Of course the US is an empire.
In times past, you needed boots on the ground, then you could get around that by having a navy, and then get around that with air-power, and then with money.
You are either subordinate to the US, or you are an enemy. There is no middle ground.
That should be obvious, since the US attempted to murder Prime Minister Nehru of India for the heinous crime against humanity of Declaring Neutrality While Non-White/Non-Christian.
The US attempted (but failed) to overthrow the Syrian government for the heinous crime against humanity of Declaring Neutrality While Non-White/Non-Christian.
The US attempted (but failed) to murder or overthrow Nasser of Egypt for the heinous crime against humanity of Declaring Neutrality While Non-White/Non-Christian.
See, only White Christian countries like Sweden, Finland, Austria and Switzerland are allowed to declare neutrality. Everyone else has to pick a side.
Truman overthrew the Greek government in 1948; LBJ overthrew the Greek government in 1967; Truman wanted to murder President Arbenz of Guatemala for the heinous crime against humanity of Building an Electric Power Plant While Non-White/Non-Christian; Eisenhower commuted Arbenz' sentence to just overthrow; Obama/Clinton illegally overthrew the Honduran government in July 2009...the 14th time the US has illegally overthrown a Honduran government since 1900; repeated overthrows of Nicaraguan governments; Eisenhower installed Castro to overthrow Batista and then Eisenhower and JFK (and other Presidents) attempted to overthrow Castro for committing the heinous crime against humanity of Nationalizing While Non-White/Non-Christian*; invaded the Dominican Republic; assassinated Ngo Diem and has half-witted brother; overthrew the government of Libya and installed Ghaddafi, then protected Ghaddafi from 11 counter-coup attempts, then ultimately overthrew Ghaddafi; overthrew the Tunisian government; gave money to Pakistan to buy weapons from Iran to give to the Contras to overthrow a Nicaraguan government; gave money to Pakistan to buy weapons from Iran to give to al-Qaida lieutenant al-Zawahiri to smuggle weapons from Albania into Kosovo-Metohija and Bosnia; bombed Serbia to overthrow the government; used Task Force 74 to threaten India during the 1971 Pakistani-Indian War; overthrew governments in Chlle, Argentina, Venezuela and Brasil for the heinous crime against humanity of Nationalizing While Non-White/Non-Christian*; overthrew governments in the Philippines; overthrew governments in Mexico; planned to invade Mexico and seize the oil and natural gas fields in 1940 because President Cardenas committed the heinous crime against humanity of Nationalizing While Non-White/Non-Christian*, but didn't because WW II was looming on the horizon; used General Qasim to assassinate King Faisal II of Iraq for committing the heinous crime against humanity of Nationalizing While Non-White/Non-Christian* then murdered General Qasim for committing the heinous crime against humanity of Nationalizing While Non-White/Non-Christian* then installed Saddam Hussein then sold chemical weapons to Saddam who used them against Iran and his own people and sat silently by; cajoled Saddam into a war with Iran'; attempted to assassinate Prime Minister Mossadeq of Iran three times (but failed) for committing the heinous crime against humanity of Nationalizing While Non-White/Non-Christian*; overthrew or assassinated Pakistani governments, presidents or presidential candidates....
I could go on for days, but you get the point...that's what empires do.
*Only White Christian countries are allowed to nationalize anything.
Of course the US is an empire.
In times past, you needed boots on the ground, then you could get around that by having a navy, and then get around that with air-power, and then with money.
You are either subordinate to the US, or you are an enemy. There is no middle ground.
That should be obvious, since the US attempted to murder Prime Minister Nehru of India for the heinous crime against humanity of Declaring Neutrality While Non-White/Non-Christian.
The US attempted (but failed) to overthrow the Syrian government for the heinous crime against humanity of Declaring Neutrality While Non-White/Non-Christian.
The US attempted (but failed) to murder or overthrow Nasser of Egypt for the heinous crime against humanity of Declaring Neutrality While Non-White/Non-Christian.
See, only White Christian countries like Sweden, Finland, Austria and Switzerland are allowed to declare neutrality. Everyone else has to pick a side.
Truman overthrew the Greek government in 1948; LBJ overthrew the Greek government in 1967; Truman wanted to murder President Arbenz of Guatemala for the heinous crime against humanity of Building an Electric Power Plant While Non-White/Non-Christian; Eisenhower commuted Arbenz' sentence to just overthrow; Obama/Clinton illegally overthrew the Honduran government in July 2009...the 14th time the US has illegally overthrown a Honduran government since 1900; repeated overthrows of Nicaraguan governments; Eisenhower installed Castro to overthrow Batista and then Eisenhower and JFK (and other Presidents) attempted to overthrow Castro for committing the heinous crime against humanity of Nationalizing While Non-White/Non-Christian*; invaded the Dominican Republic; assassinated Ngo Diem and has half-witted brother; overthrew the government of Libya and installed Ghaddafi, then protected Ghaddafi from 11 counter-coup attempts, then ultimately overthrew Ghaddafi; overthrew the Tunisian government; gave money to Pakistan to buy weapons from Iran to give to the Contras to overthrow a Nicaraguan government; gave money to Pakistan to buy weapons from Iran to give to al-Qaida lieutenant al-Zawahiri to smuggle weapons from Albania into Kosovo-Metohija and Bosnia; bombed Serbia to overthrow the government; used Task Force 74 to threaten India during the 1971 Pakistani-Indian War; overthrew governments in Chlle, Argentina, Venezuela and Brasil for the heinous crime against humanity of Nationalizing While Non-White/Non-Christian*; overthrew governments in the Philippines; overthrew governments in Mexico; planned to invade Mexico and seize the oil and natural gas fields in 1940 because President Cardenas committed the heinous crime against humanity of Nationalizing While Non-White/Non-Christian*, but didn't because WW II was looming on the horizon; used General Qasim to assassinate King Faisal II of Iraq for committing the heinous crime against humanity of Nationalizing While Non-White/Non-Christian* then murdered General Qasim for committing the heinous crime against humanity of Nationalizing While Non-White/Non-Christian* then installed Saddam Hussein then sold chemical weapons to Saddam who used them against Iran and his own people and sat silently by; cajoled Saddam into a war with Iran'; attempted to assassinate Prime Minister Mossadeq of Iran three times (but failed) for committing the heinous crime against humanity of Nationalizing While Non-White/Non-Christian*; overthrew or assassinated Pakistani governments, presidents or presidential candidates....
I could go on for days, but you get the point...that's what empires do.
*Only White Christian countries are allowed to nationalize anything.
Nor is the aid the CIA provided in support of the dictatorship that followed, and the conspiracy that occurred prior.
Which specific acts of war or aggression did Allende partake in that would make 'peaceful' as a descriptor a joke?
What of American involvement in and manipulation of foreign elections, including the Chile elections?
What of American support for horrific and unsavoury allies of convenience all over the world, many of which could be considered terrorists and performed acts of terrorism? Iran Contra? Afghanistan Taliban?
What of the direct, extensive and ongoing American involvement in Allende's overthrow? Their support for Pinochet and his military coup/dictatorship both before and after the war?
The bottom line is that Allende was elected (despite attempts at electoral manipulation on all sides), he didn't oppress his people, he didn't wage war or engage in acts of aggression, and the CIA banked and backed an unlawful armed military coup that then transitioned into a brutal dictatorship, and it did this in pursuit of American economic interests and expansion of its sphere of influence. It is completely inexcusable from any ethical standpoint.
Yes, when one takes a gamble and fails—like letting a Trotskyite run around in a position of being and being somehow surprised when he ****s you over in the name of the “revolution”—the sharks come out. None of this is news. It’s a story as old as time, quite frankly.
Like I said before, he was toppled before he could have a chance to get the training camps set up for insurgents in neighboring countries....like Castro did in Cuba.
Hey, if it’s okay for the KGB to literally bribe your opponents, then whining about US “meddling” is rather hilariously hypocritical.
Oh look, and then we’ve got another attempt to equate the Taliban and the Mujahideen. I get it’s easier for lazy rhetorical purposes to pretend the US armed the Taliban, but we didn’t. The two groups were entirely different organizations, and it was a top corner Mujahideen who led the resistance against the Taliban for years prior to 2001.
The bottom line is that the KGB bribed opponents to get Allende into power and then he was topped before he could consolidate said power, thus earning himself a martyr’s fairy tale.
You mean the sharks that the CIA aided, abetted, funded and supported?
Where's the evidence he was going to set up insurgent training camps?
It's obviously not okay, but the CIA was doing literally the same thing albeit on the opposing end of the ideological spectrum. No one is righteous, but that the US failed in its electoral manipulations doesn't justify a military coup and overturn of the result, particularly when Allende did nothing that could remotely justify such an operation.
First of all, I love how you gloss over the Contras which were in fact terrorists whose atrocities Reagan methodically whitewashed, and certainly far from the only unsavory actors that the US has supported and backed: United States and state-sponsored terrorism - Wikipedia
Second, Taliban and Al Qaeda at a minimum benefited substantially from American interventions in Afghanistan; it is a matter of record that arms and training in support of the Mujahideen ultimately made its way to these organizations, including to some of Osama's closest allies and Osama himself. The amount to which they benefited can be disputed, but it simply cannot be denied that there was a considerable and significant degree of blowback and unforeseen consequences occurred in the process and as a direct consequence of empowering the largely fundamentalist Mujahideen to combat the communists.
The bottom line in actuality, is that the CIA also tried to manipulate the electoral process, failed, and then employed a brutal dictator to depose him via force and in violation of any kind of ethics and international law on the basis of what was thought to be in favour of American economic and political interests.
You can try to whitewash or deflect from modern American realpolitik and its depraved Machiavellian actions all you like, but it doesn't change the fact that they were done, and they represented a singleminded pursuit of American interests without regard for any ethical norms or international law. That the Soviets also engaged in atrocity doesn't magically make American crimes any less grave. The history of the US has had serious blights upon it, and it is far better you acknowledge them then try to pretend they don't exist, and that our country has always been some mythical paragon of sound ethics and principles beyond reproach or criticism.
The Taliban certainly did not “benefit substantially” from being overthrown from power in Afghanistan. Al Qaeda certainly did not benefit from having its leaders wiped out.
Your article is rather amusing because many of its supposed claims(and funnily enough, I see no mention of the taliban on the list whatsoever) are based on rumor and innuendo from left wing sources(Italy) groups which could only be considered “terrorists” if one seriously stretches the definition(Los Pepes) or groups which fought against brutal thugs like the Milosevic regime.
When one compares that to, say, Iran or Russia’s track records...
Iran and state-sponsored terrorism - Wikipedia
Terrorism and the Soviet Union - Wikipedia
It looks downright paltry.
Ah, so in other words Allende’s manipulation of the democratic process is okay because others were doing it too? Yeah, not buying it.
Gee, other than the fact that said training camps were set up by the KGB in just about every one of their client states? And that Allende was indebted to the KGB for their assistance in coming to power in the first place?
The brutal dictator employed himself. If the US had stopped in to stop him all that would happen was you usual suspects would scream and whine about that. That’s what happens every time the US topples a brutal thug.
They were indisputably a problem that the CIA helped create; one that cost us trillions of dollars and thousands of lives as part of the 'war on terror' when Afghanistan was invaded, alongside Iraq.
They're not listed because the Taliban were an offshoot of the Mujahideen as opposed to a party that was directly assisted; the strengthening of the Taliban was as stated, an unforeseen consequence of supplying them against the Soviets, though in truth it shouldn't be really so surprising or unforeseen that Islamic fundamentalists in a loose coalition, would eventually come to turn on the States, once we stopped being the enemy of their enemy, and continued to intervene in the general region.
Again, you're deflecting from the issue that the country has engaged in egregious and serious ethical missteps in pursuit of its foreign policy. No one is disputing the evils of Soviet and Iran sponsorship of terrorism; that others do it is no defense against the reality of what the States has done in the name of (hopefully) advancing its interests.
You're projecting. It seems to be literally your own argument that as above, because others were aiding and abetting terrorists, and engaging in egregious breaches of international law and ethics, that it's okay for us to do so in the case of Allende among other situations in pursuit of what is perceived to be in the raw national interest.
That doesn't prove anything; there was no evidence nor was any such activity in place at the time of the coup, or during Allende's presidency. You can't prosecute a coup over what might happen without anything but at best expectations based on past precedent and expect to be justified; that's ridiculous.
No, he didn't. Pinochet undertook the coup with substantial US support and recognition of the fact at every point in time: before, during and after. It is laughable revisionism to suggest that Pinochet was not a significant beneficiary of US patronage, and that the US was not intimately involved with the overthrow of Allende.
The Mujahideen were not created by the US either; resistance to the Soviet occupation, which was incredibly brutal, was already underway long before the US got involved in any way, shape or form. The Taliban didn’t come about until well after the war. Your argument is the equivalent of blaming the US for Action Directe because we armed the French Resistance during the Second World War.
Funny how others doing it is a defense of Allende though. Not to mention, as I stated before, that while the US has certainly interacted with unsavory elements, trying to call that “support of terrorism” is often laughable.
The fact that Allende had not been able to secure power doesn’t change the fact that he was indebted to the KGB, or the fact that the KGB routinely set up such bases in just about every one of their allies. Preemptive actions are a routine part of foreign policy and spy craft literally going back hundreds of years, by the way; allowing an enemy to accomplish something and then reacting puts on the defensive.
Yes, Pinochet was a thug. But he was going to try and overthrow Allende regardless of what the US did. Reducing third world players to nothing more than puppets in the hands of the US is laughable
ecofarm:
No one said it was, but is America an empire? Make a case.
Cheers.
Evilroddy.
It is an "If by whiskey" question....
If by empire you mean a traditional empire of territories and client states the answer is no. Not since the early 1900s.
If by the empire you are going with the varied new interpretations of empire that have little to do with the original definition then an argument can be made. Especially in the late 1940s to early 1960s. We were in the unique position of being a super power and the only major industrial country not digging itself out from the ruin of WWII. Many nations of the world were more than happy to join the gravy train. Others wished to be shielded from the scare of communism.
It can be said the "new" empire was one of persuasion rather than invasion.
And terrorism, and bloody coups, criminal conspiracy and electoral manipulation and rigging, guerrilla warfare, and many other kinds of covert and overt intervention.
Yes... The US did bad things... Often to thwart communist intervention....
And after the blood baths following the creation of the USSR and Red China in addition to Pol Pot, the Korean Kim's, etc. it can be argued the US was the lesser of two evils.
Liberation is not imperialism.
Yes, the US is the lesser evil, but we also did pretty inexcusable things; in some of those cases, perhaps even many, they couldn't be justified for reasons of fundamental security or preventing humanitarian crisis. We should never whitewash our history, otherwise we become incapable of learning from it.
I am not proposing whitewashing. I am a proponent of looking at things a bit more dispassionatly than others. I don't suggest the US has been 100% correct in everything they do. I do believe that people were of a mind that they were doing the right thing.
I simply don't think that in every single case there was an ethical argument to be made for what was done; that is what a more dispassionate assessment would likely conclude. When regime change, including of peaceful, democratic governments, is pursued on the basis of economic interest or merely a desire to retain influence, it becomes rather difficult to argue that it was the right thing to do.
It’s cute you believe that.
But while America can be somewhat benevolent in its conduct, whether there’s an imperial standard above the capital of certain countries or not, in pursuit of its foreign policy it has been party to , supportive of and in some cases aided and abetted some pretty gross human rights violations.
You seem to side step this issue, but America has and continues to use power projection and economic pressure to run an unofficial global empire, often with the aid of some pretty bad folks, in the context of the geo-political game, it is what it is, but stop pretending your country is some selfless liberator of the oppressed, it has been in some circumstances, but overall, not really.
It's cute that you're such a super cynic about foreign intervention, but you're not the only benevolent person in America.
On certain subjects you have an incredibly one dimensional view and yes, I am super cynical of American Foreign intervention, why shouldn’t I be?
After all that’s happened, there’s not a single reason not to be.
I wouldn't consider the feminist perspective of foreign intervention to be one dimensional.
The important thing to notice is that we aren't the only benevolent people in the world and a free government is not filled with evil.
The feminist perspective of... What in the hell are you on about?
So you have no idea what my perspective is. You thought it was nationalism? Wtf. Nationalism is garbage.
And you claim I'm one dimensional on this? You don't even have a clue wtf I'm coming from.
I'm an interventionist via ecofeminism. If that's so one dimensional, explain it for us all. Show us that you can actually grasp where I'm coming from. Let's see. Present my fundamental claims/points. I know you can't. That's rhetorical. You have absolutely no ****ing clue where I'm coming from.
One dimensional describes your idiotic take on my perspective.
No I don’t have a clue where you’re coming from, because you seem to believe America acts in a purely humanitarian and egalitarian fashion when it comes to its foreign policy,
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