Young Americans have never witnessed a functioning foreign policy

JJumpCrisscross about 3 hours ago 29 commentsRead Article on ft.com

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Tycho•about 2 hours ago

Well under Dubya it was pretty successful. Firstly, there was never a repeat of 9/11. Secondly, they pulled off one of the most overwhelming military victories of all time against Iraq, a full-blown invasion completed in weeks with hardly any losses. This also secured Israel’s long term prospects in the region, which seems to be one of the most sacred directives of American policy. It did also lead ultimately to civil war in Syria and political destabilisation in Germany/Europe (from refugees), but that is no skin off Uncle Sam’s nose. You may not like it, but in the history books that’s what peak foreign policy looks like.

Steppphennn•about 1 hour ago

A wouldn’t say the Iraq finished in “a few weeks.” They knew if they just left it would go back to the same business as usual. So the USA stayed for years playing Sim City. Trillions of dollars all said and done doesn’t seem like a win. These proxy’s are just that, proxies, because foreign policy on a grander scale is harder to accomplish like with China or Russia. USA won one proxy in the region but it’s more akin to winning the battle not the war. Iran is showing this as I type.

aworks•about 1 hour ago

Hardly any losses except for the violent deaths of hundreds of thousands of Iraqis over a decade.

Georgelemental•about 2 hours ago

> This also secured Israel’s long term prospects in the region, which seems to be one of the most sacred directives of American policy.

Not really—it massively increased Iran's influence in the area, which is why in 2007 they had to panic, reverse course, and start backing al-Qaeda again ("the redirection").

SwellJoe•about 2 hours ago

They've never witnessed functioning policy on any front. Bin Laden wanted to destroy America, and he succeeded beyond his wildest dreams. The current administration is the logical result of fear and ignorance and xenophobia being elevated to our primary motivations, rather than merely being the position of a few embarrassing reactionary cranks. A prerequisite for winning elections in half the country today is that you must be the dumbest and meanest and most corrupt motherfucker the voters have ever seen. If you're not, somebody dumber and meaner and more corrupt will come along to push you out (e.g. Paxton in Texas for a current example, but it's the entirety of the Republican party and a not insignificant part of the Democratic party).

gruez•about 2 hours ago

>They've never witnessed functioning policy on any front. Bin Laden wanted to destroy America, and he succeeded beyond his wildest dreams.

This is revisionism. The agenda of al-Qaeda was to establish a caliphate. The whole "al‑Qaeda Plot to Just Sit Back and Enjoy Collapse of United States" meme was just a pivot after they got pummeled by the US army, after 9/11. That's not to say the US won, but the US losing isn't the same as al‑Qaeda winning.

>al-Qaeda[a] is a pan-Islamist militant organization led by Sunni Islamist jihadists who self-identify as a vanguard spearheading a global Islamist revolution to unite the Muslim world under a supra-national Islamic caliphate

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Al-Qaeda

SwellJoe•about 1 hour ago

Did they need the real estate under the World Trade Center to establish a caliphate?

gruez•32 minutes ago

Which was why it was widely considered a dumb move on the part of Bin Laden. It attracted all sorts of unwanted attention, that ultimately led to the the core group losing all relevance. The other al-Qaeda franchises might be doing well, but the people who pulled off 9/11 (and their successors) have virtually no influence, on top of being hunted by the US.

lokar•about 2 hours ago

American politics has often been about pitting one group against another. Convincing them that others are benefiting at their expense, or that they will in the future.

earth-tattoo•about 2 hours ago

If you think democratic party is any less corrupt than republican, you are already biased

dabraham1248•about 2 hours ago

To rip off my own comment from a couple of months ago:

This kind of reflexive both-sides-ism works to obfuscate the _huge_ difference in scale, _and_ the occasional, small-but-real attempts of mostly democrats to do something about it.

Now, if the democrats had more big donors than republicans, maybe they wouldn't? But that's a counterfactual that we can't know. But we do know that Bush 1 vetoed a soft money limit passed mostly by democrats, and that Clinton pushed for one, but didn't get it done.

McCain-Feingold passed the Senate with 48 out of 50 D votes (96%), and 11 of 38 R votes (29%) (and one I (100%)), the House with 198 of 210 D (94%), and house, 41 out of 217 R (19%), 1 out of 2 I (50%). Then it was a mostly R appointed Supreme Court that gutted it. Then a _more_ R appointed court that has continued to whittle it down.

For all that the Democrats don't go far enough, there is a _huge_ difference between the parties on this.

EMIRELADERO•about 2 hours ago

No. A difference of degree is still a difference, and Trump 2 is vastly and openly more corrupt than any other administration, Democratic or Republican.

lokar•about 2 hours ago

I think some 19th century administrations could compete.

KyleTheDev•about 2 hours ago

"If you don't think this ridiculous thing that I believe, you're biased and wrong!"

The current republican party is comedically more corrupt than the current democratic party.

neuroelectron•about 2 hours ago

>they see only mistrust between allies

https://archive.is/OJyDx

124ahg•about 2 hours ago

When was the last time it functioned? George Bush Senior? The transition from the Soviet Union collapse was reasonable.

The what is the definition of "functioning"? The unlimited NATO expansion began under Clinton, Middle East expansion, wars and regime changes under Bush Junior.

All presidents since Dubya continued the containment of Russia policy and the Middle East expansion. The fall of Syria and cooperation with Al Qaeda occurred under Biden, Trump was crazy enough to sign off the Iran special military operation.

So it functions in the sense that the US retains energy dominance and keeps the EU, Russia and China down.

Or does "functioning" mean "pretending to be nice to allies"? That is the domain of the Democrats.

jazzpush2•about 2 hours ago

Can you say anything specific? If you're going to criticize policy, there are many specific things you can say. 'Keeps China down' is not only incorrect, but meaningless itself.

Supermancho•about 2 hours ago

As I look back to after the Kuwait defense, the attack on Iraq and forward stopped making sense because US leadership didn't explain the rationale. Politicians didn't want to get caught up in the problematic history of dealing with Iraq and Iran, so the US charged in and pushed out Iraq under the flag of supporting an ally (the US was really serving Saudi Arabia and punishing Saddam). There was an expectation that Iraq's military over-investment would have kept them in economic check for some time.

After 9-11 it became obvious that there was a political and economic gold-rush opportunity under Cheney (who was the brains of the Bush admin). The US constructed Operation Iraqi Freedom to finally eliminate the uncontrollable and brutal Saddam family, while satisfying the needs of various parties (eg SA, Israel, Iran, Kuwait). Again the US population got a different narrative and there were no political consequences.

This trend of ignoring what the US populace needs to know, doing whatever benefits those that are in power, then constructing a fake narrative continues. The names are different, but the policy is non-existent. The difference in the Trump Administration is that the constructions challenge reality or simply don't exist. The political consequences have been the same. None[1].

Maybe it's always been this way.

[1] The primary driver of political consequence in the US seems to be economics, because that's a consequence that's measurable and cannot be rationalized as a patriotic good for some imagined future state of the world.

wood_spirit•about 2 hours ago

I’m not sure about the Biden cooperating with Al Qaeda thing (perhaps you mean not intervening when HTS took over? Biden was backing the Kurds at the time) but it was Trump who did a deal with the Taliban re Afghanistan.

The post war Republican Party had been all about building alliances and being nice to allies! The current Republican Party is so different and distant from the stances of the party just 20 years ago.

Georgelemental•about 2 hours ago

Cooperating with Al-Qaeda is a decades-old policy—started under Clinton, brief pause after 9/11, then returned in full force in late Bush years (2007 "redirection") and hasn't stopped since.

jameskilton•about 2 hours ago

A few weeks ago I was golfing with a 21-year old wearing a Trump hat. Didn't ask him about it, it could have been ironic, but I realized something: He's never seen a healthy America, probably doesn't even have any concept of how things could be better.

It's rough being a Millennial. Came of age at the end of the last time the country was arguably "healthy", then 9/11 happened and it's been downhill from there.

treis•about 2 hours ago

My perpetual reminder that this "healthy America" never existed. As far as generations go Millennials have it easier than the Vietnam, WWII, and WWI/Great Depression generations.

sheikhnbake•about 2 hours ago

Which Millennials? It's hard to take that sentiment seriously when children and home ownership are out of reach luxuries for a significant portion of the generation which was not the case following the post-WWII economy, as evidenced by boomers' namesake.

dude250711•about 2 hours ago

Maybe it's just the closest thing to being a rebel (as in going against popular opinion) these days.

jazzpush2•about 2 hours ago

I know someone who shared this sentiment. As if being highly-supported by the largest 'alt' media (Rogan etc.) and traditional media (Fox, etc.) is in any way rebellious. Never mind being a literal billionarie who got away with fucking kids and continues to shill crypto coins.

harvey9•about 2 hours ago

Popular opinion can just be at local scale. Hence Tom Lehrer's joke

"It takes a certain amount of courage to get up in a coffee house or a college auditorium and come out in favour of the things everyone else in the room is against like peace and justice and brotherhood and so on"

seanw444•about 2 hours ago

We have proof he fucked kids now?

somekyle2•about 2 hours ago

yeah, we always joked among my left-leaning friends who were cool with any sort of gender expression or style, pierced and tatted, didn't really judge drug use or aggressive music, didn't value respect for authority that our kids were do their edgelord rebellion phase by being regressive conservatives, and I don't doubt that happens. Ultimately, "what will make people like my mom unreasonably mad?" is a compelling thing for some young people (and some older! I know boomers who seem to like MAGA in part because it pisses people off who they view as stuffy and stuck up).