> There is no question that the US has acted like a bully in Southern America, but you ignore that other countries have acted the same way in other parts of the world[1], and with far more disastrous results[2].
No. The argument is not that having some other country as hegemon would be better than the US. The argument is that any single country being overly powerful is a negative, and a more multipolar would would be healthier.
"The US should maintain enough military capacity to prevent/repel an invasion of the continental US" is not particularly controversial. But the US "defending" countries halfway around the world is not healthy for either.
> Pax Americana is currently the only thing preventing me and hundreds of millions of other Europeans from sharing the same fate. Russians do not dare to invade as long as they don't know if Americans would press the nuclear button or not. My freedom to live in peace and unharmed, speak my language and practice my culture, directly depends on the missile silos tucked away somewhere between the cornfields of Iowa. How about that for a perspective?
Russia has spent the past year failing to conquer a country of 40 million, without any involvement from those missile silos. If they tried to invade Poland or Finland they would crumble even quicker. The only countries with a legitimate fear of a Russian invasion are the same countries who have shown zero willingness to protect other people's "freedom to speak their language and practice their culture" when it comes to Russian people living within their (present) borders.
"The argument is that any single country being overly powerful is a negative, and a more multipolar would would be healthier."
That would be a first, wouldnt it?
We are currently seeing the consequences of the waning of the US unipolar Superpower.
Venezuela had a referendum to annex large parts of its neighbor.
Iran attacked nuclear Pakistan and has its proxies disrupt international shipping lanes and wage war against Israel.
Turkey has its fingers in tons of conflicts and supported its ally Azerbaijan in the ethnic cleansing of Nagorno Karabakh.
China asserts its military dominance in the south China and is depriving other nations thousands of km away of their rights and resources. Never mind that it is also preparing to invade and subjugate Taiwan.
....
Turns out if given power people are jerks, who would have guessed.
No? US intervention has some successes but many failures. The region where the US's dominance was most complete (South America) is also the region where its influence has been most negative. Conversely the most positive side of the US was on show when dealing with Europe during the Cold War era, where there was more of a balance of power.
> Turns out if given power people are jerks, who would have guessed.
Sure. The thing is that that applies to the US too.
> The argument is that any single country being overly powerful is a negative, and a more multipolar would would be healthier.
I don't find that convincing, given that the main claimants to this "multipolar world" are totalitarian dictatorships.
> Russia has spent the past year failing to conquer a country of 40 million, without any involvement from those missile silos. If they tried to invade Poland or Finland they would crumble even quicker.
This is not a view shared by any experts on the ground. Russia still maintains enough potential to cause immense damage to Poland, Finland, and all other of its neighbours, even if they ultimately lose. Rebuilding Ukraine will take many decades and countless billions, and the vast areas Russians have mined will take many centuries to clear. The mines will maim and kill tens of thousands of people - some of who haven't even been born yet - long after the war has ended.
> The only countries with a legitimate fear of a Russian invasion are the same countries who have shown zero willingness to protect other people's "freedom to speak their language and practice their culture" when it comes to Russian people living within their (present) borders.
This is complete bullshit, straight from Russian propaganda. Human rights are protected in Europe better than anywhere else in the world, and particularly well in places like Finland and Sweden that are rushing to prepare for war with Russia.
Please do tell where Russia stands in global rankings of human freedom, and where do Finland or Sweden stand.
> This is not a view shared by any experts on the ground. Russia still maintains enough potential to cause immense damage to Poland, Finland, and all other of its neighbours, even if they ultimately lose. Rebuilding Ukraine will take many decades and countless billions, and the vast areas Russians have mined will take many centuries to clear. The mines will maim and kill tens of thousands of people - some of who haven't even been born yet - long after the war has ended.
Russia could certainly cause severe economic damage and kill many people, sure. But find me one credible expert who, given what we know now, supports your "hundreds of millions" claim.
> Human rights are protected in Europe better than anywhere else in the world, and particularly well in places like Finland and Sweden
Which is why the EU has been making increasingly strident criticisms of the way the Baltic states treat their Russian minorities (at least prior to the current war), and why Ukrainian efforts at EU membership stalled.
> Please do tell where Russia stands in global rankings of human freedom, and where do Finland or Sweden stand.
Depends whose "global" rankings they are. The likes of Freedom House show a clear bias once you dig into the details - apparently China not permitting schools to teach in Tibetan is a travesty, but Estonia limiting how much schools can teach in Russian is not worth knocking a point off for.
Nobody would care about Russian minorities and their rights if Russia wouldnt weaponize them. Its a typical Russian strategy:
Radicalize and support those minorities. If the country does not do anything, it has a rebellious subversive group being directed by a hostile country. If it does anything it just goes to show how hostile and suppressive those countries are which justifies more official Russian reactions.
Also dont forget that those loyal Russian minorities were part of the imperial oppressive structure by which Russia ruled over its subjects.
> Nobody would care about Russian minorities and their rights if Russia wouldnt weaponize them.
Anyone who cares about protecting non-Russian ex-Soviet languages and cultures for principled reasons should care about protecting the Russian language and culture in places where they're a minority, for the same reason.
> Also dont forget that those loyal Russian minorities were part of the imperial oppressive structure by which Russia ruled over its subjects.
The Russian empire transplanted various peoples at various times as a tool of oppression, but that's hardly the fault or responsibility of the poor peasants who got transplanted. And on the ruling side, Stalin the Georgian was every bit as oppressive and imperial as Russian rulers before or since.
What I meant was, that no country would treat Russian minorities any way different than other ethnicities. Russia weaponizing those people makes less favorable legislation necessary.
Sure, but the Russian Empire in its various forms transplanted those Russian people because they were loyal and could be put into positions of power. If you compare their treatment to that of the German minorities after WW2 they got a very good deal.
> Russia could certainly cause severe economic damage and kill many people, sure. But find me one credible expert who, given what we know now, supports your "hundreds of millions" claim.
Since mid-2023, everyone from think-tanks like the German Council on Foreign Relations to chiefs of defense of Europe have been ringing an alarm bell over Putin's ambitions beyond Ukraine. The population of Germany and Poland alone pushes the number of people directly at risk of Russian aggression over 100 million.
> Which is why the EU has been making increasingly strident criticisms of the way the Baltic states treat their Russian minorities
They haven't. The sob story about Russians being mistreated everywhere was a smear campaign to sabotage the entry of Eastern European countries into the EU. Its heyday was around the end of accession negotiations in early 2000s. As of 2024, nobody takes that seriously anymore. Russians too have recognized ineffectiveness of that narrative and have stopped pushing it.
> Depends whose "global" rankings they are.
Indeed. Only a severely brainwashed person would put Russia anywhere near Finland or Sweden when it comes to human rights. You can reply with shallow rhetorical arguments, but there's as much to discuss here as with the Flat Earth crowd. It's not a good faith discussion beyond this point.
> The population of Germany and Poland alone pushes the number of people directly at risk of Russian aggression over 100 million.
You think there's a serious risk of a Russian tank column making it to Frankfurt? Lol. Lmao even.
> As of 2024, nobody takes that seriously anymore. Russians too have recognized ineffectiveness of that narrative and have stopped pushing it.
If no-one takes it seriously that's because no-one expects western countries to be principled any more. The language laws are real.
> Indeed. Only a severely brainwashed person would put Russia anywhere near Finland or Sweden when it comes to human rights.
Sure. Finland and Sweden have much better human rights records than Russia, agreed. But they're not the countries that rely on the US nuclear umbrella for defence (joining NATO is not the same thing as being dependent on it); the countries that do have rather murkier records.
> You think there's a serious risk of a Russian tank column making it to Frankfurt? Lol. Lmao even.
Tank column? I don't know. But Russia may very well attack the Suwalki gap and hit German cities with long-range missiles to terrorize Germans into dropping support for Poland and Lithuania, while threatening that any German response will unleash nuclear armageddon, as they are currently trying to break the morale in Ukraine. The distance from Suwalki gap to Frankfurt is roughly the same as the distance between active frontline in Ukraine and Lviv (~1000 km), the city that had to enter 2024 under Russian missile attacks. As someone put it succinctly, Russia is shooting missiles at cities 10 Belgiums away from the frontline - with no intention of stopping anytime soon.
> If no-one takes it seriously that's because no-one expects western countries to be principled any more.
The human rights situation in Russia has deteriorated so much in the past few years that their complaints towards the EU can only be taken as a joke. Russian diplomats risk getting laughed out of the room (like Lavrov already experienced) if they raise the issue. Russia has left the European Convention on Human Rights, not to mention "lesser" things like decriminalizing wifebeating, destroying the last remnants of freedom of speech and free expression, turning blind eye to anti-gay pogroms taking place in southern part of the country, systematically persecuting Russian human rights activists, and carrying out ethnic cleansing by conscripting and sending ethnic minorities to die as cannon fodder in pointless "meat attacks" in Ukraine.
Russia is approaching North Korea at a fast pace. Ironically, in the entire world, Russia is one of the worst places to be in as a Russian - which is why all the top dogs in Russia have their children, wives and mistresses living in safety of the "degenerate" west.
> Russia may very well attack the Suwalki gap and hit German cities with long-range missiles to terrorize Germans into dropping support for Poland and Lithuania, while threatening that any German response will unleash nuclear armageddon, as they are currently trying to break the morale in Ukraine.
Russia could certainly drop a handful of missiles on Frankfurt if they were feeling particularly stupid. They could not "reduce it to total rubble" or kill thousands, much less millions, except by using nuclear weapons (if their nuclear weapons even work).
> Russia has left the European Convention on Human Rights, not to mention "lesser" things like decriminalizing wifebeating, destroying the last remnants of freedom of speech and free expression, turning blind eye to anti-gay pogroms taking place in southern part of the country, systematically persecuting Russian human rights activists, and carrying out ethnic cleansing by conscripting and sending ethnic minorities to die as cannon fodder in pointless "meat attacks" in Ukraine.
That changes nothing about whether Russians in other countries are permitted to "speak their language and practice their culture".
> Ironically, in the entire world, Russia is one of the worst places to be in as a Russian - which is why all the top dogs in Russia have their children, wives and mistresses living in safety of the "degenerate" west.
They live in self-reliant countries with strong human rights protection including for Russians - again, not those countries that are dependent on the US nuclear umbrella.
> I don't find that convincing, given that the main claimants to this "multipolar world" are totalitarian dictatorships.
If the USA is dictating issues outside its borders, and the affected people have no vote in US politics, then to them, this isn't conceptually different from being ruled by a dictatorship at all.
No. The argument is not that having some other country as hegemon would be better than the US. The argument is that any single country being overly powerful is a negative, and a more multipolar would would be healthier.
"The US should maintain enough military capacity to prevent/repel an invasion of the continental US" is not particularly controversial. But the US "defending" countries halfway around the world is not healthy for either.
> Pax Americana is currently the only thing preventing me and hundreds of millions of other Europeans from sharing the same fate. Russians do not dare to invade as long as they don't know if Americans would press the nuclear button or not. My freedom to live in peace and unharmed, speak my language and practice my culture, directly depends on the missile silos tucked away somewhere between the cornfields of Iowa. How about that for a perspective?
Russia has spent the past year failing to conquer a country of 40 million, without any involvement from those missile silos. If they tried to invade Poland or Finland they would crumble even quicker. The only countries with a legitimate fear of a Russian invasion are the same countries who have shown zero willingness to protect other people's "freedom to speak their language and practice their culture" when it comes to Russian people living within their (present) borders.