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Why Europe Is Warning of Pax Americana's End

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Re: Why Europe Is Warning of Pax Americana's End

#371

Post by emodendroket »

seppin wrote: post #341
emodendroket wrote: post #102

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Well, that's the theory, yeah. I think there's been some question about some of the newer NATO members for some time though. http://www.interpretermag.com/americans-are-prepared-to-die-...

Americans were willing to die in Iraq, and we still don't know "why" they did.

No other career prospects? Patriotism? Desire for revenge?

I think there's no way that we could have gone on as long as we did (and continued to maintain some presence there even still) with a draft, though. People don't really care that much about a senseless war if they don't sense that they themselves are at risk.

Re: Why Europe Is Warning of Pax Americana's End

#372

Post by emodendroket »

macintux wrote: post #356
emodendroket wrote: post #48

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The countries he banned also all happen to have had historically antipathetic relations with the US. It's hard to tease out one thing from the other; it would have been illegal for Trump to pursue business in Iran. I think ultimately Trump's foreign policy is going to end up extremely military-directed and won't be that much of a radical departure from what we've seen recently (not that that is necessarily good).

A large part of the established world order, for better or worse, is based on the predictability of US foreign policy. Until it's clear that Trump is going to honor our existing agreements, continue to push for freedom of the seas, etc, that world order is going to start evolving into something different.

I constantly hear this argument in favor of the US intervening this or that place and I remain a bit skeptical. I don't think anyone really believes the US is going to neglect its obligations to countries it has actual defense agreements with, no matter what foolish thing Donald Trump is saying this week.

Re: Why Europe Is Warning of Pax Americana's End

#373

Post by tiatia »

seppin wrote: post #335
tiatia wrote: post #325

Earlier quoted context omitted.

"they need some pretext." Russian law would give this pretext. Putin would be obligated by the constitution to protect "Russians" abroad. Ukraine has a huge Russian minority. " Also even if they wanted to, they don't have the forces to occupy Kiev." Ukraine is currently on the level of a 3rd world country. Russia would have air superiority within 24 hours. And the Russian military is still a formidable opponent, even…

> Russian law would give this pretext. Putin would be obligated by the constitution to protect "Russians" abroad. Ukraine has a huge Russian minority. Russian law is not recognized outside of Russia. Besides, that logic would give him legal authority to conquer half of Eastern Europe. > Ukraine is currently on the level of a 3rd world country. Russia would have air superiority within 24 hours Do you have any idea wha…

"Russian law is not recognized outside of Russia. Besides, that logic would give him legal authority to conquer half of Eastern Europe." In a way it does. But how are "Russians" in danger in Easter Europe? https://www.loc.gov/law/help/russian-georgia-war.php#Russia%...

"Do you have any idea what occupation means? " Actually I do. And I don't think it would be a big issue. Please consider that the regime currently in power in Ukraine is liked only by a small part of the population. The background and intent of the "color revolutions" in such countries is very questionable. Besides that, the military of Ukraine is basically non existent.

Do you know what the Ukrainian military bases on the Crimea Island did? They just raised the Russian flag.

And don't forget, Russia has troops even in the West of Ukraine. (Transnistia).

Re: Why Europe Is Warning of Pax Americana's End

#374

Post by dang »

fictioncircle wrote: post #350
owebmaster wrote: post #344

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Fake News. Look, I don't mind agreeing with you that Russia invaded and annexed a part of Ukraine. But what in this situation makes it inherently different from the malvine islands war and annexation? Just the links? Someone could think that your reasoning is unrealiably biased, and get back to the question of Ukraine and Russia and get some doubts if it is really a good reasoning (Russia annexed a past part of itsel…

In other words, you have 0 evidence. K. I'm done.

Please stop posting uncivil and unsubstantive comments to HN. We ban accounts that do that repeatedly.

Re: Why Europe Is Warning of Pax Americana's End

#375

Post by dang »

madgar wrote: post #218
FreakyT wrote: post #166

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I suspect the parent comment was meant as sarcasm, but in line with Poe's law, it's unclear without some kind of notation.

Comments like that on social media are going to make it awfully tough for you to re-enter the US, we don't need any more traitors.

> we don't need any more traitors

Obviously you can't comment like this here. We've banned this account.

Please stop creating accounts to break HN's guidelines with.

Re: Why Europe Is Warning of Pax Americana's End

#376

Post by dang »

dagenleg wrote: post #112
madgar wrote: post #78

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Widely reported by fake news! Any and all media with few exceptions* is the enemy of the United States now, of course they say those things. * InfoWars, RT and Breitbart excluded

Are you rabid?

Commenting like this will get your account banned regardless of how wrong someone else is, so please don't do it again.

Re: Why Europe Is Warning of Pax Americana's End

#377

Post by krakensden »

seppin wrote: post #251
krakensden wrote: post #230

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yes, but it's not ethnically Georgian, which was sort of the problem. That wikipedia article toes the Georgian line, which is sort of disappointing, but they do cite the EU report (via the 'world socialist news', which I don't really want to cite) that the pretext was manufactured. The Russian point of view is that they were stopping an ethnic cleansing right on their border, before it could get too far. It's not a c…

> Yes, but it's not ethnically Georgian, which was sort of the problem. This is the Russian argument, if a sovereign country has a majority of ethnic Russians, it's ok to invade that country on their behalf. As a neutral, do you actually agree with this? It seems crazy.

I think you're misinterpreting me- it was a problem for the Georgians, not the Russians. Saakashvili thought he could get away with a short, victorious war. A bunch of people died, and then a bunch more because Russia is big on punctuation.

It's also worth noting that Russia has been playing the long game here- the South Ossetians and Abkhazians aren't ethnically Russian, and no one is claiming they are- but Russia has issued more than 90% of them passports.

I sort of think people are mostly too eager for good guys and bad guys. I really don't think that what happened in Georgia is a straight line towards Russian World Domination.

Re: Why Europe Is Warning of Pax Americana's End

#378

Post by wobbleblob »

raverbashing wrote: post #117
wobbleblob wrote: post #61

After the round of elections in France and Netherlands this spring, and Germany this summer, Europe may or may not start disintegrating, depending on the outcome. Ms. le Pen may not win this time, but she will one day. A correctly timed scandal or major terrorist attack in the second round may sink her opponent. Moscow, London and Washington are hard at work with her, to make this happen. When she, or someone like he…

I'll only say one thing: people outside of France are much more worried/supporting LePen than the ones inside it In fact, anglophones have some trouble understanding the situation through the language barrier She's getting "pumped up" through the Brexit/Trump wave, but don't assume it's the same thing (though I am worried about the repercussions, if she gets elected, naturally)

On the contrary. People outside of France get to see her through the mainstream media, which makes it look like only xenophobes could be voting for her. From Francophone friends I hear she's actually smart, witty, an excellent debater, and if she weren't held back by her name and the reputation of her father, she could have more mainstream appeal.

Re: Why Europe Is Warning of Pax Americana's End

#379

Post by wobbleblob »

jerf wrote: post #122
sveme wrote: post #111

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If gp thinks a win by Le Pen or her counterpart in Germany is a given, he does not understand the election system in each respective country. Living in the EU, I actually experience quite the opposite to what jerf is predicting: a reemergence of the EU as a passionate project after Brexit. People have taken the EU for granted for way too long, now it starts to emerge as an issue that is worth fighting for (check e.g.…

I don't necessarily predict the disintegration. I'm pointing out that the idea of blaming Trump for it is temporally silly. It's an ongoing process that didn't start three weeks ago, and even trying to backdate it to Trump's candidacy would A: be insufficient to explain anything anyhow and B: have to explain how Trump somehow knocked over the EU despite hardly saying a word about it during his campaign. But as for ev…

If you look again, I didn't mention that name at all. The only relation is that, after the changes in London and Washington, outside interference will now not only be coming from Moscow, and they are capable of exerting far more refined influence than Moscow's online troll army and funding of anti EU activists.

Re: Why Europe Is Warning of Pax Americana's End

#380

Post by wobbleblob »

jerf wrote: post #113
quonn wrote: post #94

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The UK was never a very convinced member of the EU, so Brexit is not a good example. But more importantly, the EU is not falling apart, it is merely facing a crisis. A pro-EU US administration could help to save it while Trump will likely accelerate it's decline.

If the EU, designed to be the counterbalance to the United States, is so delicate that it lives or dies based on the decisions of one man that doesn't even live there, it is falling apart. There's no way around this; if it's gotten to that point of illness it has already proved itself extraordinarily weak. Blaming Trump for pushing it over the edge is just a politically-convenient privileging of the numerous other fo…

The EU is designed entirely for internal reasons: to end the cycle of great wars between France, Germany, Russia and Britain over resources and arable land. The basic idea is that you don't need to fight over coal and steel, if you can just buy it. Protectionism, by design, leads to conflict. This could be intentional, expecting to win that conflict, but for Europe, with several adjacent powers of similar strength and modern weaponry, it was obviously not working out well.

American influence has actually been instrumental in getting the project started[1]. 'Europe' doesn't have any geopolitical or military ambitions, and as so many member states are NATO members, it tends to follow American interests in these matters.

[1] http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldnews/europe/1356047/Eur...

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