Posted on 05/09/2008 4:18:27 PM PDT by Dawnsblood
With United States warships and air force planes at the ready, and over 1 million of Myanmar's citizens left bedraggled, homeless and susceptible to water-borne diseases by Cyclone Nagris, the natural disaster presents an opportunity in crisis for the US.
A unilateral - and potentially United Nations-approved - US military intervention in the name of humanitarianism could easily turn the tide against the impoverished country's unpopular military leaders, and simultaneously rehabilitate the legacy of lame-duck US President George W Bush's controversial pre-emptive military policies.
Myanmar's ruling junta has responded woefully to the cyclone disaster, costing more human lives than would have been the case with the approval of a swift international response. One week after the killer storm first hit, Myanmar's junta has only now allowed desperately needed international emergency supplies to trickle in. It continues to resist US and UN disaster relief and food aid personnel from entering the country. Officially, 60,000 people have died; the figure is probably closer to 100,000.
(Excerpt) Read more at atimes.com ...
Sure! Let's invade Burma!
The left is completely out of their minds: When it makes sense to invade or bomb a country (Afghanistan, Iraq, Iran, etc.) they yell and scream “No war for oil!” and call the president a Nazi, when it makes no sense from a national security viewpoint (Haiti, Kosovo, Myanmar, Rhwanda) they are 100% for it! What a sad group of fools!
Why isn’t media asking Obama what he would do?
Hillary?
This is a golden opportunity to see what a potential future president would do.
Hey we can't even send NG troops to any city in our OWN country at a whim!
As I said, it would be interesting to see what the RATS future Pres. candidates would do.
IBTNC?
It starts out like this:
http://en.wikisource.org/wiki/United_Nations_Security_Council_Resolution_794
I can see a case being made that we could go ahead and provide some relief, without local permission. I’m not advocating that, but I might after thinking about it for a bit.
If we have the ability, there can be times when action is the morally right thing to do.
I think it’s a very bad idea for the US to force humanitarian aid on a country that doesn’t want us there.
I also think that it’s a very bad idea to use our military as an international relief agency. Didn’t we learn anything from Somalia and Kosovo?
Unless we declare war on Islam, we don’t need to invade Burma. Personally, I don’t care how many Burmese die because of this storm. They tolerate the gag fish government they have.
To put away the tryannical homies
We shouldn't get in
To save their sad skin
Burma Save!!
On a practical level, even if we had ground assets available - which we don’t - Burma’s dictatorship has a common border with and is being propped up by China. When we attempted to topple the North Korean government - another dictatorship that had a common border with China - during the Korean War, the Chinese got involved in a big way. Bottom line is that if we invade Burma, we will find ourselves fighting the PLA. I’m not sure that’s such a good thing, given all the other things on our plate right now.
"Show me just what Mohammed brought that was new, and there you will find things only evil and inhuman, such as his command to spread by the sword the faith he preached." - Manuel II Palelologus
Only wars where the US has absolutely no national interest or it would actually be detrimental to America are pure for the left.
So liberal moonbats think it's O.K. to preemptively to invade China and Russia allies: Myanmar, but it's American imperialism and colonialism to invade Iraq ?
ain’t communism wunnerful? oh happy day when Mass. gets it’s H-cane
The Wilsonian paradigm (nation build, make war, and engage in foreign subsidy, all regardless of the national interest) has wrought no stability, does not benefit America, and has not, on its own, benefited any other nation either. The BS "spilling American blood and spending American money for everyone on earth is good for America" has not been borne out by hard facts. At best, it makes no damned difference how much America sacrifices for the global "common good".
The sole "benefits" have been to add to the enormous external public debt being transfered to our grandchildren, and to give world tyrants a convenient bogeyman to blame for their own failures of governance - a way to externalize their own problems to a Great Satan, another name for the same benevolent "savior" America has striven to be for the world for a century.
It is capitalism and science (two demonized positive forces in a world with few others) which have wrought every benefit upon the earth over the last century; all manners of government interventionism have only impeded the advancement of stability and prosperity (at home and abroad). It is capitalism which brought down the Soviet empire, capitalism which is (very slowly) transforming Asia.
Regardless of the facts, the mainstream in both major parties are enamored with the Wilsonian orthodoxy. If a Democrat captures the presidency in November, Republicans will revert back to their pre-2001 stances on nation building, and Democrats will revert back to pro-Wilsonian views. When either group is in power, the formula is government intervention domestically and as a matter of foreign policy, with the party out of power, for the sake of partisanship only, pretending to place a high value on American blood and American treasure.
A pox on the naïveté of idealist foreign policy.
In short, the idea isn't merely bad, it's grotesque.
By all means, let's rush right in so we can take credit for the inevitable disaster. We couldn't save one flooded city, what makes them think we can save a whole starving country?
OTOH, dealing with the Russians and Chinese might be easier than Nagin and the LA Democrats...
Because we dont’ want to see a million people die?
Not saying invade, but the government in Mynamar are communist thugs that routinely commit attrocities against their people. Seems like some well placed sources could make the life of the Burmese people better.
My thought was drop the food in a population center along with loaded machine guns to protect the food. They need help. Their Satanic government will let them die.
Well...these people weren’t killed by Saddams poison gas, or by the shredding machines, their women weren’t raped at will....BUT, they’ve suffered from GLOBAL WARMING....THAT is why we need to invade..../s
Now...that was good!
This must be their attempt at genocide! I heard earlier today that the U.S. Air Force will drop food and supplies from the air to these beleaguered people. I hope we have no planes shot down, but if we do, I hope our warships know exactly where the junta resides and retaliates immediately.
The only good thing about Kim is what she sits on.
I would like to date her sister, not the one that looks like a linebacker, but the older and shorter one.
The Left is completely out of its mind? Where have you been these last two months? While the left is guilty of a lot of things, it wasn't the left who decided to recognize the independence of Kosovo, an American financed country and soon to be entrepot to Islamofascists on their way to the rest of Europe. So, while the invasion of Myanamar for humanitarian reasons might have originated on the Left, it's a policy futile enough and pointlessly wasteful enough for The Bush administration and The NeoCons to passionately embrace.
After all, if they're pissing away American treasure in Kosovo, whyever should they worry about pissing away more in Myanamar?
Most reassuring to see that you, as do some others, “gets it”.
Insurgency? China's right across the border. We're talking hundreds of thousands of Chinese troops on Burmese soil fighting to eject our guys.
Don’t worry, they’ll be eternally grateful to the USA. Like Haiti and Somalia.
Actually, your examples highlight a different question - not of gratitude, but of practicality. Can they be fixed? We know that Somalia and Haiti cannot be - at a cost acceptable to us.
Yes, I agree. And I wish the long suffering Burmese would be liberated.
I can see a case being made that we could go ahead and provide some relief, without local permission...
there can be times when action is the morally right thing to do...............
If we start just going in to help, there will be a fight, need to be prepared for that because that junta’ only desire is to keep all power for themselves, and they don’t give a rat’s behind about any of the citizens. I am all for the navy to just send in choppers and riverboats and help, but they will need air cover because they will be attacked by the junta’s privaate armies
I think it’s a very bad idea for the US to force humanitarian aid on a country that doesn’t want us there.......
The country is not the government, it is the people of the country, and they are screaming for help now, just as they did last year when a lot of them were murdered by the junta.
They still don’t understand why the US and UN didn’t come in and stop it
A large difference here is that the Burmese people not only want, but EXPECT us to help
I mean, we've never done anything like that before, have we?
</s
Generally speaking I’ve always been in favor of military force ONLY when vital US interests are at stake.
But I’m willing to be persuaded that sometimes a moral imperative exists only because we are the ones ABLE to act. That is: because we can, we must.
There’s a useful logic in that.
Any unauthorized help would have to be followed by military strength in these two ways: A) when the local authorities commandeer the relief supplies for their own purposes, and B)when the local authorities actively impede the progress of relief supplies (like shooting down helicopters).
The “A” problem is the biggest for now. Lots of aid supplies are being misappropriated by the local Junta groups.
B)when the local authorities actively impede the progress of relief supplies (like shooting down helicopters).
...........
That was my point, we should just send in the aid helicopters, and be prepared for a fight, because it would probably happen. The people want our help, but the junta only want to help themselves, they are concentrating on tomorrow’s voting, and won’t even post pone it, except for the areas worst hit by the stor, they are even threatening people in the border areas that there will be trouble if they don’t
Why is it not the moral imperative for the Eastern Asian countries to give aid to their fellow neighbor?
They have plenty of resources.
It is not up to us to shoulder this burden. The other 200 countries in the world that aren’t fighting two wars to deter Islamic terrorism should do something instead of sitting on their ample @sses.
How about the OPEC nations—they have a little extra dough sitting around now.
It’s time for other countries to risk lives and treasure to promote the welfare of others.
While we are fighting a war for survival against Islamofascisnm, and China and Russia are becomming wealthier and more dangerous, a war in Burma is insane.
“So liberal moonbats think it’s O.K. to preemptively to invade China and Russia allies: Myanmar, but it’s American imperialism and colonialism to invade Iraq ?”
Because they secretly long for being enslaved and dominated by communist forces rather than to “suffer” under the U.S. flag.
Because the UN is the world’s most ineffectual organization evah??? And the US is involved in two wars and really doesn’t have the manpower to be involved with a third.
It is the neighbors moral imperative, but it is also the U.S.’s moral imperative because we’re really the only country that has the capability to do certain things. The U.S. navy/ air force might be the only ones able to get to the more remote areas of Burma. Also, from a purely selfish standpoint, engaging in such relief activities does help the U.S.’s image abroad. The U.S. navy did lots of good work during the tsunami, and it really helped America’s image in places like Indonesia.
Doing nice work does not help the US image abroad. Those that hate us still hate us even though we have freed hundreds of millions of people across the globe. We’ve been doing nice work for 64 years. We beat back Nazism, Emperor worship,fascism, communism,rebuilt Europe and Japan, and freed Eastern Europe. Fat lot of good that did us.
Other air forces has cargo planes that can do this work. Our USAF cargo planes and navy are strained doing relief and patrol work in the service of two armed forces fighting warson two fronts, and we need to be ready in case we attack Iran.
I know this sounds mean, but it is way past time for others countries to get off their asses and DO something, even if it costs them money, instead of pointing to us to do more.
As far as the tsunami, that was good that we did what we did, but it did absolutely nothing for our image. The Indonesian Muslims still want us dead.
India, China, Malaysia, Singapore, Japan and others in the region have plenty of resources they can bring to bear—IF THEY CARE TO.
That they don’t care is quite evident. Let their image suffer for a change.
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