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« on: December 11, 2004, 02:53:58 am »
Unfortunately no country has a particulary nice History, regardless of who they are. The only reason we see the "Western Powers" as better is due to the old adage that "history is written by the victors". I'm sure if you asked the Russians in the early 80s if they thought they were the good guys they would have said yes. A country that had tried to build a better state for the workers, that had been invaded three times in 20 yeaars by powers seeking their destruction and had successfully fought back the ide of Fascism and won WWII. Its very mich a matter of perspective and its hard enough to view from the inside in any manner, let alone objectively.
I was speaking with a lecturer in International Relations today, just about current happenings etc and the funny thing was, he was saying similar stuff. He is a pro-American right-wing Australian, hates apeasers, fully supported the Iraqi War, like the free market etc
And he thing was even he was saying that the current administration were a bunch of criminals and worse. In theory you would expect him to support them, given his sympathies. But it seems these guys have even given up the pretence of legitimacy. I will be the first to admit than any superpower does take drastic, sometimes grossly disproportianate action. But thats not it with the new guys, they seem to court trouble, they seem intent on ripping up that rather nice Constitution and they seem intent on lining their own pocket at the expense of collapsing the economy, which wont only affect their country, but practically everywhere.
They've upset the balance of power, they dont seem to understand that alliances will form against you if you get too strong, thats the way the international system works. Instead they'd rather a show of power to destroy any counterbalance, say in Europe or Southeast Asia that would develop. Thats why they decide to use multimillion pound bombs ona third world country, to show "this is what we do to punish our foes." The nice smart laser missile sytems were a warning to the leaders of any country, not as such out of humanitarian concern. It was a message to say, "we can even target individuals if we want."
Ah fuck I've started a rant, this probably doesnt even make sense. Come the morining I'll see if it still makes sense and delete it otherwise.