Picture this scenario:
September 11th - terrorists fly aeroplanes into Buckingham Palace, the Parliament Buildings and Canary Wharf.
Everyone would be upset and sympathy would be offered by nations across the world. Would we see Dubya only hours after this occurred saying, ‘we will stand shoulder to shoulder…’ and pledging as much military help as the UK needed in eradicating this ‘new enemy’? I think not. Let us look historically. The United States is an intensely selfish nation. Whilst it was perfectly clear that a horrendous ‘attack on freedom and democracy’ was being carried out in Europe in 1939-1945, the US was still only motivated to help out after they were affected directly at Pearl Harbour. The First World War tells a similar story. It was only because Germany sank four American ships in 1917 that America was reluctantly persuaded to help the quest for eradicating injustice and oppression in Europe.
Some people might say that the reason that the British are showing such strong support is because so many of its nationals were killed in the Twin Towers. Of course, the fact that 114 Americans were killed on the Lusitania (a British ship) in 1915 did not affect American isolationism. It is still true today - America could not care less about atrocities in other countries unless they are in some way involved. If I may be so bold as to suggest that this is THE REASON that they have found themselves in this mess in the first place.
This is in no way meant to undermine the sense of grief caused by the very sad events of September 11th but it is America’s problem. When the US shows some concern for other nations when they are in times of need, then we can work together. Right now, however, America is so wrapped up in its financial and military dominance that it couldn’t really care less.
Leave them alone to fight their own battles - that is exactly what they would do if it happened to us.
Could you wrap that up into a single sentence or question to make it a bit clearer what we’re debating?
Sure:
This house believes that America should deal with its own problems
I agree.
However, I disagree that this particular problem is exclusively America’s.
As an American who saw and smelled the smoke coming from the Pentagon on Sept. 11, I would like to tell the OP that their post was crude, insensitive, and wrong to the nth degree. If this forum was the Pit, I would tell the OP to f–k you. However, I won’t. Also, the U.S. donates quite a lot of food, medicine and other resources to countries in need. I’m sure that if the alternative scenario the OP wrote about had happened, search and rescue teams from the U.S. would have been there as soon as possible to help out, much as they did during that massive earthquake in Turkey a few years? ago. I think you’re reprehensible and disgusting. Please don’t post again until you graduate from kindergarten and can display some human empathy.
This would kill what? 4 canaries, a couple of lackeys and some parliament members who couldn’t afford to go to the south of France for the week? 
>> What the hell is the UK doing?
:
: . . . having tea?
I’d debate you if I understood your position but I am so confused I may ruin the fun if by mistake I happened to be in agreement with you. Just to be safe I’ll say I disagree with you and ask you to provide some cites.
“This Canadian thinks it is time to speak up for the Americans as most generous and possibly the least appreciated people on all the earth.
Germany, Japan and, to a lesser extent, Britain and Italy were lifted out of the debris of war by the Americans who poured in billions of dollars and forgave other billions in debts. None of these countries is today paying even the interest on its remaining debts to the United States.
When the franc was in danger of collapsing in 1956, it was the Americans who propped it up, and their reward was to be insulted and swindled on the streets of Paris. I was there. I saw it. When distant cities are hit by earthquakes, it is the United States that hurries in to help. This spring, 59 American communities were flattened by tornadoes. Nobody helped.
The Marshall Plan and the Truman Policy pumped billions of dollars into discouraged countries. Now newspapers in those countries are writing about the decadent, warmongering Americans. I’d like to see
just one of those countries that is gloating over the erosion of the United States Dollar build its own airplane. Does any other country in the world have a plane to equal the Boeing Jumbo Jet, the Lockheed Tristar, or the Douglas 10? If so, why don’t they fly them? Why do all the International lines except Russia fly American planes?
Why does no other land on earth even consider putting a man or woman on the moon? You talk about Japanese technocracy, and you get radios. You talk about German technocracy, and you get automobiles. You talk about American technocracy, and you find men on the moon - - not once, but several times - and safely home again.
You talk about scandals, and the Americans put theirs right in the store window for everybody to look at. Even their draft-dodgers are not pursued and hounded. They are here on our streets, and most of them, unless they are breaking Canadian laws, are getting American dollars from ma and pa at home to spend here.
When the railways of France, Germany and India were breaking down through age, it was the American who rebuilt them. When the Pennsylvania Railroad and the New York Central went broke, nobody loaned them an old caboose. Both are still broke.
I can name you 5,000 times when the Americans raced to the help of other people in trouble. Can you name me even one time when someone else raced to the Americans in trouble? I don’t think there was outside help even during the San Francisco earthquake.
Our neighbors have faced it alone, and I’m one Canadian who is damned tired of hearing them get kicked around. They will come out of this thing with their flag high. And when they do, they are entitled to thumb their nose at the lands that are gloating over their present troubles. I hope Canada is not one of those.”
Gordon Sinclair
June 5 1973
Nor was it exclusively a European problem when an evil dictator was committing genocide or when, as I said in the OP, 114 Americans were killed on the Lusitania.
I suppose Mr Sinclair can now finally add England to the list.
Thank you Mr Blair.
We shall not soon forget this.
Ah, I think I understand where you’re coming from now.
I thought you were saying “Let the Americans handle it themselves, they are more than capable”, but it now seems like you’re saying “They stood by without helping in the past, so why should we help now?”
How (and who) exactly does it help if we adopt that stance?
Correct me if I’m wrong, bmerton, but I’m guessing at one point or another in your life you’ve said the words “American imperialism.” C’mon, tell us, am I right? In other word, we’re damned if we do (American running dog imperialists) and damned if we don’t (selfish isolationists).
>> Ah, I think I understand where you’re coming from now
I still haven’t a clue. Can someone please tell me what side I’m supposed to be playing for?
Perhaps I need to clarify my point.
I see nothing wrong the idea of other countries giving money/helping in search and rescue operations etc. Of course that is the right thing to do.
I do see something wrong with other countries sending troops to support America’s assault on Afghanistan.
There is a big difference.
Let me see if I understand your position: It was a bad thing when, before and during the early part of World War II, the United States turned its back and refused to get involved[sup]1[/sup] in confronting an evil movement with continent re-shaping ambitions and a global reach which, at that specific moment, was most particularly faced by the nations of Europe. Conversely, it must therefore have been a good thing when the United States finally did get directly and fully involved (if only because it was itself attacked and declared war upon) and helped to defeat the evil of Nazism. Up to this point, I’ve got no problem with your reasoning. But your rememdy is that 21st Century Europe should turn its back and refuse to get involved in confronting an evil movement with continent re-shaping ambitions and a global reach[sup]2[/sup] which, at this specific moment, is most particularly faced by the United States. Do you really think spite is an appropriate principle for ordering international relations?
Yes, the United States has a long history of isolationism, and there is still a streak of isolationism in America today. (At least with respect to the continent of Europe, the same could be said of Great Britain.) Fortunately, after World War II, statesmen much wiser than bmerton realized that isolationism like that of the U.S. between the World Wars could prove disastrous. The Government of the United States, the Government of the United Kingdom, and (eventually) the governments of seventeen other sovereign states signed a treaty in which they pledged to regard an attack on one of them or any of them as an attack upon them all. American soldiers stood watch with our European allies for over 40 years to in mutual defense against possible outside aggression. Although the threat has receded, American soldiers are still in Europe today. While I don’t pretend to have approved of all of the current American government’s policies before September 11 (or all of them since then, for that matter), I don’t think you have any basis to suggest that the U.S. would not have met its fundamental treaty obligations to defend the United Kingdom from armed attack (or to so defend Belgium, Canada, the Czech Republic, Denmark, France, Germany, Greece, Hungary, Iceland, Italy, Luxembourg, the Netherlands, Norway, Poland, Portugal, Spain, or Turkey, if it came to it). Hell, we defended Kuwait from armed attack, and we had no formal treaty obligation to do so. Of course, we had interests in Kuwait, but it’s not like we don’t have plenty of interests in Europe as well.
[sup]1[/sup]It is of course on oversimplification to say the United States refused to get involved in World War II before Pearl Harbor. A strong isolationist movement prevented the U.S. from directly entering the war; however, Franklin Roosevelt did just about everything he could to involve the U.S. in Britain’s defense, going well-beyond the normal bounds of neutrality. You have perhaps heard of “Lend-Lease”? And even before Pearl Harbor, the U.S. was in an undeclared naval war with Nazi Germany in the North Atlantic, with American and German warships firing at each other on sight.
[sup]2[/sup]I don’t particularly wish to get into a debate about the relative evil or the relative threat of Hitler and bin Laden; I am aware it’s not a perfect analogy, but what analogy is?
It helps the UK because it means that we do not put ourselves directly into the firing line for the next terrorist attack.
Hmmm.
>> It helps the UK because it means that we do not put ourselves directly into the firing line for the next terrorist attack.
And that’s why he is accusing the USA of being selfish. :rolleyes:
Winston Churchill once said:
“America usually does the right thing in the end, after its tried everything else”.
You are right that the US would probably have met its ‘fundamental’ treaty obligations.
Answer this, however:
Where are all the Belgian, Canadian, Czech, Danish, French, German, Greek, Hungarian, Icelandic, Italian, Norwegian, Polish, Portuguese, Spanish and Turkish troops in Afghanistan?
I feel that the UK is going slightly beyond these ‘fundamental’ obligations. I do not feel that the US would do the same if it were the other way round. Why, therefore, are we compromising our national security by helping the US more than is necessary when they would be unlikely to do the same for us.