They didn’t seem to need it in 1967 or 1973.
So what? They don’t need to be able to do that to be safe.
How much of a “hard left” even exists in Europe any more? Even the parties with “Socialist” in their names seem to have given up on socialism.
Insofar as a discussion of this would end up being a hijack, I shall merely observe that I find your comments, beginning with the phrase “Western Propaganda” to be themselves propaganda. However, should the readers wish to conclude that queerly it just so happens that all Russia’s neighbours somehow are individually just awful, and the poor Russians are backed into their behaviour… well they are free to draw such peculiar conclusions.
On the Continent, rather more than one would like. CP France still exists, and there are plenty of hard left movements that poll around 10%.
France’s Socialist party sadly also still contains hard line, real live proper Socialists in significant numbers.
PRC is a nuclear power. Taiwan is not.
You are distorting the observations I recall. I think the analysis to date is that PRC would suffer massive casualties and in taking Taiwan, would likely destroy the prize. That does not mean PRC can not do it, nor that this does not represent an ongoing threat to Taiwan, in particular as PRC is continuously and presently upgrading its military capacity, including its ability to project power at sea.
Given PRC’s recent and continued posture re Taiwan, interventions in South China Sea (sorry not Pacific, stupid mistake) and hostile war games, I find your evaluation of PRC threat (current and reasonably predictable future) to be fantastical.
You are of course free to draw your own conclusions too. It’s just amazing how for example US media showed footage of Tskhinvali ruins with headlines of “Russia bombing Georgia”, and many other such gems. The whole event has been grossly misrepresented in western media. There is propaganda and lies going both ways of course, but if you consider Georgia to be some beacon of freedom that was assaulted by the big bad bear, you are very very mistaken. Some things could have been handled better on Russia’s side, but in the main, it was a legitimate response.
Note however, that western media has considerably changed their approach to this event since a good while back. At the beginning the rhetoric went along the lines of “Russia invades Georgia”, but now they have generally conceded that Georgia initiated the conflict.
I have even communicated with several Georgians who share my opinion, they blame the event entirely on their president, but at the same time many are afraid of expressing this out of fear of their livelihoods.
Also, Russia is seen as a liberator both in Abkhazia and South Ossetia, which both have been de facto independent since early 90’s.
We can take this to a separate thread if you’re interested.
–
The amount of Russophobia never ceases to surprise me. Their main goals are to improve their economy and standard of living, not to build an empire. What do you think would happen if USA withdrew from western Europe? Nothing. They neither have the capacity nor the will to start any military conflicts.
Charming as your repetition of the Russian official spin on its acts is, I note that I am not an American nor a consumer of American media at all. As such, US media means fuck all to me. EU media in several languages I do consume. I already noted I decline to hijack this thread regarding Russia’s uniquely troubled relationship with … well all of its neighbours. Queer that. Poor peaceful Russian gov.
I would hardly think this is a hijack. Whether or not other countries need American military protection is almost entirely dependent on the hegemonic ambitions of other great powers, or would-be great powers.
Both China and Russia have a consistent message of how dangerous their neighbors are (including each other). When you have dozens of neighbors and they are almost all hostile, you have to wonder whose fault that is. I guess China has fewer neighbors, but they have poor relations with India, the Muslim Central Asian countries of the Former Soviet Union, Mongolians, Japanese, Vietnamese. Of all these, the one that they have the most to fear from based on recent history is Japan. Japan has never acknowledged its own wrongs during WWII in any sincere way towards its Asian neighbors.
If Japan had been properly demilitarized by the Americans after WWII, only a permanent American presence would have prevented the Chinese from reaching across the Sea of Japan to deliver a bitch slapping revenge as soon as they got their own military act together. Of course Japan has been allowed to maintain a credible military capability of its own, so the US presence is really more needed to keep the Japanese from getting any more silly ideas than keeping the Commies at bay.
Sorry, I didn’t mean to say that you are American; the slant is also very heavy throughout European media, as I clearly observed here in Sweden.
I will discontinue the SO hijack too, but I think the issue of Russia’s perceived expansionism is still relevant to the thread.
Here’s how I currently understand Russia’s foreign relations with their neighbours, in wide strokes.
Take a look at Finland’s relationship with Russia instead, which is a much better indication of what it would be like if the neighboring country treats Russia respectfully as a business partner rather than a threat. They enjoy a pretty good and constructive relationship.
Russias relationship with the Estonia and Latvia is worse, but has been improving over the last year. Russian minorities have felt persecuted there which has spawned quite some animosity on both sides, but things are slowly improving. Latvia and Russia have signed some border treaties which helps moving relations further.
I think Lithuania-Russian relations are coming along pretty well, and are better than with the other Baltic countries, unless I am mistaken.
I don’t see any real issues with Russia’s relations with Belarus either. They have strong ties and Russia is their main trade partner. They also have a rather deep military cooperation, integrated air defenses, joint military exercises, and so on. Their union effort seems to have mostly stalled though, but I think not entirely abandoned. They did have a gas dispute due to price issues and payment problems, as Russia wanted them to pay market prices instead of a highly subsidized price. I think they still have an agreement with significantly lower prices than other European countries have though.
The largest foreign relations issues lie with Ukraine and Georgia. Ukraine has a very anti-Russian president who currently has very little support among the people, something like a single digit approval rating (4-5%?). It remains to be seen what will happen in their coming election. Their failure to pay their gas debt and their weapons exports to Georgia aren’t helping their standing with Russia either. A large part of their population (mostly in the Eastern part of the country) are positive to stronger relations with Russia. Georgia is self-explanatory.
Kazakhstan also enjoys a largely good relationship with Russia too.
It’s a bit worse with Azerbaijan due to their issues with Armenia (who has pretty good relations with Russia).
All in all, it’s not as bad as wmfellows describes. I see no risk of Russian expansion in any of these countries.
http://www.alternet.org/world/141071/spending_%24102_billion_a_year_on_800_worldwide_military_bases_is_bankrupting_the_country/
It is a huge waste of money. We keep building more. It is long past time to cut bases .
Merely 14 or 15.
If the PRC couldn’t invade Taiwan and force a final conclusion to their civil war in 1949, I don’t know how they would invade an island chain much farther away with a much bigger population. Japan was demilitarized after WWII (in the sense that the military stood down, not that all war criminals were necessarily brought to justice). It was only the Korean War that prompted the US occupation to encourage Japan to re-arm, as the Self-Defense Forces were only officially established in 1954.
The US presence in Japan now is very minimal, limited primarily to Air Force and Navy, with all the Marines in Okinawa getting ready to be moved to Guam. We’re not keeping the Japanese from any silly ideas. Our nuclear umbrella is perhaps keeping Japan from developing nukes of their own, along with their own unique history in that area.
But of all China’s neighbors, only Russia and India are comparable military powers now or potentially. And it really has not much of substance to quarrel over with Russia or India. Would China go to war, e.g., because it covets Siberia?
Uhm. Yes. Yes, they would. It’s actually fairly likely, I’ve mentioned it before. Siberia is full of all kinds of natural resources.
To be honest, I’m expecting a major war in the next twenty years or so. I’m not sure when or how, but the world is full of smug nations that are entirely sure that their way is the best and only way to do things. And who feel war is old-fashioned and will never happen again.
This is, in my mind, the perfect climate for a war to start. If you add China’s gender imbalance and power imbalance issues, and Russia’s urges to prove that they are, in fact, a first world country… well. It’s not pretty.
Leave aside your dubious characterisations above (which to discuss in depth require a separate discussion), Russia already has a record of border conflicts, and relative to the Perceptions of its neighbours, that the vast majority feel threatened by Russia, regarding of pro Russian government spin, that is probative.
As such, while you may (as you have) argue that they are collectively mistaken, regarding the OP, it is most certainly the case that a very large percentage of Russia’s neighbours perceive her to be hegemonic, untrustworthy and prone to interventions to “protect” her interests (including Russophone minorities, a classic little game for excuses, Germans used it admirably). As such, the OP’s assertion that neither Russia nor China present threats to American allies is at best highly discussable.
No we’re just not as big on building empires anymore. But since you’re not interested on building your empire here (at least, not in a traditional sense) most of us are grateful for your support against the Russions/Chinese/terrorists/whatever.
You?
Except that China has already gone to war with India in 1962 and still holds territory that India believes belongs to it:
Perhaps, but does either have need of the U.S. to protect it from the other?
Apart from oil, the only thing China really needs right now is women. But winning them in war is not a realistic prospect.
**wmfellows **and smiling bandit, where do you get this absurd idea? It is certainly the case that the left generally speaking would espouse different foreign policy ideas than the US government, but there’s no one in their right mind in the European left who would argue that the EU would have to take over the role of the US. Especially the hard left has a fairly sizeable hatred of the project of European integration, so they’re even less likely to support a more integrated foreign policy at the EU level - let alone a world in which the EU became a hegemon. To suppose that left wing supporters in Europe would dream of the EU, of all actors, becoming a benevolent, touchy-feely force in the world is ludicrous. These guys may be left wing, but they’re not stupid!