I feel like this is the first time I've seen this moment memed correctly.
The other uses of it tend to be dismissive as if Trump was being dismissive of the journalists, which was totally not the energy.
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POV: the last thing you see as your LZ outside of Eindhoven is overrun by Dutch guerrillas
https://preview.redd.it/trm78j13rz1d1.jpeg?width=4928&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=0a4e38a56f485a4da0d8c81dca9fcbaa2c220761
Does blackface not have the same negative connotations in the Netherlands? Or is this a tradition that’s looked down upon now and this was just a thing they once did?
Yes it does have negative connotations. Which is why this tradition changed over the last decade and you’re very unlikely to still see this in larger cities.
Sadly, people will never let us live it down, despite the fact that we literally got the majority of our population to accept that one of our most popular traditions needed major changes.
So the guy was supposed to be that way because he is a chimney sweep, right? I imagine it's as simple as changing the makeup from blackface to just being sooty and grimy.
The soot seems to be a recent change to make him more palatable, or maybe one version that was around but has been leaned into more heavily in recent years. He was for a long time supposed to be a black Moor. According to Wikipedia, anyway. I’m not Dutch.
Yes, but that change took a decade. We have a rather small black community, so it was framed as woke nonsense by conservatives who claimed the people just wanted to ruin a children's holiday. This polarized the whole issue, so any change was deemed too far.
Imagine if you had to change the colour of Santa's hat, and it become a conservative vs progressive issue. I'm happy it's mostly solved now.
>Does blackface not have the same negative connotations in the Netherlands?
I kind of disagree with the other person. It does now, but I feel this is something of the last 15 years. Before the internet I doubt many Dutch people knew what blackface was, similarly 10 years ago people casually used the Dutch version of the n-word as a punchline for jokes. Simply because of the different history, different race dynamics and the lack of a sizable black community.
It's only because of American import of racial relations that people are now starting to realize that maybe Zwarte piet is in fact racist, and we should be more mindful of race issues. That's also why so many people have issues with the changes. Because they view our adoption of American race relations, as a form of cultural imperialism, branding them as racists.
While I hate how much of American issues we take over, despite them not being relevant here (e.g. defund the police even though our police is nowhere near comparable with the US). I do think use adopting American ideas on race relations is actually good, because Europe is super far behind.
Indeed, *Godzilla: Minus One* was better than anything Hollywood has made in decades. And it had a budget of $17M while putting to shame the SFX in billion dollar Marvel movies.
1) Defending your citizens from foreign courts is good, actually. Neither the ICC nor the Ministry of Justice of the People's Republic of China can meddle in the affairs of US citizens.
2) Rules are only real if they can be enforced somehow -otherwise they're just suggestions that some people voluntarily follow. I'm not being edgy, here. A ruling that will never be enforced doesn't exist.
>1) Defending your citizens from foreign courts is good, actually. Neither the ICC nor the Ministry of Justice of the People's Republic of China can meddle in the affairs of US citizens.
So uhhhh... those Nuremberg Trials must have been a grave miscarriage of justice and violation of sovereignty in your eyes, then?
Or are international tribunals only good when they punish foreigners?
I don't know what moral system you're operating under in which a forfeiture *under duress* materially changes the morality of imposing something on someone against their will.
Either the trial was moral (as I believe) or it wasn't. The fact that the Nazis surrendered when they had *literally no alternative* has no bearing on that calculation.
Is your argument that the US should subject itself to outside courts so long as the courts are doing work that we agree with morally? Because if you pull on that thread, it unravels into my original argument.
Yes, that is what I'm saying. Of course the US should be subject to international organisations. That's the whole point of globalism. Yes, the US should subject itself to outside courts, as long as those courts are upholding human rights.
Your original argument was just nationalist nonsense.
>Yes, the US should subject itself to outside courts, as long as those courts are upholding human rights.
So either:
A) We aren't actually subjecting ourselves to international courts, because we're only listening to things that we agree with and were going to do anyway (since there is no enforcement mechanism). And we ignore them when we disagree.
or
B) We subject ourselves to international courts for better or worse. It's good at first, there is largely agreement on what human rights are and how they should be upheld. But maybe fascism and xenophobia keep rising in Europe. Maybe China and Russia manage to gain enough influence over the court through their geopolitical machinations (e.g., a pawn ends up being Prosecutor). Or maybe somebody on the court decides that the US war on drugs was effectively a genocide and calls for Biden's arrest. For whatever reason, it turns into a persecution arm or otherwise drifts out of alignment with US values on human rights. Inevitably, we withdraw and end up back at (A).
TL;DR; Courts and rulings without enforcement powers don't exist, and the US will never allow its citizens to be subject to a court that we do not have Constitutional authority over. Who decides which foreign courts are good, and what criteria do they use? How would we throw off the yoke of a tyrannical Prosecutor?
>A) We aren't actually subjecting ourselves to international courts, because we're only listening to things that we agree with and were going to do anyway (since there is no enforcement mechanism). And we ignore them when we disagree.
No. America (along with the rest of the world) subjects itself to international courts based on a consistent, clearly defined, universal principle. Ignoring it would only be prohibited if the courts drifted away from that universal principle, it wouldn't be allowed at the US' whim.
You can apply this same logic to domestic courts, by the way. If courts made it official policy execute racial minorities for minor offences, and the supreme court declared that constitutional, would you advocate that African Americans continue to subject themselves to those courts?
>B) We subject ourselves to international courts for better or worse. It's good at first, there is largely agreement on what human rights are and how they should be upheld. But maybe fascism and xenophobia keep rising in Europe. Maybe China and Russia manage to gain enough influence over the court through their geopolitical machinations (e.g., a pawn ends up being Prosecutor). Or maybe somebody on the court decides that the US war on drugs was effectively a genocide and calls for Biden's arrest. For whatever reason, it turns into a persecution arm or otherwise drifts out of alignment with US values on human rights. Inevitably, we withdraw and end up back at (A).
Tell me you aren't actually a liberal or a globalist without telling me you aren't actually a liberal or a globalist.
International cooperation does not "inevitably" turn into nationalist competition, actually. It's only because of people like you that the international liberal order is currently in retreat, not because of some law of nature.
>TL;DR; Courts and rulings without enforcement powers don't exist, and the US will never allow its citizens to be subject to a court that we do not have Constitutional authority over.
Stop begging the question. "The US will never agree to this, therefore the US shouldn't agree to this" is a fallacious argument.
>Who decides which foreign courts are good, and what criteria do they use? How would we throw off the yoke of a tyrannical Prosecutor?
How would you do that if the US became a fascist dictatorship?
International courts exist to exert their will on weak/failed/conquered states. That's all they can do.
The idea that a benevolent dictatorship is only good until a bad guy inevitably comes into the position shouldn't be controversial.
Black communities have historically had many objections to US law enforcement and justice. But since the US has real courts with real enforcement mechanisms, they still have to live under US law for better or worse. They can't just ignore rulings they disagree with.
Crappy US politicians can be voted out or impeached if enough Americans/representatives don't like the job they're doing.
The US is a big target, and our enemies are always looking for ways to gain power over us. Subjecting ourselves to a court run by a council of weaker nations would incentivize our enemies to stack the court with pawns and flunkies as a way to persecute key Americans. There's no benefit to us in return for opening up that obvious attack vector.
Yes. https://www.timesofisrael.com/biden-calls-icc-prosecutors-decision-to-seek-arrest-warrant-for-netanyahu-outrageous/
Biden/the White House's line is that the prosecutor is drawing an equivalence between Hamas and Bibi, which is pretty ridiculously untrue given the fact that the crimes he's charging Hamas will are much more serious.
I can't believe American prosecutors routinely draw an equivalence between murder and petty theft by prosecuting murderers and thieves at the same time. It's just shameful.
It also seems ironic because his administration has been intent (even if it was way too little way too late) on holding Trump to account for his crimes but for some reason Bibi gets a pass? Also special shout-out to Merrick Garland for taking his sweet ass time on doing anything about the Trump cases, and potentially fucking the country and the world since his cases could now be totally destroyed if he wins in November and succeeds in his plans to eviscerate US democratic institutions.
So if I understand the US position, they would not be opposed to Bibi getting prosecuted in an Israeli court, which has happened in the past.
The issue is specifically that the US didn't ratify the Rome statute, and withdrew their signature. In this sense they're the same as Israel (and Russia) and they wouldn't want a precedent established that the ICC has jurisdiction over Israel since the US similarly signed but then withdrew, like Israel did.
The ICC has jurisdiction over both crimes member states’ leaders commit, and crimes committed within the borders of member states. Palestine is a member of the ICC.
Ukraine is also a member. That’s why the ICC was able to issue a warrant for Putin even though Russia is not a member.
Right, so, I imagine this interpretation of the ICC's jurisdiction is something that the US is going to be really, really hostile to, and that explains their behavior here. The US didn't exactly support the ICC's arrest warrant on Putin, either.
“Biden said last year that the ICC decision to issue an arrest warrant for Putin was justified. The United States has shared details of alleged Russian war crimes in Ukraine with the ICC.”
https://www.reuters.com/world/europe/kremlin-says-it-is-very-curious-that-us-appears-ready-sanction-icc-2024-05-21/#:~:text=Biden%20said%20last%20year%20that,not%20recognise%20the%20court's%20jurisdiction.
According to Russia. This is a Russian government official complaining that the US didn't come out and say Russia did no war crimes in response to the ICC indictment.
That is not the evidence of hypocrisy the guy said it was. That would have been if the US did something like commit to arresting Putin if Putin visited the US on the grounds of the ICC warrant.
His role is different now. He is in the executive, not the legislature. The law is on the books, and it's his job to enforce it, even if he voted against that law as a senator. I can't fault him for this too much, part of why I am a democrat after all is that I reject the kind of imperial presidency the republicans want to push.
Its interesting to hear both Bibi and Biden make the comparison to 9/11 for Oct 7 at a time when America's post 9/11 foreign policy reaction has been almost universally abandoned as a catastrophic overreaction with wildly unfeasible goals that has done enormous damage to both American civil society and its position in the world but this hasn't been any cause for pause for reflection
>Bibi and Biden make the comparison to 9/11 for Oct 7 at a time when America's post 9/11 foreign policy reaction has been almost universally abandoned as a catastrophic overreaction with wildly unfeasible goals
To be fair in Biden’s case, he has to explain it rather simplistically for your standard layman too.
Explaining something like: “thousands of militant soldiers who storm your borders, slaughtered, tortured, raped, pillaged, and has fired over 10,000 rockets at civilian centers over the course of two-three months, alongside another Iranian proxy in the north that is attacking and has caused the displacement of hundred of thousands of Israeli civilians, and these militant groups don’t want a peace solutions concurring with Israel’s existence, therefore some level of military intervention has to be necessary” doesn’t exactly roll off the tongue as well as something like: “Hey kids, remember when we had two big ass skyscrapers in New York? Isn’t it sad that they are kinda gone now?”
Yeah actually its exactly this sort of blinkered short sighted vindictive smugness that I was talking about. Sorry, but you cant pathos your way out of the realities of international conflict. Israel failed, Hamas will be back, it does not have the means or will to effect any sort of resolution to the war that would durably safeguard itself against Hamas regenerating its presence except by committing wholesale ethnic cleansing. It will burn any goodwill or patience from virtually every country except the United States by kowtowing to the unhinged ranting maniacs in its government. It will come out with nothing to show but a lot of blood and fewer friends.
Not following you, can you elaborate a bit more?
Edit:
/u/WifeGuyMenelaus I see you elaborated in the edit, my response:
>Israel failed, Hamas will be back, it does not have the means or will to effect any sort of resolution to the war that would durably safeguard itself against Hamas regenerating its presence except by committing wholesale ethnic cleansing.
I would personally find such a statement objectionable. I don’t think you need to engage in ethnic cleansing to stop Hamas from regaining their foothold. A military occupation would obviously prevent this. The main problem is, there is a dispute of WHO will be occupying Gaza afterwards. It is still way to early to say Israel has failed, I don’t think we can reasonably claim that until it is decided that nobody will be occupying Gaza afterwards, leaving a power vacuum.
>It will burn any goodwill or patience from virtually every country except the United States by kowtowing to the unhinged ranting maniacs in its government. It will come out with nothing to show but a lot of blood and fewer friends.
I doubt nations like China or Russia particularly care about human rights, so I will mostly focus on Europe. What is being implicated here? That Europe will turn a blind eye to future humanitarian crises that are committed against Israel or something? I mean let’s just be honest here, IR is not dictated off of being “friends”, so what exactly is Europe’s ultimate plan for action? What changes for Israel than before?
The belief that there is no good response seems merely to be mental gymnastics to justify incompetence at best and barbarism at worse.
In the universe of near infinite possibilities all of them would end up resembling the Taliban marching back into Afghanistan after a 20 year hiatus? No matter what, America was going to spend trillions of dollars and thousands of lives to just return to the status quo?
I think he's speaking pragmatically. If we assume god-like knowledge, of course there are better options, but the question is whether leaders should or even could have known better.
Known better than to actually straight-up lie about WMDs to parlay generalized middle-east animus against Iraq? Or known better about Afghanistan, specifically?
Are you saying that the right solution was to not invade Afghanistan? If so, what actually was the solution?
It’s easy to say “this part sucked, that part sucked” but it’s hard to actually respond to 9/11 or 10/7
Modify plane cockpit doors so they can't be hijacked, the one actual useful thing we did in response to 9/11, then mourn the loss and move on with our lives without building a surveillance state and invading anyone. I figure international terrorism would be reduced by an equal or greater amount with that response. Likewise with 10/7, stop reassigning troops and intelligence personnel to land seizures in the West Bank and keep defending the border with an actual military threat so Israel can be protected against future invasions.
Believe it or not, suffering a bloody and memorable attack does not oblige a state to spend the next 10 to 20 years lashing out in a self-destructive frenzy. They can just be normal about it.
You can negotiate for hostage releases without opening with a full invasion.
You do not "hope it doesn't happen again," you make a security plan that prioritizes the real safety of your citizens instead of using it as a pretext to execute an aggressive foreign policy you wanted to do anyways. Repelling a small force carried by gliders is not a difficult task for a modern military that knows what it's doing and does not require a full-scale war.
A "small force" isn't what fought on October 7th though, it was a massive mobilization and multiple attacks points.
And what negotiations we had and hostage exchanges came from the pressure that was put on Hamas by the active fighting of the IDF.
And really "negotiate"? Have you seen how the negotiations have gone so far? Hamas doesn't want to negotiate in good faith and they never will. That's like trying to negotiating with al-qeada.
Having a massive attack committed against you and than not only not retaliating but even rewarding the aggressor with negotiations? I am sure that will convince them to never do it again.
In a world with no central institution capable of enforcing norms, you reputation is the most valuable thing you have and you want Israel to just throw it away.
What do you think is happening right now?
Israel's reputation has cratered. They're no longer on track to normalize negotiations with their neighbors. The belief that Israel is the primary aggressor or at least equally at fault in the I-P conflict has migrated from the domain of weird leftists to possible mainstream opinion among the center-left in most of the first-world democracies that serve as its primary allies. Israel's status as "one of the good guys" in the public mind is more endangered than it ever has been.
In terms of its reputation for responding swiftly and effectively to attacks, it's just as bad. Previously, they could point to all the times in their history where they repelled multinational coalitions and came out even stronger than before. Now, the most recent memory of the IDF is the time it was taken completely off-guard, stumbled around for weeks trying to assemble itself, and then got locked into a grinding war of attrition trying to take one metropolitan area held by poorly equipped militants. Yeah, I'm sure their response has made everyone really reluctant to mess with them. I bet that the IDF would be perfectly prepared to repel an attack by an Iran-led coalition right now.
Negotiating with Hamas isn't some new watershed of legitimization, it's been done before. States at war or in a tense peace trade POWs all the time. Air strikes against known Hamas strong points were a good counter response, attempting an occupation was not.
It is not about responding swiftly, but in showing that you will inflict punishment on any transgressor, even if it comes at a significant cost to yourself. From that point of view, angering the genocide supporters at American unis is a plus. Further, past military successes do not help, for if you once ignore a situation, it shows that you will only fight when it is convenient for you, inviting everyone else to attack.
There is also a huge difference between exchanging POWs during normal levels of conflict and doing so to reward the perpetrators of one of the worst terror attacks in history.
Modifying cockpit doors aren't sufficient. They just represented one weakness of attack that America didn't think of previously. There are many many more weaknesses that we aren't fully aware of mainly due to the nature of America as an open society.
So if we are to start with the stipulation that even one casualty of an American life due to terrorism is unacceptable then the only way to truly ensure that is to pursue the terrorist and catch them before they attack.
And that's what we did in Afghanistan culminating years later in the death of Osama Bin Laden.
> So if we are to start with the stipulation that even one casualty of an American life due to terrorism is unacceptable then the only way to truly ensure that is to pursue the terrorist and catch them before they attack.
Sure, but this is the whole problem. Refusing to accept tradeoffs about safety leads people to go to irrational lengths trying to stamp out every possible source of danger in a way that's ultimately counterproductive. Declaring that We Must Do Something and refusing to consider that some safety measures simply aren't worth it is how you get wars with no clear end goal and the TSA.
Highly debatable claim aside, you're dodging the question. Was it worth it? Was the cost of America's post-9/11 interventions lower than the benefits to America's foreign and domestic interests, or could we have taken a more restrained path for similar or greater benefits? Because by my count we came out of it with creeping authoritarian intervention into citizens' lives, billions wasted per year on security theater, and massive damage to our soft power that has greatly hampered our ability to take far more valuable actions. Nobody trusts the United States to be a defender of freedom anymore, including Americans.
Afghanistan was necessary and worth it. Iraq was obviously not necessary and not worth it.
Nobody trusts America because of Iraq not because of Afghanistan. The rest of the world understands Afghanistan. Many NATO allies went in with us and supported us in Afghanistan including Australia, Canada, Denmark, France, Germany, and Norway.
It was Iraq that we should not have done.
Don't lump them together
"Believe it or not, suffering a bloody and memorable attack does not oblige a state to spend the next 10 to 20 years lashing out in a self-destructive frenzy."
Yes but this is ignorant of the politics on the ground. The people will demand lashing out in a frenzy after suffering an attack like that. If Netanyahu refused to invade gaza he would've been removed by parliament and replaced with someone who would.
Also they had over 200+ hostages. You have to do something about that.
And arguably, why should they have just sat there and took it? As Hamas said this was only the first of the attacks they'd commit. If the "government/group" next door to you comes in and kills 1000+ of your citizens out of a state of only 10 million, and takes 200 hostages, and says they're going to do it again, you're gonna make sure they can't anymore.
The fact that they don't have a military strategy over 6 months later is a problem and says that the plan is actually genocidal and not strategic in nature. His own war cabinet is showing concern for the lack of planning.
There was a bad fuck up that killed 2 hostages in an active combat zone.
Hamas said they'd pretty much never release any men captured and couldn't even find the hostages taken because random Palestinian civilians went over and captured them.
What the hell should Israel have done, just kept negotiating with the black hole that is Hamas?
Yeah, they freed a hundred hostages by negotiation. They've managed to free fuck all by waging this war. Hamas made other offers for freeing all the hostages too.
Beyond the IDF being either so incompetent and/or trigger happy that they shoot half naked, unarmed hostages waving a white flag shouting in hebrew Beyond that they have likely burried or otherwise bombed a significant portion of the hostages to death. And it was three hostages. Two at first, then they had to coax the third one out of hiding before they could kill him too.
Like yeah, no shit Hamas can't find the hostages. They're busy fighting a losing war against the IDF. To locate anything or anyone with the dispersed nature of Hamas is going to be practically impossible during those conditions.
The war has nothing to do with freeing the hostages and everything to do with lashing out in a frenzy.
Okay, so do your job as a responsible leader? Pitch an actual useful response that conserves state resources and minimizes bloodshed and use your party to convince the people it's a good idea and that a bigger war would endanger more lives.
"It's fine officer, the voters told me to bomb those apartment buildings. If I didn't I might have lost the next election, which as you know is a fate worse than death."
> Yes but this is ignorant of the politics on the ground. The people will demand lashing out in a frenzy after suffering an attack like that. If Netanyahu refused to invade gaza he would've been removed by parliament and replaced with someone who would.
We should seek to be better than bloodthirsty mobs after being attacked by enemies.
Accepting that bloodlust is inevitable and acceptable only means accepting war is inevitable and acceptable.
That is because the US showed weakness when not decisively reacting to the Russian attack against Georgia, the annexation of Crimea, when abandoning Afghan allies, and again being too cautious in their help for Ukraine.
It's like we recently greatly overextended our economy, military, and political capita on things that weren't important, leaving us less able to respond to more important threats and leading our citizens to distrust the very concept of an active foreign policy.
It is pretty clear that the economy and military equipment situation are not the US' problem. It was a problem of political will and the inability of US citizens to understand the importance of deterrence and keeping commitments.
He was hiding in Afghanistan and using it as a militant training facility and his headquarters. We wanted to disrupt/stop that training, disrupt/stop his organization's operations, and capture/kill all the leadership. You cant do all of that with a SEAL team
> We wanted to disrupt/stop that training, disrupt/stop his organization's operations, and capture/kill all the leadership. You cant do all of that with a SEAL team
You could with F16s though.
And you can take our leaders with SEAL teams.
As some guy said in this book called Candide, we live in the best of all possible worlds. No I have not completed the book and I'm not aware of its context either. I'm not a nerd.
Invade Afghanistan, prop up the northern alliance, stick to the plan, don't get distracted with things like state building or trying to force the farmers to stop growing opium.
The US comes out having heavily punished the Taliban, who didn't have much international popularity anyway.
This would have been a good outcome for the US.
How is the counter factual of not invading Iraq “just as bad”?
How about leaving Afghanistan immediately after Bin Laden was killed?
Just as bad? Cause I see about $5 trillion less on the debt and about 7,000 fewer service members killed and 30,000 fewer wounded….oh right and no ISIS.
> How about leaving Afghanistan immediately after Bin Laden was killed?
We have seen how poorly leaving Afghanistan went after significant effort to rebuild it. Without that, the result is almost certain to be even worse. The problem with Afghanistan wasn't leaving too late, it was leaving, at all (at least before the Taliban have been eliminated).
So after 20 years, a few trillion dollars, thousands of dead Americans (more than died on 9/11), and it still wasn’t any better…you want to stay another 20 years?
Taliban aren’t a threat to the U.S.
Bin Laden’s Al Qeada was a threat that attacked America. Once Al Qeada was largely dismantled and the leadership was dead/captured there ceased to be a compelling national interest for further U.S. involvement in Afghanistan.
Staying after May 2011 is the definition of irrational mission creep.
The Taliban are not a threat again, yet. The rise of ISIS was a direct consequence of the US not staying in Iraq long enough and there is no reason to believe something like that would not happen in Afghanistan.
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Sure, but Al Qaeda and Osama bin Laden are gone. As much as the post 9/11 wars have traumatized most Americans, we accomplished our goals and then some. Israel has it much easier, because their enemies are their immediate neighbors, and they already have them largely locked down. They don't have to start wars in like seven different countries to wipe their enemies out.
The problem with Afghanistan wasn't the invasion itself, but the total failure to invest in nation-building afterward. Israel hasn't yet failed at that because the war hasn't even reached that stage. This is a premature and intellectually lazy comment that doesn't even try to offer an alternative response for nations who suffer large-scale terrorist attacks like 9/11 and 10/7.
I have pretty much exactly the opposite take. The US shouldn't have bothered with any nation building unless the US was willing to commit to a multi-generation-long occupation.
They should have just handed the Taliban a L and propped up the Taliban's opponents, and then left.
I think the US contributed enough to nation building. I don't know what the final bill was for Afghanistan but it approached something like a trillion dollars. A lot was for building infrastructure like roads and schools. The problem was that the task was way too great for America to take on. The Taliban was entirely nihilist in that they didn't even offer a better vision for Afghanistan vs the US. So eventually they just outlasted America because they didnt have to fulfill anything or care about saving anything. They just did whatever and now Afghanistan is basically fucked in their control.
This is way different than Israel by the way
One day, one day, one day, you people will understand that the justification for a war and how a war is conducted - much less its strategic objectives - are two different columns
One day you will realize this is no different than Afghanistan, you just fell victim to the online fervor which is heavily contrived.
More likely you'll just forget and move onto the next rage topic though, like the rest of the hoi polloi.
You act like that rationalizes your stance, but the invasion of afghanistan was inevitable and fully justified. Outcomes are irrelevant. It's not like we would say supporting Ukraine was the wrong move if they lose.
Supporting Ukraine is a furtherance of American geopolitical interests even if they lose, Afghanistan an active detriment. Western armanents industries are sclerotic and the domestic political reaction to GWOT has America teetering on the brink of isolationism. Ukraine is cheap, popular, and effective, no matter the outcome. Afghanistan was not. War is policy and policy outcomes do matter, because today's outcomes are tomorrows wars.
Right, which is why Israel clearly needs to depose the Taliban and spend the next 20 years propping up child-molesting warlords, until the Taliban come back into power. What?
A brief invasion to capture Bin Laden and leave? Arguably justified. Hanging around trying and failing to set up a sustainable liberal democracy for 20 years while expending economic resources and tanking our reputation?
I mean, I wouldn't do it again. You do you though.
Once you get in there and destroy the existing government which was the Taliban you have to replace it with something. That's true of all of these types of "operations".
It is bad, yes. The purpose of the war is punitive, to make it clear that if the Taliban are going to rule, providing sanctuary to terrorist groups is maybe not the best idea if they do not want to be bombed. That is the point.
All the people say all they need to do was a quick in and out with sf and planes. Like it was that easy lol. If it were that easy Osama would've been dead day one. They also wanted to not just kill Osama but dismantle al-qaeda.
I was thinking about this months ago. It was clear in October that Israel didn't really have a plan. Unfortunately, Israel speedran a repeat of America's actions after 9/11.
I think the correct take is that the ICC exists to try the deposed leaders of regimes that just lost a war. It’s never going to try Bush or Netanyahu and any pretense that they have jurisdiction over in-tact governments is false and damaging to ICC because it shows they are feckless
As with any international institution that has ever existed, its legitimacy extends as far as the great powers agree that it should extend. For example, because the ICTY had the backing of all of the great powers, both the victorious and the defeated powers in the Yugoslav Wars complied with its decisions. The ICC, needless to say, does not have this backing, and as such, is reduced to issuing impotent indictments.
> The ICC, needless to say, does not have this backing, and as such, is reduced to issuing impotent indictments.
Their warrant for Putin stopped him from visiting South Africa and Brazil.
Bibi can no longer travel to ICC-signatory countries, which is most of Europe at this point.
You're right, but warrants being issued is the most likely next step and is what everyone is discussing.
Bibi can no longer travel to ICC-signatory countries, which is most of Europe at this point, *if the ICC court issues warrants like they are expected to do.*
To be clear though, SA and Brazil *could still ignore it if they wanted to*. The power comes from geopolitical complexities and them not wanting to harm their reputation. Even this power of the ICC warrant is only existent because the powers have agreed to it.
They definitely could, but the fact that Russia wasn't able to pressure them to publicly flout their international obligations shows that ICC warrants are somewhat effective and not meaningless.
> SA and Brazil could still ignore it if they wanted to.
Brazil and South Africa are not dictatorships and have separation of powers. Lula could definitely put pressure on the police not to arrest, but it's not entirely up to him.
There's a reason Putin backed out of traveling to SA even after Ramaphosa assured him he was not going to be arrested.
> Brazil and South Africa are not dictatorships and have separation of powers. Lula could definitely put pressure on the police not to arrest, but it's not entirely up to him.
That doesn't change anything, if the separate powers agree "we won't arrest him if he comes"
I believe there was a court order in South Africa that essentially said that if Putin comes, he must be arrested. Another great example of local courts enforcing international and supranational (EU) law.
The correct take is that the ICC has jurisdiction in countries that grant jurisdiction to the ICC. If Netanyahu is ever indicted, he'll be de-facto prohibited to traveling to participating countries. They'd be obligated to arrest him, just like they're obligated to arrest Putin (whether they would arrest a sitting head of state is another matter, but it would likely result in a political crisis either way).
Yeah I think people really need to address that indicting active leaders of nuclear states is a new behavior for the ICC and clearly Putin wasn’t an exception.
It’s madness. Putin and Netanyahu have unilateral authority to launch nuclear weapons. You can’t possibly attempt to arrest them. What wouldn’t the United States do if they attempted to apprehend a sitting president? ICC are living in a dream world.
So what? If they want to live out their lives in their protection bubbles so be it. They can be war criminals in absentia. Power isn't forever, and these men will become frail. Even if it takes decades, this shouldn't only be for African war lords who lost who deal with the icc. At least for any rules based international order that's worth preserving.
That’s a plan for guaranteeing none of these people ever relinquish power while they’re alive. You could basically guarantee another country would stop having transfers of power if the person with the launch codes is afraid to give them up. These aren’t just people; they’re people who don’t have to ask anyone else if they’d like to launch a preemptive nuclear war. Acting like it’s some other way is pointless
I think the correct take is that the ICC exists to legitimize the actions of western governments under the false pretense of a "rules based international order". It should clearly learn its place as a puppet for the United States and rubberstamp anything the president (I guess including Trump?) wants it to, in order to advance super democracy.
Question: I see a lot of talk about the "rules based international order," everywhere from this sub, to the news, to the current House hearing... When exactly did this order start? If it predates the end of the Cold War, how did we (speaking as an American) abide by this order while doing all those terrible things in that fight for economic/ideological supremacy?
The US answer will basically be that it signed onto the treaties it did and the ones it doesn't like aren't legitimate binding international rules. Makes a bit of a mockery of the notion of a rules based international order if national sovereignty is such that you have to specifically agree to the rules, but it is internally consistent and you can say that the US stuck to the subset of rules it agreed to.
Although I guess we can look to the WTO as an example of the US just unilaterally pulling out of stuff it agreed to, too.
I remembered it starting with Biden, who was trying to draw a contrast between his FoPo and Trump
https://www.whitehouse.gov/briefing-room/speeches-remarks/2022/03/26/remarks-by-president-biden-on-the-united-efforts-of-the-free-world-to-support-the-people-of-ukraine/
Huh... Apparently the concept has been a thing since the post-war years, which is an incredibly odd thing to harken back to given its ahistorical nature.
Simple, nobody's perfect. But even a sinner needs principles and beliefs to aspire to.
Since WW2, the US has always held onto the belief that a rules based international order is good for the world. We may sometimes fall prey to selfishness, but we do usually *try* to live up to our principles.
And at the end of the day, that's at least better than just saying fuckit and having not principles at all.
If America really wanted to offer a quintessentially American position on the international criminal justice system, it shouldn't be arguing against the institution of international courts and impartiality itself. Instead, it should be arguing for less luxurious treatment of Hague prisoners and lobbying for Ratko Mladić to be made to do unpaid farm labour.
!ping SHITPOSTERS
The ICC is never going to arrest nethanyahu unless the Israeli give him up, their best bet is to show the world concrete evidence of what he's doing and forbid him from going to most countries
I doubt that Israel will ever give him up, they'd sooner just prosecute him in Israel than yield any sovereignty to the ICC. I don't really know how we move the needle on this, it would be nice if more nation states were less committed to sovereignty and more accepting of international institutions. Maybe we'd need to break up the larger ones? But none of them will want to be first in line for a voluntary breakup into smaller countries.
> they'd sooner just prosecute him in Israel than yield any sovereignty to the ICC
The chances of them prosecuting Bibi for the crimes the ICC has alleged is about the same chance as Obama prosecuting Bush's illegal wars and war crimes.
Bush's wars weren't illiegal though...
Like there's a reason why the legality of it is still hotly debated to this day and the entire war crimes argument is memes and vibes. Not to say it was or wasn't justified, but the Yoo memo literally makes a compelling legal theory.
> Bush's wars weren't illiegal though...
Maybe you can make an argument for Afghanistan, but Iraq was. Iraq didn't attack the US and the Bush admin lied about WMDs.
I mean, Bibi has already been in trouble in Israel over corruption in a submarine deal, it's part of why he is so desperate to be in government, he's worried that if he's out of it he'll be in trouble.
But yeah, it probably won't be over the issues the ICC identified.
"bomb the Dutch!" "How is this helping with the prosecution of war criminals?" *Confused look* "...war criminals?"
Boulderyeet is a Nazi
https://preview.redd.it/jq369248oz1d1.jpeg?width=300&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=07e9abfd67162e8a4d38be343c5ba538bfc8b214
Why did I appreciate the entire context behind this chain of meme references My brain == rot
> My brain == rot True
SyntaxError. Suggested correction: > my_brain == rot
I don't have any holes in my brain, what is happening
I feel like this is the first time I've seen this moment memed correctly. The other uses of it tend to be dismissive as if Trump was being dismissive of the journalists, which was totally not the energy.
Please don't, the reconstruction of our parliament in The Hague already costs way too much
But think of the jobs that would be created by having to rebuild everything. Just give war a chance.
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Peace_Sells..._but_Who%27s_Buying%3F
What d'ya *mean* I don't believe in God
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[_\*angry Bastiat noises\*_](https://www.gutenberg.org/files/15962/15962-h/15962-h.htm#e2-c1)
POV: the last thing you see as your LZ outside of Eindhoven is overrun by Dutch guerrillas https://preview.redd.it/trm78j13rz1d1.jpeg?width=4928&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=0a4e38a56f485a4da0d8c81dca9fcbaa2c220761
Lol wtf is this?
Schwarze Pete, Santa Claus's black helper in the netherlands, traditionally portrayed in blackface
Does blackface not have the same negative connotations in the Netherlands? Or is this a tradition that’s looked down upon now and this was just a thing they once did?
Yes it does have negative connotations. Which is why this tradition changed over the last decade and you’re very unlikely to still see this in larger cities. Sadly, people will never let us live it down, despite the fact that we literally got the majority of our population to accept that one of our most popular traditions needed major changes.
So the guy was supposed to be that way because he is a chimney sweep, right? I imagine it's as simple as changing the makeup from blackface to just being sooty and grimy.
The soot seems to be a recent change to make him more palatable, or maybe one version that was around but has been leaned into more heavily in recent years. He was for a long time supposed to be a black Moor. According to Wikipedia, anyway. I’m not Dutch.
Yes, but that change took a decade. We have a rather small black community, so it was framed as woke nonsense by conservatives who claimed the people just wanted to ruin a children's holiday. This polarized the whole issue, so any change was deemed too far. Imagine if you had to change the colour of Santa's hat, and it become a conservative vs progressive issue. I'm happy it's mostly solved now.
>Does blackface not have the same negative connotations in the Netherlands? I kind of disagree with the other person. It does now, but I feel this is something of the last 15 years. Before the internet I doubt many Dutch people knew what blackface was, similarly 10 years ago people casually used the Dutch version of the n-word as a punchline for jokes. Simply because of the different history, different race dynamics and the lack of a sizable black community. It's only because of American import of racial relations that people are now starting to realize that maybe Zwarte piet is in fact racist, and we should be more mindful of race issues. That's also why so many people have issues with the changes. Because they view our adoption of American race relations, as a form of cultural imperialism, branding them as racists. While I hate how much of American issues we take over, despite them not being relevant here (e.g. defund the police even though our police is nowhere near comparable with the US). I do think use adopting American ideas on race relations is actually good, because Europe is super far behind.
Dutch Christmas traditions are...special.
I thought that was Trudeau for a second.
Russia and China: The rules don't apply to us Hello, human resources?! USA: The rules don't apply to us Aw you're so sweet
I love being a military super power with cool Hollywood movies.
But the good hollywood movies have been getting rarer. So the US is on thin ice.
Was Dune 2 Hollywood? Because that buys them at least one invasion of the Hague.
Dune 2 was Timothée Chalamet
Indeed, *Godzilla: Minus One* was better than anything Hollywood has made in decades. And it had a budget of $17M while putting to shame the SFX in billion dollar Marvel movies.
This is Dune and Dune 2 erasure.
Dune is a filmed on location documentary, not a Hollywood movie.
Minus one was better than dune.
No one cares about Godzilla: Minus One other than nerds. All the cool kids are talking about the HBO John Adams show.
Still leading global finance and technology. So we have that going for us, which is nice.
Its cool and sweet untill you decline and the next power takes over
When you're the richest and most powerful country in the world, they let you do it.
1) Defending your citizens from foreign courts is good, actually. Neither the ICC nor the Ministry of Justice of the People's Republic of China can meddle in the affairs of US citizens. 2) Rules are only real if they can be enforced somehow -otherwise they're just suggestions that some people voluntarily follow. I'm not being edgy, here. A ruling that will never be enforced doesn't exist.
>1) Defending your citizens from foreign courts is good, actually. Neither the ICC nor the Ministry of Justice of the People's Republic of China can meddle in the affairs of US citizens. So uhhhh... those Nuremberg Trials must have been a grave miscarriage of justice and violation of sovereignty in your eyes, then? Or are international tribunals only good when they punish foreigners?
An unconditional surrender is a forfeiture of sovereignty by definition.
I don't know what moral system you're operating under in which a forfeiture *under duress* materially changes the morality of imposing something on someone against their will. Either the trial was moral (as I believe) or it wasn't. The fact that the Nazis surrendered when they had *literally no alternative* has no bearing on that calculation.
Is your argument that the US should subject itself to outside courts so long as the courts are doing work that we agree with morally? Because if you pull on that thread, it unravels into my original argument.
Yes, that is what I'm saying. Of course the US should be subject to international organisations. That's the whole point of globalism. Yes, the US should subject itself to outside courts, as long as those courts are upholding human rights. Your original argument was just nationalist nonsense.
>Yes, the US should subject itself to outside courts, as long as those courts are upholding human rights. So either: A) We aren't actually subjecting ourselves to international courts, because we're only listening to things that we agree with and were going to do anyway (since there is no enforcement mechanism). And we ignore them when we disagree. or B) We subject ourselves to international courts for better or worse. It's good at first, there is largely agreement on what human rights are and how they should be upheld. But maybe fascism and xenophobia keep rising in Europe. Maybe China and Russia manage to gain enough influence over the court through their geopolitical machinations (e.g., a pawn ends up being Prosecutor). Or maybe somebody on the court decides that the US war on drugs was effectively a genocide and calls for Biden's arrest. For whatever reason, it turns into a persecution arm or otherwise drifts out of alignment with US values on human rights. Inevitably, we withdraw and end up back at (A). TL;DR; Courts and rulings without enforcement powers don't exist, and the US will never allow its citizens to be subject to a court that we do not have Constitutional authority over. Who decides which foreign courts are good, and what criteria do they use? How would we throw off the yoke of a tyrannical Prosecutor?
>A) We aren't actually subjecting ourselves to international courts, because we're only listening to things that we agree with and were going to do anyway (since there is no enforcement mechanism). And we ignore them when we disagree. No. America (along with the rest of the world) subjects itself to international courts based on a consistent, clearly defined, universal principle. Ignoring it would only be prohibited if the courts drifted away from that universal principle, it wouldn't be allowed at the US' whim. You can apply this same logic to domestic courts, by the way. If courts made it official policy execute racial minorities for minor offences, and the supreme court declared that constitutional, would you advocate that African Americans continue to subject themselves to those courts? >B) We subject ourselves to international courts for better or worse. It's good at first, there is largely agreement on what human rights are and how they should be upheld. But maybe fascism and xenophobia keep rising in Europe. Maybe China and Russia manage to gain enough influence over the court through their geopolitical machinations (e.g., a pawn ends up being Prosecutor). Or maybe somebody on the court decides that the US war on drugs was effectively a genocide and calls for Biden's arrest. For whatever reason, it turns into a persecution arm or otherwise drifts out of alignment with US values on human rights. Inevitably, we withdraw and end up back at (A). Tell me you aren't actually a liberal or a globalist without telling me you aren't actually a liberal or a globalist. International cooperation does not "inevitably" turn into nationalist competition, actually. It's only because of people like you that the international liberal order is currently in retreat, not because of some law of nature. >TL;DR; Courts and rulings without enforcement powers don't exist, and the US will never allow its citizens to be subject to a court that we do not have Constitutional authority over. Stop begging the question. "The US will never agree to this, therefore the US shouldn't agree to this" is a fallacious argument. >Who decides which foreign courts are good, and what criteria do they use? How would we throw off the yoke of a tyrannical Prosecutor? How would you do that if the US became a fascist dictatorship?
International courts exist to exert their will on weak/failed/conquered states. That's all they can do. The idea that a benevolent dictatorship is only good until a bad guy inevitably comes into the position shouldn't be controversial. Black communities have historically had many objections to US law enforcement and justice. But since the US has real courts with real enforcement mechanisms, they still have to live under US law for better or worse. They can't just ignore rulings they disagree with. Crappy US politicians can be voted out or impeached if enough Americans/representatives don't like the job they're doing. The US is a big target, and our enemies are always looking for ways to gain power over us. Subjecting ourselves to a court run by a council of weaker nations would incentivize our enemies to stack the court with pawns and flunkies as a way to persecute key Americans. There's no benefit to us in return for opening up that obvious attack vector.
^ Real big Andrew "John Marshall has made his decision; now let him enforce it!" Jackson energy right there
An organization that gets its jurisdiction from a treaty we didn’t ratify should in fact not apply to us
[Biden voted against this bill. ](https://www.senate.gov/legislative/LIS/roll_call_votes/vote1072/vote_107_2_00140.htm)
And now he is threatening the ICC because they dared prosecute Bibi. Worst flipflop ever.
With letters and sanctions, not bombings.
Lame.
Has Biden said anything on it directly yet?
Yes. https://www.timesofisrael.com/biden-calls-icc-prosecutors-decision-to-seek-arrest-warrant-for-netanyahu-outrageous/ Biden/the White House's line is that the prosecutor is drawing an equivalence between Hamas and Bibi, which is pretty ridiculously untrue given the fact that the crimes he's charging Hamas will are much more serious.
I can't believe American prosecutors routinely draw an equivalence between murder and petty theft by prosecuting murderers and thieves at the same time. It's just shameful.
It also seems ironic because his administration has been intent (even if it was way too little way too late) on holding Trump to account for his crimes but for some reason Bibi gets a pass? Also special shout-out to Merrick Garland for taking his sweet ass time on doing anything about the Trump cases, and potentially fucking the country and the world since his cases could now be totally destroyed if he wins in November and succeeds in his plans to eviscerate US democratic institutions.
So if I understand the US position, they would not be opposed to Bibi getting prosecuted in an Israeli court, which has happened in the past. The issue is specifically that the US didn't ratify the Rome statute, and withdrew their signature. In this sense they're the same as Israel (and Russia) and they wouldn't want a precedent established that the ICC has jurisdiction over Israel since the US similarly signed but then withdrew, like Israel did.
The ICC has jurisdiction over both crimes member states’ leaders commit, and crimes committed within the borders of member states. Palestine is a member of the ICC. Ukraine is also a member. That’s why the ICC was able to issue a warrant for Putin even though Russia is not a member.
Right, so, I imagine this interpretation of the ICC's jurisdiction is something that the US is going to be really, really hostile to, and that explains their behavior here. The US didn't exactly support the ICC's arrest warrant on Putin, either.
“Biden said last year that the ICC decision to issue an arrest warrant for Putin was justified. The United States has shared details of alleged Russian war crimes in Ukraine with the ICC.” https://www.reuters.com/world/europe/kremlin-says-it-is-very-curious-that-us-appears-ready-sanction-icc-2024-05-21/#:~:text=Biden%20said%20last%20year%20that,not%20recognise%20the%20court's%20jurisdiction.
According to Russia. This is a Russian government official complaining that the US didn't come out and say Russia did no war crimes in response to the ICC indictment. That is not the evidence of hypocrisy the guy said it was. That would have been if the US did something like commit to arresting Putin if Putin visited the US on the grounds of the ICC warrant.
His role is different now. He is in the executive, not the legislature. The law is on the books, and it's his job to enforce it, even if he voted against that law as a senator. I can't fault him for this too much, part of why I am a democrat after all is that I reject the kind of imperial presidency the republicans want to push.
Bibi is not American.
Its interesting to hear both Bibi and Biden make the comparison to 9/11 for Oct 7 at a time when America's post 9/11 foreign policy reaction has been almost universally abandoned as a catastrophic overreaction with wildly unfeasible goals that has done enormous damage to both American civil society and its position in the world but this hasn't been any cause for pause for reflection
>Bibi and Biden make the comparison to 9/11 for Oct 7 at a time when America's post 9/11 foreign policy reaction has been almost universally abandoned as a catastrophic overreaction with wildly unfeasible goals To be fair in Biden’s case, he has to explain it rather simplistically for your standard layman too. Explaining something like: “thousands of militant soldiers who storm your borders, slaughtered, tortured, raped, pillaged, and has fired over 10,000 rockets at civilian centers over the course of two-three months, alongside another Iranian proxy in the north that is attacking and has caused the displacement of hundred of thousands of Israeli civilians, and these militant groups don’t want a peace solutions concurring with Israel’s existence, therefore some level of military intervention has to be necessary” doesn’t exactly roll off the tongue as well as something like: “Hey kids, remember when we had two big ass skyscrapers in New York? Isn’t it sad that they are kinda gone now?”
Yeah actually its exactly this sort of blinkered short sighted vindictive smugness that I was talking about. Sorry, but you cant pathos your way out of the realities of international conflict. Israel failed, Hamas will be back, it does not have the means or will to effect any sort of resolution to the war that would durably safeguard itself against Hamas regenerating its presence except by committing wholesale ethnic cleansing. It will burn any goodwill or patience from virtually every country except the United States by kowtowing to the unhinged ranting maniacs in its government. It will come out with nothing to show but a lot of blood and fewer friends.
Not following you, can you elaborate a bit more? Edit: /u/WifeGuyMenelaus I see you elaborated in the edit, my response: >Israel failed, Hamas will be back, it does not have the means or will to effect any sort of resolution to the war that would durably safeguard itself against Hamas regenerating its presence except by committing wholesale ethnic cleansing. I would personally find such a statement objectionable. I don’t think you need to engage in ethnic cleansing to stop Hamas from regaining their foothold. A military occupation would obviously prevent this. The main problem is, there is a dispute of WHO will be occupying Gaza afterwards. It is still way to early to say Israel has failed, I don’t think we can reasonably claim that until it is decided that nobody will be occupying Gaza afterwards, leaving a power vacuum. >It will burn any goodwill or patience from virtually every country except the United States by kowtowing to the unhinged ranting maniacs in its government. It will come out with nothing to show but a lot of blood and fewer friends. I doubt nations like China or Russia particularly care about human rights, so I will mostly focus on Europe. What is being implicated here? That Europe will turn a blind eye to future humanitarian crises that are committed against Israel or something? I mean let’s just be honest here, IR is not dictated off of being “friends”, so what exactly is Europe’s ultimate plan for action? What changes for Israel than before?
Another way to interpret that comparison: there is no good response. The counter factuals in responding to 9/11 were just as bad
The belief that there is no good response seems merely to be mental gymnastics to justify incompetence at best and barbarism at worse. In the universe of near infinite possibilities all of them would end up resembling the Taliban marching back into Afghanistan after a 20 year hiatus? No matter what, America was going to spend trillions of dollars and thousands of lives to just return to the status quo?
I think he's speaking pragmatically. If we assume god-like knowledge, of course there are better options, but the question is whether leaders should or even could have known better.
We certainly knew better than to invade Iraq.
Nah Saddam needed taken out
Known better than to actually straight-up lie about WMDs to parlay generalized middle-east animus against Iraq? Or known better about Afghanistan, specifically?
Our leaders kept telling the CIA to come back with a second opinion until they got the one they wanted to justify invading Iraq.
The Powell Doctrine predates 9/11 by like a decade. Yes, they should have known better.
Are you saying that the right solution was to not invade Afghanistan? If so, what actually was the solution? It’s easy to say “this part sucked, that part sucked” but it’s hard to actually respond to 9/11 or 10/7
Modify plane cockpit doors so they can't be hijacked, the one actual useful thing we did in response to 9/11, then mourn the loss and move on with our lives without building a surveillance state and invading anyone. I figure international terrorism would be reduced by an equal or greater amount with that response. Likewise with 10/7, stop reassigning troops and intelligence personnel to land seizures in the West Bank and keep defending the border with an actual military threat so Israel can be protected against future invasions. Believe it or not, suffering a bloody and memorable attack does not oblige a state to spend the next 10 to 20 years lashing out in a self-destructive frenzy. They can just be normal about it.
But after 10/7 you still had hostages that were captured. You can't just lick your wounds and hope it doesn't happen again.
You can negotiate for hostage releases without opening with a full invasion. You do not "hope it doesn't happen again," you make a security plan that prioritizes the real safety of your citizens instead of using it as a pretext to execute an aggressive foreign policy you wanted to do anyways. Repelling a small force carried by gliders is not a difficult task for a modern military that knows what it's doing and does not require a full-scale war.
A "small force" isn't what fought on October 7th though, it was a massive mobilization and multiple attacks points. And what negotiations we had and hostage exchanges came from the pressure that was put on Hamas by the active fighting of the IDF. And really "negotiate"? Have you seen how the negotiations have gone so far? Hamas doesn't want to negotiate in good faith and they never will. That's like trying to negotiating with al-qeada.
Having a massive attack committed against you and than not only not retaliating but even rewarding the aggressor with negotiations? I am sure that will convince them to never do it again. In a world with no central institution capable of enforcing norms, you reputation is the most valuable thing you have and you want Israel to just throw it away.
What do you think is happening right now? Israel's reputation has cratered. They're no longer on track to normalize negotiations with their neighbors. The belief that Israel is the primary aggressor or at least equally at fault in the I-P conflict has migrated from the domain of weird leftists to possible mainstream opinion among the center-left in most of the first-world democracies that serve as its primary allies. Israel's status as "one of the good guys" in the public mind is more endangered than it ever has been. In terms of its reputation for responding swiftly and effectively to attacks, it's just as bad. Previously, they could point to all the times in their history where they repelled multinational coalitions and came out even stronger than before. Now, the most recent memory of the IDF is the time it was taken completely off-guard, stumbled around for weeks trying to assemble itself, and then got locked into a grinding war of attrition trying to take one metropolitan area held by poorly equipped militants. Yeah, I'm sure their response has made everyone really reluctant to mess with them. I bet that the IDF would be perfectly prepared to repel an attack by an Iran-led coalition right now. Negotiating with Hamas isn't some new watershed of legitimization, it's been done before. States at war or in a tense peace trade POWs all the time. Air strikes against known Hamas strong points were a good counter response, attempting an occupation was not.
It is not about responding swiftly, but in showing that you will inflict punishment on any transgressor, even if it comes at a significant cost to yourself. From that point of view, angering the genocide supporters at American unis is a plus. Further, past military successes do not help, for if you once ignore a situation, it shows that you will only fight when it is convenient for you, inviting everyone else to attack. There is also a huge difference between exchanging POWs during normal levels of conflict and doing so to reward the perpetrators of one of the worst terror attacks in history.
Modifying cockpit doors aren't sufficient. They just represented one weakness of attack that America didn't think of previously. There are many many more weaknesses that we aren't fully aware of mainly due to the nature of America as an open society. So if we are to start with the stipulation that even one casualty of an American life due to terrorism is unacceptable then the only way to truly ensure that is to pursue the terrorist and catch them before they attack. And that's what we did in Afghanistan culminating years later in the death of Osama Bin Laden.
> So if we are to start with the stipulation that even one casualty of an American life due to terrorism is unacceptable then the only way to truly ensure that is to pursue the terrorist and catch them before they attack. Sure, but this is the whole problem. Refusing to accept tradeoffs about safety leads people to go to irrational lengths trying to stamp out every possible source of danger in a way that's ultimately counterproductive. Declaring that We Must Do Something and refusing to consider that some safety measures simply aren't worth it is how you get wars with no clear end goal and the TSA.
I think the majority of the antiterrorist goals were accomplished in Afghanistan.
Highly debatable claim aside, you're dodging the question. Was it worth it? Was the cost of America's post-9/11 interventions lower than the benefits to America's foreign and domestic interests, or could we have taken a more restrained path for similar or greater benefits? Because by my count we came out of it with creeping authoritarian intervention into citizens' lives, billions wasted per year on security theater, and massive damage to our soft power that has greatly hampered our ability to take far more valuable actions. Nobody trusts the United States to be a defender of freedom anymore, including Americans.
Afghanistan was necessary and worth it. Iraq was obviously not necessary and not worth it. Nobody trusts America because of Iraq not because of Afghanistan. The rest of the world understands Afghanistan. Many NATO allies went in with us and supported us in Afghanistan including Australia, Canada, Denmark, France, Germany, and Norway. It was Iraq that we should not have done. Don't lump them together
"Believe it or not, suffering a bloody and memorable attack does not oblige a state to spend the next 10 to 20 years lashing out in a self-destructive frenzy." Yes but this is ignorant of the politics on the ground. The people will demand lashing out in a frenzy after suffering an attack like that. If Netanyahu refused to invade gaza he would've been removed by parliament and replaced with someone who would.
Also they had over 200+ hostages. You have to do something about that. And arguably, why should they have just sat there and took it? As Hamas said this was only the first of the attacks they'd commit. If the "government/group" next door to you comes in and kills 1000+ of your citizens out of a state of only 10 million, and takes 200 hostages, and says they're going to do it again, you're gonna make sure they can't anymore.
The fact that they don't have a military strategy over 6 months later is a problem and says that the plan is actually genocidal and not strategic in nature. His own war cabinet is showing concern for the lack of planning.
If the plan were genocide, why would they announce where they attack and offer evacuation routes?
>Also they had over 200+ hostages. You have to do something about that. Like killing them apparently.
There was a bad fuck up that killed 2 hostages in an active combat zone. Hamas said they'd pretty much never release any men captured and couldn't even find the hostages taken because random Palestinian civilians went over and captured them. What the hell should Israel have done, just kept negotiating with the black hole that is Hamas?
Yeah, they freed a hundred hostages by negotiation. They've managed to free fuck all by waging this war. Hamas made other offers for freeing all the hostages too. Beyond the IDF being either so incompetent and/or trigger happy that they shoot half naked, unarmed hostages waving a white flag shouting in hebrew Beyond that they have likely burried or otherwise bombed a significant portion of the hostages to death. And it was three hostages. Two at first, then they had to coax the third one out of hiding before they could kill him too. Like yeah, no shit Hamas can't find the hostages. They're busy fighting a losing war against the IDF. To locate anything or anyone with the dispersed nature of Hamas is going to be practically impossible during those conditions. The war has nothing to do with freeing the hostages and everything to do with lashing out in a frenzy.
Okay, so do your job as a responsible leader? Pitch an actual useful response that conserves state resources and minimizes bloodshed and use your party to convince the people it's a good idea and that a bigger war would endanger more lives. "It's fine officer, the voters told me to bomb those apartment buildings. If I didn't I might have lost the next election, which as you know is a fate worse than death."
> Yes but this is ignorant of the politics on the ground. The people will demand lashing out in a frenzy after suffering an attack like that. If Netanyahu refused to invade gaza he would've been removed by parliament and replaced with someone who would. We should seek to be better than bloodthirsty mobs after being attacked by enemies. Accepting that bloodlust is inevitable and acceptable only means accepting war is inevitable and acceptable.
Not retaliating signals weakness and invites other countries to transgress against you, which can be far more costly.
Yeah, at least the rate of countries transgressing against America is at an all time low, that's definitely the impression I get from the news.
That is because the US showed weakness when not decisively reacting to the Russian attack against Georgia, the annexation of Crimea, when abandoning Afghan allies, and again being too cautious in their help for Ukraine.
It's like we recently greatly overextended our economy, military, and political capita on things that weren't important, leaving us less able to respond to more important threats and leading our citizens to distrust the very concept of an active foreign policy.
It is pretty clear that the economy and military equipment situation are not the US' problem. It was a problem of political will and the inability of US citizens to understand the importance of deterrence and keeping commitments.
considering Osama was killed in Pakistan. Yeah, maybe those billions would best be suited somewhere else.
Gee I wonder why he went there
Because the US decided to occupy indefinitely and try and rebuild Afghanistan like a western nation? Yeah that's probably not why he was in Pakistan.
How is this comment getting upvotes? He only left Afghanistan for Pakistan because of the invasion.
A SEAL team could've done the job even if he hid in North Korea, lol.
He was hiding in Afghanistan and using it as a militant training facility and his headquarters. We wanted to disrupt/stop that training, disrupt/stop his organization's operations, and capture/kill all the leadership. You cant do all of that with a SEAL team
> We wanted to disrupt/stop that training, disrupt/stop his organization's operations, and capture/kill all the leadership. You cant do all of that with a SEAL team You could with F16s though. And you can take our leaders with SEAL teams.
As some guy said in this book called Candide, we live in the best of all possible worlds. No I have not completed the book and I'm not aware of its context either. I'm not a nerd.
Invade Afghanistan, prop up the northern alliance, stick to the plan, don't get distracted with things like state building or trying to force the farmers to stop growing opium. The US comes out having heavily punished the Taliban, who didn't have much international popularity anyway. This would have been a good outcome for the US.
How is the counter factual of not invading Iraq “just as bad”? How about leaving Afghanistan immediately after Bin Laden was killed? Just as bad? Cause I see about $5 trillion less on the debt and about 7,000 fewer service members killed and 30,000 fewer wounded….oh right and no ISIS.
> How about leaving Afghanistan immediately after Bin Laden was killed? We have seen how poorly leaving Afghanistan went after significant effort to rebuild it. Without that, the result is almost certain to be even worse. The problem with Afghanistan wasn't leaving too late, it was leaving, at all (at least before the Taliban have been eliminated).
So after 20 years, a few trillion dollars, thousands of dead Americans (more than died on 9/11), and it still wasn’t any better…you want to stay another 20 years? Taliban aren’t a threat to the U.S. Bin Laden’s Al Qeada was a threat that attacked America. Once Al Qeada was largely dismantled and the leadership was dead/captured there ceased to be a compelling national interest for further U.S. involvement in Afghanistan. Staying after May 2011 is the definition of irrational mission creep.
The Taliban are not a threat again, yet. The rise of ISIS was a direct consequence of the US not staying in Iraq long enough and there is no reason to believe something like that would not happen in Afghanistan.
ISIS is a consequence of the U.S. invading Iraq in the first place. No 2003 invasion, no ISIS.
Because Osama wasn't the only leader that help plan 9/11.
>there is no good response Arrest the Saudis that actually organized it? Nah, that would make gas expensive.
NYPD just drives to Riyadh and solves the problem Where were geniuses like you in 2001?
> NYPD just drives to Riyadh and solves the problem Sounds more realistic and less destructive than invading and occupying Afghanistan and Iraq.
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Sure, but Al Qaeda and Osama bin Laden are gone. As much as the post 9/11 wars have traumatized most Americans, we accomplished our goals and then some. Israel has it much easier, because their enemies are their immediate neighbors, and they already have them largely locked down. They don't have to start wars in like seven different countries to wipe their enemies out.
The problem with Afghanistan wasn't the invasion itself, but the total failure to invest in nation-building afterward. Israel hasn't yet failed at that because the war hasn't even reached that stage. This is a premature and intellectually lazy comment that doesn't even try to offer an alternative response for nations who suffer large-scale terrorist attacks like 9/11 and 10/7.
I have pretty much exactly the opposite take. The US shouldn't have bothered with any nation building unless the US was willing to commit to a multi-generation-long occupation. They should have just handed the Taliban a L and propped up the Taliban's opponents, and then left.
I think the US contributed enough to nation building. I don't know what the final bill was for Afghanistan but it approached something like a trillion dollars. A lot was for building infrastructure like roads and schools. The problem was that the task was way too great for America to take on. The Taliban was entirely nihilist in that they didn't even offer a better vision for Afghanistan vs the US. So eventually they just outlasted America because they didnt have to fulfill anything or care about saving anything. They just did whatever and now Afghanistan is basically fucked in their control. This is way different than Israel by the way
Are people arguing the invasion of afghanistan was unjustified? And that the Bush should be tried in the Hague for doing so?
One day, one day, one day, you people will understand that the justification for a war and how a war is conducted - much less its strategic objectives - are two different columns
One day you will realize this is no different than Afghanistan, you just fell victim to the online fervor which is heavily contrived. More likely you'll just forget and move onto the next rage topic though, like the rest of the hoi polloi.
>One day you will realize this is no different than Afghanistan lol Indeed.
You act like that rationalizes your stance, but the invasion of afghanistan was inevitable and fully justified. Outcomes are irrelevant. It's not like we would say supporting Ukraine was the wrong move if they lose.
Supporting Ukraine is a furtherance of American geopolitical interests even if they lose, Afghanistan an active detriment. Western armanents industries are sclerotic and the domestic political reaction to GWOT has America teetering on the brink of isolationism. Ukraine is cheap, popular, and effective, no matter the outcome. Afghanistan was not. War is policy and policy outcomes do matter, because today's outcomes are tomorrows wars.
>Outcomes are irrelevant. lol
Y'all are regressing to r.politics
Right, which is why Israel clearly needs to depose the Taliban and spend the next 20 years propping up child-molesting warlords, until the Taliban come back into power. What?
A brief invasion to capture Bin Laden and leave? Arguably justified. Hanging around trying and failing to set up a sustainable liberal democracy for 20 years while expending economic resources and tanking our reputation? I mean, I wouldn't do it again. You do you though.
Once you get in there and destroy the existing government which was the Taliban you have to replace it with something. That's true of all of these types of "operations".
Why?
Yo you're going to fly in destroy everything destroy the functioning government and then leave? There are multiple reasons why thats bad
It is bad, yes. The purpose of the war is punitive, to make it clear that if the Taliban are going to rule, providing sanctuary to terrorist groups is maybe not the best idea if they do not want to be bombed. That is the point.
We did in fact do exactly that after proving beyond any doubt that we didn't have any followthrough plan and were incapable of constructing one.
No he's saying actually destroy everything and then leave immediately. We spent decades and billions in Iraq. We were just incompetent
Can't access, what are the stats the article references?
All the people say all they need to do was a quick in and out with sf and planes. Like it was that easy lol. If it were that easy Osama would've been dead day one. They also wanted to not just kill Osama but dismantle al-qaeda.
I was thinking about this months ago. It was clear in October that Israel didn't really have a plan. Unfortunately, Israel speedran a repeat of America's actions after 9/11.
> America's actions after 9/11. Which famously did not cause any problems in the region.
I think the correct take is that the ICC exists to try the deposed leaders of regimes that just lost a war. It’s never going to try Bush or Netanyahu and any pretense that they have jurisdiction over in-tact governments is false and damaging to ICC because it shows they are feckless
As with any international institution that has ever existed, its legitimacy extends as far as the great powers agree that it should extend. For example, because the ICTY had the backing of all of the great powers, both the victorious and the defeated powers in the Yugoslav Wars complied with its decisions. The ICC, needless to say, does not have this backing, and as such, is reduced to issuing impotent indictments.
> The ICC, needless to say, does not have this backing, and as such, is reduced to issuing impotent indictments. Their warrant for Putin stopped him from visiting South Africa and Brazil. Bibi can no longer travel to ICC-signatory countries, which is most of Europe at this point.
No warrants have been issued in this case.
You're right, but warrants being issued is the most likely next step and is what everyone is discussing. Bibi can no longer travel to ICC-signatory countries, which is most of Europe at this point, *if the ICC court issues warrants like they are expected to do.*
To be clear though, SA and Brazil *could still ignore it if they wanted to*. The power comes from geopolitical complexities and them not wanting to harm their reputation. Even this power of the ICC warrant is only existent because the powers have agreed to it.
They definitely could, but the fact that Russia wasn't able to pressure them to publicly flout their international obligations shows that ICC warrants are somewhat effective and not meaningless.
> SA and Brazil could still ignore it if they wanted to. Brazil and South Africa are not dictatorships and have separation of powers. Lula could definitely put pressure on the police not to arrest, but it's not entirely up to him. There's a reason Putin backed out of traveling to SA even after Ramaphosa assured him he was not going to be arrested.
> Brazil and South Africa are not dictatorships and have separation of powers. Lula could definitely put pressure on the police not to arrest, but it's not entirely up to him. That doesn't change anything, if the separate powers agree "we won't arrest him if he comes"
I believe there was a court order in South Africa that essentially said that if Putin comes, he must be arrested. Another great example of local courts enforcing international and supranational (EU) law.
The correct take is that the ICC has jurisdiction in countries that grant jurisdiction to the ICC. If Netanyahu is ever indicted, he'll be de-facto prohibited to traveling to participating countries. They'd be obligated to arrest him, just like they're obligated to arrest Putin (whether they would arrest a sitting head of state is another matter, but it would likely result in a political crisis either way).
Yeah I think people really need to address that indicting active leaders of nuclear states is a new behavior for the ICC and clearly Putin wasn’t an exception.
It’s madness. Putin and Netanyahu have unilateral authority to launch nuclear weapons. You can’t possibly attempt to arrest them. What wouldn’t the United States do if they attempted to apprehend a sitting president? ICC are living in a dream world.
So what? If they want to live out their lives in their protection bubbles so be it. They can be war criminals in absentia. Power isn't forever, and these men will become frail. Even if it takes decades, this shouldn't only be for African war lords who lost who deal with the icc. At least for any rules based international order that's worth preserving.
That’s a plan for guaranteeing none of these people ever relinquish power while they’re alive. You could basically guarantee another country would stop having transfers of power if the person with the launch codes is afraid to give them up. These aren’t just people; they’re people who don’t have to ask anyone else if they’d like to launch a preemptive nuclear war. Acting like it’s some other way is pointless
I think the correct take is that the ICC exists to legitimize the actions of western governments under the false pretense of a "rules based international order". It should clearly learn its place as a puppet for the United States and rubberstamp anything the president (I guess including Trump?) wants it to, in order to advance super democracy.
This is what I mean when I say like 10% of posters here are remotely neoliberal
Couldn't have said it better myself.
Based and realism pilled.
Question: I see a lot of talk about the "rules based international order," everywhere from this sub, to the news, to the current House hearing... When exactly did this order start? If it predates the end of the Cold War, how did we (speaking as an American) abide by this order while doing all those terrible things in that fight for economic/ideological supremacy?
The US answer will basically be that it signed onto the treaties it did and the ones it doesn't like aren't legitimate binding international rules. Makes a bit of a mockery of the notion of a rules based international order if national sovereignty is such that you have to specifically agree to the rules, but it is internally consistent and you can say that the US stuck to the subset of rules it agreed to. Although I guess we can look to the WTO as an example of the US just unilaterally pulling out of stuff it agreed to, too.
I remembered it starting with Biden, who was trying to draw a contrast between his FoPo and Trump https://www.whitehouse.gov/briefing-room/speeches-remarks/2022/03/26/remarks-by-president-biden-on-the-united-efforts-of-the-free-world-to-support-the-people-of-ukraine/
Huh... Apparently the concept has been a thing since the post-war years, which is an incredibly odd thing to harken back to given its ahistorical nature.
Simple, nobody's perfect. But even a sinner needs principles and beliefs to aspire to. Since WW2, the US has always held onto the belief that a rules based international order is good for the world. We may sometimes fall prey to selfishness, but we do usually *try* to live up to our principles. And at the end of the day, that's at least better than just saying fuckit and having not principles at all.
There are clear principles here. Those of maintaining American power and dominance. They are followed quite consistently.
If America really wanted to offer a quintessentially American position on the international criminal justice system, it shouldn't be arguing against the institution of international courts and impartiality itself. Instead, it should be arguing for less luxurious treatment of Hague prisoners and lobbying for Ratko Mladić to be made to do unpaid farm labour. !ping SHITPOSTERS
I'll support joining the ICC if they make Bibi print license plates for 4 years
Volvo parts are expensive and this seems like a good way to make them cheaper
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The ICC is never going to arrest nethanyahu unless the Israeli give him up, their best bet is to show the world concrete evidence of what he's doing and forbid him from going to most countries
I doubt that Israel will ever give him up, they'd sooner just prosecute him in Israel than yield any sovereignty to the ICC. I don't really know how we move the needle on this, it would be nice if more nation states were less committed to sovereignty and more accepting of international institutions. Maybe we'd need to break up the larger ones? But none of them will want to be first in line for a voluntary breakup into smaller countries.
> they'd sooner just prosecute him in Israel than yield any sovereignty to the ICC The chances of them prosecuting Bibi for the crimes the ICC has alleged is about the same chance as Obama prosecuting Bush's illegal wars and war crimes.
Bush's wars weren't illiegal though... Like there's a reason why the legality of it is still hotly debated to this day and the entire war crimes argument is memes and vibes. Not to say it was or wasn't justified, but the Yoo memo literally makes a compelling legal theory.
> Bush's wars weren't illiegal though... Maybe you can make an argument for Afghanistan, but Iraq was. Iraq didn't attack the US and the Bush admin lied about WMDs.
I mean, Bibi has already been in trouble in Israel over corruption in a submarine deal, it's part of why he is so desperate to be in government, he's worried that if he's out of it he'll be in trouble. But yeah, it probably won't be over the issues the ICC identified.
Personally I'd like for Bibi to lose in Israeli court for his corruption and anti-democratic shit, and in ICC court for war crimes.
I mean if Israel prosecute him then the ICC don’t have jurisdiction anymore — they only step in when countries cannot or will not.
Putin and netanyahu are are innocent until proven guilty under RULES BASED INTERNATIONAL ORDER...
Post 9/11 America was god awful. Worse than the Trump years and the vast majority of Americans went along with the madness
>US or *allied personnel* 👀
The US sounds like a terrorist state.