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Politics : Foreign Affairs Discussion Group -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: frankw1900 who wrote (47322)	9/26/2002 7:58:50 PM
From: Bilow	Respond to of 281500

Hi frankw1900; Re: "Last I looked, everyone in the middle east treats everyone shittily. Don't think you can single out the Israelis." You're exactly correct about the Middle East, but the same analysis applies to Southeast Asia. The problem is not that the Israelis are shitty, but that (1) we are allied with them, and (2) they are particularly hated by the locals. When the Japanese took over Indochina, they kept the French overseers. So some of the locals, who were horribly treated by the Japanese, saw the French as part of that. And then we took over from the French. Re: "Now it's all down to who can shout loudest, "Aron/Abdul started it first!" as justification for the latest outrage." Assigning blame is useless, as a matter of foreign policy. But analyzing other people's intentions is quite useful. It really doesn't matter whether you think that the Jews or Arabs (or both) are going to roast in Hell. All that matters, from the point of view of foreign policy, is that they hate each other. Re: "The US could withdraw from the world today, as you advocate,and some mad bastard from there would still try to drive a nuke up the Hudson." I'm not advocating "withdrawing from the world". What I'm advocating is withdrawing militarily from places where we're not wanted, and where our forces contribute to the dislike for our country. For instance, we will still buy products from the Middle East, just like we continued to buy products from Indochina after we withdrew from that area. As to your assumption that a mad bastard would still drive etc., you're right. The US already has home grown terrorism in Oklahoma. The US has had terror bomb blasts for about 100 years, many of them associated with foreign interests (i.e. the anarchists). It didn't start in 2001 and it ain't going to stop in 2002. By the way, the historical fact is that the Italian Anarchists quit blowing up buildings in the US without the US having to occupy Italy. And Puerto Rico, who was responsible for some bomb blasts here, was not won over by military conquest, but instead by a gentle occupation. Re: "Pull US troops and weapons back and see how well the US can assert its interests for trade and commerce." To keep the sea lanes clear requires very little military presence. In addition, that military presence is welcomed in most of the globe and uses little island bases like Diego Garcia in other parts. I do not propose pulling those troops back. The fleet will still show the flag. Or are you going to argue that when the US pulled out of Vietnam the result was that commerce in the area was halted, LOL. Re: "For the past two hundred years the US has been the symbol of freedom for the world and it's been such because it's always had foreign entanglements.It's a conceit to think otherwise. For a long while the entanglement was intellectual as the American revolution lighted up revolutions throughout the world but once the US became a world power the entanglement became intellectual and physical." By "entanglement" I mean military entanglements, not trade relations, etc. You're setting up a straw man argument. -- Carl