Ukraine in turmoil

[Ken B]

No, some were from US bombs.

Your flippancy proves my point.

[Todd]

Your flippancy proves my point.

How?

[Pat B]

Did you say the number counts, via whatever method and criteria, deaths in 2009? Then my point is proven. It is necessarily conjectural that those deaths were caused by the invasion in 2003. Those deaths involve more players making choices than George Bush in 2003.

The war did not end in 2003.

[kishnevi]

Are those deaths all from US bullets? If not it's an excellent analogy.
Anyway Todd I think we each know all we need to here. At least I do.

Had the US not invaded Iraq in 2003,  those deaths would not have happened.  Therefore, the US is responsible for those deaths.  There is nothing possible to argue with in that,  unless you intend to invent your own version of reality.

My earlier post was very strictly a statement of fact, which I purposefully phrased to avoid any moral judgments; that you mistake my statement of fact for a moral judgment in turn tells me some significant things about how you view facts.  But because I wish to remain friends with you,  I will refrain from saying anything more.

[Ken B]

Had the US not invaded Iraq in 2003,  those deaths would not have happened.  Therefore, the US is responsible for those deaths.  There is nothing possible to argue with in that,  unless you intend to invent your own version of reality.

My earlier post was very strictly a statement of fact, which I purposefully phrased to avoid any moral judgments; that you mistake my statement of fact for a moral judgment in turn tells me some significant things about how you view facts.  But because I wish to remain friends with you,  I will refrain from saying anything more.

Some would some not, and others  might have. And other actors were involved. Lots can happen even in the absence of Americans. Agreed?

[kishnevi]

Some would some not, and others  might have. And other actors were involved. Lots can happen even in the absence of Americans. Agreed?

Agreed,  But certain things would not have happened in the absence of an American invasion.

1--There would not have been a war.
2--Sunni jihadis and Shi'ites would have not had a chance to engage in violence against each other.  And since most of the people who died by violence in Iraq since 2003, died because of that violence against  each other,  it's a statement of fact to say our invasion of Iraq was responsible for their deaths.

If we were to use your logic,  all the people who died in the Reign of Terror did not die as a result of the French Revolution.   

[Ken B]

Agreed,  But certain things would not have happened in the absence of an American invasion.

1--There would not have been a war.
2--Sunni jihadis and Shi'ites would have not had a chance to engage in violence against each other.  And since most of the people who died by violence in Iraq since 2003, died because of that violence against  each other,  it's a statement of fact to say our invasion of Iraq was responsible for their deaths.

If we were to use your logic,  all the people who died in the Reign of Terror did not die as a result of the French Revolution.

They didn't die as a result of the Tennis Court oath.

2is a perfectly respectable claim, that by over throwing the repression of the Baath party the extremists had freer reign. But that is like my Blackmun number. You can make a case, but the numbers are not facts, they are conjectures. They don't count other lives saved, and they don't allow for the possibility of civil war, or even more violent civil war, happening anyway. Syria. Egypt. Lebanon. You really cannot be so sanguine that Saddam would have kept order, not killed a lot of people doing it, or not started another war.

[kishnevi]

They didn't die as a result of the Tennis Court oath.

2is a perfectly respectable claim, that by over throwing the repression of the Baath party the extremists had freer reign. But that is like my Blackmun number. You can make a case, but the numbers are not facts, they are conjectures. They don't count other lives saved, and they don't allow for the possibility of civil war, or even more violent civil war, happening anyway. Syria. Egypt. Lebanon. You really cannot be so sanguine that Saddam would have kept order, not killed a lot of people doing it, or not started another war.

If I want to read speculative history,  I will go read to the sci fi section of Barnes and Noble. 
In the sense that everyone dies of something,  then the death of those people is not due to the American invasion, in the same way that the death of Abraham Lincoln was not due to John Wilkes Booth.

But we did invade Iraq, and all those people did die as consequences of that invasion, and that makes us responsible.  Inventing alternate scenarios does not absolve the US of that responsibility. The only result of your efforts is to make me suspect you are a criminal defense lawyer in real life (except that you've said what your real career is.)

[Ken B]

If I want to read speculative history,  I will go read to the sci fi section of Barnes and Noble. 
In the sense that everyone dies of something,  then the death of those people is not due to the American invasion, in the same way that the death of Abraham Lincoln was not due to John Wilkes Booth.

But we did invade Iraq, and all those people did die as consequences of that invasion, and that makes us responsible.  Inventing alternate scenarios does not absolve the US of that responsibility. The only result of your efforts is to make me suspect you are a criminal defense lawyer in real life (except that you've said what your real career is.)

I'm talking what numbers mean Jeffrey, and how they may or may not mean what is claimed for them, and whether they are reliable, not absolving anyone of anything.

[kishnevi]

I'm talking what numbers mean Jeffrey, and how they may or may not mean what is claimed for them, and whether they are reliable, not absolving anyone of anything.

At least a hundred thousand people died  as a consequence of the US invasion of Iraq.
Inventing alternate ways in which they may have met death but which never happened in reality does not change the fact that they died as a consequence of the US invasion of Iraq. If John Wilkes Booth did not shoot Lincoln,  then someone else might have killed him, or he might have died peacefully in his bed at any point in time after April 1865.  But John Wilkes Booth did shoot Lincoln, and therefore was responsible for his death. 

I repeat: At least a hundred thousand people died as a consequence of the US invasion of Iraq. If you can not accept a fact as basic as that,  then discussion is useless.

[Ken B]

At least a hundred thousand people died  as a consequence of the US invasion of Iraq.
Inventing alternate ways in which they may have met death but which never happened in reality does not change the fact that they died as a consequence of the US invasion of Iraq. If John Wilkes Booth did not shoot Lincoln,  then someone else might have killed him, or he might have died peacefully in his bed at any point in time after April 1865.  But John Wilkes Booth did shoot Lincoln, and therefore was responsible for his death. 

I repeat: At least a hundred thousand people died as a consequence of the US invasion of Iraq. If you can not accept a fact as basic as that,  then discussion is useless.

If A kills B because C killed  D I don't count B's death against A unless C was also involved in killing B. You do. That is the crux of the dispute. I'd like to see numbers that don't count B is all. All the numbers here count B.

[kishnevi]

If A kills B because C killed  D I don't count B's death against A unless C was also involved in killing B. You do. That is the crux of the dispute. I'd like to see numbers that don't count B is all. All the numbers here count B.

B counts because if C had not killed D,  A would have not been able to kill B.

If I read you correctly, you want to limit the casualties to those people who died as a direct result of being hit by American bullets and bombs.  That's the not the real world.  The real world includes all the people who died as a result of American actions, a number that is at least 100,000.  Or  650,000, depending on your source (I just saw that number mentioned on Reason's website.) And since the violence still continues, that number has not yet stopped growing, because the sectarian violence continues, and the sectarian violence is directly due to American actions.

[Ken B]

B counts because if C had not killed D,  A would have not been able to kill B.

If I read you correctly, you want to limit the casualties to those people who died as a direct result of being hit by American bullets and bombs.  That's the not the real world.  The real world includes all the people who died as a result of American actions, a number that is at least 100,000.  Or  650,000, depending on your source (I just saw that number mentioned on Reason's website.) And since the violence still continues, that number has not yet stopped growing, because the sectarian violence continues, and the sectarian violence is directly due to American actions.

No you don't read me correctly. But I do distinguish between B and D, and I want to draw my own conclusions based on the numbers and not to be expected to accept someone else's criteria or numbers.

And I do think counterfactuals matter. Consider this if you disagree. Your argument about sectarian killings depends on the counterfactual assertion that it would not have happened had the US not invaded. Right or wrong you are doing a counter factual comparison to alternate history to get that conclusion. That is different from the direct effdcts of American bullets.

[Mirror Image]

I didn't read what the whole argument has been about between Ken, Jeffrey, Todd, but whatever it is it's certainly not worth the trouble IMHO. The bottom line is it doesn't matter if 60 or 1,000 people died in a war and how or whom did the killing because it's done under tragic circumstances any way we want to look at it. Nobody, unless they're inflicting violence and killing innocent people, deserves to be gunned down for any reason whatsoever. War doesn't solve anything nor does arguing about it, because, in the end, no one wins.

[Ken B]

I didn't read what the whole argument has been about between Ken, Jeffrey, Todd, but whatever it is it's certainly not worth the trouble IMHO. The bottom line is it doesn't matter if 60 or 1,000 people died in a war and how or whom did the killing because it's done under tragic circumstances any way we want to look at it. Nobody, unless they're inflicting violence and killing innocent people, deserves to be gunned down for any reason whatsoever. War doesn't solve anything nor does arguing about it, because, in the end, no one wins.

I think John's advice is good. So I for one propose to move on to different topics.

[Philo]

Todd and select others: A simply brilliant piece coming from the political realist school. Very apt analysis. http://www.thenation.com/article/178655/time-realism-and-common-sense-ukraine#

As an aside, Stephen Walt's blog is required reading for anyone who is interested in high level analysis of issues pertaining to political science.
http://www.foreignpolicy.com/voices/walt

In fact most everything offered up for perusal on Foreign Policy is worth a look.

[Florestan]

Superpowers will be superpowers. And I tend to be on the side of those that are democratic. There's nothing flowery about it - I just prefer my world police to be from a land with free elections, free press and free speech.

If I were an Iraqi, an Afghan, a Serbian or a member of whatever nation has been attacked by US in the last 2 decades (not to say the last 2 centuries...), I couldn't care less about the free elections, free press and free speech of the Americans, because all three combined could not prevent me, or members or my family, or my friends and neighbors to be maimed and killed and have our property destroyed and our lives ruined.

If I were a member of whatever nation which during the last 100 years have had dictatorial and authoritarian regimes supported and financed by US, I couldn't care less about the free elections, free press and free speech of the Americans, because all three combined couldn't make for the lack thereof in my own country.

As Todd said, US is no world policeman at all, because a true policeman at least tries to arrest, or deter, all thugs in town, while US is very selective in his actions. US simply does what any other superpower in history has done: promotes and defends its own interests manu militari and props up all those proxies that are of service to them. The difference being that US is, arguably, the most hypocritical superpower the history has ever known.

[Rinaldo]

Do you really subscribe to the bizarre, almost perverse morality your post implies?  That is, are minor Russian actions that have so far resulted in no, or few, deaths somehow worse than, or at best morally equal to, wars that resulted in the deaths of hundreds of thousands (or at least over one hundred thousand using conservative estimates) because those wars were undertaken by a democratic power using a variety of pretenses, some of them false?  Are Russian actions now really worse than the US continuing to murder people in a method that is increasingly viewed as illegal the world over (ie, drone strikes)?

I don't think Russian actions are minor. Russia may not exort its military force like the US does (although Georgia and Ukraine show a lot of promise - talk about false pretenses!), but it continues to support dictatorships all around the world and does a lot of harm undermining human rights efforts through vetos and other means.

Yes, things like drone strikes do worry me a lot BUT at least I know any transgressions will be eventually reported by journalists, discussed in the open and there's a possibility to vote out the people responsible.

If I were an Iraqi, an Afghan, a Serbian or a member of whatever nation has been attacked by US in the last 2 decades (not to say the last 2 centuries...), I couldn't care less about the free elections, free press and free speech of the Americans, because all three combined could not prevent me, or members or my family, or my friends and neighbors to be maimed and killed and have our property destroyed and our lives ruined.

Well, if you put all these military actions in one bag like they're comparable (for example, the NATO strikes were perfectly okay in my book - it was the last resort to stop Milosevic)..

...while US is very selective in his actions

No cop can stop all crimes. Going to war with, say, the North Korea would sadly be nuts. And since we're counting bodies, how many people there die / spend their entire life in concentration camps because Russia uses countries like North Korea as political leverage, instead of taking a strong stance against them?

To sum up my views, while the US often acts like an elephant in a porcelain store, there's also a lot of good being done (even the godforsaken Iraq war could've turned okay-ish, if it was planned by people who actually understood the region). But I dread what a country like Russia would be doing in America's place.

[Florestan]

the NATO strikes were perfectly okay in my book - it was the last resort to stop Milosevic..

So in your book, the last, and perfectly okay, resort to stop a dictator is to maim and kill his innocent subjects and destroy their personal and communal property... That's a very fine example of that "bizarre, almost perverse morality" Todd was alluding to.

And talking about selective actions (and double standards), ethnic cleansing conducted by Serbians against Croatians, Muslim Bosnians and Albanian Kosovars was an abomination, while ethnic cleansing conducted by Croatians, Muslim Bosnians and Albanian Kosovars against Serbians was all right, as can be inferred from the fact that no such last resort was ever used against Tudjman or Izetbegovic or UCK. You seem to subscribe to the simplistic and false view that in the Yugoslavian wars the Serbians were the bad guys and the Croatians, Muslim Bosnians and Muslim Kosovars were the good guys.

No cop can stop all crimes. Going to war with, say, the North Korea would sadly be nuts. And since we're counting bodies, how many people there die / spend their entire life in concentration camps because Russia uses countries like North Korea as political leverage, instead of taking a strong stance against them?

Russia don't take a strong stance against North Korea because NK serves, directly or indirectly, Russia's own interest. Just as US, and for the very same reason, didn't take a strong stance against Shah Pahlavi or Augusto Pinochet.

To sum up my views, while the US often acts like an elephant in a porcelain store, there's also a lot of good being done (even the godforsaken Iraq war could've turned okay-ish, if it was planned by people who actually understood the region).

You're wrong. If the US Dept of State had people who actually understood the region then the war would not have been started in the first place.

But I dread what a country like Russia would be doing in America's place.

I agree that it is better (for us Western and Central Europeans, that is) to live under US' hegemony than under Russia's, but (1) this doesn't blind me neither to the American blunders, errors and aggressions nor to their immorality and hypocrisy and (2) I fear not the latter ever becoming as powerful as the former and replacing it as THE superpower.

[Rinaldo]

So in your book, the last, and perfectly okay, resort to stop a dictator is to maim and kill his innocent subjects and destroy their personal and communal property... That's a very fine example of that "bizarre, almost perverse morality" Todd was alluding to.

And talking about selective actions (and double standards), ethnic cleansing conducted by Serbians against Croatians, Muslim Bosnians and Albanian Kosovars was an abomination, while ethnic cleansing conducted by Croatians, Muslim Bosnians and Albanian Kosovars against Serbians was all right, as can be inferred from the fact that no such last resort was ever used against Tudjman or Izetbegovic or UCK. You seem to subscribe to the simplistic and false view that in the Yugoslavian wars the Serbians were the bad guys and the Croatians, Muslim Bosnians and Muslim Kosovars were the good guys.

No, I don't see the world as good guys vs bad. But from my point of view (and I know views on this subject differ A LOT) the Serbs started it all way back in the eighties and in the end, they took the majority of punishment for their actions. The bombing didn't target "innocent subjects" and it succeeded in stopping the genocide. It came to either military action or sitting back, sending Milosevic sternly worded notes and watching him do whatever he felt like doing.

In any case, double standard sure ain't pretty, but it's inevitable in our world. The fact that you can't fix everything shouldn't stop you from trying to fix something.

Russia don't take a strong stance against North Korea because NK serves, directly or indirectly, Russia's own interest. Just as US, and for the very same reason, didn't take a strong stance against Shah Pahlavi or Augusto Pinochet.

Which was wrong, of course. The whole Iran affair is a despicable Western fuckup - but that was decades ago and America, under Obama, seems to have finally learned a lesson. NK, on the other hand, is a current tragedy (on an entirely different level than anything Pinochet ever did) and it just adds up with all the other things that I can't stomach about Russia and its politics, both national and international.