An Empire of Good Intentions

[DerAdlerIstGelandet]

You are correct also. I can agree with that.

[evangilder]

Yep, you described the situation in Iraq accurately.

[GT]

Update.

[SM79Sparviero]

You also have to give the country the ability to stand on it's own two feet with democracy. A previously undemocratic nation does not know how to do that so you have to occupy the area for a long time. With occupation comes hatred from the population wondering why foreign troops are in their lands

The problem is more subtle and deeper.
Ex, if you speak with a sincerely religious Hindi and say "all men and women have the same legal duties and rights " in the best hypotesis he neither understands what you are speaking about, in the worst he gets sincerely sad because he feels it as a deep insult to his religious and philosophical sense of life.

More important, the man itself is not necessariously is amoral or less honest than us, in his own background.
If you democratically approve a law that forbids to a widow to burn herself together with the body of the dead husband I feel it as a progress in civilization but she feels it as a "degeneration of customs" also because her relatives will mark her as "impure" if she escapes her own sacrifice.

Human rights are a idea born in Europe not before the XX century , they are a postulate for very good purposes but still an arbitrary postulate exactly as Catholic faith in Jesus Christ's resurrection is no more than a postulate.

Again, the borders between African states (but not only African, think of Yugoslavia) are arbitrary postulates imposed by agreements among the old colonizators and for the convenience of these ones that bind different people,often in mutual conflict for centuries, to a forced cohabitation ( ex think of Tutsi and Hutu tribals) .
If we add the problem of petrol and the puppet local dictators imposed by "more civilized" nations for their purposes, it is like a torch in a fuel tank.

If we hope to take our kind of civilization to these people we must clear up to IMPOSE it at various possible levels,as softly as it is possible, but it will always be honestly an imposition.
And we have the duty to stay there not for a short time, not as conquerors but as neutral "referee", with a clearly fair distance from each conflicting pole.

[DerAdlerIstGelandet]

The problem is when you get people of different ethnicities that have been fighting each other for 1000 of years such as in the former Yugoslavia and even in some of the old Colonies of Africa. It is deeply rooted that it will never be bred out of them.

[wmaxt]

There are many good points here. Plan_D is correct in that Good Intentions can cause more grief than just about anything. Evan is also right in that until a country is ready it can't be freed.

I think we are in Iraq for personal reasons of the President because Iraq was never a threat to the US (though I will always support our troops). Plan_D is also correct in that the people must be ready to make freedom of government sustainable, I don't think Iraq is there yet.

My view of the responsibility of the US to the world is this:
1. To help and encourage those who want our help.
2. To set an example but not to force our ways on others. Our vision isn't perfect and may not be right for others.
3. To help defend those that are both in need and request our help.
4. To be a part of the world community, not the bad boy on the block.

I honestly think as people get educated the world will become democratic in some form. The needs and desires of the various peoples will produce a format of government that fits those needs.

wmaxt

[DerAdlerIstGelandet]

Originally Posted by wmaxt

My view of the responsibility of the US to the world is this:
1. To help and encourage those who want our help.
2. To set an example but not to force our ways on others. Our vision isn't perfect and may not be right for others.
3. To help defend those that are both in need and request our help.
4. To be a part of the world community, not the bad boy on the block.

I completely agree with you on this. Well said!

[plan_D]

Obviously, GT, you are failing to read all the posts and collect my views together. Do not read a single one of my posts and dissect it without building up the general picture.

As I noted in the very first post, the British Empire was kind hearted but a kind heart is not always kindness to other people. The idea of the British Empire during the 19th Century (Key that you note 19th Century) was to great a system of alliance between it's sub-ordinate nations. In which three different methods were tried, and ultimately failed. Even one was of Home Rule, an effective freedom.

I did point out, Sparviero, that a religious culture could and most likely would think of an inclusion of equal rights and democracy as a dilution or destruction of their own culture. That one, simple, post was to reinforce and simplify the point as a whole. I'm sure you understand that.

As I said in a previous post the world cannot be equal for the world to work there has to be rich and poor. There has to be a class system of working, middle and high.

The perfection is created by imperfection.

[Medvedya]

Originally Posted by plan_D

As I said in a previous post the world cannot be equal for the world to work there has to be rich and poor. There has to be a class system of working, middle and high.

The perfection is created by imperfection.

This was the fundamental problem with the Communist system - if everybody gets the same things, then why bother working hard or striving for a goal? Even if it's an abstract one, there has to be a pay-out as the end result.

Humans are aquisitive by nature. Although I'm pretty happy with my lot, I instinctively desire better or more things for myself, and if I get those better things, that inevitably means someone else doesn't.

Selfish? Well, regretably that's the way it is. The alternative is to take monastic orders, which is fine in itself for some people - but if everybody were to all do that, we as a species we would not advance - and thus undermine our personal and universal destiny.

[plan_D]

Yeah, what he said...

[SM79Sparviero]

I did point out, Sparviero, that a religious culture could and most likely would think of an inclusion of equal rights and democracy as a dilution or destruction of their own culture. That one, simple, post was to reinforce and simplify the point as a whole. I'm sure you understand that.

This coul seem a paradox on the contrary it is one of the key points.
British colonialism was based generally (and in particular in India) on the "indirect rule" that's to involve the highest number of local people "(native administration") the first that it is possible on their self-administration on the model of an european democratic country,with the exception of Rhodesia, South African states, Kenya where the percent of white colonizator was very high.

This is the mistake:it was too soon, indigenous administrators even the ones with a good cultural level didn' t really believe in their job and they perfectly realized that most of the administrated population didn't believe in it yet.
Europeans had first to go to them and try think with their head, later colonized population could ( maybe) be allowed to go to European way of thinking , much later and very very gradually.

Italian model of colonization was imposted apparently on a fast ideological transfert from Fascism to local people but the first problem that most intelligent leaders realized was that they had to learn languages, customs, most importantly local complex social relationships if they wanted to get obedience or simply collaboration.

The few successful Italian actions in East Africa in WWI were got by those few officers who had been so humble to learn Somali and Ethiopian languages and to realize that Ascari or Dubat fought well in attack and very poorly in defence actions,they respected and followed their leader only if they saw him on the first line in battle "like a fighting lion(" Ambesà)".

Ex, remember Amedeo Guillet "cummandar-as-sheitan".If you lived in Italy you couldn't believe that a noble cavalry officer from Piemont could humiliate himself up to learn Arabian or Somali, but he did, and he is still alive, in Ireland.
Others who needed a "basci buzuk" ( underofficer) to translate lost as soon as the interpreter was killed, annd the orders could not be comunicated.

[plan_D]

The British tried several ways to rule their sub-ordinate nations during the days of the Imperial Empire. From culturing them to just giving them the basics.

The fact of the matter is with the British Empire, during World War 2 the colonies turned out in their hundreds, thousands and millions to defend the British Empire. They thought the British may be bad but as a ruler, there's no one better.

[DerAdlerIstGelandet]

The problem is you can not culture another nation that is already deeply rooted in its own culture. I agree plan_D though that Britain did not do that bad when as he said the colonials came out and fought for England and some of them were damn good soldiers.

[GT]

Update.

[plan_D]

The advancement of British culture and technology gave many of it's colonies a better state of life than what it would have been had the British never been there. That is why Britain is remembered as a "decent Empire" among most people. Britain did not destroy the infrastructure it had created among these nations when it left, in most cases (mostly Africa) the indigineous population did. Britain set up telegraph communications, roads and railways in it's sub-ordinate nations. As I say, after the 1857 Mutiny in India, Britain was all too happy to keep India Indian.

Britain did have slaves but Britain was also the first full nation to stop slavery. The state of Vermont was the first province. Britain even banned slavery amongst it's Empire in 1833. After the abolishment of slavery in the U.S in 1867, the United States Navy and Royal Navy worked jointly to stop the slave trade.

The fact that so many Commonwealth soldiers rallied to the Union Jack is an ever lasting tribute to the decency at heart of the British Empire. Sure, it was not always great and there were times of atrocity but we had always intended our Empire to be remembered not for it's size, scope and influence but for it's decency and open-mind. And I'm sure the U.S is trying the same.

Only, as has been mentioned before and I'm sure everyone understands...the inclusion of democracy and culture in most nations in the Middle East or South-East Asia would look to them as a destruction of religion and their culture.