I’m not sure the best term is “immoral,” but it didn’t involve US self-preservation.
Unless you can tell us how Syria or Darfur are threatening the US borders, directly or otherwise, yes.
I don’t agree, and I’m not the OP.
I totally agree with Robert163, service in the military is wrong, the military is wrong, and the soldier who went off with the girl who the o.p. had a crush on is a total scumbag.
Nicely done. I can here the short-circuiting of synapses as this is digested.
I get so tired of hearing that. Please tell me how the wars in Korea, Vietnam and Iraq threatened either my personal liberty or my ability to speak my mind? Not in a, “oh it’s not that simple” response. Because it is simple. Tell me exactly how I was threatened.
I was going to ask if the American military had pissed in the OP’s cornflakes this morning, but yours is good, too.
So military service would be okay if there were a draft, like in most of our wars.
Perhaps you could understand that if I feel that being in the US Military is wrong, like WRONG, then I would be bothered by people’s attempts to make excuses on this matter.
I wouldn’t say it was OK, not at all. I am really not sure how I feel about drafted service but I can defiantly say it is far less objectionable than non conscripted service.
Well, I thought you were supporting the OP’s arguments. Sorry for the confusion.
The OP listed wars he thought were “justified” and not. link
I was using info the poster argued, just not found in this thread. Again, I am sorry.
There are many who feel that war is justified to stop crimes against humanity. The US military was sorta used in this way in Libya last year.
I’m cheerfully prepared to understand your feelings on the matter, even if I disagree with them and am inclined to mock them.
It would be nice to think that certain world leaders and officials could sit down together over cup of coffee and concur on everything: land, religion, resources, trade, etc. But it doesn’t work that way.
It might work that way in some Roddenberrian future, but for now we’re only just over a half century away from a global war using nuclear weapons. We’ve come a long way; we’ve got a long way to go and a strong military is required in any democracy that hopes to remain as such (unless you have a very powerful big brother, or can band together with a bunch of other siblings).
Proactively invading other countries in order to maintain self-interests in a region is fine by me. I think South Koreans would agree too, especially that Oppo Gangnam guy.
May I ask what might seem to be a tangental, personal question?
Robert163, how old are you?
You said in the other thread that you feel there have been some American wars which were justified. Who, in your opinion, would have fought in those wars if nobody joined the military?
Same question crossed my mind. He sounds like me at 20 years old. The would has become much more gray as I became much more gray.
I don’t disagree that much of what the U.S. Military does isn’t what I would want it to do, if I were in charge. I’m not willing to demonize every service member, however.
I am supporting some of them, but selectively, and I haven’t read the related threads by the OP carefully.
No need to apologize. 
Now, back to the bash!
My frustration is this:
I put myself in the place of and Iraqi business owner who had their shop destroyed in a firefight. My shop is now destroyed. I don’t care about Americas complicated internal political structure. I don’t care that the kids involved on the US side of things were poor, or misled, or needed money for college or that they loved their country.
None of those distinctions matter to me. Not one bit.
I am simply taking this “debate” and framing it from the real life point of view of the people it affects. I’m not interested in sunday morning talk show explanations or objections. They all pale in comparison to my business that was just destroyed by automatic gun fire.
Even WW2 is not all that clear cut.
Japan made an argument that the US was trying to dictate Japan’s foreign policy at the point of an economic gun. (The oil & steel embargo threatened to crash Japans economy within 18 months.) Which we were. The attack on Pearl Harbor was because the Japanese leadership in charge at the time felt that the very survival of their nation was at risk.
The US Navy also had a “shoot on sight” order against Nazi U-boats at the latter half of '41, too, and giving all kinds of Lend Lease to Great Britain and the Soviet Union. I would not be surprised if Hitler felt war was inevitable, influencing him on his DoW of 8 December.
I can defiantly say that I have a hard time thinking of immoral actions that are only somewhat objectionable if one is being instructed to do them. When I think of immoral actions, I tend to think of things like abusing children, intentionally murdering a defenseless person, committing acts of vicious bigotry, and so on. If the government told me that I was expected to undertake a truly immoral act or face punishment, I don’t believe that the threat of punishment would be a compelling excuse for the immoral act.
How immoral can the act be of supporting the American political agenda really be if it is okay to do if the government simply tells you to do it?
The point we are raising is, who really has the moral culpability here? The soldier who pulled the trigger, or the president who ordered an unjustified war?
Scale down the size of the military by 75% or 90% and make sure it’s employed only for legitimate reasons, then we have something to discuss.