Advocate said:
I specifically said I had not yet read the links. Although since then I have read the second one that you called "a good place to start". What I was referring to is a US policy that has been ongoing at least since the time of Theodore Roosevelt to keep American businesses dominant worldwide. From my understanding of that article, you are saying that we have moved beyond that limited goal (which for decades required a military intervention only occasionally) to a broader goal of insuring no competition to US businesses at all, even from local ones, and that this will require a serious expansion of both military presence and intervention. Do I have this basic premise right?
I'm glad to hear back from you, Advocate. I'm sorry we didn't discuss these matters a couple months ago when my patience was not wearing thin. You seemed to me to be a reasonable and thoughtful person, and I was worried that you were bailing out on me with, "I'll have to consider that later." It's happened to me before. However, I feel now that you will at least give honest consideration to my arguments.
You are right about the interventionist history of the US. The goal has not shifted to insuring no business competition, but it has shifted to world hegemony. When the USSR fell, many people thought, "Great! Now we don't have to worry about our security being threatened by evil Communists trying to take over the world and there is so much more hope for world peace." Another, smaller group of people, in all their greed and arrogance thought, "Great, there goes the competition! Now we have so much more opportunity to wage war and take over the world."
The latter group is called the neo-conservatives. They have the misguided notion that it is the US's mission to remake the world according to its design and to do so by employing military might. They have a whole series of wars planned for us. They are the authors of the policy of pre-emption. What pre-emption is really about can be seen in our dealing with Iraq. It has nothing to do with responding to actual threats. It has everything to do with finding pretext for wars of conquest. As a Libertarian pundit put it, the Department of Defense should be named the Department of Offense.
I'm not a Libertarian (I'm a nonpartisan liberal), but I agree with them on this issue. I've never liked Pat Buchanan, but I agree with him when he says that we are supposed to be a republic, not an empire. The anti-war movement is broad. Far from being a bunch of radicals on the left fringe, it reaches across the political spectrum to include traditional conservatives and Libertarians. The radicals are the neo-conservatives, some of the most prominent of whom, like David Horowitz, were communists in the Sixties or at some point in their lives. They just transferred their communist one-world dreams to what they saw as the winning side.
Advocate said:
However, I would also like to know what you propose US foreign policy should be if our current policies are wrong. By the way, I also want to tell you that I respect your opinion on this subject more than I do that of most of the other anti-war people since your opposition is in terms of what is good for the US and its people (the "blowback" argument and the resource draining effects of empire) and not in terms that seem to me to be saying that its OK for Iraq/North Korea/whoever to ignore the UN and kill their own people and/or their neighbors, but its not OK for the US to ignore the UN and use force to stop them.
Thank you for your respect. However, your characterization of the majority of the anti-war movement does not seem accurate to me, but that's another discussion and one I'm not interested in pursuing. We'll both just have to pay more attention to what the protesters are saying to know what their position is.
My position on foreign policy is this: Respecting the right of self-determination of others. That means that it should not matter what form of government another nation chooses (democratic, monarchy, socialist, communist, some other form of authoritarianism) as long as it has legitimacy. Legitimacy is the acceptance of the government's authority by its people. That is not the same as popularity. Nor is it the same as a lack of complaints. The US government has maintained legitimacy even though at times the president (not any particular president) has had approval ratings below 50% and people have always had complaints. As long as that foreign government is not hostile and aggressive towards us, we should recognize it and pursue friendly relations with it.
My philosophy recognizes that the ultimate power rests with the people--even in authoriatarian regimes. Authoritarian regimes are overthrown when the people want change bad enough. History is full of examples, including recent ones. It is not the duty of, nor is it appropriate for, the United States to impose its choice of government on other people. The idea put forth by some conservatives that people living under an authoritarian regime are helpless and must be liberated from the outside is one that ignores history and reality. If the US (and other countries) could become a democracy through popular revolt, then why should it be the place of the US to spend its lives and treasure doing other people's work for them? (Especially when they're not asking for that help.) It is my belief that democracy in some form is the result of a natural progression of an increasingly sophisticated society. It is independent of culture, but culture will influence the particular form that the democracy takes.
Once it becomes clear to the best of our honest judgment that a regime has lost legitimacy (a large, popular revolt is a good clue), then the United States can and should withdraw its recognition of the regime and assist in whatever way practical the popular revolt to expedite the inevitable and maintain goodwill with that country's people. (Those people bashing France for not being our puppet should learn that France helped us during the Revolutionary War, and for that we are indebted to them just as they are indebted to us for the liberation from the Nazis. Of course, when France helped us it was mainly to hurt the British empire than it was out of sympathy for us, but their help was still important. I think they were being sincere when they gave us the gift of the Statue of Liberty in 1876.)
So my idea of foreign policy is one of peaceful co-existence rather than war-mongering hegemony.
Please read the two articles I've directly linked (the one from the Sunday Herald is fairly short) and then continue to learn more about this. It will help you understand what is really going on.
Edited for minor corrections.
