is literally nothing we can do about it except continue to suffer.
(even though the country is awash with guns)
regime change will merely be one bad politician replacing another
i see people speak of revolution all the time... and im not sure they fully understand just how powerful state armies have become
the people have no voice or power any more. the armies do.
i think there needs to be a way to check the powers of the state (i dont know that elections work that well in my part of the world)



*shit, im about to go read 1984, i think we are living it*

when iraq invaded kuwait?

its pretty much consensus that bush's war(s) was unjustified
also, it was a unilateral decision
(well, with the behest of britain - and blair is having his reckoning over this at the moment)

but we aren't really speaking about faith
are you saying that there is never justification for involvement?
or how are you defining a humanitarian mission?
is this sending food aid and medicines and working through USAID? NGOs?
USAID is typically a bilaterial agreement btw governments so it is above all foreign policy
(i worked for 5 years directly and indirectly through USAID- basically they paid 100% of my salary- as a contractor. i think i trust this 'intervention' even less)

>So when repeatedly, our "intervention" is in areas that
>directly allow us to influence/strengthen economic/geo
>political influence and glaringly NOT in places that provide
>no benefit to us then I think that demonstrates our true
>intentions

could you be more specific about this?
you think the u.s should only intervene in places where it will not benefit?
could you name some of these countries?
also.... are you saying these influences are/have been overwhelmingly negative?

i dont think anything we did in the first gulf war was in anyway to "help" anyone but ourselves

im saying when it comes to US foreign policy, we have a 60 + year history of putting our fingers in other peoples business only when it helps us geo-politically, the effort to defeat communism was the excuse then, islamic terrorism is the excuse now


this is a good book in that regards

https://www.amazon.com/KILLING-HOPE/dp/B007K517VE



>>how are you defining a humanitarian mission?
is this sending food aid and medicines and working through USAID? NGOs?


I would use humanitarian in the loosest sense of the word, anything that requires us to divert money/resources/soldiers to a foreign country to "help" them


NGO's? common fronts for espionage, CIA etc...
USAID? dont know anything about them,

i guess what im getting at is the need for transparency when it comes to our involvement in things in other countries

but how to put that into effect in any kind of realistic manner I couldnt say


>>>could you be more specific about this?
you think the u.s should only intervene in places where it will not benefit?
could you name some of these countries?
also.... are you saying these influences are/have been overwhelmingly negative?

I would say the US should consider helping other countries if they ask for it, and the real motivation not be furthering our own selfish goals

im not saying we shouldnt go into places that provide no benefit what im saying is it obvious how we pick and choose where to go.

Its hard to guess at a person's real motivation, so you must look at the result of their actions to deduce their motivations,





Sudan, Nigeria, West African Region I'd say are the glaring things we seem to not really be so focused on(for obvious reasons)

(and your, as in americans)

>NGO's? common fronts for espionage, CIA etc...
>USAID? dont know anything about them,

its how the u.s government delivers humanitarian aid to countries
they might hire ngo's to do the work
but the contractual agreement is typically between the US govt and the national govt
so your main beef is with USAID.

>i dont think anything we did in the first gulf war was in
>anyway to "help" anyone but ourselves

i dont necessarily see self-interest as being a bad thing - actually i'd say majority of human interaction is self-interest
(including humanitarian work - which i've had the 'pleasure' of being involved in for over 5 years)

anyway...
what i'm reading is
some form of intervention - that is not based on self-interest
or intervention only when a country requests it
(by this do you mean the national government of the country? in the case of syria this would mean assad
or how would you legitimize who calls for help?)

>Sudan, Nigeria, West African Region I'd say are the glaring
>things we seem to not really be so focused on(for obvious
>reasons)

i dont know about sudan at the moment, but id say in south sudan....
yes the u.s is engaged

my bad


Your questions are great questions, I honestly don't believe I'm informed enough on the workings of international aid and things like that to flesh out my opinion any further

I just know that I distrust the US whenever we do decide to get involved, atleast militarily

straight up aid, trade blah blah probably more nuanced for sure


your question about "Who" is asking for help is very important and I think a big part of what we got ourselves in trouble with during the interventions in the cold war is the way we identified "who" needed help

i think actually this is what got me curious

there seems to be an anti free-trade thing happening
which is a bit of ironical for the u.s.

Which will never happen because of the veto as you mentioned above.
End of unilateral economic sanctions.
This goes against the Military industry complex interests so never happening either.
In general not a fan of the far reaching trade agreements as poorer countries usually get the short end of the deal.