Resistance fighters learned jihad from U.S. textbooks

[Fletch]

George Washington was right then and now.

B-b-b-b-b-but the world has changed since George Washington, and it's imperative that our principles change to keep up with the times! It's the liberal, progressive thing to do!

 

[phylodog]

Dubious, unless you believe that communism is historically inevitable, rather than a perversion of human society. I reject that Marxian notion of the dialectic, but plenty of non-Marxists apparently believe in it.

The Soviets couldn't manage their empire as it was. If we hadn't opposed, their domain would have been larger and even more unmanageable. Not injecting ourselves into every third-world bush war does not mean we would have necessarily weakened our position.

George Washington was right then and now.

I'm not in favor of injecting ourselves in the world's affairs at the level we have been. I'm not in favor of fighting other countries wars for them. I just find the "all or nothing", "throw the baby out with the bathwater" mindset humorous. It takes precious little effort to sit back and recognize failures. It's a bit more difficult to quantify the successes. I'm pretty sure there are at least a couple of bad things that didn't happen as a direct result of our meddling in foreign affairs.

This country isn't perfect, far from it. I'm all for reasonable debate or attempts at coming to solutions to our problems. This section of the forum is severely lacking in both.

 

[Blackhawk2001]

Which ones? Honest question. I'm admittedly not a big history buff but I'm unaware of any countries or empires which have thrived for hundreds of years unchanged.

Rome lasted 1000 years, but once its citizens got lazy and became more enamored of bread and circuses than defending it, it fell to more vigorous "barbarians".

Sometimes an empire gets too big to control and collapses into revolution; sometimes an empire doesn't have enough resources to maintain its empire (Nazi Germany and Soviet Russia come to mind). Sometimes cultural differences drive an empire asunder (China has witnessed this many times). Sometimes, it's poor leadership at a critical time. Great Britain, France, Spain and Portugal all ended up relinquishing vast portions of their empires in order to survive; but they can't be called "empires" anymore - with the possible exception of Great Britain, which maintains the fiction of empire (because Queen Elizabeth II is still styled "monarch" of something like 70 countries) although it can barely rule itself and Wales.

In South America, the Aztecs and Incas had empires but they disappeared behind the veil of history.

Today, we can speak in terms of hegemony; but there aren't any empires.

 

[Fletch]

Today, we can speak in terms of hegemony; but there aren't any empires.

Semantics.

 

[HeadlessRoland]

From MKULTRA/Bluebird/Artichoke to Mossadegh, we have a long, noble history of lighting the bags of crap alight long before we stomp on them. The only reason I don't yet worry too intensely about the coming genocide is that the apparatus of the State is still inept enough to bury us in foreign quagmires. Until they can successfully do something without INTENSE SEVERE DECADES-LONG BLOWBACK, I'm going to keep my personal DEFCON at 2.

 

[HeadlessRoland]

Rome lasted 1000 years, but once its citizens got lazy and became more enamored of bread and circuses than defending it, it fell to more vigorous "barbarians".

Sometimes an empire gets too big to control and collapses into revolution; sometimes an empire doesn't have enough resources to maintain its empire (Nazi Germany and Soviet Russia come to mind). Sometimes cultural differences drive an empire asunder (China has witnessed this many times). Sometimes, it's poor leadership at a critical time. Great Britain, France, Spain and Portugal all ended up relinquishing vast portions of their empires in order to survive; but they can't be called "empires" anymore - with the possible exception of Great Britain, which maintains the fiction of empire (because Queen Elizabeth II is still styled "monarch" of something like 70 countries) although it can barely rule itself and Wales.

In South America, the Aztecs and Incas had empires but they disappeared behind the veil of history.

Today, we can speak in terms of hegemony; but there aren't any empires.

I challenge the notion that any civilization can exist for any length of time unchanged. Ancient Rome does not all today mirror present-day Italy. Even in older ages, civilization's natural tendency is to improve and to become more populous, and thereby, more efficient. Civilizations the world over have been altered - and changing - due to their respective citizenry. Any advancement, no matter how slight, happens rapidly. Took Rome ages to invent modern-style plumbing, but it swept the republic in a short period. Destruction, particularly after Diocletian's price and currency edicts in 301, rapidly destroyed Rome from the inside-out.

 

[LEaSH]

Empires certainly do exist. In every traditional sense of the word.

Not as visible as we view empires in our history, but they exist in nameless ways.

There is an invisible hand out there, it's global and greedy and doesn't give **** about how future history will depict it.

 

[rambone]

What is 6 supposed to be? Thimbles? Shots of tequila?

I'm thinking carbombs.

 

[rambone]

 

[CarmelHP]

Actually, could we get some English translations of those texts for our schools?

 

[rambone]

Here's a pretty interesting documentary about Al Qaeda, and how it was created.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=r-hYorNi0nA

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cHAwbYpRGkQ