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As a preface I don't defend slavery:

The comparison has been made historically between American slavery and Russian serfdom. As slavery goes American slavery could vary from "pretty good" to "fething awful" at least American slaves were expected to receive food and shelter, and in not particularly rare occasions were paid for their labor outside of their owner's needs and maintained a peculium.
Russian serfs by contrast could expect absolutely nothing from their title holder and conditions ranged from "really bad" to "starving to death."

George is right that post war America was no picnic if you happened to be black,brown, or yellow. My maternal grandfather as a point of fact was often the subject of racial discrimination: for being Portuguese and from Massachusetts. America was the land of milk and honey as long as you were white, Protestant, English speaking; or looked like you could be.

Aren't most of the new (though admittedly in many cases failing) democracies ex-colonies of the European colonial powers?

How new are we talking? Post 1948?

That would be roughly when most of the colonies broke away from the Euorpean powers (violently or not), so yeah I guess.

Nearly all of which modelled themselves on the British Parliament. The Indian Parliament in particular is blatently based on the British system, as are Canada and Australia's.
Can't speak for Africa, I'm afraid.

I actually pretty sure that nearly every modern democracy that is ACTUALLY a democracy is based on the British Parlimentary system. I was thinking particularly of Israel as "not a colony" but let's be honest they brought thier ideas about government from Euoropa.
So Harry: probably.

Joey wrote:You're confusing Free Speach with elections. The UK was perfectly free even before the American revolution. Anti-government pamphlets were widespread.

And many of their writers were free to spend time at his majesty's pleasure, in the prisons of England or exiled to her colonies.

AustonT wrote:George is right that post war America was no picnic if you happened to be black,brown, or yellow. My maternal grandfather as a point of fact was often the subject of racial discrimination: for being Portuguese and from Massachusetts. America was the land of milk and honey as long as you were white, Protestant, English speaking; or looked like you could be.

Indeed. For some the deal was very good indeed. What America lacked was equality not freedoms per se.

A safer place? What a joke.

Just one minor example I guess they just forgot to mention:

The deaths of thousands of civilians during the cluster bombing campaign in Laos and other countries in southeast asia. All in the name of freedom and democracy I suppose?

There is still a very serious problem here with unexploded ordnance from that era. Thanks America!

dogma wrote:That was rational self interest, not benevolence.

I would make the argument that a political and economic system that makes it an act of rational self-interest to work to improve the freedom and liberty available in other countries is a great system, and one that, in the case of the USA, has greatly improved the overall welfare of the world.


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corpsesarefun wrote:I'm still confused as to how anyone could claim america has "made the world more free", how would you measure the contribution of america towards global freedom? for that matter how would you go about measuring global freedom at all?

By comparison to other periods in history, looking at how many people live in democracies, and have effective civil rights protection. It's really not that hard.

You can consider America's effect towards such by looking at how it actions have impacted other countries. For instance, it's fairly obvious that if the US hadn't entered WWII, then Russian tanks wouldn't have had any reason to stop in Berlin, and would have rolled right through, stopping at the channel at the very least. As I don't think it's very hard to say West Germany was a nicer place to live than East Germany, and France was a much nicer place to live than Albania, then it's fair to say the US could be thanked greatly for their efforts.

Then you can look at Japan and South Korea. It is through special relationships with the US that each of these countries became democratic (the first being made so after WWII, the latter through open trade and close military support).

Adding up all the people of Western Europe, Japan and South Korea, and well you get a hell of a lot of people living under governments that are much better than they would have been, absent US support.

That doesn't mean the US is an absolute force for good and nothing else. What they've done to various democratic movements in South America is appalling. But on the balance there's a lot more good than bad.


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Amaya wrote:I guess the US maintains a constant SF presence down there for absolutely no reason whatsoever.

That's so they can pick and choose which side to support in coups, to ensure favourable governments in as many South American countries as possible.


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Joey wrote:Well without the United States, Germany would almost certainly have conquered Europe. The help the USA gave to the Soviet Union was huge, and pretty one-sided. The Americans aided the Soviet Union for no other reason than to stop Germany.
And, obviously, that was that huge American army that pretty much curb stomped the Germans. It's not a myth that Europe would be speaking German if it weren't for the Americans. The entire continent would be a German puppet and the Russian people would essentially have been destroyed.
So yeah I think the USA has been a force for good. From a European standpoint, anyway. And remember that the US is, at heart, a European nation.

As I pointed out in the other thread, that's completely and utterly wrong.


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AustonT wrote:I think we can virtually guarantee that the Austrio-Hungrian Empire would remain unchanged and the path to WWI remains clear. So unless you are prepared to say that without America the Allies would have lost WWI the path to WWII remains clear as well. Unless you can hypothesize some sort of different outcome perhaps in France in the late 18th century, which probably would have happened anyway. America hasn't really affected Europe so much to change the course of European history until the post war era...which is pretty much the time period in which the US became a superpower and relates to the thread title.

One could propose that absent America, the French might have fared better in their rivalry with the English, and not suffered a financial crisis. From there you might not have the French Revolution, and from there you might not have Napoleon. Without his ruinous campaigns, France might have remained the great power in Europe. If that is the case, there is no need for Britain to switch it's traditional allegiance away from Prussia (and/or Germany which may or may not have even existed) and towards France.

Perhaps a great European war was inevitable, but the make up of the sides and therefore the eventual winner was not.


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Joey wrote:The presence of a powerful liberal democracy, yes. For the record the USA is not a beacon of democracy, at least not in Europe. Victorian England looked down on the Americans because of the continuation of slavery, for example. And in the latter half of the century all eyes were on Germany anyway.
Anyway, modern liberal democracy arose in France, the UK and Scandinavia, not the USA.

It's a really weird thing to pretend that the American Revolution had no impact on the politics of France. Ridiculous really.


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AustonT wrote:I can posit that the likelihood remains so high that the outcome remains the same. The butterfly effect is all well and good, but the American Revolution didn't change a whole lot in Europe.

The French Revolution?!

It's kind of famous.


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Joey wrote:Right, which is around the same time the slaves got the vote.
I'm not arguing that America is not a liberal democracy, but its democracy is copied from Europe, it is not an American invention.
When the Weimar Republic was formed, it was not inspired by America, nor was any other fledging democracy.

Seriously people, the French Revolution. It's important.

Barksdale wrote:A safer place? What a joke.

Just one minor example I guess they just forgot to mention:

The deaths of thousands of civilians during the cluster bombing campaign in Laos and other countries in southeast asia. All in the name of freedom and democracy I suppose?

There is still a very serious problem here with unexploded ordnance from that era. Thanks America!

Macro scale, my friend.

Oh wow, I didn't know someone said that without the US the Allies would have lost Europe. Sigh, that's the whole reason I made that other thread.


And Sebster, SF are used to help initiate coups as well. They're also used (or at least were) to train local forces, including those used to combat the drug cartels.

I do think that people who say that without the US, Europe would be speaking German are a little silly. As Sebster pointed out, they would be speaking Russian.

Amaya wrote:Oh wow, I didn't know someone said that without the US the Allies would have lost Europe. Sigh, that's the whole reason I made that other thread.

He made the same claim in that thread of yours. I corrected him in that as well. Doesn't seem to have done any good.

And Sebster, SF are used to help initiate coups as well. They're also used (or at least were) to train local forces, including those used to combat the drug cartels.

These days it seems they're pretty much there just for activities that benefit the local nations, so that's a plus.


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Bromsy wrote:I do think that people who say that without the US, Europe would be speaking German are a little silly. As Sebster pointed out, they would be speaking Russian.

And, to be fair, Soviet rule would be hardly any better than Nazi rule. So Europe has a lot to be grateful for there.

sebster wrote:

AustonT wrote:I think we can virtually guarantee that the Austrio-Hungrian Empire would remain unchanged and the path to WWI remains clear. So unless you are prepared to say that without America the Allies would have lost WWI the path to WWII remains clear as well. Unless you can hypothesize some sort of different outcome perhaps in France in the late 18th century, which probably would have happened anyway. America hasn't really affected Europe so much to change the course of European history until the post war era...which is pretty much the time period in which the US became a superpower and relates to the thread title.

One could propose that absent America, the French might have fared better in their rivalry with the English, and not suffered a financial crisis. From there you might not have the French Revolution, and from there you might not have Napoleon. Without his ruinous campaigns, France might have remained the great power in Europe. If that is the case, there is no need for Britain to switch it's traditional allegiance away from Prussia (and/or Germany which may or may not have even existed) and towards France.

Perhaps a great European war was inevitable, but the make up of the sides and therefore the eventual winner was not.

You are KIDDING?!?!? The French Revolution was important? The Seven Years War left France's finances in ruins, there was still a famine, the Bourbons were still in power, radical leftism was still on the rise in France, the Jews were still agitating for emancipation. All the players were intact. It's reasonable to say that without the debt of the American Revolution paid in kind in grain by the Americans that financial ruin and starvation were even MORE likely. Locke and RDepending on how far you'd like to go with this socialism, which finds it's roots in the Revolution (hence the towering mass of scholarship both in support of the left and right), was inevitable especially in France in the 18th century. Hobbes, Locke and Rousseau were all unaffected by the American Revolution. Your position does a great disservice to the overarching concerns of the French and the influence of starvation and radicalism not just in Paris, but in the countryside.

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Bromsy wrote:

Barksdale wrote:A safer place? What a joke.

Just one minor example I guess they just forgot to mention:

The deaths of thousands of civilians during the cluster bombing campaign in Laos and other countries in southeast asia. All in the name of freedom and democracy I suppose?

There is still a very serious problem here with unexploded ordnance from that era. Thanks America!

Macro scale, my friend.

Yeah, I guess a conflict spanning 20 years, an estimated 3 million civilian deaths, many many more wounded or displaced, and with regular people, 40 years later, still dealing with the concequences is not macro. I can cite other examples but with a little research you can do the same. Education, my friend. Its a good thing. Try it out.

America is great for starting wars they cannot finish and leaving the rest of the world to clean up the pieces. Funny part is the wars in southeast asia were fought for 'freedom, capitalism, and democracy'. All things which America seems to be lacking these days...Guantanamo Bay, bailouts of large corporations who made bad bets (THIS is a socialist policy if I ever saw one), supporting puppet governments such as in Iraq and Afghanistan.

If anything, post-WW2 the United States has made the world a more dangerous place. Not just in war but in many of the ridicuous social and political ideas coming out of the United States these days.

I would much rather a Chinese run world then an American. Lol I also cant wait to see some guy quote this and say. LOL DERP AMERICA #1, how can China run a world better then us!

Cause they can... they just can. And they don't want to commit terrorism to 1/3 of the world...

just my two say.

AustonT wrote:You are KIDDING?!?!? The French Revolution was important? The Seven Years War left France's finances in ruins, there was still a famine, the Bourbons were still in power, radical leftism was still on the rise in France, the Jews were still agitating for emancipation. All the players were intact. It's reasonable to say that without the debt of the American Revolution paid in kind in grain by the Americans that financial ruin and starvation were even MORE likely. Locke and RDepending on how far you'd like to go with this socialism, which finds it's roots in the Revolution (hence the towering mass of scholarship both in support of the left and right), was inevitable especially in France in the 18th century. Hobbes, Locke and Rousseau were all unaffected by the American Revolution. Your position does a great disservice to the overarching concerns of the French and the influence of starvation and radicalism not just in Paris, but in the countryside.

My position no doubt does a great deal of disservice to many things, but you're really only making the case that the line up of the major players on each side in WWI could not be assumed to be the same if there were no America, and therefore it's outcome, and therefore WWII are by no means certain.

And when you claim the Bourbons were still in power you're ignoring a great deal of political complexity, about as much as saying England is still a monarchy, so nothing has changed since 1066.


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Poppabear wrote:I would much rather a Chinese run world then an American. Lol I also cant wait to see some guy quote this and say. LOL DERP AMERICA #1, how can China run a world better then us!

Cause they can... they just can. And they don't want to commit terrorism to 1/3 of the world...

just my two say.

Is this a joke?

sebster wrote:

AustonT wrote:You are KIDDING?!?!? The French Revolution was important? The Seven Years War left France's finances in ruins, there was still a famine, the Bourbons were still in power, radical leftism was still on the rise in France, the Jews were still agitating for emancipation. All the players were intact. It's reasonable to say that without the debt of the American Revolution paid in kind in grain by the Americans that financial ruin and starvation were even MORE likely. Locke and RDepending on how far you'd like to go with this socialism, which finds it's roots in the Revolution (hence the towering mass of scholarship both in support of the left and right), was inevitable especially in France in the 18th century. Hobbes, Locke and Rousseau were all unaffected by the American Revolution. Your position does a great disservice to the overarching concerns of the French and the influence of starvation and radicalism not just in Paris, but in the countryside.

My position no doubt does a great deal of disservice to many things, but you're really only making the case that the line up of the major players on each side in WWI could not be assumed to be the same if there were no America, and therefore it's outcome, and therefore WWII are by no means certain.

And when you claim the Bourbons were still in power you're ignoring a great deal of political complexity, about as much as saying England is still a monarchy, so nothing has changed since 1066.

Amazing. First it's the French Revolution, now it's WWI and II. You disagree simply to be disagreeable. Further discussion would be a waste of my time.

Polonius wrote:While I agree with Dogma that little of America's foriegn policy is benevolent, I really don't care why people do things. I'm a results oriented guy, at least with regards to public and foriegn policy.

Why does it matter why the US is giving food to North Korea? We're helping people not starve.

Well, if you don't mind me extrapolating that into stupidity, it could be extended to "why does it matter that the US is offering free vasectomies and abortions to Haitians? We're helping poor people not to have children they can't afford."

sebster wrote:

AustonT wrote:You are KIDDING?!?!? The French Revolution was important? The Seven Years War left France's finances in ruins, there was still a famine, the Bourbons were still in power, radical leftism was still on the rise in France, the Jews were still agitating for emancipation. All the players were intact. It's reasonable to say that without the debt of the American Revolution paid in kind in grain by the Americans that financial ruin and starvation were even MORE likely. Locke and RDepending on how far you'd like to go with this socialism, which finds it's roots in the Revolution (hence the towering mass of scholarship both in support of the left and right), was inevitable especially in France in the 18th century. Hobbes, Locke and Rousseau were all unaffected by the American Revolution. Your position does a great disservice to the overarching concerns of the French and the influence of starvation and radicalism not just in Paris, but in the countryside.

My position no doubt does a great deal of disservice to many things, but you're really only making the case that the line up of the major players on each side in WWI could not be assumed to be the same if there were no America, and therefore it's outcome, and therefore WWII are by no means certain.

And when you claim the Bourbons were still in power you're ignoring a great deal of political complexity, about as much as saying England is still a monarchy, so nothing has changed since 1066.


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Poppabear wrote:I would much rather a Chinese run world then an American. Lol I also cant wait to see some guy quote this and say. LOL DERP AMERICA #1, how can China run a world better then us!

Cause they can... they just can. And they don't want to commit terrorism to 1/3 of the world...

just my two say.

Is this a joke?

No it's not. OH and look an Austrailian, America's twin. What does mentioning America commiting terrorism make you butthert? I'm sorry but when people start going on about how America is number one. It just really sets me off. I like Americans, but the way their country is run, I'm not attacking the people of the states, just the way they think because of all the right wing bull that has bing going around since Sep 2001.

AustonT wrote:Amazing. First it's the French Revolution, now it's WWI and II. You disagree simply to be disagreeable. Further discussion would be a waste of my time.

What? You said this; "I think we can virtually guarantee that the Austrio-Hungrian Empire would remain unchanged and the path to WWI remains clear. So unless you are prepared to say that without America the Allies would have lost WWI the path to WWII remains clear as well."

In response I thought of one example of the top of my head that would be immediately impacted by the absence of a USA, and used that to speculate on some ways in which the the march towards WWI and then WWII isn't as inevitable as you first assumed.

And then you pretend that I'm just bringing up WWI and WWII out of nowhere. Did you read your own post?


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Poppabear wrote:No it's not. OH and look an Austrailian, America's twin. What does mentioning America commiting terrorism make you butthert? I'm sorry but when people start going on about how America is number one. It just really sets me off. I like Americans, but the way their country is run, I'm not attacking the people of the states, just the way they think because of all the right wing bull that has bing going around since Sep 2001.

I thought you might be mocking people who are so into the 'boo USA' thing they are silly enough to say 'yay China'. I mean your reasoning for the position was 'Cause they can... they just can.' That reads like a joke post.

Anyhow, you've basically made two mistakes. The first is in thinking that there's something uniquely American about what they've done with their power. Look any major power, their record sucks. Look at what the British got up to when they ruled the world. Look at them now and they talk of global citizenship and international community and all that and you'd never know they killed 10 million or more Indians with economic policies that were both cruel and utterly stupid.

The second mistake is that when you picked a country to replace them, you pretend China would somehow be so much nicer than the US in flexing their muscle. That position requires complete ignorance on China's record with ethnic minorities within China, and complete ignorance on China's record with neighbouring countries.

sebster wrote:

AustonT wrote:Amazing. First it's the French Revolution, now it's WWI and II. You disagree simply to be disagreeable. Further discussion would be a waste of my time.

What? You said this; "I think we can virtually guarantee that the Austrio-Hungrian Empire would remain unchanged and the path to WWI remains clear. So unless you are prepared to say that without America the Allies would have lost WWI the path to WWII remains clear as well."

In response I thought of one example of the top of my head that would be immediately impacted by the absence of a USA, and used that to speculate on some ways in which the the march towards WWI and then WWII isn't as inevitable as you first assumed.

And then you pretend that I'm just bringing up WWI and WWII out of nowhere. Did you read your own post?

It's almost as if I was answering this post in which you say things like:

sebster wrote:

The French Revolution?!

It's kind of famous.

or

sebster wrote:
Seriously people, the French Revolution. It's important.

To which I answered: about the French revolution. In fact despite your incredulous "The French Revolution?!" if we go back and look at my WHOLE quote:

AustonT wrote:

corpsesarefun wrote:It wasn't the root cause to my knowledge, my point is we can't know what the world would be like without america.

I think we can virtually guarantee that the Austrio-Hungrian Empire would remain unchanged and the path to WWI remains clear. So unless you are prepared to say that without America the Allies would have lost WWI the path to WWII remains clear as well. Unless you can hypothesize some sort of different outcome perhaps in France in the late 18th century, which probably would have happened anyway. America hasn't really affected Europe so much to change the course of European history until the post war era...which is pretty much the time period in which the US became a superpower and relates to the thread title.

That's a reference to the French Revolution in the large letters in case you were wondering, the bigger ones are a hint towards the inevitability of said event.
Either you want to talk about the French Revolution, or you want to talk about the world wars. Until you can provide a more feasible chain of events that disproves the inevitability of the French Revolution further discussion on my part, with you, is a waste of my time.

AustonT wrote:That's a reference to the French Revolution in the large letters in case you were wondering, the bigger ones are a hint towards the inevitability of said event.
Either you want to talk about the French Revolution, or you want to talk about the world wars.

Exactly, you asked for a way in which it might have played out differently, I gave one and then you got angry that I did it. Weird.

Poppabear wrote:I would much rather a Chinese run world then an American. Lol I also cant wait to see some guy quote this and say. LOL DERP AMERICA #1, how can China run a world better then us!

Cause they can... they just can. And they don't want to commit terrorism to 1/3 of the world...

just my two say.

Do you think the people of Tibet would agree with you here ?

According to a UN report, "The Chinese occupation of Tibet has been characterised by acts of murder, rape and arbitrary imprisonment; torture and cruel, inhuman and degraded treatment of Tibetans on a large scale. The number of Tibetans killed after the Chinese occupation -- a period marked by torture and starvation -- now exceeds a million. According to a document captured by the guerrillas fighting the Chinese army, 87,000 deaths were recorded in Lhasa between March 1959 and September 1960. More than 6,000 monasteries, their belongings -- the priceless jewels of Tibetan culture, precious Thangka paintings and other valuable documents were destroyed by the Chinese army."

And this is what you think will be better than what we have now yes ?

reds8n wrote:

Poppabear wrote:I would much rather a Chinese run world then an American. Lol I also cant wait to see some guy quote this and say. LOL DERP AMERICA #1, how can China run a world better then us!

Cause they can... they just can. And they don't want to commit terrorism to 1/3 of the world...

just my two say.

Do you think the people of Tibet would agree with you here ?

According to a UN report, "The Chinese occupation of Tibet has been characterised by acts of murder, rape and arbitrary imprisonment; torture and cruel, inhuman and degraded treatment of Tibetans on a large scale. The number of Tibetans killed after the Chinese occupation -- a period marked by torture and starvation -- now exceeds a million. According to a document captured by the guerrillas fighting the Chinese army, 87,000 deaths were recorded in Lhasa between March 1959 and September 1960. More than 6,000 monasteries, their belongings -- the priceless jewels of Tibetan culture, precious Thangka paintings and other valuable documents were destroyed by the Chinese army."

And this is what you think will be better than what we have now yes ?

To be fair some pretty horrific stuff has been implemented by US policies as well, people have already noted South America. The major difference was that it was never actual US troops doing the killing.

I don't see anyone here seeming to claim that America is whiter than white, flawless and taint free as if it's a gift from God.

I do see people making claims that China will somehow be magically better because... I dunno.. they don't wear stetsons ?

Have a look at their human rights records. You think that gay people have a rough time in western style countries ? You ain't seen anything yet.

You know there's presumption of innocence in Chinese law yes ? And confessions are routinely..."taken"..... from "suspects" prior to them having access to lawyers.

Can't say that I'm a massive fan of their "re-educational labour camps" either really.

dogma wrote:

Joey wrote: I doubt the Chinese would send millions of men overseas to fight for the liberty of others.

In all fairness, we don't really do that either.

I don't often laugh out loud when reading this forum, but this was one of those times.

I'm not saying China is a picnic, or even comparable, to a US dominated world. But personally, I like the current balance. So long as the leave us alone.

You know there's presumption of innocence in Chinese law yes ? And confessions are routinely..."taken"..... from "suspects" prior to them having access to lawyers.

Japan has that as well. I think they're allowed to keep "supects" in an interrogation room for 48 hours or until they get a confession. Most convictions in Japan happen to be from confessions.

SilverMK2 wrote:
Anyway, I think the world would be a better place if the USA sent out armies of teachers, builders and doctors rather than soldiers.

You should take a look at what our soildiers do where they go. I've personally helped put in schools, clinics, water wells, been involved in innoculation programs, helped move tons of building and school supplies... I've helped set up deployments into areas hit by floods and mudslides to bring medical aid, water, and food to folks, and then get roads and other infrastructure rebuilt. I've seen ODAs deployed for no other purpose than to run clinics in some crappy places where the local government couldn't or wouldn't provide services to some very needy people. All this well before 9/11. We've done more since then.

Barksdale wrote:A safer place? What a joke.

Just one minor example I guess they just forgot to mention:

The deaths of thousands of civilians during the cluster bombing campaign in Laos and other countries in southeast asia. All in the name of freedom and democracy I suppose?

There is still a very serious problem here with unexploded ordnance from that era. Thanks America!

I agree with this, And I think there are several Latin American countries that has few good things to say about US involment, Chille is a good exampel on this point.