[yyyk]

I think that aiding in the death of a couple hundred thousand Syrians, having militias in at least 4 ME states, and chanting eternal hostility to US and Israel plays a role. Also putting women in jail for 20 years for refusing to wear hijab is unpopular.

[gherkinnn]

I thought you were talking about the US until I got to “hostility towards US [...]”. Funny.

The US cares about the Syrian deaths about as much as they do about those in Yemen. Morals play absolutely no role here. And when a politician howls something about humanitarian reasons you can be sure it’s a farce.

What matters is giving head to the right person. Do that, and anything is fair game.

[Udik]

> The US cares about the Syrian deaths about as much as they do about those in Yemen

Especially since they fueled the war themselves. Regime change is less risky if you can just pay people on the ground to do it for you.

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Timber_Sycamore

[visarga]

Other countries did much worse to US and are still friends. I think it's arbitrary.

[Veen]

It is always bizarre to me that people think of international relations as a sphere in which normal morality operates or should operate. The US does what it thinks is in its strategic interests within the constraints of its power. Iran does the same.

Whether one side or the other has in the past acted immorally is irrelevant. You don't win the argument by saying "America has done bad things too", as if that should persuade it to change its behavior. It's a category error; nothing but ineffectual emotive fluff. You'd have more traction arguing that sanctions are, in fact, not in America's long term best interests.

[refurb]

Indeed. A lot of people tend to have a quite naive view of international relations - and I don’t blame them as media reporting tends to simplify things to a extreme, often trying to identify who is right and who is wrong.

In reality, beneath the surface, is a complex web of relationships and competing/aligned interests.

A good example is the Israel-Palestinian conflict. It may seem like an Israel-Arab conflict, but many Arab countries are aligning with Israel to counter the Shiite threat from Iran. But those same Arab countries can’t abandon the Palestinian cause either. So they walk a tightrope of tacitly supporting Palestine, often hollow public statements about the “on-going fight for a Palestinian state” all the while strategizing with Israel on how to contain Iranian influence. They can’t support Palestine 100% because that would mean severely weakening themselves with regards to Iran.

One can argue that’s two faced and they should be ashamed of partnering with the enemy of a group they support, but in reality every country does it. It’s about practically protecting your interests. And sure you might seem like you flip flop in your statements, but alliances and enemies are created and disappear all the time.

[boomboomsubban]

>You'd have more traction arguing that sanctions are, in fact, not in America's long term best interests

The problem with that angle is that without caring about morals, military invasion is probably better for America's interests than sanction relief.

[Veen]

One would hope they'd learned from Iraq and Afghanistan why military invasions aren't the strategically optimal way to deal with these problems. Although that may be a forlorn hope.

[boomboomsubban]

As much of a clusterfuck both of those wars were, I don't think they can be shown to have been clearly bad for the US long term interests. It's a hard thing to calculate, and the war hawks would be more than willing to only show the data saying more war is a good strategic idea.

[havetocharge]

You need the moral fluff to convince humans to risk their lives in participating in the invasion.

[boomboomsubban]

There's more than enough willing mercenaries, at most the moral fluff just drives the price down.

[havetocharge]

What's that de Gaulle quote? "No nation has friends only interests."