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Related: Editorials & Other Articles, Issue Forums, Alliance Forums, Region ForumsDonald Trump says world would be a better place if Saddam, Kadhafi still ruled
Donald Trump is ruining Jeb!
Trump doctrine
Trump said his foreign policy strategy would be centered around beefing up the US military.
All I know is this: were living in Medieval times
Were living in an unbelievably dangerous and horrible world, he said.
The Trump doctrine is simple, he added. Its strength. Its strength. Nobody is going to mess with us. Our military will be made stronger.
http://www.rawstory.com/2015/10/donald-trump-says-world-would-be-a-better-place-if-saddam-kadhafi-still-ruled/
Trump the WAR president?
Politicalboi
(15,189 posts)They kept the madness to a minimum.
Angry Dragon
(36,693 posts)Vinca
(50,237 posts)They were bad guys, of course, but I don't see much if any improvement since they're gone and it's cost us thousands of American lives and a trillion American dollars.
underpants
(182,632 posts)Not ever in recorded history
If D'uh Donald hasn't noticed we have a lethal killing force unlike any ever assembled and we pay top dollar for it too. The problem isn't the military being weak, the problem is that half the leadership has their head in the sand.
patricia92243
(12,592 posts)peacebird
(14,195 posts)Blue_In_AK
(46,436 posts)Juicy_Bellows
(2,427 posts)Saddam and Kadhafi.
spanone
(135,795 posts)gratuitous
(82,849 posts)They were the ones who thought it was a swell idea to impose their will on the Middle East, only it turns out that there are a lot of pretty willful people in the Middle East.
AzDar
(14,023 posts)Ack.
pampango
(24,692 posts)The mistake Mr. Trump is making is to think ahistorically, that is, to think as though societies do not change dramatically over time. The Neoconservatives thought they could install a king over Iraq in 2003. But Iraqi society had overthrown the kings in 1958, and there is no going back. History may not be dialectical in exactly the Hegelian sense, but any historical situation does produce other, different situations over time. Moreover, societies can change dramatically. History is not static. It is not like a slab of marble. Historical developments produce new and different historical situations over time, and new generations react to the previous ones by striking out in different direction, even at great risk.
How anyone in his right mind could think that Bashar al-Assad (r. 2000- present) brought stability to Syria just baffles me. He provoked the 2011 uprisings and he caused the civil war by deploying his military against the peaceful demonstrators. Thats stability? It is mostly his fault that over 200,000 Syrians are dead and 11 million out of 22 million are homeless. If you are president and your country is in this condition, you dont get to say you brought stability. Nor is the problem outsiders. In 2011 there was almost no outside interference in Syria. Bashar drove the opposition to pick up arms. The largely rural and illiterate Syria of 1970 when Bashars father came to power is long gone. You cant keep them on the farm once they have seen gay Paree.
Libya under Gaddafi was not stable by 2011, and it was not the United Nations no-fly zone that made it unstable. It was unstable because Gaddafis secret police state had lost its authority for a majority of the population, which rose up against it. That is clear instability, and it was provoked by Gaddafis erratic and sclerotic dictatorship and by massive repression. I wandered the halls of the courthouse in Benghazi in May of 2011 and the walls were full of pitiful old black and white pictures of young men, including soldiers, whom Gaddafi had made to disappear, asking plaintively if anyone knew their fate (we know their fate).
Does Mr. Trump believe that Europe was more stable when Erich Honecker ruled significant swathes of Germany with an iron fist? Or when Tito headed Yugoslavia? Inflexible dictatorships that cannot adapt to social change and the rise of new generations cause instability, Mr. Trump. They dont forestall it. Or, they dont forestall it for more than a generation.
http://www.juancole.com/2015/10/mideast-wouldnt-dictators.html