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Originally posted by Davros:
The manner in which the latter sections were said though, comes across as "we are the biggest bully in the streets and if we want your lunch money we will bloody well take it". Now of course that is not a very successful the way to win friends and influence people, but you seem to argue that that in itself is really immaterial. One thing that manner does do is it keeps the word TARGET painted squarely on the chest of the country.
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Well my friend, I think this is where we venture into the thorny problem of all blind people the world over grabbing different parts of the same elephant and arriving at different conclusions about what we're grabbing ahold of.
I'll look yet again, but I don't really see where I was employing quite so much bluster. I think the problem is that it is indeed a forgone conclusion that all else notwithstanding, we're the undisputed heavyweight champ in terms of our ability to project military power. And I can understand how this scares the crap out people, or at least makes them uneasy, when we get riled up start throwing punches.
However, I think it is likewise true that there is such a great expectation that we'll temper out use of force with judicious wisdom that we'll negate it entirely. I heard others complain time and time again about how big bully-boy America is beating up on smaller. weaker militaries like those fielded by the Taliban or the Hussein regime in Iraq. Well, the whole purpose of having a gargantuan, well-funded, well-trained, and highly effective (read: lethal) military is to KEEP THE PEACE by providing a strong disincentive for other countries to resort to violently aggressive diplomacy. At any rate, if Saddam or Al Queda or OBL are fanatical enough to adopt a "victory or death" attitude and dumb enough to adopt it against a military force against which they are hopelessly outclassed, that's their fault.
Quote:
Originally posted by Davros:
The US is big enough to go it alone, but I would have thought there still were advantages to not alienating all your friends in the world. If the US were only into bully action on their own, then I would struggle with my personal position of wholehearted support.
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Once again, I agree that doing things in an agreeable way is nice...but at what cost? I for one do not expect our President to allow out country to be threatened, terrorized, and ultimately weakened by violent thugs, fanatics, and paranoid dictators for the sake of appealing to the fickle whims and fancies of the world community.