Kerry: "Don't behave in 19th-Century fashion by invading another country on trumped-up pretext."

hoochymama23
For sure the excuse will be that we have never invaded another Nation on our own but NATO was the invaders. They always will be. Bush had NATO to back up his invasion which has been in place for a long time. Russia, China, and North Korea do not have that. Although, Russia and China can Veto as being on the Security Council it makes our cases against Russia, China, and North Korea a problem.

It was not a problem with Iraq.

The problem is that when Russia and China become a problem can NATO go against them when they are Members??

Russia and China are not members of NATO....

Question: Anyone think there should be some type of entrance exam before taking place in these threads?

en.wikipedia.org...

Ok, in a sense your right. But there are plenty of agreements or "understandings" that Russia is a part of NATO.


Now, to your insulting request, I disagree.

reply to post by James1982
When China and Russia have a Vote in the Security Council it pretty much can mean they are members of NATO when the vote they cast pretty much means whether NATO can attack.

Unless they dont want that, which means they arent part of NATO for a reason, or its because we dont want them in NATO which could be another discussion all together.

reply to post by James1982

I was pointing out someone who would have started talking behind the scenes and helped to work out a compromise solution, one which might well have involved both sides getting something of what they wanted (the Russophile Crimea becoming closely linked to Russia, the western Ukraine left free to build links westward), and nobody losing very much face.
As distinct from the use of public stance-taking rhetoric which means either war or somebody publicly backing down.
I don't think a diplomatic approach aiming at averting war deserves the angry tirade which you're directing at it.
If you think war is better then diplomacy, go ahead and have your war.
If not- consider the benefits of diplomacy.

hoochymama23
When China and Russia have a Vote in the Security Council it pretty much can mean they are members of NATO when the vote they cast pretty much means whether NATO can attack.

I think you are confusing NATO and the U.N. Understandable, because the U.S. has recently been dominating both bodies, but they are not the same thing at all.

Just a few additional thoughts in the aftermath of the Crimea attack.

The total absence of great political statesmanship and lack of action from both America and EU would in my view definitely send signals to China that whatever Russia can do and get away with, we can also. China has stepped up their global ambitions over the years and has a few conflicts ‘unsettled’ such as Taiwan and some minor areas in Japan.

I also strongly suggest that Russia and China probably has a silent secret agreement to back each other on this. Thus it is likely that China was informed about the Russian Crimea attack and got the “go ahead” some days before it happened.

With this. The ‘Obama/Kerry’ America finally seems to have become the official extension of the greater ‘global like EU’, EU always wanted America to be. They will now all attack the Russians with their secret and most lethal weapon ; Dialog, dialog and dialog. It’s the global leftwing politician’s answer to everything and they will cling to it until the western civilization is gone forever.

reply to post by _BoneZ_


Kerry faces the nation, and the nation facepalms.

I'm not at all surprised with his hypocrisy, I'm wondering about the relevancy of his position. What exactly is he supposed to do again? All I've seen from him and his predecessor Hillbilly Clinton is a bunch of taxpayer funded holidays, Press conferences, and failed diplomacy.

The only reason that I can see why the SOS is still in existence is because TPTB want to keep their buddies employed. I'ts better to have an incompetent friend in power rather than a competent enemy.

reply to post by helius


Don't forget China vs Vietnam, oh and China vs the Philippines, oh and China vs pretty much everyone ion the South China Sea region because apparently, it all belongs to China..

Us not doing anything here, in the Ukraine, sends all the wrong signals that we don't hold up our end of the bargain.

stumason
reply to post by helius

 

Don't forget China vs Vietnam, oh and China vs the Philippines, oh and China vs pretty much everyone ion the South China Sea region because apparently, it all belongs to China..

Us not doing anything here, in the Ukraine, sends all the wrong signals that we don't hold up our end of the bargain.

You mean like the whole world is the USs playground?

reply to post by Yusomad


Is it really though? The US was hamstrung when it came to Syria and had a limited involvement in Libya and an almost non-existent involvement in Mali. At least what the US does, it does so with broad international backing and, generally, play's by the rules.

Make no mistake, I am no American fan boy, but there is a world of difference between what the US has got up to and what Russia is up to now. This is, plain and simply, a land grab by Russia and exactly what they did to Georgia.

I was actually talking about how the US/Western powers have defence treaties and such like with other nations - if we do not uphold our agreements with Ukraine, then what message does that send to the others we've pledged to defend?

reply to post by _BoneZ_


I saw him say that on TV...i had to have a look online to see if i had heard him right, because i just couldn't believe what i heard coming out of his mouth!

The thing that really irks me about it, is not so much that what he said was absolutely, stunningly, mind-blowingly hypocritical...but that he said it with a straight face apparently expecting the people of the world, including me sitting there with my coffee, to believe he was being sincere and not have a WTH moment!

Absolutely bloody amazingly bad politics.

My Government aren't much better either, being honest about it...it's like we've entered 'Twilight Zone politics'...it's surreal.

reply to post by stumason

The US was hamstrung when it came to Syria and had a limited involvement in Libya and an almost non-existent involvement in Mali. At least what the US does, it does so with broad international backing and, generally, play's by the rules.

I'm not a USA fanboy either, but i do recognise the absolute need in the world for a strong, stable and most of all HONEST USA.

Without America during the last century, the world would be a very different place today, and probably not for the better.

But, America has lost its way i feel...it has become corrupt (well, more than is normal for a large and powerful country) during the last couple of decades, which i feel will be its fall from grace if it isn't careful.

Because i respect Americans, that doesn't mean i'm blind or apologetic for them either.

You say above that they generally play by the rules, consider Eisenhower's CIA bay of Pigs - failed illegal military invasion of Cuba in 1961, in context with Ukraine ironically was for the purposes of regime change.

The US weren't playing by the rules then, not even generally so.

Vietnam was another military invasion, politically motivated to protect US assets in the Southern region and prevent the spread of Communism and reunification of Vietnam, the 'Tonkin' incident by itself wasn't playing by the rules either.

Iraq and WMD speaks for itself as being self-evident.

Involvement in Libya, again for regime change (a pattern seems to be emerging) but took a back seat role as you mentioned, but nonetheless, still interfering in a sovereign nation by encouraging revolution and regime change)

Afghanistan - regime change, again.

Syria - trying, but on hold.

Iran - “In the middle of the Cold War, the United States played a role in the overthrow of a democratically elected Iranian government” Obama said during his keynote speech in Cairo, back in 2009 (regime change yet again, ignoring democracy, illegal.)

Iran #2 - Tried for years, but lately - like Syria also on hold.

The list could go on, and none of it or much of it could be considered the USA 'generally playing by the rules'.

And now we have USAID being implicated in funding aspects of the coup in Ukraine, for..yep, illegal regime change.

The really nonsensical part of the involvement of the US and EU in overthrowing a 'resistant' Ukrainian Government is how the spindoctors thought they could sell it to the world and make it believable?

They probably assumed it would be a 'win-win-win' situation.

The coup would happen, unelected radicals would form an interim government more friendly to EU/US overtures (win 1).

Russia would have no choice but do one of two things...either send a protection force to defend ethnic Russians from potential harm from the racical right-wing thugs forming the interim government, which could be then used as propaganda against Russia, which as this thread is showing, is being thrown out by the hypocritical and sickening truck load (win 2).

Russia could have done nothing, ethnic Russians could have been victimised or even slaughtered and Putin would be condemned and ousted for failing to protect them (win 3).

The end result would be a US/EU controlled Ukraine, on the Russian doorstep, with a politically weakened or ousted Putin...who's obviously a barrier to Syria and Iran plans.

It's really a shady and dirty world we live in, but if nothing else the hypocrisy should wake up a few million more people around the world to just how controlled and directed our media really is, and how shockingly dishonest our politicians really are just by watching Kerry earlier and reading what Cameron and Hague are chirping about the situation.

This may turn out to be a regime change too far i think, and far from ousting Putin, it may yet backfire on a few politicians closer to home.

reply to post by MysterX


I did say "generally"....

But if you bring up cold war era examples, then the Soviets did their fair share too - it was all part of the game and to be honest, like you said, without the US then the world would have been a very different place and even when they didn't "play by the rules" it was usually for the greater good - often after the Soviets had been up to their own dirty tricks in fact.

In Cuba, for example, Castro had support from the Soviets but even the US welcomed the revolution hoping it would bring "democracy" - that was shattered when Castro signed co-op agreements with Russia though.

It's all very well picking examples of US "bad behaviour", but you have to show them in the correct context and understand that they weren't the only one's up to dirty tricks.

I dread to think what the world would have looked like if the West hadn't worked as hard as they did to stop the spread of Communism. Up until the 1980's the Soviets had a military advantage over the West and had they not been pegged back where possible, it is very likely they may have sought to press that advantage.

stumason
reply to post by MysterX

 

I did say "generally"....

But if you bring up cold war era examples, then the Soviets did their fair share too - it was all part of the game and to be honest, like you said, without the US then the world would have been a very different place and even when they didn't "play by the rules" it was usually for the greater good - often after the Soviets had been up to their own dirty tricks in fact.

In Cuba, for example, Castro had support from the Soviets but even the US welcomed the revolution hoping it would bring "democracy" - that was shattered when Castro signed co-op agreements with Russia though.

It's all very well picking examples of US "bad behaviour", but you have to show them in the correct context and understand that they weren't the only one's up to dirty tricks.

I dread to think what the world would have looked like if the West hadn't worked as hard as they did to stop the spread of Communism. Up until the 1980's the Soviets had a military advantage over the West and had they not been pegged back where possible, it is very likely they may have sought to press that advantage.

I agree with pretty much all of what you've said there mate.

They have all been at it at some point or another, none of them are as pure as the driven snow, that's for certain.

I could have just as well listed down our own history of dirty tricks, illegal this and that's, as well as the USSR's, Russia's, China's and probably a long list of Banana republics too...but the USA list was written in the context of the astounding 'Kerry Hypocrisy' i had seen earlier on TV.

If Cameron or Hague have the audacity to come out on TV with more or less the same rhetoric, i'll probably be making another list!

reply to post by _BoneZ_


I spoke those exact words when I heard that too. I wonder if this is the "event" people were talking about under the subject of world war 3 starting as a result of some event around the Sochi Olympics?

MysterX

Without America during the last century, the world would be a very different place today, and probably not for the better.

Well, without the US during the last century there would have been a lot less democratic elected governments replaced by fascist dictators who torture and kill dissenters in many countries. Or such dictators kept in power. I have my doubts that is in any way for the better, but perhaps you may want to ask the people in said countries what they think.

Like
Suharto in Indonesia
Saddam Hussein in Iraq
Augusto Pinochet in Chile
Mohammad Rezā Shāh Pahlavī in Iran
the House of Saud in Saudi Arabia
Mobutu Sese Seko Kuku Ngbendu wa Za Banga in Congo
just to name a few, as the list of US backed dictators is a lot longer.

reply to post by _BoneZ_


OMG and to think he could have been elected President.
Then we would have had a total IDIOT in The White House.

Thank God we have OBAMA.
LMFAO

In the interview/press release, Kerry used the term "Kleptocracy" and I didn't know what it was so I looked it up on Wikipedia:

a form of political and government corruption where the government exists to increase the personal wealth and political power of its officials and the ruling class at the expense of the wider population, often with pretense of honest service

Thank you Mr. Kerry. For years now I've been running around saying the government of the United States is run by a bunch of crooks. Now I'll be able to class things up a bit and use the appropriate technical term for it, Kleptocracy.

reply to post by _BoneZ_


Yeah, i LMAOffed to that Kerry's statement too. The US is in no position to be waving fingers in the air and say "baad boy, you can't do that". I mean seriously; are your defense department officials that much deranged? Looks like they're way outthere from reality and recent history, and that's scary.

reply to post by _BoneZ_


I want to agree with you because I remember Iraq too, but what about that thing where we respect our elders? I am a young guy, far removed from Kerry's world experience. No matter what I think about what Kerry says, Kerry has more experience than me both as a soldier and as a well traveled man and as a person in general. Given these facts, I can only sigh. Same was mostly true for Bush and even Cheney, even moreso. I can't see past my own limited vision. I guess I'm kind of like a dumb animal that runs from people trying to help it. Or how a child will say dumb things like "I'm never having children!"

Irregardless of what I think, the world will go its own way. Sure, I factor into it, but because I'm only 1/7,000,000,000 and factoring into it my own inexperience as a person in general, I must conclude I am insignificant.

Maybe having respect for our elders means holding your disagreement to yourself and giving way to the majority instead of your own flawed opinions.

Let me rephrase all of this. If it was wrong in 2003, isn't it still wrong today? It doesn't matter whether Bush does it or Putin does it. And yet I have to sit back and ask is it worth it for us to give troops and/or supplies to Ukraine if that's what it comes to? A long-term war with Russia is not exactly what I had in mind. Yet is not that what we've had? Russia and China have never been friendly with the US and in fact have fought proxy wars in one manner or another with us.

When it's the UN calling for intervention, not just the US or France or Britain or Russia, I put a lot more weight to that. We need a UN with a balanced voice. It's not right one country can have so much power to dictate the lives of others.