http://www.smh.com.au/articles/2003/06/27/1056683907322.html
This from the same people who refused to support the world court?
Now they want to cop, judge and jury?
Is there no end to the gall of the Bush administration?
Sounds like a great way to teach those uppity countries like Canada and Holland, with their decriminalized pot and their gay marriages, not to mess with the U.S.! If we can’t convince other governments to enforce our laws, we’ll just go in and enforce them ourselves.
Although it might be hard to use that particular justification. How long until we see a government study linking gay marriage to terrorism?
Reeder do you even read the articles you post?
You said
when in actuality they want to create an international peacekeeping force led by the U.S. rather than the U.N. Whether that is right or wrong would be a matter to debate. Such questions would normally be raised in a OP in place of your attacks on the Bush administration.
and Mr2001
please try to return back to reality, we sort of miss you here.
treis - The problem is that international peacekeeping organizations already exist. The U.S. thumbs its nose at the existing international infrastructure, then suggests forming a new organization, coincidentally led by the U.S.? Seems to me that they just want the U.S. to make the decisions, and other countries to quietly help with the implementation.
I agree, but not in the sense you meant. The UN is mostly useless to counterproductive. NATO is now confounded by France and some other European countries who are not seeking cooperation with the US. So, the problem is that international peacekeeping organizations already exist, but they are not up to the job. How should the US deal with this problem?
A popular approach would be to rely on the UN (or NATO). That would make a lot of people feel good, but it would lead to failure IMHO.
Another idea would be to fix the UN so it works the way it’s supposed to. That’s an ideal solution, but not practical.
Rumsfeld’s idea of starting anew has the virtue that it’s something that actually can be done, and it has chance of actually being effective.
Wait a second you mean as the defense secretary for the United States Donald Rumsfeild actually has the gall to suggest something that gives the United States military more power? Holy dog shit Batman!
The world is becoming polarized France and Germany along with Russia and China are growing wary of the immense power that the United States weilds in the world. They have used and will use the power that they have in NATO and the UN to counter the United States foriegn policy. France with veto power in the U.N. and its and Germany's position in NATO can block any move the United States tries to implement.
This is Real Politik at its grandest governments looking out for the best interest of its respective country regardless of the right and wrong of a situation. I don't think France or Germany opposed this recent war becuase they cared about the Iraqi people or wanted Sadam to remain in power. The war was the one issue that France could build an international counter to the United States around. In this situation it behooves the United States to attempt to set up an international peacekeeping force (not a world police force as Reeder said) that is not under the direction of these two bodies. It not only will give current and possible future military operations increased international legitimacy by including more countries but will free up U.S. forces from current peacekeeping duties.s0ersj aper h8we
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Well, what’s your definition of “up to the job”?
If the US is truly interested in international decision making, it must face the possibility that other countries will have different ideas of which problems are important for international action, and what steps are appropriate to take in response. When you’re on a panel and the other panel members disagree with you, it’s more likely that you’re wrong than that everyone else is ganging up to spite you.
The “problem” that should be dealt with is not that the UN doesn’t agree with the US, but that the US expects the UN to be a rubber stamp for the US’s decisions.
The only way the US will get an international body to rubber stamp its decisions is if the US controls the body - which means it has no international legitimacy at all.
On the other hand, if other members do share the decision making, why would you expect any more “cooperation” than we’ve had from the UN and NATO?
(sorry about my previous post I swear I put a line between those paragraphs)
Unfortunatley I don’t think this is the case as I have previously stated in this thread France, Germany, Russia, and China have breaking U.S. hegemony in the world as one of their top foriegn policy goals.
The whole point of this international peacekeeping force is to at least give U.S. military action the air of multi-laterial decision making. The Bush administration has a stated goal of returning U.S. foriegn policy decisions to Washington from the U.N. and NATO.
The USSR forced Europe into a relationship dominated by the United States in order for its protection forcing Europe to go along with foriegn policy decisions of the U.S. Now that the USSR is gone France and Germany are trying to return more power in the world to Europe. The Bush administration is doing every thing in its power to keep power in America and America on top of the world both militarily and economically. In the real politik sense of the world this is absolutely the best move for both parties involed Europe trying to gain power and the U.S. trying to maintain it.
However in the moral sense of the world the U.S. is being greedy as hell doing all it can to maintain an extravigant life style while much of Africa and Asia is dirt poor. But who’s fault is that? If a canidate ran on the platform of equalizing the economic situation of the world he would be laughed out of the poll booth. Time ran a story recently with a few people bemoaning the fact that they have taken a 10 grand pay cut from 80 to 70 grand per year while villiages in Africa are lucky to pull in 80 grand each year.
So what do Americans do? They protest the Bush administrations policy but in the end how many more protestors would be out there if the median income in the U.S. dropped to 5 thousand a year? The Bush administration is not the thing to blame for the foriegn policy it takes it rests soley on the American people.
But the fact of the matter is that greed is a part of Human nature and every where else in the natural world. If the roles were reversed I don’t believe for a second that they would do anything different from America. Which brings us back to the administration’s policy. We are the top dogs in the world and we elect a government to maintain that. American’s will accept nothing less.
Oooh! Oooh, oooh, oooh! Can I answer this one? Hmmm? Please? Can I?
When december says the UN and NATO are “not up to the job,” he means they don’t kowtow to the wishes and orders of the United States. How dare those organizations actually question US about our motives and proof for a war with Iraq? Clearly they are a bunch of foggy-minded bumblers – undoubtedly corrupted by bad influences such as France – who lack our moral clarity and black-and-white worldview.
Oh, and :rolleyes:
Yeah, rjung! You’ve got it! Why, if the United States had caved in to France’s outrageous demands to wait two more months, the war would be over and we would still be in Iraq looking for WMD!
Oh. Wait a minute.
Unfortunately international decision making hasn’t worked very well for the downtrodden of the world. The UN didn’t stop the slaughter of Moslems in the former Yogoslavia. Neither did Europe. That slaughter was ended by US action, intiated by Bill Clinton. The US had to beg the UN for permission to stop the slaughter of Moslems in Kuwait. The UN hasn’t been at all successful in their efforts in various African countries that are in horrific need. The UN hasn’t prevented North Korea and Iran from getting nuclear weapons. The UN didn’t stop massive starvation caused by the governments of North Korea and Zimbabwe. The UN didn’t stop Saddam Hussein from torturing and murdering thousands of Iraqis.
I wish the UN was able to do the job it was designed to do. But, wishing doesn’t make it so.
It’s a good goal for the US to have, but I still don’t understand why we didn’t attain it by opening our wallet for the UN, immersing ourselves in UN politics, and gently dominating it and making it in our own image. Doing it this way (as described in the OP) would be a much harder sell even if we hadn’t just burnished our image as arrogant colonializers and vigilantes.
If I were living anywhere other than the US, I think this would sound to me a lot like Darth Vader informing my planet that the Empire will henceforth be supplying police services for our protection and for the good of space.
It does, it does.
A question - I know it’s hypothetical, but it could very well happen. So here goes… for proponents of this idea, how do you imagine this global police force would fit in with the UNSC, NATO and the like? Rummy & Co. seem to believe that both these organisations in particular aren’t relevant anymore, so what happens when a conflict arises where both the UNSC and this new force decide intervention is neccessary? Who gets precedence? More importantly, who decides who gets precedence? Would this new force wait until the UNSC makes up it’s mind about whether to intervene or not? Or would it simply pre-empt the UNSC?
Admittedly, the US has done a lot of good as an intervening force, but more often than not it’s acted in it’s own best interests (not that’s there’s anything wrong with that). To now let it have control over a global policing force, and an autonomous one at that, is just plain scary. The US’s best interests are not always in the best interests of the rest of the world.
I don’t think the U.S. government is doing anything it does not normally do. The real problem is that the people in charge have no tact.
I don’t know how seriously this is being discussed, but it sounds like a colossally stupid idea. The US should be looking at ways to extricate itself from being the world’s policeman, not entrenching itself in the that role. I was no big fan of the Iraq invasion, but that country was in a league with the worst of the worst out there. It isn’t like there are dozens of Iraqs that need to be dealt with and we have to gear up some machine for dealing with all of them over the course of time.
That they don’t. That in and of itself could be enough to bring all kinds of hell down around our collective ears (American ears and those of non-Americans alike), and it may be for that reason alone that I see their activities to date plus their threatened / hinted-at future ventures as being a quantum leap in aggression. Somehow it comes out to “mildly reassuring” to think it’s just that the idiots at the helm have the diplomatic skills of Trent Lott crossed with Howard Stern. I admit a lot of what worries me is what they’ve said they will do or are thinking of doing, and that what they’ve actually done so far is only bad for how badly they’ve handled the PR and the world-consensus issues on it.
So do you have anything to back this up, or are you just making shit up? Do you have, for instance, a foreign policy document from these countries saying that breaking U.S. hegemony is one of their top foreign policy goals?
Then again, if this is such a heinous crime, why is it OK for the U.S. to have the maintenance and expansion of its hegemony as one of its top foreign policy goals? That goes beyond a nation looking out for its own interests.
I’ve no written documents to back it either, but it’s quite clear that France (or at the very least the current french government) feels very concerned about US hegemony and that breaking it is indeed one of its foreign policy objectives. How would I know? Because it isn’t really something which is hidden. You might find many articles discussing related issues in (serious) french papers, on a regular basis. Germany isn’t as strongly dedicaced to this task by a long shot.
As for China, as far as I know (but I’m not really knowlegeable about this), it isn’t true. AFAIK, at this point in time, China feels that the better policy is to get along with the US, and to avoid directly confronting this country in the diplomatic field, except on issues which are deemed essential by the Chinese governement.
As for Russsia, I wouldn’t know what is its overall position.
The idea to have one party making the decisions is a good one, as the problem of France or gasp the USA or other nations with veto power, vetoing unfavourable decisions for them and thus effectively stalling the decision making has been done and will be done.
Giving the authority to make decisions to the country with the biggest military and the biggest economical interest to conveniently peace-keep other nations to kingdom come is a very bad idea though. If anyone should lead an international police force, it should be switzerland.