I support America being involved in all of it. How to do it is usually my issue, but I think we've been repeatedly, painfully taught not to disregard the crises of the world.

The United States should have stayed out of the Iraq/Iran conflict because here it is, coming back to bite us in the butt because we gave Saddam some toys to play with

It was very hard to choose just one. I pick the future over the past.. I hope we dont go into Liberia.

A bit of history, which is of interest to the topic....In July 25, 1990, meeting with April Glaspie, US ambassador to Iraq, Saddam asked her opinion of an Iraqi invasion on Kuwait. She reportedly said,"We have no opinion on your Arab-Arab conflicts...the Kuwait issue is not associated with America." Eight days later his army blasted into Kuwait. Was that one avoidable? I think often military might is not the answer, and we haven't exactly been successful in the outcomes of some of your listed engagements.

I think the jury is still out on Liberia. We may want to revive our historic ties with a country that has a capital named after one of our presidents. More directly to our present security needs, we may need to help make sure that Liberia does not become a terrorist haven or a collapsed state.

Even more than that, if their dictator will step down only if we come in, that is an important factor. Also if the people of Liberia truly want us there it makes the situation different than Somalia.

It would be nice, however, if France continued to play the dominant role and accepted some of its international responsibility here.

I think the 2nd Iraq war was a mistake. I think our foreign policy helped create the Noriega problem in the first place. I think we could have helped ourselves out by not getting involved on both sides of the Iraq/Iran conflict.

Kosovo, is, I believe, an example of successful policy. This is dependent on fixing an end date and having the region emerge stable. Somalia was not a bad idea in theory but it was a bad idea in practice. Anything that starts with reporters illuminating the beach at your predawn landing seems destined to go horribly awry. I apologive for any conflicts that were left out of this summary.

We should have stayed out of Bosnia because it wasn't our problem. We should have stayed out of Rwanda/Burundi because again, it wasn't our problem. We should have stayed out of Korea because it was a bad idea from the beginning. Domino theory...what a joke. We should have stayed out of the most recent Iraq War because I don't like the idea of living in a country whose government thinks it has every right to invade and conquer sovereign nations for the purpose of taking their natural resources. I think we should stay out of Liberia because it is, once again, not our problem. We should have stayed out of Panama because the war on drugs is completely unwinnable. We should have stayed out of the Iraq/Iran war because it was, you guessed it, not our problem. We should have stayed out of Somalia because, *sigh*, it wasn't our problem. The only two from this list that we should have been involved in are Afghanistan and Nazi Germany. I wish I could say that both were successful campaigns, however, we failed in Afghanistan. Yes we captured or killed many Al-queda associates, but missed the man on top, who, after all, was the man in charge of the 9/11 attacks. I sincerely hope that Bush and Co. have not given up on him.

They were our problem because of the mass murders that were occuring. How can you just sit back and watch millions be slaughtered and not do anything?

I stand by my vote of the Iraq/Iran conflict

Unless the mass murders are taking place within our borders, it isn't our concern.

It is our concern no matter where it happens.

We need to deal with mass murderers like Milocevic to make the world safer for everyone. That won't happen with murderers like him running around

Why? Why should we be responsible for other's actions? We are not the United States of the Earth, but the United States of America. And unless the problem lies within America, we have nothing to do with it and as such should not get involved. When the U.S. tries to be the world's policeman, it only makes us more enemies and breeds contempt from the rest of the world no matter how honorable our intentions.

Milosevic was a mass murderer, true. But he was Europe's problem, not ours.

Nu Marx, I am curious: how do you reconcile your isolationism with your concurrent belief in socialism and welfare? For me, the two are intertwined. It is my opinion that socialism is the political extension of compassion (simplifying, as this is not a thread on socialism) - and in the world, I feel no less of a responsibility towards others. Do we have a greater responsibility due to our enormous wealth? I think we do. I do not think that this means troops and bringing the death machine to every country. It means upholding the rule of international law, and being defenders of the Declaration of Human Rights. If we exist in comfort and liberty at the expense of the rest of the world, our societal experiment will be short-lived. It is in the long-term interest of freedom and democracy to achieve a prosperous and compassionate, free and democratic, world.

Achieving this at the hands of the United States armed forces is well-neigh impossible. We need a new vision of our role, a new paradigm of thought.

It is odd, isn't it? Well, it is true that I think the U.S. should be isolationist, but do believe in socialism. That being said, my problem is this...military interventionism solves nothing. Not in the long term anyway. We knock over governments left and right and as a result, we leave the country in shambles and/or make it a new American imperial holding. For example, look at many Pacific islands, the Caribbean, the Middle East, scattered parts of Africa, and until somewhat recently, Central America. Our intervention has made us few friends and many enemies. It is arrogant to presume that we know what's best for the rest of the world. Its wrong to force that arrogant will upon unwilling civilians. While I have nothing but compassion for those suffering in the world, especially in Africa, I can't help but feel that America should be more focused on righting its own wrongs. Namely, feeding our hungry, housing our homeless, clothing our cold, and employing our jobless. The humanitarian aid, however, is something I'm completely comfortable with. In fact, we should be giving a whole lot more than what we are. The U.S. is capable of sending many more billions of dollars in aid than what is currently being done. To summarize an answer to your query, I will say that I believe that socialism/welfare for all is the ultimate goal, but remaining militarily (I should have clarified that in my earlier posts, sorry) isolationist is key to bringing about a better world. The only time we should ever use our military is when we've been attacked first i.e., Japan, Afghanistan, and if our current allies have been attacked and are in need of our help.

Also, I'd like to add that this isn't the first time my beliefs came into dire conflict. Every time I hear about something that will destroy a natural environment, but will employ several thousand people I tend to go a little crazy. Finding some sort of balance always seems so impossible.

The problem with applying this assumption to policy is simple, it is a blanket statement. Rather than allow for a rational detailed disscusion of risks and benefits ,it immediatley closes the military option in all cases. In the interests of flexibility (and the host of problems this particular characteristic can help solve) this is damaging to foreign policy. To apply this to American in specific:

I agree completely. It is a fact of life these days that America has relatively enormous power over the world. Power is simply the ability to change one's surroundings. This includes possibilites for better or worse. This depends on the situation and the response. Because the possiblity for improvement exist, benevolent (having the interest of humanity as a whole at heart) foreign policy makers would consider each situation on a case-by-case basis and take advantage of the oppurtunity for positive change that any situation may present. This would result in a better world than effecting isolationism, consideration is simply a more flexible tool.
In order to explore the issue further I ask this question:

Why do you believe we should get involved if our allies are attacked, it is not always our problem?

Because treaties are treaties. We signed up for NATO and should abide by it. Our fellow NATO countries hopped on board to help us the very day we were attacked on 9/11. That is one thing. Getting involved militarily with countries that have not wronged us is....well, wrong.

NuMarx:
But if military intervention never solves anything, what is the point of intervening militarily in these cases?

You misunderstand. Military intervention in terms of trying to police the world never solves anything. Using the military to counter-attack foreign enemies who have attacked us is totally acceptable.

My biggest gripe would be Rwanda and Burundi. It is, and always had been, that foriegn powers shouldn't get involved in civil conflicts. I know it's a difficult decision to sit and let citizens rip themsleves apart, but it never seems right to go and kill civilians because they were killing each other. Plus, it's unfair to give any side an advantage in a civil conflict. It's just wrong in my opinion. However, in cases like Somalia - with a militant leader who kills any civilian who so much as opposes him. That is certainly a cause for military intervention, especially since it would take an idiot to assume that it could be solved diplomatically.

I don't agree with Panama either. But the reasons are obvious.

I agree with all the others though. Nazi Germany sucked.

Exactly! If we wouldn't have sold arms to Saddam in the first place we wouldn't be in this mess! I guess hind sight really is 20-20...

[quote=Billy Jean,Jul 24 2003, 07:03 PM] [QUOTE]Exactly! If we wouldn't have sold arms to Saddam in the first place we wouldn't be in this mess! I guess hind sight really is 20-20... [/quote]
I hate when people make that argument. Saddam wasn't always a tin-hat dictator, and at the time, he was warring against one of our biggest enemies. He was corrupted by the power he ended up having. That would be like mocking the Russians for arming the Afghani breakaway state, and then trying to take it over.

He overthrew the Shaw(sp?) of Iraq and had all his opponents murdered when he assumed power. Not a very nice way to start your rule.

We had no business over there and our involvement has caused the perceived American Imperialism that exists now in many of the Muslim nations.

1.) I don't know how to spell it either
2.) America had it start by killing thousands of British troops, and not the mention the other massively violent revolts that happened. Saddam was a big capitalist, and at the time, he wasn't doing anything too appaling. You can't predict the future.

You lost me on this part.

BTW, Saddam ousted President Gen. Ahmed Hassan Bakr in 1979.

on edit: OK, with all of the posts concerning Iraq, the intro of the Brits threw me.

Try the American Revolutionary War.

As a sidenote, I think he might have been mixing up Iran and Iraq. I do it alot, has nothing to do with his argument.

The first attempt saddam used in killing the current leadership in iraq failed, this lead him to leave to egypt. When the batth(sp?) party started really gaining power in iraq he made his return. Somehow he made a rise to the top in the batth party, when he took power he had a meeting. During this meeting while smokeing a cigar(it was recorded) he called the names of people he took as traitiors, these people, well i think all but one were killed.

There is no doubt that Saddam was a hardliner. If you look at the tape, however, you can see that Saddam wasn't exactly happy about the names he called out [one of the only public appearances where Saddam coule be caught with a tear falling from his eye]. Not that we should feel sorry for him, but I think there was alot of internal Baa'th pressure to kill some of the people who were killed.

Yes, his leaveing home to live with his uncle i think had a major impact on him. This is what in my opinion lead him to work for the baa'th party in the first place.

I think I voted Korea on this several days ago, but I can't be sure. Having gone back and considered it some more, though not being able to change my vote, I'll say we should have stayed out of Kosovo.

Genocide in Kosovo?
May 1999 Greek Court ruling
Civilian Deaths in NATO Air Campaign
Amnesty International: NATO war crimes?
Sept. 7 2001, Court rules no genocide
Serbs become the persecuted

It would appear there was no genocide taking place. Our intervention, however, cost the lives of some 500 Yugoslav civilians and led to widespread persecution of the Serbs despite the presence of UN and NATO forces. It doesn't appear to me that intervention was at all necessary.

No genocide you say?
Tell that to the massacred 7000 Muslims living in a safe haven neutral zone (AFTER being ousted from their homes) under the protection of Dutch peacekeepers in Srebrenica. That massacre occurred in 1995, around three years before our military involvement.

As for our intervention, I was against it because there were no 'good guys' in this conflict. One side was simply better armed.

To give a brief summary of how that war was fought....there were no ground troops, and no decisions left to the discretion of the pilots. They were given pre-approved targets, obtained by UAV (unmanned air vehicle) tapes. Imagine, also, the vicissitudes of determining the good guys from the bad at such a high altitude (the Serbs were equipt with very high tech anti-aircraft SAMs obtained from the Russians).

Several pilots witnessed mass looting, burning, and pillaging from the skies, but were not given the discretion to fire on the offending troops. They had to go back to Aviano, let the General watch the tape of the burnings, and get a signed permission slip to fire. Needless to say, by the time that was finished, there were no enemy troops remaining in the area....We did, however, spend a lot of money firing million dollar LGBs on paper tanks with 15 dollar heating elements inside.
Yes, that conflict was a mess, but not because the Serbs weren't guilty of genocide, and not because our troops indiscriminately fired on civilians.

While genocide usually entails massacres, massacres are not in and of themselves genocide. Nobody is denying that there were war crimes committed in Kosovo. All that changed was the charge:Court rules no genocide in Kosovo

Obviously, the purpose was the destruction of the Albanians, or they would not have pursued and slaughtered those 7000 Muslims who had already been displaced and were living in a safe haven. That court is criminally wrong.

With the information I have looked at, I would again disagree, Mrs. Pigpen. From what I have found, what occurred at Srebrenica in 1995 was gendercide rather than genocide. While the case is an atrocity all the same, were they simply interested in ethnic cleansing they would have included the women in the massacre as well.

They raped the women. They shot the men who wouldn't fight FOR them. Kosovo was justified. This was genocide. Plain and simple!

Rape and the singling out of men for execution are war crimes, but they are not genocide, goamerica. You can maintain all you like that Kosovo was justified, and we will continue to disagree, but justify it simply on the basis of war crimes. NATO exaggerated claims, gendercide occurred in Srebrenica, but there was no genocide.

The rough definition as giving by me breaks the name down, geno, like genome and so forth, like in nazi Germany with the Jews being the geno, then cide like fratricide or homicide for murder, or murdering a type of people, to extinguish a type of people. The full definition i leave up to you to find. I am sure that what court made that ruling would do it knowing me or you on Americas debate could not make such a ruling false, after all that would leave them looking rather incompetent.

As far as how many war crimes are handed out i am sure most of them are right on the button. Hitler attempted genocide, what happened down their was a lot of things, and i am also sure that leavening those groups to their own devices genocide most likely would have occurred huh? what is the definition of ethnic cleansing?

does anyone know if anwar(sp?) sadat worked with the nazis during their occupation of africa, and related regions?

Dictionary.com: Ethnic Cleansing

I had to vote Iraq:
7,000+ civilian casualties and mounting, more than 400 US soldiers dead, repeated attacks on US/UN buildings, the country spiraling into chaos...
...and the war started through LIES and DECEIT.