[cogman10]

The US did not retreat. We fought multiple wars to maintain our power and influence. We toppled multiple regimes to maintain puppet governments. Very much the same as the USSR and China have done.

Vietnam, Korea, Iran, Iraq, Cuba, Guatemala, Haiti, etc.

US conquest was quiet similar to British conquest. They didn't make their conquered people citizens (that'd make things tricky for exploitation) so instead they make sure the "democracies" they spread elected the right leaders who just so happen to align with US interests.

There's a reason the US has military bases across the globe. It's not because they've retreated from their subservient states.

[adriand]

> The US did not retreat. We fought multiple wars to maintain our power and influence. We toppled multiple regimes to maintain puppet governments. Very much the same as the USSR and China have done.

As much as I am critical of the US, until now the US did behave very differently from other superpowers. Consider the end of WWII. The US did not inflict reparations on the vanquished nations but rather, invested huge sums in their rebuilding, in the process making stalwart allies of them. These were not puppet governments, they became thriving democracies.

This is not to excuse the many bad things the US has done in Latin America, Vietnam, etc. But there is really no comparison between US behaviour and that of the USSR (or of colonial European countries, for that matter). People in Soviet-controlled East Germany were quite keen to go to the west and did not perceive the presence of US military bases there as evidence of American totalitarianism.

That, of course, has changed and now America is seen as a predatory hegemon. But that has not always been true.

[tharkun__]

The US did not keep bases in all of West Germany though.

There were different sectors. The US had essentially the South. There were also the British sector and French. The Soviets were the fourth sector but we all know how that one was quite different from the other three.

While the French and British have mostly left, the US stayed. Though to be fair even the British still do have some bases it seems as NATO troups. But no more large garrison in many larger cities.

The US on the other hand is still there with much larger force. Like think back to "Air Force One" (the movie with Harrison Ford) which used Ramstein Airbase in the movie (though they didn't actually film there) and that airbase has come up in the Iran conflict as a conflict of its own. Meaning Germany didn't want the US to use it as a hub for US operations (supply logistics) for the Iran war.

[adriand]

> The US on the other hand is still there with much larger force.

To provide for European security! That’s the deal in terms of Europe and NATO and also specifically to handle Germany. The idea was that America would provide security to Europe including the nuclear umbrella, and one benefit - among many others - was that Germany would not need to have a powerful military.

Can you perhaps guess why people might be concerned about a heavily armed Germany in the postwar period? Those same concerns are bubbling up in European capitals right now, as Germany rearms due to the loss of the US as a reliable partner.

[tharkun__]

Which is now out the window.

And yes I definitely remember Colbert quite some time ago quipping about exactly that (paraphrased from memory): US no longer reliable NATO partner and nuclear deterrent. So Europe needs to step up. Let's have Germany have nukes. What could possibly go wrong!

The obviously funny thing being, that the US has, for a long time and Trump doubled down, asked Europe including Germany to spend more on military. And the "moderate forces" in Germany are not an issue in that regard. Those are the ones not wanting Trump to use Ramstein airbase in a war he started.

But would you want the AfD to come to power and wield those ramped up, potentially now nuclear, forces? The party that was ruled as "definitely extremist right wing aka neo nazi" in some federal states by Germany's own "Federal Office for the Protection of the Constitution". Oh and also was that not the party a certain Elon Musk and Trump were trying to prop up? Which is doubly funny because of the AfD's alleged ties to Putin (sometimes more than alleged).

[adriand]

> But would you want the AfD to come to power and wield those ramped up, potentially now nuclear, forces?

Totally! That’s what makes the situation doubly maddening. It would be one thing if these actions were bad for the world and good for the US. But they’re bad for the US too!

I forget who it was that said this, and I’m sure my paraphrasing is bad, but I listened or read something I found chilling. It was something like, ordinary Americans are totally unprepared for the level of danger they will experience over the coming decades.

The only reason Trump is able to destroy global institutions so easily is because Americans take their security for granted. But that security is the result of institutions developed in the aftermath of an utterly devastating war. Now those institutions are damaged and America’s friends are alienated, right when they are most needed to deal with China, Russia, AI, drones, cyber, nuclear, climate…talk about bad timing.

[spwa4]

WTF ... this comment, the one I'm replying to is written by an LLM. Look at the last sentence:

> deal with China, Russia, AI, drones, cyber, nuclear, climate…talk about bad timing.

Note the characters used for the "..." in that sentence. I have never seen a human do that, not even once, and LLMs like ChatGPT do it all the time.

[eucyclos]

The US was preferable to the British who were preferable to the Spanish. Hopefully the next global hegemon is similarly preferable to the US.

[thaumasiotes]

> As much as I am critical of the US, until now the US did behave very differently from other superpowers. Consider the end of WWII. The US did not inflict reparations on the vanquished nations but rather, invested huge sums in their rebuilding, in the process making stalwart allies of them.

That is also how Rome routinely dealt with the border tribes that it defeated. It's not a new idea. That's just what superpowers do.

[cogman10]

The US treated both Germany and Japan well. It did not and has not treated any other nation whose government it's meddled with well. That's my point.

Edit Actually we probably could throw in South Korea into the nations the US has treated well after meddling.

[bdamm]

Spain, France, the entire iron curtain following 1992 dissolution of USSR, Taiwan, Phillipines, Costa Rica, Panama ... and speaking of central America, Venezuela isn't doing so bad either. Perhaps more expansive lists could be produced once the definitions of "meddled with" and "treated well" are more refined.

[BobbyJo]

Vietnam and Korea were technically wars to stop conquest, no?

[cogman10]

Conquest from who?

I generally take the word "conquest" to mean some outside force coming in and taking over. That didn't happen in either Vietnam or Korea. You could argue that the USSR used conquest to take over territories for the soviet union. However, that's not something really arguable about Vietnam or Korea. Vietnam, in particular, was the native population overthrowing their conquerors, the french, and then deciding they wanted to be communists. They got support from both the USSR and China, but they weren't ultimately under the umbrella of either regime.

Now, I'd agree that Vietnam and Korea both had civil wars supercharged by the US, China, and Russia. But I disagree that these were wars where the US was stopping conquest. We see that in the modern state of Vietnam and North Korea. Vietnam, funnily, became a closer ally to the US than China after the war.

Cuba is very much the same way. It wasn't conquered by an outside force. Yet they did ally with the USSR once the dust settled. They were still an independent nation from the USSR.

[throw0101d]

> Conquest from who?

The Communists. Would you rather live in North or South Korea?

Vietnam is interesting in that they're still politically authoritarian but willing to be more economically open; see also China. (Just don't say the wrong thing about the wrong people.)

[cogman10]

> Would you rather live in North or South Korea?

Today obviously the South. In 1950, probably the North. Throughout the Korean war, it's a wash. The US obliterated the north, but the south was completely insane towards their own civilian population. The ROK was not a "nice" government to live under during the korean war.

If you lived in the north there was a good possibility that you were getting bombed. It was best to live near china.

If you live in the south, there was a good chance you would be conscripted and sent to the meat grinder as a man.

The subsequent cease fire, the south has rebuilt and become the better place to live. The north has mostly struggled due to international sanctions. They have never fully recovered.

[the_af]

"The Communist" were a faction in a civil war, that's not an invasion. And the split in both cases (Vietnam and Korea) was recent and artificial, in the sense of no tradition of there being two countries. It wasn't one country invading another country, but two halves engaged in a civil war.

Where one wants to live is irrelevant. It wasn't about stopping an invasion, which was the initial claim. The US was meddling.

[the_af]

> Vietnam and Korea were technically wars to stop conquest, no?

No.

For example, the US got involved in Vietnam to help the colonizer (France) stop an independence movement. Yes, because they feared the resulting Vietnam may become communist and USSR aligned (something they helped happen, since Ho Chi Minh quite admired the US and expected them to help him at first), but even if this was the case, it's still not about stopping an invasion, because commie Vietnamese are still Vietnamese.

Something along those lines for Korea, too.

[spwa4]

Let's compare with the Soviets and conclude the obvious: the US did retreat.

[psadauskas]

The US has over 128 military bases in 55 foreign countries.

Russia has 12, mostly in former Soviet countries. China has 3.

[JumpCrisscross]

> Russia has 12, mostly in former Soviet countries. China has 3

To be fair, you're comparing land powers–that tend to annex their holdings–with a maritime power, who tend to trade with and maintain favourable ports at their conquests/allies. So yeah, China doesn't have any foreign bases in Tibet. But that's because it annexed it in the 1950s.

Put together, America obviously has a larger military than China or Russia. But before Russia became a rump, the Soviet Union could marshall military resources comparable to–and for one decade, in excess of–those of the United States for much of the post-War era.

[throw0101d]

> The US has over 128 military bases in 55 foreign countries.

Are those 55 countries forced to have US military bases, or are they willing/happy to have them around?

Estonia wants more US troops:

* https://news.err.ee/1609992007/estonia-signals-willingness-t...

The Philippines is also good with the US expanding its presence:

* https://news.usni.org/2026/02/02/u-s-army-quietly-stands-up-...

* https://time.com/6252750/philippines-us-military-agreement-c...

[spwa4]

How many "foreign" bases did Russia have a few years after WW2, before revolutions kicked them out? Before Russia annexed countries and destroyed the populations?

Because that's, of course, the real question.

It's literally thousands.

You need thousands of military bases if you're going to do "thought police". Because that's what you'll never read here. Russia HAD a (military) thought police. It was Putin's job when he got started, by the way.

[MiiMe19]

Me looking for the soviet military bases rn

EDIT: I completely misunderstood the context here, nevermind.

[spwa4]

I live in the Netherlands. The closest one was about 260 km from where I live.

Of course, not any more.

[throw1234567891]

To be fair, if you stand in the middle of The Netherlands, 260km in any direction and you end up outside of the country. Which base are you talking about?

[MiiMe19]

I completely misunderstood the context of this discussion and revoke my mildly snarky comment. You are correct.

[JumpCrisscross]

Out of genuine (and goodwilled) curiosity, how had you read it?

[coldtea]

Was that on a country that went on a genocidal rampage just before and lost the war after killing millions all around Europe, which was decided to be divided in several parts, of which USSR got to control one, and which still developed into an independent country less than a decade later?

[spwa4]

Yes, but you're leaving out the other 9 countries the Soviet Union occupied, and immediately started killing the population to keep their conquests: Poland, Austria’s Soviet zone, Hungary, Romania, Bulgaria, Czechoslovakia, Estonia, Latvia, and Lithuania.

By contrast, the US retreated. And also didn't start killing any population.

[cogman10]

> And also didn't start killing any population.

Except for the populations in the global South. We spent a decade firebombing Vietnam and Cambodia.

[coldtea]

"Killing their population" as in executing some Nazi collaborators, of which there was no shortage in all, down to full cooperation? Like the ones involved in the Axis alliance and in the eastern front offensives that caused the deaths of millions of their own people?

>And also didn't start killing any population.

Yes, just Korea, Vietnam, Cambodia, and anybody who leaned national sovereignity/left in the Latin America and later the middle east.

[throw0101d]

> Very much the same as the USSR and China have done.

The expressed goal of Communism (USSR, later China) was to spread its ideology to the entire world. The US chose at its goal the containment of Communism:

* https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/X_Article

* https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Containment

This is what drove Korea, Vietnam, Cuba/Castro, and many other countries with left-leaning governments. In many cases this ended up with the US supporting the right-wing people, e.g.:

* https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Augusto_Pinochet

> There's a reason the US has military bases across the globe. It's not because they've retreated from their subservient states.

Yes, containment and power projection to keep the sea lanes open for trade (which benefits the US financially and life-style-wise, but also benefits countries who export things, to the US and other places):

* https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/NSC_68

If you don't think having peaceful sea lanes is useful, see Houthis/Red Sea and Strait of Hormuz. What we're seeing with Trump's worldview is a return to how things tended to be earlier in history:

* https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mercantilism