US foreign policy

[bush_cheney2004]

The topic of U.S. foreign policy is often met with collective amnesia when it comes to the history of other imperialist nations around the world, especially when it comes to Great Britain (including Canadian subjects)...and Afghanistan:  

 

Quote

The British Lord Ellenborough started "The Great Game" on January 12, 1830, with an edict establishing a new trade route from India to Bukhara, using Turkey, Persia and Afghanistan as a buffer against Russia to prevent it from controlling any ports on the Persian Gulf.

The Great Game officially ended with the Anglo-Russian Convention of 1907, which divided Persia into a Russian-controlled northern zone, a nominally independent central zone, and a British-controlled southern zone. The Convention also specified a borderline between the two empires running from the eastern point of Persia to Afghanistan and declared Afghanistan an official protectorate of Britain.

 

 

 

Edited June 18, 2017 by bush_cheney2004

[CITIZEN_2015]

14 minutes ago, hot enough said:

You've got to read some history, C. 

 

You have to go back further than the military invasion date when the Soviets staged a military coup in 1973 when they overthrow Zahir Shah. This date was the end of peace in Afghanistan. THIS was when the invasion started. The actual military invasion was a follow up as I mentioned they tried to keep their puppets in power after popular uprising by the nation and YES the CIA was indeed supplying arms to the Afghan fighters the SAME way that Russians and Chinese were supplying arms to Vietnamese in order to fight and weaken America.  

They are both the same. They stage coup, they send army to keep their puppets, they bomb civilians they kill women and children, they oppress the weak both America and Russia are the same evil but what makes America less evil is that at least they have democracy at home. And they on occasions (like Obama administration) support democratic movements and democratic transitions. They are true elections in the US when people's vote counts and if fraudulent then they force their president out (Nixon for example) but who dares to kick Putin out. The Russians do not have democracy and the nation are mostly racist and bigots.

 

Edited June 18, 2017 by CITIZEN_2015

[hot enough]

10 minutes ago, CITIZEN_2015 said:

You have to go back further than the military invasion date when the Soviets staged a military coup in 1973 when they overthrow Zahir Shah. This date was the end of peace in Afghanistan. THIS was when the invasion started. The actual military invasion was a follow up as I mentioned they tried to keep their puppets in power after popular uprising by the nation and YES the CIA was indeed supplying arms to the Afghan fighters the SAME way that Russians and Chinese were supplying arms to Vietnamese in order to fight and weaken America.  

 

That too is covered in the article. You should read it. And ponder, if the USA can declare the entire western hemisphere as their private plunder zone, why should Russia or any other big power let the US into their area?

America was the illegal invader in Vietnam, Korea, Cambodia, Laos, ... . R and C helped those countries dump the predators and then they went home. 

 

[DogOnPorch]

1 minute ago, hot enough said:

That too is covered in the article. You should read it. And ponder, if the USA can declare the entire western hemisphere as their private plunder zone, why should Russia or any other big power let the US into their area?

America was the illegal invader in Vietnam, Korea, Cambodia, Laos, ... . R and C helped those countries dump the predators and then they went home. 

 

 

Hate to rain on your parade, but it was North Viet-Nam doing the invading of countries: Laos, Cambodia and South Viet-Nam. The US was in South Viet-Nam w/ permission of the S-Vietnamese government.

[hot enough]

16 minutes ago, CITIZEN_2015 said:

They are all the same. They stage coup, they send army to keep their puppets, they bomb civilians they kill women and children, they oppress the weak both America and Russia are the same evil but what makes America less evil is that at least they have democracy at home. And they on occasions (like Obama administration) support democratic movements. The Russians do not have democracy and the nation are mostly are racist and bigots.

 

Neither R or C have over 70 illegal invasions under their belt since WWII. 

Obama kept the Bush war crimes in progress right up to the time he left office. He invaded Libya and he has been trying to overthrow the Syrian government since he came to power.

He orchestrated the overthrow of Ukraine's government. 

[CITIZEN_2015]

4 minutes ago, hot enough said:

Neither R or C have over 70 illegal invasions under their belt since WWII. 

Obama kept the Bush war crimes in progress right up to the time he left office. He invaded Libya and he has been trying to overthrow the Syrian government since he came to power.

He orchestrated the overthrow of Ukraine's government. 

You seem to be biased against America while flashing American atrocities (which I agree they did commit a lot off atrocities and still do) but don't say a word about Russian atrocities committed in the past (unlike you who counted American atrocities I lost count of Russian atrocities all over the world) and still committed as we speak. One thing is interesting that you NEVER responded to the fact that Russia do NOT have democracy at home and Americans do. And Russian people are racists and treat their own union from other parts (of former Soviet Union) real bad and they are bigots.

[hot enough]

South Vietnam never existed. It was a US puppet creation just like all the other US brutal, vicious, RIGHT wing dictatorships the US has supported and supports around the world. 

The people of the south hated the Americans as much as those of the north. They both wanted them out of their country. Eisenhower knew full well that the people of Vietnam wanted Ho Chi Minh as their leader because he wanted the independence of Vietnam from the ugly Europeans that has been raping and pillaging. So the US scuttled planned UN elections. 

The US fought their "war" against the people of the south, which was why the US turned to genocide to try to make their evil dominate. What's new about that? 

Quote

Vietnam

excerpted from the book

Heroes

by John Pilger

South End Press, 2001 (and 1986), paper

History as Illusion
p178

When I began to write this, in 1985, ten years after the end of the war in Vietnam, I heard the results of an opinion poll in which people in the United States were asked how much they could remember about the war. More than a third could not say which side America had supported and some believed that North Vietnam had been 'our allies'.' This reminded me of something a friend of mine, Bob Muller, a former US marine officer paralysed from the waist down as a result of the war, told me. As president of the Vietnam Veterans of America, Bob speaks on college campuses where he is asked as a matter of routine, 'Which side did you fight on?'

This 'historical amnesia' is not accidental; if anything it demonstrates the insidious power of the dominant propaganda of the Vietnam war. The constant American government line was that the war was essentially a conflict of Vietnamese against Vietnamese, in which Americans became 'involved', mistakenly and honourably. This assumption was shared both by 'hawks' and 'doves'; it permeated the media coverage during the war and has been the overriding theme of numerous retrospectives since the war. It is a false and frequently dishonest assumption. The longest war this century was a war waged by America against Vietnam, North and South. It was an attack on the people of Vietnam, communist and non-communist, by American forces. It was an invasion of their homeland and their lives. Just as the current presence in Afghanistan of Soviet forces is an invasion. Neither began as a mistake.

So it is not surprising that many Americans are today confused about who their 'allies' were during the war, because in reality they had none. Clients yes, allies no. The difference is as critical as the difference between 'attacked' and 'became involved', for it is the clear division of truth from propaganda.

http://www.thirdworldtraveler.com/Pilger_John/Vietnam_Heroes.html

 

[DogOnPorch]

South Viet-Nam sure did exist. Exactly as long as North Viet-Nam.

[hot enough]

15 minutes ago, CITIZEN_2015 said:

You seem to be biased against America while flashing American atrocities (which I agree they did commit a lot off atrocities and still do) but don't say a word about Russian atrocities committed in the past (unlike you who counted American atrocities I lost count of Russian atrocities all over the world) and still committed as we speak. One thing is interesting that you NEVER responded to the fact that Russia do NOT have democracy at home and Americans do. And Russian people are racists and treat their own union from other parts (of former Soviet Union) real bad and they are bigots.

The US is supposed to be the good guy, remember? A good guy doesn't illegally invade over 70 countries, pretending to save them while murdering tens of millions just to steal the bread from children's mouths. 

Is this a good guy?

 

Quote

“When US forces entered Korea in 1945, they dispersed the local popular government, consisting primarily of antifascists who resisted the Japanese, and inaugurated a brutal repression, using Japanese fascist police and Koreans who had collaborated with them during the Japanese occupation. About 100,000 people were murdered in South Korea prior to what we call the Korean War, including 30-40,000 killed during the suppression of a peasant revolt in one small region, Cheju Island.”

- Noam Chomsky

Americans are racists! They committed one of the largest genocides in world history and it continues to this day. 

Can you imagine how many Blacks would be alive if they hadn't had a dollar value as slaves.

[CITIZEN_2015]

32 minutes ago, hot enough said:

The US is supposed to be the good guy, remember? A good guy doesn't illegally invade over 70 countries, pretending to save them while murdering tens of millions just to steal the bread from children's mouths. 

Is this a good guy?

 

Americans are racists! They committed one of the largest genocides in world history and it continues to this day. 

Can you imagine how many Blacks would be alive if they hadn't had a dollar value as slaves.

Please don't misquote me. Nobody said Americans are good guys!!!! I NEVER said that. I said both America and Russia are evil but with a summary of Russian atrocities and the fact that they do NOT have democracy and free elections and free speech at home then I concluded that Russians are worse.

Yes some Americans are racists but the majority are good people not same for Russians. I think there are good people in Russia too but since the system has been corrupt and they born and raised under various dictatorships they are a lot more bad people in Russia. I have encountered many Americans and Russians in my life.

Can you imagine how many Russians would have been alive if they hadn't been killed by Stalin and many other dictators in Russia?

Edited June 18, 2017 by CITIZEN_2015

[hot enough]

South Vietnam was a figure of the imagination, an illegal US move to try to bring the people of Vietnam under US domination. Even Eisenhower knew full well that the people of Vietnam didn't want the USA or its vicious dictators. 

1954: Vietnam Temporarily Divided by Geneva Accords

  

The Geneva Accords temporarily divide Vietnam in half at the 17th parallel, with Ho Chi Minh’s forces in the north and Bao Dai’s regime in the south. The accords also call for elections to be held in all of Vietnam within two years to reunify the country. [GENEVA ACCORDS: AGREEMENT ON THE CESSATION OF HOSTILITIES IN VIETNAM, 7/29/1954] 

The US opposes the unifying elections, fearing a likely victory by Ho Chi Minh, and refuses to sign the Geneva accords. “If the scheduled national elections are held in July 1956, and if the Viet Minh does not prejudice its political prospects, the Viet Minh will almost certainly win,L the CIA notes. [KOLKO, 1985, PP. 84] 

And US President Dwight Eisenhower admits, “I have never talked or corresponded with a person knowledgeable in Indochinese affairs who did not agree that had elections been held as of the time of the fighting, a possible 80 per cent of the population would have voted for the communist Ho Chi Minh as their leader.” [EISENHOWER, 1994, PP. 372]

=======================

Here's a dandy example of how the good guys, the USA, were crooked as hell, murderers who would do anything to steal other's wealth. 

1955: Vietnamese Prime Minister Wins Referendum, More Votes Cast than There Are Voters

The US helps arrange a national referendum between Vietnamese Prime Minister Ngo Dinh Diem and Emperor Bao Dai. Diem “wins” 98.2 percent of the vote. Interestingly, a total of 605,000 votes are cast despite there being only 405,000 registered voters. [HERRING, 1986, PP. 55]

 

 

[DogOnPorch]

South Viet-Nam was just as real as the other countries of the former French Indochina...also real.

[hot enough]

21 minutes ago, CITIZEN_2015 said:

Please don't misquote me. Nobody said Americans are good guys!!!! I NEVER said that. I said both America and Russia are evil but with a summary of Russian atrocities and the fact that they do NOT have democracy and free elections and free speech at home then I concluded that Russians are worse.

Everyone says that Americans are good guys despite it being the biggest lie ever. 

One very big reason Russia was like it was after WWII was that it had suffered a great deal in WWII, while the US made out like the bandits they are. Russia was also aware of deep US duplicity. The USA had invaded Russia in 1918. Russia has never invaded the US.

Quote

History of World War II: America Was Providing Military Aid to the USSR, While Also Supporting Nazi Germany

Franklin D. Roosevelt's Lend Lease. Part II

...

Lend-lease was not charity

There is a perception that lend-lease aid was offered by the US out of the goodness of its heart. However, this version does not hold up upon closer inspection. First of all, this was because of something called “reverse lend-lease.” Even before the Second World War had ended, other nations began sending Washington essential raw materials valued at nearly 20% of the materials and weapons the US had shipped overseas.

...

US President Franklin D. Roosevelt explicitly stated that aid to Russia was money well spent, and his successor in the White House, Harry Truman, was quoted in the pages of New York Times in June 1941 as saying,

“If we see that Germany is winning the war, we ought to help Russia; and if that Russia is winning, we ought to help Germany, and in that way let them kill as many as possible …”

[HE: Does that sound like good guys?]

 

[CITIZEN_2015]

2 minutes ago, hot enough said:

Everyone says that Americans are good guys despite it being the biggest lie ever. 

One very big reason Russia was like it was after WWII was that it had suffered a great deal in WWII, while the US made out like the bandits they are. Russia was also aware of deep US duplicity. The USA had invaded Russia in 1918. Russia has never invaded the US.

 

Well not me. When you say everyone that includes me too and many others also who I have read have posted against the US on this forum and many others I know in my life. You should not paint everyone with same brush I think this is the problem.

Russia hold on to captured territories like Poland, East Germany and other Easter European after the WWII but West Germany (who was helped by Americans to rebuild) and Italy liberated by Americans got their independence back. So who was the bandit here??

[hot enough]

8 minutes ago, CITIZEN_2015 said:

Well not me. When you say everyone that includes me too and many others also who I have read have posted against the US on this forum and many others I know in my life. You should not paint everyone with same brush I think this is the problem.

Russia hold on to captured territories like Poland, East Germany and other Easter European after the WWII but West Germany (who was helped by Americans to rebuild) and Italy liberated by Americans got their independence back. So who was the bandit here??

"everyone" means the incredible US propaganda that westerners are barraged with. Think about it, everything you hear about the entire world comes thru a US media filter. 

Stalin, not Russia, held on, and as I said for a very good reason. They knew what the USA was and they know what the USA is today. The US has invaded Russia!

And in all those "liberated" countries, the US had right wing groups bombing and attacking civilians and then blaming the communists to ensure that right wing governments held onto power. Is that what good guys do?

The US overthrew any governments that they thought too liberal, governments that might actually want to help their own citizens instead of US corporations.

[eyeball]

49 minutes ago, bush_cheney2004 said:

Then why do Canada, the EU, and Japan desperately want the United States to continue doing so after more than 70 years of "world order"?

Who says they do? I certainly don't and I doubt the consensus for such positions are anywhere near as universal as you're implying.

 Ethics and morality don't matter much when blue heron's want protection.

It's not a matter of what herons want, it's a matter of how eagles behave. See Aldo Leopold's A Sand County Almanac for a primer on what ethics in nature means.

[CITIZEN_2015]

19 minutes ago, hot enough said:

Stalin, not Russia, held on, and as I said for a very good reason. They knew what the USA was and they know what the USA is today. The US has invaded Russia!

The US overthrew any governments that they thought too liberal, governments that might actually want to help their own citizens instead of US corporations.

Russia was Stalin and Stalin was Russia. 

I am certainly not defending the US as I have listed US atrocities many times in the past before but all I say is that Russians aren't saint either. We do have a lot of posts by many posters about US atrocities including my own but for some reasons it appears that we don't have much about Russian atrocities or at least not enough. I believe my post today was the very first which actually listed some Russian atrocities around the world. 

I think a good political analyst is the one who comments on both side of stories and one who is unbiased and fair.

Edited June 18, 2017 by CITIZEN_2015

[hot enough]

1 hour ago, bush_cheney2004 said:

The topic of U.S. foreign policy is often met with collective amnesia when it comes to the history of other imperialist nations around the world, especially when it comes to Great Britain (including Canadian subjects)...and Afghanistan:  

From chief cheer leader for heinous war crimes and war criminals to a poorly crafted budding historian, using the "oh look, a squirrel" routine. 

Post WWII is the defining era which we should all be focusing on because that is the era that defines current international law.

If we really want to go back we could discuss the birth of the current predator nation USA as it really came into its own.

ARGENTINA1890TroopsBuenos Aires interests protected.

CHILE1891TroopsMarines clash with nationalist rebels.

HAITI1891TroopsBlack revolt on Navassa defeated.

HAWAII1893 (-?)Naval, troopsIndependent kingdom overthrown, annexed.

NICARAGUA1894TroopsMonth-long occupation of Bluefields.

CHINA1894-95Naval, troopsMarines land in Sino-Japanese War

KOREA1894-96TroopsMarines kept in Seoul during war.

PANAMA1895

...

https://academic.evergreen.edu/g/grossmaz/interventions.html

 

[hot enough]

11 minutes ago, CITIZEN_2015 said:

Russia was Stalin and Stalin was Russia. 

That's right, and the citizens of Russia had zero say.

While the "government of the people, by the people, for the people" sat as silent as if they had been living under a dictator who would have killed them had they spoken out. While their governments murdered, raped and pillaged the planet.

 

[CITIZEN_2015]

47 minutes ago, hot enough said:

That's right, and the citizens of Russia had zero say.

While the "government of the people, by the people, for the people" sat as silent as if they had been living under a dictator who would have killed them had they spoken out. While their governments murdered, raped and pillaged the planet.

 

It was the people in the US and around the world democracies who eventually rose up and took part in anti-Vietnam demonstrations and forced to end US atrocities in Vietnam.

Yes the people in the west are politically illiterate is a fact. This is not for everyone of course but for many that as long as sex and bear is available for them then they don't care about the fact that some part of the world may be on fire. They have little knowledge of the world outside their country. Especially the US citizens who see the US as the world all alone.

Edited June 19, 2017 by CITIZEN_2015

[hot enough]

13 minutes ago, CITIZEN_2015 said:

It was the people in the US and around the world democracies who eventually rose up and took part in anti-Vietnam demonstrations and forced to end US atrocities in Vietnam.

And in the great rule of law USA, how many of the tens of thousands of US war criminals were held to account? Not a one! All that was learned was that the US has to have a more effective propaganda system to better control its citizens and other countries.

[hot enough]

1 hour ago, DogOnPorch said:

South Viet-Nam sure did exist. Exactly as long as North Viet-Nam.

You are simply a strong advocate for war crimes, war criminals and terrorists.  

"So it is not surprising that many Americans are today confused about who their 'allies' were during the war, because in reality they had none. Clients yes, allies no. The difference is as critical as the difference between 'attacked' and 'became involved', for it is the clear division of truth from propaganda." John Pilger

[SpankyMcFarland]

South Vietnam's leaders were odd birds, Catholics in a Buddhist country who couldn't shoot straight. You've got to take a really close look at prospective allies before joining a war with them. 

The Vietnamese today seem remarkably forgiving about the war; grief dominates over rage and anti-Americanism does not seem to be a big problem at all. 

[DogOnPorch]

2 hours ago, SpankyMcFarland said:

South Vietnam's leaders were odd birds, Catholics in a Buddhist country who couldn't shoot straight. You've got to take a really close look at prospective allies before joining a war with them. 

The Vietnamese today seem remarkably forgiving about the war; grief dominates over rage and anti-Americanism does not seem to be a big problem at all. 

 

Could be because MANY South Vietnamese (Hmong, Anam, Cochin, etc) were forced to leave in an event known as the Boat People. We call it ethnic cleansing...the North called it victory.

Edit: Only Diem was a Catholic, If I recall. They shot him dead...and his brother.

Edited June 19, 2017 by DogOnPorch

[bush_cheney2004]

1 hour ago, eyeball said:

Who says they do? I certainly don't and I doubt the consensus for such positions are anywhere near as universal as you're implying.

 

Doesn't have to be universal....what do you thing "collective security" has meant all these years, especially for Canada ?   Is there a counter alliance for NATO and NORAD ?

 

Quote

It's not a matter of what herons want, it's a matter of how eagles behave. See Aldo Leopold's A Sand County Almanac for a primer on what ethics in nature means.

 

No....it is a waste of time in the real world...the one that we actually live in.   Nature is actually far more ruthless.