This stems from the Israel debate… does the USA control the world? does it rule… it was suggested that the only way the war in israel would stop was if the USA got involved??? is this the case?
is the world ruled by the USA? and do we have to live by USA rules?
to a certain extent the world is yes rulled by america, but other organisations have the power, will and ability to stand up to america eg. OPEC, russia, china and as a collective - europe. i have no problem with the world having a ‘police man’ aslong as the country in question does so in a just and independant manner, the usa does NOT do this, it will only intervien if it is forced to or is in it’s interest.
therefore i think a united europe challenging america for it’s superiority is the only way towards equality
Large states, or conglomerations of states, are surely the problem and not the answer?
Europe would not really make a successful counterbalance to America from the perspective of Indonesia, etc. who will still be exploited by the West/ MEDCs in general.
After all, the existence of the USSR as a counterweight to the USA checked each other’s influence to an extent, but encouraged both to play a very active role in other states’ affairs e.g. Afghanistan.
No, the reason for the Afgahn invasion was to open the possibility of the invasion of pakistan. which would result in a warm water port in the indian ocean.
it would appear that you are thinking of vietnam when america interviened in another country’s affairs, the afgahn war was your average turf war.
[This message has been edited by macca (edited 09 April 2002).]
so, inorder for the USA not to be in control we need something to out-rank it, something bigger… which would inevitably leave to more problems as the cold war demonstrated…
so, is the answer a global organisation with everyone included? ie. the world! this would then take everyone back to square one, as within this world people would struggle for dominance??!!
is the whole situation one which will rotate as a cycle and never cease… until nuclear war that is??
Invasion of Pakistan…!!! Sorry Macca I don’t quite understand !
The way the war in Israel can be stopped would be through the arab leaders uniting, its as simple as that. Now whether they unite is another matter. There is no doubt that were the USA to withdraw their economic/military support Israel will cease to exist withing three (working !) days !
The US can stop the war will it absolutely not.
The world is influenced greatly by America, whatever America thinks right will go. The danger is America acting like judge, jury and executioner, answerable to nobody except for its allies, and with a man like George.W.Bush (Jnr) in charge, it scares me all the more.
The world is dominated by the US, not ruled, not yet anyway. I’m sure that time is not far away…and without a doubt, we have to live by the rules of the US.
People have commented that maybe the Cold war was a bad thing, I don’t think it was, it held America and Russia in a sort of taut like equilibrium. That equilibrium no longer exists, America is a loose cannon.
What are we waiting for:
THE UNITED STATES OF ISRAEL.
I wasn’t referring to invasions, but merely to intervention in general.
You can’t dispute the fact that America’s involvement in the region (prior to September) was the direct result of Soviet involvement.
its quite simple. america has bigger guns than anyone else, therefore it can walk all over anyone it wants.
“mr hussain. making weapons of mass destruction is threating to world peace and is also evil. therefore you must stop. or we will attack you with our own far superior arsenal of weapons of mass destruction.”
quote - “These people have misunderestimated the resolve of the American people” - George W Bush
misunderestimated? thats not even a bloody word!! Really George you shouldn’t try and use such big phrases, stick to the ones you know…like ‘bomb’ or ‘crusade’.
quote - “pakis” - George W Bush whilst on a diplomatic visit to Pakistan
Its always reassuring to know that we have such an articulate, tactful, intelligent man controlling the world.(that was sarcastic by the way just in case none of you picked it up)
[I am also aware that this post bears no significance at all to any of the issues raised in this forum…but I couldn’t give a toss.]
Surely the way forward to this extent would be the installation of democracy for third world states that the US and western economies rely on. If a group of nations such as Europe, or Europe and America/Canada/Australia etc signed a pact forming some kind of ‘League of Democratic Nations’ which had an absolute commitment to installing a democracy on every country on earth. This would provide the exploited peoples whose labour/resources are crucial to the Western economy to form coalitions etc against the military/economic might of the west and allow themselves better working conditions/fairer shares.
What strikes me here is that most of the threads implicitly accept the Bushian dichotomy between American and the world (You’re either for us or against us etc.). This may be the predominant mood in America and the world but it doesn’t have to be. The world isn’t monolithic (as has already been pointed out) but neither is America. Maybe we should concentrate more on replacing that ‘and’ with an ‘in’ and see America in the world. If both ‘sides’ could see this, or since it’s so obvious, at least try to keep it in mind, we might start asking if America’s actions are good for America and the world , not simply whether the world has to follow America.
In reply to the original message (because i really am to tired to read the other posts so this may have been said a few times)
If america did not fund israel then the country would not be able to sustain an army of such massive proportions millions of US dollars go to afghanistan each year to keep americans happy and this money goes a long way to funding the army.
The sad thing is this will continue because very powerful isralies in ameica use there subsadies to continue this. For example if a party member votes against supporting israel his/her opponent will be recieving huge financial support.
For this reason nobody dares not to support israel even though what they are doing is not exceptable. In other words america may rule world politics. But americas world politics are ruled by money.
I’d like to say: I think George Bush is a fricken dumb ass, who has a vocabulary the size of Rhode Island.
But do I think the US controls the world???..well, I don’t know. I’m American, I could be biased, but in some ways we do. Culturally, we are extremely powerful, and aspects of American culture has assimilated into most cultures in the world. Diplomatically…we could rule the world if we didn’t have a dumb ass president, but that’s a WHOLE nother story. Economically, we’re strong…though not now, I guess, with the stock market in shambles and falling apart. I guess we may not rule the world, but it’s really up to the other nations in the world to try and use their power if they don’t like the US having such influence. If you simply let us use our influence, then we’ll use it.
England could take an active role in the Middle East, but the world says that America is what is needed there for peace. Perhaps the rest of the world just doesn’t want to deal with it, and gives the US the things they don’t wanna deal with…don’t get really upset by that though, because I’m naive and 17, and a Senior, I don’t have a license to know what I’m talking about, just a license to drive.
Enmgland intervien in the Middle East, firstly England in such an arean doesn’t exist, but Britain does intervien, why do you think the Irainian Embassy siege occured, what about troops in Oman, what about prison officers in Palestine (or their planned deployment), to realise the work done by Britain in Middle East ally ou have to do is look at the history of the area, e.g. Palestine was set up by the British, Saudi/and most of the peninsula was part of the British empire.
Pardon me for saying England, I’ll say Britain from now on.
But if you say there is such a large British influence in the Middle East, then why don’t they use that influence? Getting mad about the US doing all this diplomatic work world-wide won’t get much sympathy if another country could do the same job.
Not going to happen. There isn’t enough interest among the public, what interest there is is too highly polarized to have any electoral gain. And most importantly there is no economic imperative for the UK, other than the general propping up of Israel as a base in the area against OPEC and the oil owners, which the US can do well enough by itself.
Even if we wanted to, we don’t have the resources or willpower to get involved in such a deep-rooted conflict.
Of course we do make some money by flogging guns/tanks etc to the Israelis. And probably the Palestinians too.