Say what? Motives matter, so of course it matters who did it because that helps tell us why they did it. And Reagan being Reagan I see no reason to believe that it was well meaning in any way.
And there, right there, you are assuming your outcome. Like it or not, the U.S. has a long, long history of intervention, humanitarian and otherwise.
(Apologies for having to give a somewhat long-winded answer!)
Firstly, the current PM is never referred to in the same way as the current President. Thus, “Prime Minister Cameron” is not used in any context where “President Obama” would be correct. Either you refer simply to “the Prime Minister”, or refer to them simply by name (e.g. “David Cameron”), or you have to use one with the other added parenthetically: “the Prime Minister, David Cameron, […]” or “David Cameron, the Prime Minister, […]” or of course “David Cameron (the Prime Minister) […]” or “the Prime Minister (David Cameron) […]”. (Naturally in all of these you can replace the first name with “Mr”, etc.)
Secondly, the way that former Presidents are referred to as “President [surname]” has no equivalent in British English, so you would have to use some such phrase as “Gordon Brown, the former Prime Minister, […]”, or “the then Prime Minister, Harold Macmillan, […]”, or whatever, depending on context.
British English follows American usage when referring to the present US President (thus, “President Obama”), but follows British usage when referring to past Presidents (thus, “Jimmy Carter, the former [US] President”). It would not be possible even in a newspaper headline to refer today to “President Clinton” without confusing the reader (e.g. they might assume at first glance that it was a swipe at the present Secretary of State).
Finally, “Mr Prime Minister” is never used (either for present or former PMs). A journalist interviewing the PM might use “Prime Minister” as a direct form of address, where an American journalist might use “Mr President”.
I think I’ve covered everything…! 
You might reread the OP. Or even the fucking thread title.
Or are you suggesting that the only measure of justification is success? :dubious: If so, please expound.
What does that have to do with anything?
What questions were those? Additionally, how did Reagan gin up the resources to successfully invade an island in two days with a military that had not seen action outside of the Lebanon peacekeeping mission in nearly a decade?
That’s one hell of a conspiracy theory you have there. Care to substantiate it, or should I just refer to a movie for the reasons?
Grenada could have been successfullly invaded by three regiments of Campfire Girls.
I visited Grenada eight years after the invasion, and an American-born woman who had been living there (specifically, on Union Island) most of her life told me she was never afraid for her own safety during any of the Bishop-General Whatshisface shenanigans…but when the Americans invaded, she was afraid.
And, she was certain that that student-kissing-the-tarmac media event was fraudulent in some way.
“Why the hell were those people there? What was the plan?” For starters. But I think you do know that, and can think of some more if you try.
(A) It didn’t take much to defeat a couple hundred Cuban construction workers, and (B) the fact that it was such a cock-up took a week is just one illustration of the haste with which it was done. Gen. Schwarzkopf’s autobiography is a good read, btw - he makes all that clear, from his seat close to the action (it was such a rush job that at one point he wound up in command of a Navy ship - every branch had to have a piece of the “action”, of course).
That’s one hell of an unquestioning Reagan worship you have there. And you don’t need a movie, you just need some common sense and some interest in reality.
I especially like the part where the runway was soon completed anyway - at US taxpayer expense.
The U.S. don’t need any reason to invade countries. In fact, there are hundred of invasions in the U.S. history, and as far as I know that country never gave an explanation about them.
Hardly. what I am suggesting is that you are looking at the ators rather than the action. This is ultimately quite similar to Cuba (twice), WWI, the European half of WW2, Korea - quite frankly, all American military actions since the Civil War. All were “optional” if you care to think that way. All had huge consequences. They were done by Democrats, Republicans, progressives, liberals, and conservatives (which had somewhat different meanings at various poitns in time).
This wasn’t all that different. The U.S. intervened in a chaotic situation with a variety of goals: humanitarian, public order, strategic power in the. If you want to condemn all U.S. military action, that’s a larger issue.
My points is that at least half of you are less concerned here with what happened and who decided it than it was Reagan who did it. Grenada was in a bad situation - we had the power to intervene and did so. It is easy to claim nothing bad would have happened, or that it wasn’t our business, or that we shoudl have elt them alone now. And yet, to have been there and had to make that decision is a different matter. Despite the old saying, hindsight isn’t 20/20. It is no less clouded than any other sight.
Look at what we are doing in Libya right now. (I think this is foolish, simply because I have deep concerns about who exactly the “rebels” actually are, but that’s irrelevant and I don’t want to get on an Obama v. whatever kick.) As far as the United States is concerned, it’s the same situation: a government we don’t like does things we don’t like in an area of strategic interest. Indeed, we have much less rational strategic interest in Libya, and I consider rational self-interest to be a much more moral thing to base your foreign policy on than humanitarianism. It generally causes far less damage.
So, in short, the intervention ended a dangerous conflict and a dangerous regime, restored actual working democracy, and the sialdn is now reasonably wealthy (given that it’s a small island nation, we can’t quite expect it’s going to be Switzerland-of-the-sea, but it does pretty well). You may perhaps argue the contrary, that everything would somehow be better absent our action, but I find that unlikely at best given the track record of similar situations.
By their fruits ye shall judge them. I follow Machiavelli (as he actually wrote and thought): I am interested in effectual truth. I am not ashamed to say we intervened for our own honest interest, and that it helped people on the side.
I am in no way a foreign policy idealist. In international relations, might always makes right, always has, and probably always will. Nor for that matter am I convinced that all the work of humanitarians has caused anything but yet more misery. Ultimately, they may tie up the good, but the evil loosen themselves. They have for 50 years had nothing more than the net effect of empowering the wicked and keeping down the just. And I am not particularly talking about their effect on us in the U.S.
And justified, too. This is a thread about justification, after all.
You are conflating a helluva lot of things under “things we don’t like”, especially when conflating genuine humanitarianism with the ideological fantasy of “anticommunism”. Not to mention that you’re dismissing domestic political “concerns” altogether, wholly without justification.
Since this “human” stuff doesn’t interest you, perhaps the “oil” stuff would?
No it don’t, and your callous attitude is not one to be proud of.
It created the conflict, and the “danger” was imaginary.
But you have to stand for something larger than yourself, or what do you matter?
So much for morality, ideals, your fellow man, and all that shit, then.
Nothing more is possible to say to you.
This was during the cold war when Russia was using Cuba as a staging area to spread armed revolt through South America. Had we not intervened it would be another Cuba.
That’s what the occupants of the House of Mirrors called “anticommunism” told (and tell) each other, yes. Factual rather than rhetorical support for that proposition is a bit lacking, though.
They were discussing the armed takeover by a marxist group so not sure where you’re going with this.
I don’t know if it would have necessarily been another Cuba, but given Austin’s close ties to Cuba and the dual use capability of the airport that was being constructed, I can understand the US government being concerned.
IOW the usual.
Interesting, huh?.
Just like all the military dictators we’ve propped up because they declared their democratic revolutionaries to be “communists”.
Calling something a name doesn’t make it the truth.
Heh. Try the interventions in the Dominican Republic (twice), Haiti (twice), Colombia (in order to create Panama) and Panama, to name a few. All far more comparable to Grenada than the Spanish-American War, World War I, World War II, the Korean War . . .
Are you noticing a trend there?
They labeled themselves.
I’ve posted the link before…
A. Whitney Brown has an explanation for the invasion.