How about Rwanda? Bill Clinton is on record as stating that his failure to intervene in Rwanda was the biggest mistake of his presidency.
This was a purely civil situation. No neighbors were really threatened. So is war so horrible that you should sit back and watch 800,000 people be hacked to death with machetes?
Exactly my point, Sam.
The US should have been willing to intervene, forcefully, with or without multilateral support or approval.
Would intervention have made a mess? Would it have “destabilized the region”? Would it have cost a fair number of “innocent” lives? Very likely. But 800,000 people wouldn’t have been hacked to death. They’d be alive today (and probably protesting us).
And yet, I’d be very wary of minimizing the risks involved in “destabilizing a region,” as if this were mere diplomatic mumbo-jumbo. One could make a very strong case that Pol Pot’s rise in Cambodia was caused (or at least aided) by just such a destabilization.
Sam and Scott:
You have both alluded to the core of the issue. When the situation is purely humanitarian and has no imperialist benefit, the issue gets downgraded in priority. As for Clinton’s regret, I cannot credit it with any more than empty political bullshit, as per usual. I doubt that you guys give Clinton much credit so why use his drivel as an example? Political pretty boys will say what makes ‘em look nice. Figured that out yet?
If the US had have had something significant to gain in an invasion of Rwanda they’d have been onto it like flies on shit. Because there was only human lives at stake it gets relegated to the “too much trouble” pile. I can’t possibly see how anyone can be gullible enough to think that the administration’s intentions are humanitarian and not economic in the face of such evidence. And if Iraq wasn’t supposedly humanitarian, just try and tell me it was about homeland security with a straight face.
And you may posture over the notion that situations like Rwanda justify military invasions for humanitarian purposes, but it amounts to searching for justification of a stupid act. If humanitarianism is the goal, war is the antithesis. I just love watching folks drool over war and then justify it with humanitarian notions. Top-rate comedy. Situations like Rwanda and present day Zimbabwe could solved by invoking the military without sending it into battle and in the end save millions of lives without ever doing battle. However, in case it is news to you, effective means are only implemented when special interests are served. Welcome the world of political back scratching.
P.S. I’ll get back to the earlier, more involved posts from furt and Scott when I have a little more time.
So LANDER–
You’re saying, what…you don’t LIKE war?
So what did we gain from Somalia and Bosnia and Haiti?