Osama bin Laden Killed

Cornfed Hick said:
That was never gonna happen.  If you kill Americans, America will want to deal with you directly. 
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I think Loose Cannon wanted to stress out that the USA doesn't participate in the ICJ because it doesn't wish to allow its citizens to be prosecuted for possible war crimes they commited. Basically, "if Americans kill you, fuck you, we don't participate in international courts".
 
In theory, I have nothing against international organizations.  Narrow ones (like NATO, trade groups, etc) serve a purpose.  On the broader sense, groups like the UN serve a function of having a structure in place to allow countries to discuss issues and have done a decent job with things like Law of the Sea, mining rights, etc. 

In practice however, there are some deep flaws (one country=one vote for example).  There are plenty of anti-US (or anti-West) tin hat dictators that would take any opportunity to stick it to the West/US.  When you see things like Libya sitting on Human Rights commisions,etc it is a farce.  It would be incredibly stupid of the US (and most any other country) to give up sovereignty to these organizations.  It is not just the US.  I do not see Russia, China, the EU, really most any country that would be willing to do this, it makes ZERO sense.

We are not a one world government and will not be in the forseeable future.  The only way that will every work is if all parties are on a somewhat equal footing with semi-equal goverment structures.
 
Well, that's why the United Nations was structured the way it was - to give the USA (and the other four major powers) a veto on the Security Council.

I think that if the USA wants to participate in international governance, they'll have to give a little, and take a little. Because at some point, they aren't going to be the biggest, baddest person on the block anymore. They aren't going to get to push and shove whoever they want, do whatever they want, etc. And at that point, they're going to want the backing of the international community. It'd be very unfortunate if the community wasn't there.

Finally, while the US might not want a tin-hat dictator to "stick it to them", there's a lot of countries who've been "stuck" by the US and allies numerous times, and who have no resource. Do you think the US should be able to do whatever it wants to do on the international stage? I'm fine with that. I don't think they should be, but I appreciate it.

England felt that way once too. They acted on it, only to get hung out to dry by their friends - such as during the Suez Canal Crisis. The mighty fall.
 
I think it is in America's (and all countries best interest) to work with other countries where possible and I think for the most part, they do.  There are occasional issues where interests collide and conflict and agreeements cannot be reached.  I have no problem being in the UN and attempting to work through it and other international organizations, however I would not want those decisions to be binding on us (nor would I suspect any other country would either). 

I do see a flaw (in the General Assembly) when a country like Tuvalu has the same vote as the US (or Russia, China, India, UK, Canada, Germany, etc). 

I'd have no problem with the US joining temporary international courts (like the post-WWII tribunals) where it makes sense, but I do not see the need or benefit of the US joining a permanenet World Court, whose decisions are not binding and they have zero power to enforce them.

World Organizations can serve a good purpose, but not as binding governmental structures.
 
bearfan said:
World Organizations can serve a good purpose, but not as binding governmental structures when we have to be responsible for our actions.
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That's what you say, right bearfan?
 
I just want to point out that, according to the US Constitution, any foreign treaty has power in the USA. If the USA signed it, it's the highest law in the land. Funny how that works - I think it's a big reason people try to avoid it. Ron Paul often forgets about that clause too.

I'm not suggesting we go to a "one world order", but I am saying that it would be nice to move closer together. It's going to happen regardless - look at the EU.
 
Treaties do have a high power in the US.  In respect to the UN, it does not bind us to any UN decisions.  The UN treaty was to join the organization as structured.  Treaties are not easy to pass in the US either, they need to be signed by the President and ratified by the Senate, those that are signed have a general agreement and usually are bi-partisan.

The EU is a good example of a group of reasonably like minded countries (similar forms of government, economic systems, etc) can get together for good purpose.  But even there, there are plenty of issues that come up between the larger and smaller countries and there are disputes and you see some rise of sentiment to get out of the EU.  Recent elections in Finland for example.  The UK not joining is also a glaring ommission to it's membership and it's own hesitation with Turkey

I am not anti-EU, my point is that this would be the easiest case to see a union of governments where it should be a success, but there are issue to work out.  It becomes more problematic when you include less like-minded countries and cultures. 

Over vast spans of time, these barriers may lessen, but I would guess the sentiment in the US would be greatly against further entanglements with the UN. 
Forostar said:
That's what you say, right bearfan?
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\\No, I meant to say what I said.  These organizations can serve a good purpose as places for discussion and agreements can come from this, but when agreements cannot be reached, countries will act in their best interest.
 
LooseCannon said:
I just want to point out that, according to the US Constitution, any foreign treaty has power in the USA. If the USA signed it, it's the highest law in the land. Funny how that works - I think it's a big reason people try to avoid it. Ron Paul often forgets about that clause too.
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Can you explain the Ron Paul reference?
 
bearfan said:
\\No, I meant to say what I said.  These organizations can serve a good purpose as places for discussion and agreements can come from this, but when agreements cannot be reached, countries will act in their best interest.
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But don't you wish the USA to be responsible towards the international community when it comes to war crimes?
 
War Crimes is a broad word.  Individuals have been prosecuted for acts agains civilians in Iraq and Afghanistan and punished in Military Courts.  My understanding is this is how most armies have handled this (there were even cases in the Wehrmacht for excesses where soldies were punished, which seems a bit odd). 

If we were not already doing this, then perhaps there would be cause to call for fruther action.

If people are wanting to declare the wars themselves as a war crime and indite Bush, Cheney, I guess Obama now too for war crimes, then no. 

There are options available to other countries, they can stop exporting goods to us, they can stop taking our money, etc.  they can form a coalition against us if they feel we are wielding too much power, the EU can build an Army and military to compete with the US, and so on.  For the most part, they have defered to us (and taken the defense savings).  If other nations do not like the job we are doing (and I am not saying it is perfect), let them do it.
 
bearfan said:
If other nations do not like the job we are doing (and I am not saying it is perfect), let them do it.
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Yes, because the US are so willing to give up their position of power and their resources for anyone else ready to do the job. No offense mate, but what world do you live in?
 
Perun said:
Yes, because the US are so willing to give up their position of power and their resources for anyone else ready to do the job. No offense mate, but what world do you live in?
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Willing to, no. 

But since World War II, the pre-World War II powers have for the most part given away their responsibilities in the world and retreated and were content with the US and USSR being world powers and after the fall of the Soviets been happy letting the US (for the most part, I am mainly excluding the UK) continue to be the military power.

Other countries can complain about certain things we do, and Iraq really seems to be the major bone of contention, which of these countries has even attempted to take over some of the defense responsibilities that they rely on the US for.

It is a two way street.
 
That thought has three flaws: The first is the idea that the ex-powers gave up their power willingly, which they didn't. They lost them in two world wars and, in the case of Britain and France, in colonial struggles afterwards. But that is not my point - good riddance to them all, Britain, France, Germany and Japan were terrible at their job.
The second flaw is the idea that the world needs leading powers to dominate the globe. Why should the US or any other country alone take the responsibility of maintaining peace and security? That is a flawed system, because that power will always go after those cases that benefit them the most first. That is even a legit survival strategy, but that is why this system can't work. This may be a shock to many, but the world isn't waiting for the US to save them. In fact, many people in the world are waiting for someone to save them from the US. That is what Osama promised.
The third flaw is the idea that Europe is weak and dependent on the US for defence. That may have been the truth in the post-war decades, but things have changed. Europe could defend itself if need be, but Europeans prefer to find peaceful alternatives before they get out their guns. I've always felt that is something Americans can't understand, because their country was not bombed to kingdom come in the forties. If you've had a bombed-out country once, you do everything to prevent that from happening again, and you also emphasise with others who don't want that to happen to them.

So why do the Europeans remain allied with the Americans? Because peace is better than war, no matter what the outcome. Nobody wants to take the role of the world's policeman from the Americans, because that would mean war, and nobody wants a war. War is a bad thing to Europeans.
 
Perun said:
That thought has three flaws: The first is the idea that the ex-powers gave up their power willingly, which they didn't. They lost them in two world wars and, in the case of Britain and France, in colonial struggles afterwards. But that is not my point - good riddance to them all, Britain, France, Germany and Japan were terrible at their job.
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No disagreement here, but by the end of the war, there was a need for the West contain the Soviets, the US was the one country in a position to do that and had through the course of the war evolved into that position.  The US made a mistake of insulating itself after WWI and was not going to make that mistake again. 

Perun said:
The second flaw is the idea that the world needs leading powers to dominate the globe. Why should the US or any other country alone take the responsibility of maintaining peace and security? That is a flawed system, because that power will always go after those cases that benefit them the most first. That is even a legit survival strategy, but that is why this system can't work. This may be a shock to many, but the world isn't waiting for the US to save them. In fact, many people in the world are waiting for someone to save them from the US. That is what Osama promised.
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I agree with this to a point, there are more world struggles that the US is not involved militarily in than there are wars that we are involved in.  Looking at the recent conflicts the US was involved, I think there is a clear reason we went into Afghanistan and there seemed to be a general agreement that we should amongst other nations.  Iraq is a bit different, but there was at least some international support for that as well and there had been oodles of UN resolutions against Iraq that did nothing.  The execution of both these wars is a different story, but at the start of both there was support.



The third flaw is the idea that Europe is weak and dependent on the US for defence. That may have been the truth in the post-war decades, but things have changed. Europe could defend itself if need be, but Europeans prefer to find peaceful alternatives before they get out their guns. I've always felt that is something Americans can't understand, because their country was not bombed to kingdom come in the forties. If you've had a bombed-out country once, you do everything to prevent that from happening again, and you also emphasise with others who don't want that to happen to them.
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Since the late 1990s what you say here is true, the US military is less focused on Europe as a place to defend, at this point the bases there are used to support operations elsewhere.  Europe can defend itself, there is no real threat that Europe is facing.

So why do the Europeans remain allied with the Americans? Because peace is better than war, no matter what the outcome. Nobody wants to take the role of the world's policeman from the Americans, because that would mean war, and nobody wants a war. War is a bad thing to Europeans.
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Europe does not need to take the role of policeman from the US, but there are cases in the world where force is needed, many of those places are areas where Europe has interests and should be willing to keep the peace (Rawanda comes to mind).  The complaints against the US seem to be we do too much (Iraq) or If you are in Iraq, why are you not stopping what is happening in Darfur (for example). 

Certainly within the US there has been debate over Iraq mainly and internally I think it is unlikely something like that will happen for some time just from US sentiment. 
I'll add too, if the US were to announce tomorrow that within  a year we are pulling all troops back to the US and are no longer the world's policeman, there would be at a minimum regional power vacumns.  Something would move to fill them, perhaps they would do a better job than the US, perhaps not. 
 
Perun said:
That thought has three flaws: The first is the idea that the ex-powers gave up their power willingly, which they didn't. They lost them in two world wars and, in the case of Britain and France, in colonial struggles afterwards. But that is not my point - good riddance to them all, Britain, France, Germany and Japan were terrible at their job.
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What job? The League Of Nations? It was always going to fail when it was almost entirely a European-centred organisation. Globalisation was only beginning to come to people's minds back then, there was no "job" to ensure world peace, only seek to look after one's possessions. The reason Britain and France were quite happy to lead the League was because they already had colonies to protect and they had nothing to gain from war. Germany, Japan and Italy joined to gain some sort of international respect at the time, especially Germany who were obviously trying to prove themselves. Everyone had an agenda back then, as they do now, but at least these days people are more and more of a planet, rather than of a nation.

I'd say Europe is willing to let America do the policing because it costs money rather than war being bad...not to mention that even the major European nations are vastly under-equipped to be tackling worldwide affairs compared to the vast forces at the disposal of the US. Thats kind of why NATO exists.  I wouldn't necessarily agree that it stems so much from WW2, more that ever since WW2, Europe has never had a fantastic economy to the extent they could ever build up the resources like the US. So it has always been natural to avoid war because we simply cannot afford it. If Europe did have the resources, I am certain it would be more "war-mongering" just as the US is seen, its difficult to see it that way though because everyone is so used to Europe being under-resourced and looking for ways out. The nature of Europe being multiple nations with varying amounts of resources affects it too.

Do Europeans think America does a bad job? Well this is the thing...since when was it the USA's job to be involved in all affairs on our behalf? Its not a job, its simply a circumstance. The quicker we stop seeing this as a matter of nations the better.
 
Ranko said:
Can you explain the Ron Paul reference?
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Yep. Ron Paul likes to say that the US Constitution is the highest law of the land and that America should ignore or withdraw from international treaties.
 
Withdraw might be allowed, most treaties have an "out" for countries.  There are not many (if any), I have in mind that we should withdraw from, but there are ways it can be done.
 
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