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04-29-24 03:29 AM
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Acmlm's Board - I3 Archive - World Affairs/Debate - North Korea's got Nukes.....and I care, why? New poll | |
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Since: 11-18-05
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Posted on 10-24-06 11:04 PM Link | Quote
I have a quick question. What is undemocratic about Russia?
Remember, the Soviet Union is over and done with.
Koryo

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Since: 10-17-06
From: Michigan, USA

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Posted on 10-24-06 11:19 PM Link | Quote
And people tell me I'm uninformed?
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Since: 11-18-05
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Posted on 10-25-06 01:48 AM Link | Quote
That's not an answer.
Arwon

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Since: 11-18-05
From: Randwick, Sydney, NSW, Australia

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Posted on 10-25-06 08:30 AM Link | Quote
Ah, see now we're back to the start and I can call Koryo a funhouse mirror version of a Trotskyist.
Koryo

Keese


 





Since: 10-17-06
From: Michigan, USA

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Posted on 10-25-06 04:31 PM Link | Quote
It's really biology 101 stuff, Plus Sign Abomintion.

And Arwan can call me whatever he likes, if it makes him feel good.

But the fact is that no one has provided any alternative answers. Arwan and PSA at least are content to do really nothing (a few sanctions at best). North Korea isn't likely to go democratic on its own. Even after KJI is gone, I'm sure some of his military leaders will continue the opressive practices of his regime. This thread has been about 2 points. 1: It will be easier to reform North Korea, because we already have an established democracy right next door to pick up where KJI left off, rather than trying to build a democracy out of nothing. 2: if we can't promote or protect democracy now with the most powerful country in the world, then what position will we be in to do it when the US is no longer the world hegemon?
Young Guru

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Since: 11-18-05
From: Notre Dame, IN

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Posted on 10-25-06 06:16 PM Link | Quote
In response to your second point. I think the more important issue is what are the affects going to be of the Unite States' actions to spread democracy throughout the world. Many people in countries that we are trying to spread democracy to are not all that happy with the US. It's pretty much evident that the US is going to slip out of power sometime in the next 50 years, so what are the nations that become more powerful than us going to do about our actions that we've taken now. If they follow suit with what we've done, they will ignore us if there is something they really want done, and if that thing isn't democracy we're going to be stuck just having to sit back and deal with it. Maybe we should be trying to promote a more positive image of the US rather than adding fuel to the fire of our negative PR campaign. Maybe war and overthrowing of governments is not the only solution to the problems of the world.
Arwon

Bazu


 





Since: 11-18-05
From: Randwick, Sydney, NSW, Australia

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Posted on 10-25-06 08:17 PM Link | Quote
Alternatives? How about sticking to the conventions of diplomacy and recognising the limits of one's power and the fact that actions have consequences and sometimes we can't act like bloody superheroes and save everyone from evil?

Since when has "spreading democracy" ever been a major foreign policy imperative or a workable one? It's fantasy, it's simplistic and it's juvenile, and you keep making all these assumptions about democracies being inhernetly good and other governments being inherently evil and aggressive. This line is instructive of the massive cognitive leaps being made here: "Arwan (sic) and PSA at least are content to do really nothing (a few sanctions at best). North Korea isn't likely to go democratic on its own." Note the leap straight to "going democratic" as, in Koryo's mind, the only concievable possibility worth exploring. Very telling.

Aside from a lot of inappropriate comparisons to the post-WW2 situation there hasn't been a lot of talk about all the successful examples of going into other countries and making them democracies. Has Iraq taught you nothing? All I can think is thank god the idea is going out of fashion.

Exporting political systems does not work.


(edited by Arwon on 10-25-06 07:18 PM)
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Since: 11-18-05
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Posted on 10-25-06 09:20 PM Link | Quote
Originally posted by Koryo
It's really biology 101 stuff, Plus Sign Abomintion.

And Arwan can call me whatever he likes, if it makes him feel good.

But the fact is that no one has provided any alternative answers. Arwan and PSA at least are content to do really nothing (a few sanctions at best). North Korea isn't likely to go democratic on its own. Even after KJI is gone, I'm sure some of his military leaders will continue the opressive practices of his regime. This thread has been about 2 points. 1: It will be easier to reform North Korea, because we already have an established democracy right next door to pick up where KJI left off, rather than trying to build a democracy out of nothing. 2: if we can't promote or protect democracy now with the most powerful country in the world, then what position will we be in to do it when the US is no longer the world hegemon?



I quoted you.

Where is your answer to my Russian question?
Arwon

Bazu


 





Since: 11-18-05
From: Randwick, Sydney, NSW, Australia

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Posted on 10-26-06 02:45 AM Link | Quote
Well they *are* kinda slouching towards a mild sort of fascism...
Ziff
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Since: 11-18-05
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Posted on 10-26-06 04:36 AM Link | Quote
Oh, I'm not lying. Russia has a lot of problems. I mean their elected leader declared that Russia needs to be ruled by the dictatorship of law. But the fact of the matter is that he claims that it is not democratic and I'd like to see his proof for that.

Because he claimed that the EU didn't have surpass the U.S. in terms of hard economics, but I mean...I just stumbled upon an IMF document about the EU's combined GDP (and for the record we had been speaking about EUROPE (which is arguably a term that in the contemporary allows for the thought of unified statistics)). So I just drummed it up on wikipedia (which has sourced the IMF) here. Also he made a claim that the EU had nowhere close to the U.S. in terms of military budgets. This is true. But that doesn't change the fact that the EU has an unimaginably diverse force with an extremely vast budget.
Arwon

Bazu


 





Since: 11-18-05
From: Randwick, Sydney, NSW, Australia

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Posted on 10-26-06 04:40 AM Link | Quote
Ayup. That's when we get into nasty definitional issues. Is Singapore democratic? Is Jordan? Israel? Venezuela? Thailand? Malaysia? the Solomon Islands?
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Since: 11-18-05
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Posted on 10-26-06 05:25 AM Link | Quote
Well, then we get into nastier issues about the nature of democracy itself and what it constitutes at a theoretical and philosophical level. And then we start quoting Mills and de Tocqueville. Then we start quoting Enlightenment philosophers. And then suddenly it drops down to arguments over the nature of Poland in the middle-ages (I don't about Australia Arwon, but we study mediaeval Poland's politics religiously here in Canuckistan). But yeah. It falls to either way that if he wants to toss out a statement like that, I'd at least like to see some proof. And hell, I'm not even disagreeing fully with him. But for once he is throwing something out there that I'm quite knowledgeable about and follow quite regularly and to which I devote a considerable chunk of my studies. I want to see what he will source and what arguments he will offer. I'd say that it is only fair.

As for a posited relation of China-S. Korea and China-N. Korea.
China loves S. Korea and would love for S. Korea to subsume its neighbour to the North. N. Korea is an embarassment to the Chinese. They hate how they have a constant reminder of Stalinism just bordering them. They hate how they have to toss money to them. They hate how their problem child has flaunted the international order. They hate how that has impacted them. Mainland Chinese culture is dominated by the soft-power eminating from S. Korea. And besides, at no time has the Chinese ever been seen as a directly imperialist power. They've been content to sit on their coast and build up their own system. It has been that way for 2000 years. I really don't think that they're going to turn around and change that now. Besides, China is stingy. They don't want their prosperous northern areas, particularly the gorgeous city of Harbin, to fall into disarray because of the flocks of the people that their stupid little neighbour chose to mistreat.

China isn't standing on its two feet yet and doesn't really know its true position in the world. Very few nations have ever been in its position. To call it a directly imperialist power at this time is wrong. It is deeply conservative in its mindset right now and sees the current world as its engine of growth. Why would you change the order around you when it benefits you more than chaos?
Arwon

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Since: 11-18-05
From: Randwick, Sydney, NSW, Australia

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Posted on 10-26-06 05:38 AM Link | Quote

at no time has the Chinese ever been seen as a directly imperialist power


Sort of. That applies outside of the area considered, however wrongly, to be part of the historical Chinese nation, of course. Places like Tibet and Turkestan and Mongolia and so forth.

Of course the question is... would China actually follow through on defining the ancient Koguryo kingdom including both North Korea and part of Manchuria, as historically Chinese, with an attempt to expand? Probably not, but attempts by China to claim Koguryo (since it principally developed in Northwest China) as part of its multi-thnic identity have caused some tension between China and SK recently.


(edited by Arwon on 10-26-06 04:41 AM)
Koryo

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Since: 10-17-06
From: Michigan, USA

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Posted on 10-30-06 10:10 PM Link | Quote
In response to Young Guru
The US could not possibly accomplish more, and probably not much at all, to spread democracy by leaving dictatorships intact, withdrawing troops from the world, and behaving in a multilateralist way. We can accomplish far more in the long run by destroying a dictatorship government and replacing it with a democratic government (even only a quasi democratic government) than we can by leaving the dictators intact and trying to teach them how to be multilateralists. No mater what we try to do to KJI, he will never behave like Great Britain, Canada, or Sweden. So it cannot be argued that KJI or any other dictator will be encouraged to act more unilaterally than they already do because of how the US is acting. While I oppose excessive heavy-handedness in spreading democracy, a bit of heavy handedness is still better than leaving a dictator in place if there is very little foreseeable hope of that dictator being overthrown. Like in North Korea. I see almost 0 chance of a North Korean democracy springing up on its own. Most likely, KJI will hold on until he dies, then one of his generals will take over, and military men will continue to control North Korea as long as the North Korean army remains so strong. Once the army is too weak to maintain control, the government may actually fall apart, in which case I�m sure that China will send in troops to �secure and protect their friends and allies in North Korea�, and turn the country into a puppet state. That is what will happen without any US intervention. And, yet again, if war to overthrow governments is not the solution, then please suggest one. I have yet to hear it.

Originally posted by Arwon
Note the leap straight to "going democratic" as, in Koryo's mind, the only concievable possibility worth exploring. Very telling.

Yes, very telling indeed that I think democracy is the best goal for a country. How foolish of me. I should put �regional stability� above all else, like you. Tell us, then, since you�re so into biology 101, what are the other possibilities �worth exploring�? And just how many North Koreans must die while we are �exploring� them, eh?

Originally posted by Arwon
Aside from a lot of inappropriate comparisons to the post-WW2 situation there hasn't been a lot of talk about all the successful examples of going into other countries and making them democracies. Has Iraq taught you nothing?

Show me these false comparisons to WW2.
And Iraq has indeed taught me several things that would pertain to North Korea:
-It is very difficult to create a democracy out of nothing.
-It is important to bring enough troops to maintain order.
-It is important to control the borders to prevent saboteurs from coming in.
-It is important to keep hostile foreign influences out while reconstruction is underway.
-Never start a war without a viable propaganda machine.

As for point number 1, as I�ve said countless times already, it will be far easier for North Korea to transition to a democratic country, because we aren�t trying to create a democracy out of nothing, as we are in Iraq.
Point number two is important, but more so in Iraq than in North Korea. I don�t anticipate violent crime being quite as extensive as in Iraq, as there is little law an order in North Korea now anyway.
We must watch North Korea�s borders to prevent people coming across from China or Russia who might try to sabotage or otherwise hinder North Korea�s transition to democracy (or unification with South Korea, in this case). This is again why I stress the importance of South Korea. China will be more reluctant to try to march troops into sovereign South Korea territory than a collapsed North Korea.
And lastly, Iraq has taught me that any cause can fail when all the propaganda is against you. KJI has effectively used propaganda to cloud the minds of the North Koreas so far. If his propaganda machines are allowed to operate while the US and South Korea are rebuilding (or building) North Korea, the population will resist. They will refuse to attend American built hospitals or schools and refuse to work in new factories, if KJI�s propaganda machines continue to run. Most likely China will try to do the same.

As for a comment some time ago, I would indeed allow North Koreans to come to the US. We�ve got millions of illegal Mexicans up here. North Koreans can�t be much worse.


Exporting political systems does not work.

It most definitely worked for Communism, Islam, and European Monarchies. It also can and has worked for democracies. Look at Japan and South Korea for two examples (another WW2 reference for you).


Where is your answer to my Russian question?

You know very well where Russia is lacking in democratic practices. You�re just asking me because you think I don�t know.


Because he claimed that the EU didn't have surpass the U.S. in terms of hard economics, but I mean...

According to your own sources, France and Great Britain alone make up 40% of the EU military budget. The budget itself is well below half that of the US, and when two countries (France and UK) make up almost half of that, I still maintain that their military is worth very little for the cause of protecting freedom, democracy, and weak countries around the world. I�m not sure what your claim that their military is �diverse� has to do with anything. I�m also not sure how my statements about the EU�s military budget has anything to do with Russian democracy or lack thereof. Also, when was the last time the EU pooled its entire military power for a common cause? The US military acts as a single unit, as opposed to the EU�s military being split among many, many countries. The US military is also equipped to fight anywhere anytime. I�m not trying to tout the virtues of the American military. I�m trying to show that the EU has very little ability to protect democracy in the world. If China chose to invade South Korea tomorrow (not that it is likely, but play along for a moment), what could the EU do about it? Very little, and certainly less than the US could do. That was my point.


China loves S. Korea and would love for S. Korea to subsume its neighbour to the North.

This more than anything else shows how little you actually understand about Biology 101.


. N. Korea is an embarassment to the Chinese. They hate how they have a constant reminder of Stalinism just bordering them. They hate how they have to toss money to them. They hate how their problem child has flaunted the international order.

China does not have to �toss� any money at KJI. They choose to. China also cares about as much for international order as North Korea does. China also is right next to Russia. What better reminder of Stalinism does one need?


at no time has the Chinese ever been seen as a directly imperialist power. They've been content to sit on their coast and build up their own system. It has been that way for 2000 years. I really don't think that they're going to turn around and change that now.

So China has no ambitions toward Taiwan? And Tibet is supposed to be part of China? And China never tried to invade Japan? And whatever China did 2000 years ago means very little to the current Chinese government. I guess your problem is not with Biology 101 but with History.


Besides, China is stingy. They don't want their prosperous northern areas, particularly the gorgeous city of Harbin, to fall into disarray because of the flocks of the people that their stupid little neighbour chose to mistreat.

Because China doesn�t mistreat its people, right?


(edited by Koryo on 10-30-06 09:20 PM)
Arwon

Bazu


 





Since: 11-18-05
From: Randwick, Sydney, NSW, Australia

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Posted on 10-31-06 12:02 AM Link | Quote
Random thing in the news today, apparently China hasn't shipped any oil to North Korea for about a month. Ho-hum.

Now let's play with this exporting democracy thing.


It most definitely worked for Communism, Islam, and European Monarchies. It also can and has worked for democracies. Look at Japan and South Korea for two examples (another WW2 reference for you).


OK, firstly, Islam isn't a political system. Turkey is very differnet from Indonesia is very different from Yemen is very different from Nigeria is very different from Uzbekistan is very different from Syria is very different from Chechnya is very different from Lakemba.

Second, Communism. Aside from the essentially imperialist imposition of the Stalinist model on Eastern Europe and, to an extent, North Korea, I can't think of a successful communist revolution that wasn't actually borne from a homegrown insurgency. And those were in both cases kind of a post-war tabula rasa (there's something in the theory that in order to change a country you have to completely destroy it in a long and exhausting war first) and at any rate, hardly the sort of model you want if you're going for the moral high ground. On the other hand, Russia, Cuba, Vietnam, Yugoslavia, China, Laos and Cambodia were all independent revolutions--supported materially from abroad, yes, but still moving on their own internal dynamics and not possible without them. Hungary in 1919 was another short-lived one. Hell, even a couple of countries that WERE under the Stalinist boot attempted socialist or social-democratic inspired counter-revolutions against their alien and imposed system (see also: 1956 Hungarian Revolution and the Prague Spring, Socialism with a human face, etc). The notion of Communism as a successfully exportable system of government died with Guevara in Bolivia, surely.

When were European monarchies exported? I'm really unclear what you mean by that.

World War two analogies. OK, Japan. There was a pre-existing indigenous democracy (the Taisho period) to fall back on, a recurring tradition of embracing Western innovations in order to improve their own standing, there was the shame of defeat and the exhaustion of several years of aggressive warfare, and of course there was Hirohito's absolute authority being extremely useful. Politically, every single thing was in favour of the US in Japan. There was the ability to completely close the country and have MacArthur assume dictatorial control for about 4 years (a fairly draconian occupation, even if it was cooperated with fully--and you couldn't achieve that level of control these days either politically or practically). It's certainly the closest thing we have to a success we have ever witnessed in nation-building, but all the preconditions had to be exactly right in a way that occurs extremely extremely rarely.

South Korea. Democracy wasn't exported there, period. It was a colony of Japan 1910-1945, its post-war republic quickly slipped into dictatorship, was a pro-US dictatorship until 1988 aside from a couple of brief periods of attempted revolution, then it overthrew that regime and became democratic as the Sixth Republic entirely under its own internal steam.

----

Oh and other options worth exploring? How about listening to what the South Koreans actually want instead of demanding they be used as pawns to facilitate geopolitical goals? Their view has broad bipartisan support even from South Korean conservatives and varies only in terms of partisan bickering and slight variances on how much pressure and leeway to apply. In the vast majority of sane South Korean eyes (and all major parties), the only concievable path to unification is helping close the income gap by encouraging trade and openness, while trying to avoid driving the North into doing something stupid--if I can quote the Economist here:


Meanwhile, South Korea's predominant political consensus, says Andrei Lankov of Kookmin University in Seoul, is to seek gradual change north of the border in ways that might eventually narrow the vast income gap between the two sides. Tightening the screws too far risks goading Mr Kim to strike back. A collapse of the regime, followed by reunification, would impose unbearable costs on the South. Even the opposition GNP, says Park Jin, a member of the party, believes in maintaining dialogue with the North, while adding some pressure.


It's going to be interesting wathcing already fraught Seoul-Washington relations from here on in given the American assumption that they know what's best for everyone and lack of willingness to listen to their nominal allies. It really is.


(edited by Arwon on 10-30-06 11:40 PM)
Ziff
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Since: 11-18-05
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Posted on 10-31-06 02:14 AM Link | Quote
"You know very well where Russia is lacking in democratic practices. You�re just asking me because you think I don�t know. "

Well, if you know, concoct an answer.
Koryo

Keese


 





Since: 10-17-06
From: Michigan, USA

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Posted on 11-05-06 11:36 PM Link | Quote
Arwon

Islam is both a religion and, at times, a political system. You, a student of Biology, should know that very well. Islam draws no distinction between church and state (or mosque and state, I guess). The early Islamic empires were based on� Islam, believe it or not. Not all countries with a majority of the population who practice Islam are the same, as you say. But then, not all countries with a majority of the population who practice Islam are run by an Islamic government. For that mater, not all democratic countries are the same. There is just as much diversity between the US, Great Britain, Israel, France, Germany, Japan, and South Korea as there is between the countries you mentioned with a majority of people who practice Islam. There is also a fair bit of diversity within Islam. Lastly, Islam (or at least the majority of its followers) has changed quite a bit since it was being spread by the old Islamic Empires.


Second, Communism. Aside from the essentially imperialist imposition of the Stalinist model on Eastern Europe and, to an extent, North Korea, I can't think of a successful communist revolution that wasn't actually borne from a homegrown insurgency.

Well, considering that the USSR, Eastern Europe, and North Korea make up a vast percentage of the world�s communist and former communist countries, I�m not sure we have to take this point any further. However, as for the home grown insurgencies, obviously there must be a home grown component of almost any ideological movement. It�s difficult to bring an ideology to a country that is already quite satisfied with their current ideology or regime. It would be almost impossible for the US to bring democracy to North Korea if KJI was actually a great man revered by all of his people. In order for a democratic movement to spread, there must be a home grown dislike of KJI. Likewise, it would be much easier for a communist country to spread communism to a country whose people are already discontent with their current leadership. It is also possible, however, for those communist countries to invade and force communism on the local population.

Not that, when I discuss communism, I am referring to the dictatorial way in which virtually every �communist� government has administered it, not the idealized form of communism that pretends everybody can live happily ever after in a magical far away place.


there's something in the theory that in order to change a country you have to completely destroy it in a long and exhausting war first

You don�t have to, but it helps. Fortunately, I put emphasis on the moral as well as the practical, so I�m not advocating turning North Korea into a pile of rubble and building a new country on top of it.


The notion of Communism as a successfully exportable system of government died with Guevara in Bolivia, surely.

While we�re on the subject of ol� Che, you firmly acknowledge that he was a murdering thug, and not a social reformer, right? I just think it�s a fairly important point to establish before we move on.

But here�s the bottom line. You�re refusing to accept several basic and obvious truths. First, this term �stability� is really problematic in this case. North Korea is not a stabilizing force in the region. In fact, North Korea is probably the single most destabilizing force in the region. China is not likely to start a war for several more decades, and South Korea and Japan are peaceful. North Korea is the only country that is likely to start a war in North East Asia within the next 10 years. The North Korean government is also not internally good. It may be �stable� in the sense that the regime isn�t going anywhere anytime soon, but that�s hardly beneficial to the North Korean people, or anyone else for that mater. Hence the problems with the term �stability.� It sounds good, but it�s really not. Just because the regime isn�t likely to fall in the near future doesn�t mean anything good. KJI�s existence doesn�t benefit the North Korea people. In North Korea, there is not �universal health care� or �job stability� or �social services� or any other social myth that communist countries claim to posses. If KJI�s regime simply �collapsed� tomorrow, which you seem to view as a bad thing, the North Koreans would be better off than they are now. In fact, the North Koreans can�t really get any worse off than they are now, unless their society becomes engulfed in sectarian violence like Iraq, which I don�t see happening. The only likely negative would be mass emigration from North Korea, which would be a negative thing to the countries into which they flee, but not a negative thing for the North Koreans themselves. I doubt China will allow any North Koreans over the border, but South Korea may. But, as I�ve said plenty of times, in my plan, the North Koreans would already be �in� South Korea, because the South Korean government would be given control of the formerly North Korean government. Obviously, this would inconvenience some of the South Koreans. I tend to think that the very lives of the North Koreans is a bit more important than the inconvenience caused to South Koreans, but I can understand their position and, as I�ve also already said, the US should help pay some of the cost. If the so called �international community� really cares about the civilian populations of former dictatorships, as they claim to, then they will also provide funding. In the end (after some years), South Korea (or just plain Korea by that point) will actually be better off, once the former North Koreans become net producers rather than net consumers. Finally, as I�ve said many times before, I�m not forcing anything on South Korea. If they refuse to reunify with the North, then I won�t press the issue. I will point out, however, that this is the only conceivable plan for reunification for years to come (certainly within KJI�s lifetime), because no amount of �dialogue� with KJI will bring about a unification in any peaceful way. KJI would never share power with a democratic South Korean government.

Why? I don�t know, perhaps you simply think that I�m out to set up a puppet government in the north, or that I want to impose some sort of �geopolitical goals�. I�m not talking about geopolitical goals. I�m talking about the future. We are at a unique point in history right now. Currently, a huge percentage of the world�s population lives under democratic or semi democratic governments. We have an opportunity to make that the way of the foreseeable future, or we can let it all slip away and allow the world to revert to the way it has been for centuries: small warring dictatorships because, remember, democracies are not the natural state of humans in large groups. You�ll tell me I�m repeating myself and not presenting any new information, but there are really only a limited number of ways to explain to you concepts that you refuse to accept. Though quite a few countries are democratic or semi democratic now, they have very little ability to maintain that state without outside support, because there are plenty of dictatorships out there to discourage democracy. If the US wasn�t supporting South Korea, do you think it likely that they would be democratic today? Obviously, they would be ruled by KJI if we hadn�t joined the Korean War in 1950, but even after that, if we had completely withdrawn from South Korea, would they have become democratic at all? More likely they would have remained a dictatorship, and the Korean peninsula would have been forever divided among two mutually hostile dictatorships. True, there is an incredible diversity within the structure of democracies, but they all have many things in common. Why? Because democracies don�t spontaneously rise from nothing, not usually anyway. The reason most of the world�s democracies have a similar government structure is because they gain inspiration from existing, successful democracies. If the South Koreans, Japanese, and Taiwanese didn�t know about the success of the democratic system in America and Western Europe, would they be democratic today? I doubt it. All the culture and social progress in the world can easily be trampled by a large number of barbarians. I believe that spreading democracy should be the goal of the current democratic countries and that, if we don�t, large parts of the world will fall back into dictatorships. I don�t think the US, Canada, Australia, and Western Europe are in much danger of sliding back into dictatorships within the next 50 years, but much of the rest of the world is. Without the �intrusion� of the West into the rest of the world, I don�t foresee any major progress toward democracy in Africa, the Middle East, Central Asia, East Asia, and South America. In fact, we could easily see the opposite. Whether India will be able or willing to influence democratic movements in the region, I don�t know.

Oh, and seriously, what is it with the Economist? Do you get all of your political opinions from there, or are any of these actually your own?
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Since: 11-18-05
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Posted on 11-06-06 12:14 AM Link | Quote
Make installational political choices for the FUTURE is the very definition of geopolitical goals.
Arwon

Bazu


 





Since: 11-18-05
From: Randwick, Sydney, NSW, Australia

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Posted on 11-06-06 04:42 AM Link | Quote
You're still making the fundamental mistake of thinking you can actively bring other systems into a country. Your point about European democracy as a successful model is noted, but you keep making the unjustified leap from that to assuming you can proactively create these things. I cite two examples from the last post:


if we had completely withdrawn from South Korea, would they have become democratic at all? More likely they would have remained a dictatorship, and the Korean peninsula would have been forever divided among two mutually hostile dictatorships.
[and]
If the US wasn�t supporting South Korea, do you think it likely that they would be democratic today?


Again, here's the confusion between a passive "successful model" and "actuvely creating it". It is utterly perverse of you to claim that, despite US comfort with, and support for, dictatorships in South Korea, somehow the eventual seizure of state that resulted in democracy was because of the US. That is infantile and wrong-headed in the extreme.

If you're going to take credit for "inspiring" change every time a fucking political upheaval occurs, then sure, you can squint your eyes and say LOOK WE'RE SPREADING DEMOCRACY but no, that's not how it works.

You don't even seem to recognise that what you're talking about is a massive program of geopolitical reordering. You don't see the ideology in your views, you think they're somehow neutral or natural or obvious to everyone. As Ziff/PSA points out, talking about hypothetical reorderings in the future is the very definition of geopolitical goals, and moreover, you continue to display a massive disregard for what people in these countries actually think and what they want because, hey, everyone must think democracy is like, the most important thing, ever.

Democratising the world is a naive fantasy that exists only in the ivory towers of thinktanks run by people like Donald Rumsfeld. It is not good foreign policy. It's arrogant and counterproductive. My problem with the democratic peace theory is it's massively spurious and it tends to blind its followers to the real issues and the real things that need improvement. I mean, it's a harmless enough little theory on its own (except when it's inspiring people to do stupid things like invade Iraq), but the problem is, when you've got people running around thinking "lack of democracy" is the cause of so many problems, they forget about all the bigger problems in the world than a lack of formal political freedom. As if North Korea's the place with all the big problems.

I mean, do you think the slum-dwellers of Lagos, Nairobi, Rio de Janeiro, Addis Ababa and Lima care much that their countries are democratic as opposed to dictatorships right now? Why not take this obvious zeal for improving the world and focus on real issues you can do something about. Things like debt relief, US farm subsidies, fighting AIDS, climate change, and so forth? Things that fuck millions of people over every day and, unlike Stalinist nuclear-armed dictatorships on isolated peninsulas, we can actually do something about. If you want to improve the world, drop the neoconservative fantasy that somehow "holding elections" improves the situation for people, and actually look at practical issues.

As for Che, isn't the answer that he was both?


(edited by Arwon on 11-06-06 03:43 AM)
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