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US Foreign Policy 4.0: making the world safe to flee to if the MAGAts win here

Yeah, democratic self-determination is the goal even if it's imperfect relative to some standard.

say this new guy is a real piece of shit. Well, there's already one fewer piece of shit in power. So that's still good even in the worst case scenario.

either way, the goal of removing a despot has been accomplished any the Syrians. The opportunity to do better is there and that's the optimal solution. Not installing someone who we prefer.
 
they sayin’ the right things now for the $$$,$$$,$$$,$$$.$$
then they wont

not anyone’s first rodeo
 
Yeah, this has been the dream for every middle east state every time this happens and every time it ends up being crap in the end. No women's rights, death to Israel, etc. incoming.
 
ScoobyDoo said:
Yeah, this has been the dream for every middle east state every time this happens and every time it ends up being crap in the end. No women's rights, death to Israel, etc. incoming.
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Most here know this, but the word 'islam' translates to 'submission' in Arabic for a reason. It doesn't get much more clear than that.

"Moderate" Muslims are a myth, at least among the male faithful. Not that Xtian fundies are any better, of course. Same shooter of patriarchal horsesh*t chased with a pint of stale, warm Koolaid; they just drink from different glasses.
 
Kepler said:
To be fair, Egypt was a good thing. Then there was a counter-coup and a different strongman grabbed power. Same thing happened in Tunisia.

You aren't going to get a secular populist rebellion in an Islamic country right now, so anybody who grabs power is going to be some flavor of Sky Daddy Cray. These guys are saying the right things so far. They seem media savvy and they are absolutely trying to gather global support and legitimacy. In the short term that will help restore order, and that is in everyone's interest.

Long term I'm sure we won't love them because they won't play by all our rules, and we do not like that. Even though they hate Iran even more than Israel, Israel will bomb them eventually and I'm sure US media will claim they have a good reason. Whatevs. A brutal dictator is gone; it's a fractionally better world today.
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In a vacuum it was good, but the problem is if you aren't ready for Democracy the void gets filled by strongmen and despots. So yes it was good, they just werent ready for it.
 
mookie1995 said:
they sayin’ the right things now for the $$$,$$$,$$$,$$$.$$
then they wont

not anyone’s first rodeo
Click to expand...

Right but then they are in The System, and that means they are inevitably ground down by the same realities as all of us. In capitalism, the game plays you.

There is a famous argument that the US won the Vietnam War the instant we got into it. The Vietcong were a threat because they offered a genuine alternative to the Western world system, based on a homegrown, locally popular, anti-imperialist rebellion that was decentralized and anathema to the formalized systems of control in place since the colonial order and our inheritance of them. With US wealth and firepower and logistics in play, the only way for the Vietcong to survive was to become us: create a modern military, create hierarchical and centralized power structures, become rationalized. And once that happened, we had already removed the threat. Everybody who died after that on both sides was redundant -- the point of the war was already decided.

If the Syrian regime walks like a duck and quacks like a duck, then we don't care if they throw their daughters out of school at 12 or burn gays at the stake. They're a duck.
 
Handyman said:
In a vacuum it was good, but the problem is if you aren't ready for Democracy the void gets filled by strongmen and despots. So yes it was good, they just werent ready for it.
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Oh I doubt they will wind up with anything like a western democracy. But they may no longer be a failed state, and that's the big win. They have a chance to become a society where power is shared between the most powerful groups: the wealthy, the religious leaders, and maybe some sort of quasi-representation of the population. Shared power is limited power, where those groups can at least theoretically undercut each other. In the interstices of power, freedom can grow. That was how it took root in the West in the fights between the Church, the King, and the wealthy.

The new regime will at least start out needing legitimacy which means sharing out power. The more shareholders, the more real political tension that can hold back tyranny.
 
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Kepler said:
Oh I doubt they will wind up with anything like a western democracy. But they may no longer be a failed state, and that's the big win. They have a chance to become a society where power is shared between the most powerful groups: the wealthy, the religious leaders, and maybe some sort of quasi-representation of the population. Shared power is limited power, where those groups can at least theoretically undercut each other. In the interstices of power, freedom can grow. That was how it took root in the West in the fights between the Church, the King, and the wealthy.

The new regime will at least start out needing legitimacy which means sharing out power. The more shareholders, the more real political tension that can hold back tyranny.
Click to expand...

I assume you mean Syria...I am hopeful you are right but there is way too many bad actors out there and the regional hatreds are going to lead people to bad decisions. We see it every time one of the regimes fall. Revolution is a nasty business and in that region no one is pure of heart. Sometimes the devil you know...

The one good thing is that Putin lost a huge ally both in fighting and in destabilization. In the short term there is no way this is not a net positive.
 
Handyman said:
I assume you mean Syria...I am hopeful you are right but there is way too many bad actors out there and the regional hatreds are going to lead people to bad decisions. We see it every time one of the regimes fall. Revolution is a nasty business and in that region no one is pure of heart. Sometimes the devil you know...

The one good thing is that Putin lost a huge ally both in fighting and in destabilization. In the short term there is no way this is not a net positive.
Click to expand...

The other positive is Iran losses a key ally and the ability to use Syria to transfer weapons and aid to Hezbollah. Plus, Iran is being seen more and more as a paper tiger.
 
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