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Wanted: People Willing to Die on Mars

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Re: Wanted: People Willing to Die on Mars

#111

Post by andrewflnr »

bilbo0s wrote: post #98
rdl wrote: post #47

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I agree entirely for middle tier countries (which Russia was -- and, honestly, Iraq under Saddam was). For really defective places (NK, Somalia, EG, maybe Afghanistan under the Taliban, ...), your odds of killing the leadership and randomly replacing are much more likely to give you something adequate. It doesn't always work out, and it's hard when you have set yourself up for failure (like the US did in Afghanistan,…

You discount so many variables that go into making a place a "good" place to live that it's actually a little humorous to read these posts. Look, EG is, I'm pretty certain, almost 90% Fang. That probably doesn't mean much to you but for Africans... tribal affinities matter. The idea that you would get rid of one government, and another would govern appreciably differently in EG is fanciful. Add to that Oil and then u…

What exactly do you mean by a lack of resources in Afghanistan? I've always heard that it was one of the richest places in the world of unexploited minerals. Does it need to be more specific than that?

Re: Wanted: People Willing to Die on Mars

#112

Post by columbo »

mistermann wrote: post #97
shantanubala wrote: post #46

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Practically speaking, how do you ensure that the new government doesn't become corrupt in a year or two? Or more importantly, how do you restore the people's faith in their government so that they participate? Also, how would a trade embargo "fix" a country? Perhaps it would force a dictator to lessen or hide civil rights violations, but it would not repair the economy or necessarily give people more confidence in th…

> Practically speaking, how do you ensure that the new government doesn't become corrupt in a year or two? Or more importantly, how do you restore the people's faith in their government so that they participate? Here's how I'd do it: pass laws specifically forbidding these actions by government officials, the punishment being death. And then when someone violates the law, you kill them. You wouldn't have to do this t…

> Here's how I'd do it: pass laws specifically forbidding these actions by government officials, the punishment being death. And then when someone violates the law, you kill them. You wouldn't have to do this too many times before the problem magically disappeared.

All that would do is wind up killing a bunch of 3rd party candidates and anti-establishment types. You can't simply place a law and then expect it to be 100% accurate let alone the people determining guilt be 100% ethical. A corrupt judge could kill a whole lot of people with this type of law.

Re: Wanted: People Willing to Die on Mars

#113

Post by rdl »

bilbo0s wrote: post #98
rdl wrote: post #47

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I agree entirely for middle tier countries (which Russia was -- and, honestly, Iraq under Saddam was). For really defective places (NK, Somalia, EG, maybe Afghanistan under the Taliban, ...), your odds of killing the leadership and randomly replacing are much more likely to give you something adequate. It doesn't always work out, and it's hard when you have set yourself up for failure (like the US did in Afghanistan,…

You discount so many variables that go into making a place a "good" place to live that it's actually a little humorous to read these posts. Look, EG is, I'm pretty certain, almost 90% Fang. That probably doesn't mean much to you but for Africans... tribal affinities matter. The idea that you would get rid of one government, and another would govern appreciably differently in EG is fanciful. Add to that Oil and then u…

I agree the culture in EG is probably fairly stunted at best, and probably inadequate to the task of self government (once the ruling elite is gone). However, Obiang is an outlier. Getting rid of him is necessary but not sufficient to fix the country, and it's one thing AU won't do (because they're afraid of slippery-slope), and something the people can't do themselves.

The "stratfor" "geography drives political destiny" thing isn't predictive for small oil-rich countries. I mean, look at the smaller Gulf states. The issues in small oil-rich countries are essentially down to leadership. A broad democratic government is probably not the achievable goal, but something like Qatar, Oman, Bahrain, most of the Emirates, or Kuwait is far superior to EG.

Re: Wanted: People Willing to Die on Mars

#114

Post by noonespecial »

rdl wrote: post #54
nnq wrote: post #29

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's probably doable, but not without a whole bag of dirty tricks, and a group of well trained supporters... but you'd end up being like a secret agency manipulating foreign countries' politics, nothing new here, and if you were to succeed you'd give in to the temptation of using your "great benefactor, savior from poverty..." power for more one-sided goals. If you want to change a foreign country for the better and…

It would be amazing to have an entity, sort of like the US military crossed with the Red Cross, which just went into conflict zones or repressive regimes to provide infrastructure of government (power, water, education, transportation, law enforcement, security for civilians, etc.). Capable of defending itself, but not taking sides other than providing that infrastructure to everyone. Nominally this is the UN's missi…

There are very few things that people in power hate more than someone else succeeding at something without consulting them first. I'm afraid you organization would need to be almost all military.

Re: Wanted: People Willing to Die on Mars

#115

Post by saraid216 »

jimzvz wrote: post #55
tokenadult wrote: post #10

I wonder how many people are willing to take on the real adventure of living in any of the twenty poorest countries in the world, or twenty most tyrannical countries of the world (there is overlap between the two sets) to try to change those from the inside. When I was in high school, going to a high school that was named after an astronaut just after the first moon landing, I thought it was completely natural to hav…

As a citizen of a so called third-world country, your post is extremely condescending.

I honestly wonder how people define a "third-world country" these days. Cold War's over, guys.

Re: Wanted: People Willing to Die on Mars

#116

Post by rdl »

andrewflnr wrote: post #111
bilbo0s wrote: post #98

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You discount so many variables that go into making a place a "good" place to live that it's actually a little humorous to read these posts. Look, EG is, I'm pretty certain, almost 90% Fang. That probably doesn't mean much to you but for Africans... tribal affinities matter. The idea that you would get rid of one government, and another would govern appreciably differently in EG is fanciful. Add to that Oil and then u…

What exactly do you mean by a lack of resources in Afghanistan? I've always heard that it was one of the richest places in the world of unexploited minerals. Does it need to be more specific than that?

Afghanistan has high amounts of mineral wealth locked away, but while it had decent irrigation and farming in the pre-Soviet period (near Kandahar; it's really shitty to fight in btw due to old irrigation channels and just enough cover/concealment to hinder UAVs), decades of war have really hurt the agricultural sector.

More importantly, decades of war have also essentially eliminated any societal reserves of trust, so corruption at all levels is the default. The only functional unit is the family or clan, and very minimal ties to higher units of a tribe -- not to the state. Individual governors, mayors, and police chiefs rule by personal charisma and graft, and bringing their pre-existing tribal relationships in. Organs of the state end up used to settle personal vendettas, too.

There's a lot of literature that national resources (extractive, with low local labor involvement) are a curse -- the "resource curse". Norway has done ok with its oil. Gulf societies have in some ways succeeded but in other ways oil has crippled them. African countries with mineral wealth usually end up relatively fucked compared to countries with productive agriculture or a vibrant commercial sector (Nigeria minus oil is actually pretty decent; Kenya is great. Ghana until recently had no resource based wealth and is basically the Chile of Africa).

Re: Wanted: People Willing to Die on Mars

#117

Post by saraid216 »

Udo wrote: post #22

If Mars can be mined for water (and it looks like it can), there is no reason to make it a one-way trip only. Sending people there with the explicit expectation to die soon speaks of poor planning and not a lot of willingness to export the basic tenets of humanity into space with us. It's a bad precedent, it carries the wrong message about the value of intelligent life, and I'm afraid the mission's limitations also i…

  "MEN WANTED FOR HAZARDOUS JOURNEY. SMALL WAGES, 
   BITTER COLD, LONG MONTHS OF COMPLETE DARKNESS,
   CONSTANT DANGER, SAFE RETURN DOUBTFUL. HONOR AND
   RECOGNITION IN CASE OF SUCCESS."

Re: Wanted: People Willing to Die on Mars

#118

Post by enraged_camel »

tokenadult wrote: post #10

I wonder how many people are willing to take on the real adventure of living in any of the twenty poorest countries in the world, or twenty most tyrannical countries of the world (there is overlap between the two sets) to try to change those from the inside. When I was in high school, going to a high school that was named after an astronaut just after the first moon landing, I thought it was completely natural to hav…

Yeah, look at how we were greeted as liberators in Iraq! The folks over there sure appreciated us going in to solve all their problems.

Re: Wanted: People Willing to Die on Mars

#119

Post by rdl »

noonespecial wrote: post #114
rdl wrote: post #54

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It would be amazing to have an entity, sort of like the US military crossed with the Red Cross, which just went into conflict zones or repressive regimes to provide infrastructure of government (power, water, education, transportation, law enforcement, security for civilians, etc.). Capable of defending itself, but not taking sides other than providing that infrastructure to everyone. Nominally this is the UN's missi…

There are very few things that people in power hate more than someone else succeeding at something without consulting them first. I'm afraid you organization would need to be almost all military.

Most of these countries have fairly ineffective militaries, though, so even a lightly armed force could deter them. Blackwater and at least 2 other PMCs in Iraq could hold their own vs. any failed-state force or militia. It wouldn't need to be like the US Army or USAF fielding high-end weapons where a huge tail to tooth ratio came into play.

Re: Wanted: People Willing to Die on Mars

#120

Post by rdl »

desireco42 wrote: post #106
rdl wrote: post #77

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The US government's interest in intervention is not "fix things for the residents" but "US interests" (which, during the cold war, essentially just meant opposition to the USSR and some basing rights or access to resources). Admittedly even by that metric, most of the US interventions have been failures. There are a few cases where US/NATO intervention has been sort of helpful. Panama is probably better now that we g…

I am from Balkans, Balkans conflicts were largely influenced and made worse from the outside, I would even say that they would not happen if there were not desire from Germany and other powers to make as much mess as possible. Somehow Balkan conficts never got critical review from journalists and rosy propaganda stayed even to this day. For example in present day Croatia there is only 7% of people who would actually…

Where would people from Croatia go? All the ones I've met have been either KBR people in Iraq/Afghanistan or people in the US, and they seemed smart, but they were probably outliers. Germany, or US, or elsewhere?
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