[BugBrother]

>>American "hegemony" as you call it has only been good to the US' closest allies and trade partners. China, Russia and India to name three big ones have had to develop by themselves independent of American support

Are you aware of the democratic peace theory? Check wikipedia. In short, [stable] democracies don't have wars. Not even USA starts wars with (or intervene in) stable democracies.

Most of the cases "suffering" from USA are ~ evil juntas.

India is an exception, they have voluntarily turned to Russia for e.g. buying weapons -- I don't know if the country "had" to do anything, re USA (they do benefit from the global market). But Russia's junta prefers to cooperate with non-democracies -- and actively demonizes the world's working democracies. China is doing even worse jingoism than Russia.

In short -- don't mix up packs of thieves stealing countries with the countries themselves. Or with democratic governments.

>> Globalisation, unless EVERY single nation on Earth adopts isolationism both economically and socially, is unavoidable.

Why would globalization necessarily be handled in a good way? We could get the military empire building back; Russia and China have started.

[gammagoblin]

>Are you aware of the democratic peace theory? Check wikipedia. In short, [stable] democracies don't have wars.

Yeah. I actually mentioned it in passing.

"In Europe, I think the leading cause for no repeated big wars is European cooperation and the lack of other political systems than the democratic one."

Other than that I don't think democratic peace theory really holds water when the involved nations are not committed to peace (like Europe is). Russia, a democratic nation (though exactly how non-corrupt it is can be discussed), is currently intervening in Ukraine and so is the USA.

>Not even USA starts wars with (or intervene in) stable democracies.

I'm not sure I really follow. They seem to have a great time intervening in non-NATO countries.

>In short -- don't mix up packs of thieves stealing countries with the countries themselves. Or with democratic governments

I've not said that either of these nations have a clean plate, nor have I said that they're a good influence. I've argued that I dislike all interventionism, and since the article /was/ about the USA, I criticised them.

India and China sure as hell have a cleaner plate than USA though.

>Why would globalization necessarily be handled in a good way? We could get the military empire building back; Russia and China have started.

I don't think it is being handled in a good way. That's the god damned point. No nation should have global military police forces.

[BugBrother]

First... my original point isn't really discussed:

Don't mix up criminal juntas -- which must have external enemies -- with the countries they steal. I don't really care about "rights" for the juntas.

>> Russia, a democratic nation (though exactly how non-corrupt it is can be discussed),

Well, you are unusual.

Few outside Putin's controlled media would describe Putin's Russia as a stable democracy. Most people would probably argue that Russia has never been close to democratic. :-(

>> I'm not sure I really follow. They seem to have a great time intervening in non-NATO countries.

That was a comment on when I wrote: "Not even USA starts wars with (or intervene in) stable democracies."

I wrote "stable democracies"... That is not the same as "non-NATO country".

Was it an honest mistake?

>> No nation should have global military police forces.

I agree with you in principle. But it is really naive.

Our moral comes from living in a country with a working police force (state violence monopoly, rule of law, etc). Before that, there were only clan societies. Then your only security was that clan members would revenge you. And they only did that, if you were willing to revenge them. Our present morals just didn't work.

The world's states today are like clans without a state police. There will in any given area be a bigger and meaner clan doing raiding.

Now, there will be peaceful clans which don't start stuff with other peaceful clans (democracies), but consider China and Russia -- they are bigger than their neighbours and behave like vikings.

You'd certainly see much more problems for the Philippines, India, ex-Soviet etc without USA and NATO...

Point is, we have been better off with USA. No, it isn't perfect.

Would a real world police even be desirable? What would happen if they did a coup? Who could fight against them? Think 1984, history as a foot that tramples a face. (The same as in the old communist states. Which was Orwell's point, of course)