usa pondering a regime change in pakistan !!!

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Comments

  • jlew24asu
    jlew24asu Posts: 10,118
    mammasan wrote:
    It is one thing to befriend another nation. It's completely different to provide arms and money to a country that is one coup away from becoming our greatest nightmare. US policy in the Middle East has been one mistake after another for decades and it may be time we start learning our lesson before we make a truely diseasterous one.

    i'm not all for us giving them weapons. not such a great idea, I agree. but financial assitance, sounds fine. its an extremely touchy situation with our relations. hard to draw the line somewhere between friend or foe. that last thing I want is to be an all out enemy of pakistan.
  • MrBrian
    MrBrian Posts: 2,672
    Cosmo wrote:
    ...
    I think it's about time we learn from our fucking mistakes and quit doing this shit.

    But this is not what america wants. It needs to screw up and fuck people over in order to survive. America is dependent on screwing things up.

    That's why they make the same mistakes over and over and over and over and over and over again. These mistakes are not accidents. All america is interested in is fine tuning these mistakes to make itself screw up more efficiently.

    For example, America admits that supporting hussein was a mistake, but if they could go back in time they probably would not avoid supporting him, because they needed him, they wanted him. so they'd just "fine tune" that support in way that would keep hussein a puppet.
  • soulsinging
    soulsinging Posts: 13,202
    jlew24asu wrote:
    i'm not saying I am happy about the mission and their accomplishments. just trying to give soul a history lesson

    and we're trying to do the same to you. by pointing out that this tactic of arming our enemy's enemies does not make them our friends. yeah, maybe arming osama at the time seemed like a good idea against russia, but history has shown it was unnecessary and had serious consequences down the line. ditto for arming saddam against iran. now we're doing it in pakistan. when will we learn? every time we've done this, we've been burned and it has hurt us far more in the long run than it helped us in the short term. this is the problem with american policy across the board anymore... nobody is willing to look beyond the next election. look tough on *insert imaginary menace here* until you secure re-election and consequences be damned. this goes from foreign policy to the patriot act to welfare to social security. all of our policies are designed for good bullet points on campaign fliers, not for good policy for the american people. pakistan is just another example.
  • soulsinging
    soulsinging Posts: 13,202
    jlew24asu wrote:
    was it a mistake to help osama? at the time no. but osama and el queda would have become what they are today whether or not we helped them in Afghanistan 25 years ago.

    and russia would have fallen in the 1980s, regardless of whether or not we funded and trained el queda 25 years ago.
  • mammasan
    mammasan Posts: 5,656
    jlew24asu wrote:
    i'm not all for us giving them weapons. not such a great idea, I agree. but financial assitance, sounds fine. its an extremely touchy situation with our relations. hard to draw the line somewhere between friend or foe. that last thing I want is to be an all out enemy of pakistan.

    I'm not saying we should concider and treat them like an enemy either, but we should be a little more carefull of who we arm. It seems to me that our government acts without weighing the consequences of their actions. Pakistan under the wrong hands would make Iran look like a wimpering beaten puppy and our solution to that is to throw money at them and provide them with weapons.
    "When one gets in bed with government, one must expect the diseases it spreads." - Ron Paul
  • jlew24asu
    jlew24asu Posts: 10,118
    soulsinging wrote:
    and we're trying to do the same to you. by pointing out that this tactic of arming our enemy's enemies does not make them our friends. yeah, maybe arming osama at the time seemed like a good idea against russia, but history has shown it was unnecessary and had serious consequences down the line. ditto for arming saddam against iran. now we're doing it in pakistan. when will we learn? every time we've done this, we've been burned and it has hurt us far more in the long run than it helped us in the short term. this is the problem with american policy across the board anymore... nobody is willing to look beyond the next election. look tough on *insert imaginary menace here* until you secure re-election and consequences be damned. this goes from foreign policy to the patriot act to welfare to social security. all of our policies are designed for good bullet points on campaign fliers, not for good policy for the american people. pakistan is just another example.

    look, I agree that giving them weapons is not a good idea. but I do not agree that we should shun them and become enemies with them. the situation with pakistan is different then that of osama and saddam.
  • soulsinging
    soulsinging Posts: 13,202
    jlew24asu wrote:
    look, I agree that giving them weapons is not a good idea. but I do not agree that we should shun them and become enemies with them. the situation with pakistan is different then that of osama and saddam.

    different, but not uncomparable. im not advocating invasion and my first post should have made that clear. it's a ridiculous idea and we're not going to meddle in pakistani affairs at this point. just saying we need to start being a little more wary of what's going on under the surface in our dealings with the middle east. im reasonably sure the only reason this president has played buddy with us is he didnt want to be next after afghanistan 6 years ago. his people dont support him and as you have noted, they really hate us. he might be the best scenario for us at this moment, but it's not going to last forever and it's time we stopped this willful ignorance. it's the same ignorance that lead to an iraq war that had no post-war plan and rested on the assumption that the people would be handing us flowers when we started marching through their streets. we don't have to shun pakistan, but that doesn't mean we need to be their best buddy and prop them up either. you see this as protecting our interests in pakistan. the rest of us see it as jeopardizing them. he cannot rule forever, and the impression his people are getting that he is a us puppet is only going to turn them further against us and fuel the desire for a strongly anti-american government once they get him outta the way. in that sense, the situation is probly more comparable to iran. our puppet rulers dont do well in the long run. you're talking about a short term battle victory that may cost us the war. an appeasing ruler in the present that is likely to produce an even more radically antagonistic ruler in the future.
  • my2hands
    my2hands Posts: 17,117
    Abookamongstthemany wrote:
    If by goals, you mean create a region of endless conflict and instability, you would be correct.


    at least a few people get it...

    and dont forget the control of resources in said region...
  • my2hands
    my2hands Posts: 17,117
    pakistan and india nuke each other into oblivion over a mountainous region... then the usa, france, UK, and israel engage in nuclear war with russia and china over a pissing contest. and then the earth can return to its healthy state after 10,000 years of nuclear fallout. problem solved.

    sometimes it is not difficult to lose all faith in the human species... but i like a good underdog so i always support the idea of hope :D

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