I wonder how much of the authoritarian tendencies of the government of certain countries (e.g. Russia, China, Iran) is driven by a desire to maintain the stability and control presumably needed to resist hostile actions by the US empire that ironically professes freedom and democracy.
Noam Chomsky on the cruelty of American imperialism
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Re: Noam Chomsky on the cruelty of American imperialism
#12Just finished reading 'Blind Man's Bluff' - about the American submarine espionage stories since WW2. There are fascinating stories but it was also striking how so many of the stories were about how the US, the technically and economically superior country, spied on and harassed the Soviets near the Soviet territories.
I read somewhere that it's not entirely unlikely that the brand of socialism/communism in the Soviet Union became more extreme because of foreign attack. Socialism was considered, probably rightly so, a mortal threat to current political and social systems so the communist camp in Russia was under assault from day 1.
For those that forgot, Russia was an ally in WW1 and once it withdrew from the war due to huge war fatigue, Russia was invaded by Britain, the US, Japan, I'm probably forgetting a bunch of dozen other invaders. For what was basically a matter of internal policy and later a civil war.
Of course, nothing could have guaranteed that the extremists such as the Bolsheviks, Lenin, Stalin, wouldn't have won even if left alone.
Re: Noam Chomsky on the cruelty of American imperialism
#13[flagged]
NATO is a very real military threat to a significant percentage of the worlds population - more so than the CCP.
It does matter if its the US or NATO or your own government. Only the people can do anything peaceful about their own politics. Everything else leads to war.
Re: Noam Chomsky on the cruelty of American imperialism
#14[flagged]
Have you got a precise source for your quote of Hannah Arendt? I am interested in reading the context but I couldn't find the quote you wrote
Re: Noam Chomsky on the cruelty of American imperialism
#15[flagged]
American elites love to hate their country. Goes back to Protestant self-loathing.
It’s amusing to see this article juxtaposed with the review of Koestler’s Darkness At Noon on the front page.
Re: Noam Chomsky on the cruelty of American imperialism
#16[flagged]
So given that all states are based on coercive violence, how does that lead you to act?
Re: Noam Chomsky on the cruelty of American imperialism
#17[flagged]
Re: Noam Chomsky on the cruelty of American imperialism
#18[flagged]
So given that all states are based on coercive violence, how does that lead you to act?
Nice try, but I see the huge difference between something like "don't rape people, or we all agreed you should be locked up" and "don't mention the Tiananmen square massacre, or the unaccountable rulers will lock you up for endangering their power, or hurt your family if they can't punish you directly"
Re: Noam Chomsky on the cruelty of American imperialism
#19[flagged]
Have you got a precise source for your quote of Hannah Arendt? I am interested in reading the context but I couldn't find the quote you wrote
It's my translation from the first German edition of "Origins of Totalitarianism". It's on page 683.
> Wir kennen keinen vollkommenen totalitären Herrschaftsapparat, denn er würde die Beherrschung der gesamten Erde vorraussetzen. Wir wissen aber genug von den immer noch vorläufigen Experimenten totaler Organisation, um zu erkennen, daß die durchaus mögliche Vervollkommnung dieses Apparats menschliches Handeln in dem uns bekannten Sinne abschaffen würde. Handeln würde sich als überflüssig erweisen im Zusammenleben der Menschen, wenn alle Menschen zu einem Menschen, alle Individuen zu Exemplaren der Gattung, alles Tun zu Beschleunigungsgriffen in der gesetzmäßigen Bewegungsapparatur der Geschichte oder der Natur und alle Taten zu Vollstreckungen der Todesurteile geworden sind, die Geschichte und Natur ohnehin verhängt haben.
-- Hannah Arendt, "Elemente und Ursprünge totaler Herrschaft"
Re: Noam Chomsky on the cruelty of American imperialism
#20I respect Chomsky very much, and I have learned a lot from him. But I do wonder to what extent his views are based on a possibly over-optimistic view of the world's potential, and a refusal or inability to accept that the the universe might be fundamentally unjust and that life is not always dignified or sacred. I would like to share his hopeful outlook (hopeful in the sense that he seems to think there ought to be a counterfactual world where everyone behaves decently towards each other and the planet), but it seems to me that it is in the nature of life to want power, and it is in the nature of power to control anything that threatens it, and so conflict, struggle and might making right are intrinsic (but perhaps deplorable) features of the world.