If we're going to play world police, then let's do it right

[Hugabear]

If we're going to play the game "When Dictators Attack", and become the world's police, then at least let's do it right. Either ALL human life is worth using military force to protect, or we should allow things to take their course. We shouldn't be playing this game of "we'll help you folks over here, but not you folks over there". This is exactly the type of attitude that creates so much animosity towards us, the people that we refuse to help wind up feeling betrayed and view us as hypocrites. So if we're going to do this, we need to do it right:

1. Protecting civilian life should not be contingent upon UN approval. Either protecting human life is worth intervention or it isn't.
2. No more playing favorites. This means getting our hands dirty in places like Burma, Sierra Leone, Ivory Coast, and even places like North Korea. Yes it means that we'll be at war a lot more often. But hey, if we're going to war to protect human lives, then we have to be willing to see it through.
3. Drastically increase military spending. Because we're going to need a lot more aircraft carriers, cruise missiles, special operations forces, etc. We're also going to need to increase our presence around the globe.

If we're not willing to do these things, then we need to stop getting ourselves involved militarily and look for other solutions.

[Schema Thing]

1. yes, "do nothing if you can't successfully do everything" is smart policy

[Hugabear]

2. Better than our current hypocritical strategy

We sure make a lot of friends with our "we're not going to help YOU folks because we just don't think you're important enough" strategy

[Posteritatis]

7. Is it really?

I'm asking that in good faith - is everyone just going back to turn-of-the-twentieth "let everyone do what they want to their people and ignore the results" actually going to be better than even a muddled response? I have a hard time seeing that as not effectively saying "none of you are important enough."

[Motown_Johnny]

8. compared to " we will never help anyone no matter what" or

"we can't help anyone now because we spent all our resources on something we could never succeed at" ?


It is called choosing your battles, literally.

[Name removed]

3. Deleted message

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[Codeine]

4. Ah jeez.

[aquart]

5. Exhausting, isn't it?

The repetitive, screechingly didactic self-righteousness is almost Olympic in its persistance and strength.

I, however, have been aware for some time that I do not belong to a nation of Buddhist monks.

[msongs]

6. or we could let all the people on DU who believe in these wars volunteer to go fight them? nt

[proud2BlibKansan]

11. +1

[Motown_Johnny]

9. Maybe, just maybe, getting the Arab League to set some standards

on how people should be treated can have some lasting effect.


Just Maybe.

[babydollhead]

10. Our own people don't take care of our own people.