Reasons of Pearl Harbor?

Roel wrote:

Give up sovereignity? Are we talking one world government here..a new world order?

Ineffectual perhaps but I fail to see how it makes the UN officials crooked. They are corrupt because they were placed in their position by a corrupt, usually non-democratic government.

For what it has accomplished to date compared to what it has cost I'm for scrapping it. For what good it has done the US to be a member why not scrap it from the US point of view?

 

A new world order was exactly what the American government took the initiative in establishing after World War II. An order in which governments would decide on international issues through a higher council, and in which disputes among countries could be settled by this same council, to prevent all-consuming wars like the two World wars had been. As you can see, in order to establish this, all nations participating need to give up their say about starting wars and allow a higher authority to guarantee their safety. This is what I meant in giving up a certain sovereignity. And since the Security council was initially dominated by capitalist countries, it certainly wasn't a threatening "world order".

I like this one, it's very selfless.
Of course it doesn't do the US any good, since the US in 1945 was the only country that didn't need to be protected! While you're one of the two existing world powers, obviously you're not the one who needs some higher authority to safeguard your borders and your trade. The whole nobility of the idea lies in the fact that the US was willing to extend its supremacy to other countries that do not have the ability to prevent war by muscle or win if attacked. If you're not into "power charity" then from your point of view the UN needs to be scrapped; if you are, however, in favour of preventing war and safeguarding the right to self-determination of peoples, then the UN is a great ideal and a step in the right direction.

The US right now is still one of the few countries that would never really need the UN to solve its problems. It should therefore not be the one to judge it. Not because the UN wouldn't stand criticism, but because the American point of view in this is obvious and one-sided.

I will not split this topic into a separate UN topic since the last time we had one, it had to be locked. Please let's just leave it at this and move on with the US and Pearl Harbour.

 

Roel wrote:

I don't believe in promoting altruism or selflessness. I'm happy to leave that to the collectivists/leftists. Too many Americans have been taken in by that kind of foolish rhetoric IMO.
As far as helping other countries I believe it is acceptable to help those where the US has a significant interest to promote or safeguard otherwise our government has no business there "righting all wrongs" and that kind of blather. There is certainly nothing wrong with charity on the individual level if one chooses..the recent tsunami disaster is a good example. Enough private donations were forthcoming..the government should stay out of it.

How convenient. Keep writing the check and don't presume to ask questions? I think not (and I hope our government will eventually have the fortitude to just say no to the UN)

I'm content to let it rest however if we have to avoid talking about anything that might be controversial we will all soon be too bored to read much less post

 

To re-phrase a rather famous US President:
"Ask not what the world can do for you, but rather what you can do for the world."

The US & the UN...
Ah me...

Well, the US effectively killed off the UN's fore-runner by setting it up (Woodrow Wilson) then refusing to enter (the next guy).

So the US tries again with the UN, then spends the next 50 years using it to fight the Cold War. Actually that is definately not fair, as it did definately take 2 to tango there, and much of the early moves were from the CCCP.

Really, the UN is good in principal - the idea is that nations of the world band together to prevent any nation or nations abusing its population or threatening world stability or whatever.
This does not really work for a variety of reasons (nobody is innocent), the most noticed ones of late being self-interest - although the early years where international intervention was stagnated by the Cold War did not help.

So, this needs resolving. Do we walk away from the UN, say "I'm alright, sod the rest of the world" and wonder why everything goes wrong, or do we try and work at it?

 

I have read your recent discussion on UN (can´t entirely disappear from here).

I just wanted to recommend you a good book: Robert Baer:
Sleeping with the Devil : How Washington Sold Our Soul for Saudi Crude

It shouldn´t be hard to get your hands on, I guess. For me - an eye-opener on the US relations with Saudi Arabia, mostly. Also - about Islamic terrorism.
For me - an eye opener on how Washington functions. I bet Grieg has his opinion about the book or/and the author - an experienced ex-CIA officer.

I can promise you that, having read it, the discussion on UN will seem to you a bit academic.

 

What about the US itself? Isn't it a union of states that entrusted their safety and their foreign policy to a federal government? We are talking about the same sovereignities here, where the UN demands less of its members than the US Federal Government does of its states. Still the States are United because of a need to put quarrels aside and stand united to protect the common good. How much does the average inhabitant of Oregon care for the average inhabitant of Florida?

 

First of all plz don't call us yankees we don't call the brits limeys of the german krauts or the japs japs strike that from the record call us what ever u whant ww2 would of started without pearl

 

In fact WW2 had started long before Pearl Harbor, except that the US weren't involved. What's your view on the theory that allowing Pearl Harbour to happen was a conscious decision by the American government?

 

Roel wrote:

Under the US Constitution the federal governments overrides the states only in limited and narrowly defined area (interstate commerce for example). Even so, the farther one gets from the people the less relevant and just the governing becomes. Oregon and Florida have different problems and need different solutions tailored to their needs and crafted by the people of their respective states. Even more so the people of Botwana and Boca Raton have different situations and cannot be justly or efficiently governed by a bureaucrat sitting in Bucharest.

 

Well, they wouldn't be if they were "governed" by the UN. I'm talking about certain sovereign powers, such as allowing the UN to interfere with their defence, to judge their international actions and to supervise their international trade. I wasn't talking about a centralized world government.

 

Roel, if you allow any Body a modicum of control over foreign trade and foreign policies (incl. defence) of sovereign governments, you´ll have New World Order within months. And no going back. It´s very dangerous. Better to forget about it. And who should have such powers? The UN? Never.
Israel will never surrender as much as a coma of it´s freedom to any political organization outside its borders, for one.
Any organization has an unhappy propensity to grow and grab more and more power.

 

The same was said about feudal lords in the Late middle ages...

It's a process that's been running for centuries in Europe: establishment of small entities with full political capabilities, consolidation of these, then the gradual absorption of these small entities by a larger government. After the consolidation of nation-states there is only one more step to take.

Feudal lands were held from the King's full power because feudal lords had castles to protect themselves with. Nation-states have the draft. Feudalities legitimized themselves with the argument of being ancient; nation-states legitimize themselves with an invented historical unity.

Have at it Ricky!

 

I sincerely hope, this step never will be taken.
National state, with all its faults and problems is based on "tribal" solidarity, due to common language, culture and heritage. And hence - a sort of solidarity.

Who, do you think will dominate the World government? What legitimity is it going to have? What control mechanisms are there going to be?

G-d forbid! Forget about it. Israel will never join such a circus maximus and, I am sure, enough reasonable people in the white part of the world will have enough brains to say No to this potential new cancer. That would become a worst kind of dictatorship, ruled by big business and Rupert Murdoch´s media empire.

 

Roel wrote:

One cannot give up part of their soverignity any more than one can be partially pregnant. Once the UN has the power to regulate defense and trade how is that substantially different from a "centralized world government"? There is also the fact that many nations in the UN are non-democratic. I don't know about Europe but if anyone seriously thinks that the US is going to hand over their jealously guarded liberty to the yahoos in the UN then they are deluded. Not gonna happen.

 

The western style nation state is not yet really threatened.

Of course, history progresses and some day,like everything it will most probably become obsolete and finally replaced by something new.
But that won't happen in any forseeable future and none of us will be there to witness it anymore.

Nowadays, we live in the time of globalization, and many have tought that such an evolution would turn the nation state obsolete.
But I have the strong feeling that the contrary is actually happening.
Confronted with a world that turns increasingely faster and makes many feel unsafe, people do have some "back to the roots" reflex.

Many people today look for identification , for common values....and more and more seem to turn towards the nation state to get this.
I don't know anybody claiming to be a world citizen....
Over 50 years of europan unification, but how many people see themselves really as europeans rather than poles, danes, greeks, french, english....

I think that the concept of nation state still is very powerfull in the minds and above all in the hearts of the people and that nothing for the moment seems to be able to replace it there.

World governement?? No chance!!
Unified Europe?? Yes, but certainly not as a federal europe, but as a union of sovereign nation states based on the common values of europan civilization!!

 

C´est ca, Castelot! Vive la France et vive Monsieur Castelot!

 

Yes - though the phrase 'Nation State' always amuses me.
The concept was born after WW1, when the new borders of Europe were re-drawn around ethnic/cultural groupings, to try to create a country of Czechs, a country of Poles, etc.
Is it possible?
Nope. Look at the Sudetenland, for a classic example.

Anyways.

UN involvement in other country's soverignty...
Beyond restricting trade tariffs, and keeping an eye on human rights etc, and requiring a chunk of the armed forces to be at UN disposal if needed, what more will the UN be doing?
Does anybody really envisage that the UN will be the ultimate government - each country elects their UN representative, and the UN governs the world?

 

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Actually in western europe, the concept of nation state is a lot older than WW1.
It was after WW1 tried to apply ito eastern europe, with sometimes desastrous consequences.

Generally it is very difficult to define criteria for a nation state.
It's not just about ethnicity or culture.
Arguably, Yugoslavia never was a nation state, whereas Switzerland with a similar ethnical/religious diversity surely is one.
Every single country has different reasons to feel as a nation or not,historical, ethnical, cultural....but economical considerations never seemed to have created a nation.

 

I think, this last argument of Castelot is the best one, regarding that unhappy creature - the EU. I agree absolutely with the opinion that nation-state is older than WW1. It might not have been pronounced that openly, but eveybody knew what it was. See the unification of Germany, of Italy. See the centennia of the existence of France as a unity.

And you cant just simply define, what nation-state is. It is so natural a unity in our culture that it´s too difficult to define.

 

Yes, sorry, I should have put that the concept was brought to the fore after WW1...

A Nation state...

Is Britain a Nation State?
Ask the Welsh.