Okay, I am just getting angry at this point. It’s no longer even modestly amusing.
About The Author
BooMan
Martin Longman a contributing editor at the Washington Monthly. He is also the founder of Booman Tribune and Progress Pond. He has a degree in philosophy from Western Michigan University.
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First question: Just HOW is this different from what he’s said before? It is a precept in business deals that you have to be willing to give up on a deal that goes sour. This is what Trump knows, this is what Trump practices, this is who Trump is. Nothing to see here, move along.
Second question: After the NATO dustup, just how long did anyone expect him to go without something similar to this happening? He is not concerned with votes. He is not concerned with expanding his sphere of political influence. Expect more of this. Probably about the defense of South America or the Panama Canal. I would expect something along the lines of “if we don’t get any $$$ from the Canal, why should we worry about it? I don’t worry about buildings I don’t own”
Third question: Honestly, when was any of this amusing? Trump has no sense of humor. He uses no humor in any of his pronouncements. His followers have no humor. It is a trademark of the Right Wing. Even their comedians are humorless: Andrew Dice Clay, Denis Miller … look back on some of their old stuff? Not funny.
Something tells me he just got an intelligence briefing and discovered that we have treaties with Japan.
‘Whaaa? You mean I can’t bill them?”
.
Rather inelegantly he’s saying that this isn’t 1945. We aren’t concerned about future Japanese military aggression nor the COMINTERN, so why are we the world’s policeman and why are we providing a free military to a country that is our trade enemy?
I’ve heard the first question from many progressives and the second is a very good question that should have been asked in 1970 before the US electronics industry cratered.
Why are you so angry? Do you have a ton of SONY stock? Don’t you want to hear a debate about policy and the future of the country? Or do you just want to chant USA! USA! SHE’S WITH US! Should the Presidential campaign be just about glass ceilings and other irrelevant slogans?
Indeed, if the man had any credibility, it would be a tricky thing for neocons to defend. Guns or butter is always in tension.
But HC is very lucky in her opponent.
I think there’s a much larger point implicit in what Booman wrote: namely, whether the US is a reliable treaty partner. That’s separate from whether the US ought to have a treaty with Japan that obligates us to defend Japan.
Lest we forget, Japan’s constitution, which forbids deployments abroad for offensive purposes, was imposed on Japan by the US. There was that small matter of Japan invading and annexing Taiwan and Korea, setting up a puppet state in NE China, conquering SE Asia….
Trump isn’t any kind of reliable.
But our military is garrisoned in over a hundred countries around the world. That’s not defense.
I understand the point about the US’ imperial reach. It is also true that we imposed on Japan at gunpoint the present order. We are Japan’s line of defense against, say, North Korea, whether you like it or not.
But the question is “should we be”? I think that’s a legitimate question, irrespective of the answer. Those arrangements are based on a world view set in stone when I was born. And I’m old enough to have great-grandchilden! (OK, boys, where are they? And don’t forget Toni is as good a name as Tony)
For some of the frog pond denizens, this was set up before their grandparents were born. Just like the Middle East mess was set up around that time,too (and even earlier, a century ago). It’s time for a second look, at least.
Trump is the last person who should be trusted to take “…a second look…” at the world order, an order which is superior to the much more immoral and chaotic order which existed before 1945.
The disqualifying factor is not whatever critical analysis of the moment he can spout, but the unseriousness of his engagement in politics and governance.
Do you really think that if Japan were attacked by North Korea we would just sit around and cheer? Also, there is something to be said about being an ally and knowing Japan has no offensive capability. It can’t be used against them.
I also tend to think the ME mess was greatly expanded in 2003 when Bush/Cheney decided to measure their dicks there. And then they just vanished and declared mission accomplished and left it all to Obama to deal with the disruption of tens of millions of lives. Like it or not we are the lead power in the world. Unlike our Trump friend, we really do create our own reality. Careful.
China is the lead power in the world.
If North Korea were that foolish, there would be several nations in the region on the case even without the US. South Korea would likely be one of them.
I find the scenario of a single attack on Japan and no other military action by North Korea farfetched. I also find the notion that North Korea would haul off and do something stupid equally farfetched.
Clarification of intentions is one of the functions of normal diplomatic relations, which we have never had with the North Korean regime. The US has used the diplomatic tool of non-recognition over much too long a term with respect to Cuba, Iran, North Korea, and Palestine. We have taken the first steps to rectify that will Cuba, But preserving the state of non-recognition with the other three is a major goal of hardliners in both parties. After 37 years, 66 years, and 49 years (or is it 68 years), the policy becomes stale and of little use.
Er, no. We are not particularly reliable treaty partners. Even in the modern age.
The United States has violated the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, the International Convention on Civil and Political Rights, the Geneva Conventions, the Convention Against Torture and even our own principles dating back to 1863. (The United States originated the first code for treatment of detainees well before the Geneva Convention.)
In 1994 the United States senate ratified the U.N. Convention on Elimination of all forms of racial discrimination promising to provide reports every two years on racial discrimination in the United States.
And that is without going into all the Native American treaties we violated.
Sheesh.
Situations change and treaties are renegotiated. We have pressured Japan to build its military. http://sputniknews.com/asia/20150616/1023444448.html
Germany likewise had constitutional restrictions on service outside the country. Only allowed as part of NATO or international force. Believe it has been or is being loosened.
Good points all. This is a useful exchange. No finger pointing.
Indeed, the 1950s era treaty may need to be revisited. But that doesn’t happen by Trump’s methods.
Ask Native Americans if the US is a reliable treaty partner.
Hell, even Petraeus said the US violated the Geneva Conventions, a treaty to which the US is a signatory and it was ratified by the Senate.
I have been a Sony fanboy for almost 20 years.
Was just an example. Prefer Panasonic and Samsung myself. YMMV
While I agree that the US has probably erred on the side of forward deployment in the recent past the system of international alliances established after the Second World War, along with nuclear deterrence, has led to a golden age of peace and prosperity unknown since the Treaty of Paris. Beware. It is hard to overestimate the uncertainty and social impact of the threat of war in the early 20th century and the corrosive influence it inevitably has on domestic politics among all powers great and small. Nothing we are experiencing is a fraction of the angst and anxiety our parents and grandparents endured in the fractured years before the Great and Second World Wars.
Especially now, with the likes of Putin and Erdogan attempting to re-establish autocratic regimes at the cornerstones of geopolitical power and leverage historical aspirations into territorial expansion we should probably not be so willing to relinquish the intangible benefits of proven alliances; certainly not for mere cash. I’m not suggesting there aren’t grounds for criticism or restructuring in many cases; it seems clear that extending NATO membership to the Baltic States was a bridge too far and financing Erdogan’s emerging market at the expense of reigning in his excesses was a bad bargain, just for example.
But we dismantle Pax Americana at our peril. Those who fought and died in the hope that their sacrifice would grant security and prosperity to those ‘at home’ would probably stir uncomfortably in their graves. Next time you pin on a poppy think about their legacy, not just their acts of courage and selflessness.
The Pax Americana was dismantled by Bush’s folly in Iraq and Afghanistan. The limits of US power were exposed in the two-front war we were funding the national security establishment to be able to fight.
The illusion was that with the Soviet Union gone, the US could become a sole superpower hegemony and economic empire. That illusion was articulated by the Project for the New American Century, promptly implemented through a carefully contrived political seizure of power that bypassed democratic checks and balances, and within three years failed miserably to the point that the orginal promoters negotiated a withdrawal from Iraq.
By the time of the Syrian civil war, US Middle East policy was in such shambles that Russia intervened to assist preventing US escalation in Syria through convincing Assad to eliminate his chemical weapons stockpiles. And then with the rise of Daesh (which included sufficient numbers of Chechnyan and Dagestani rebels to concern Russia) Russia intervened again to secure its base at Tartus and prop up the Assad regime.
Instead of working out some new bipolar or multipolar global system of power diplomatically, the US responded by ramping up a new Cold War with Russia and a pivot to Asia focusing on Chinese aggression that was not immediately apparent when China was still booming after the West’s financial meltdown.
The situation and US power has fundamentally changed since the end of the Cold War. The US must understand very soon that there are other powers in the world with which it can deal diplomatically instead of aggressively and that continuing to weaken the US economy through the current fiscal policies and business priorities also weakens US military power and perceived power in the world.
Plus, after Bush, no one perceives the US as having benevolent motives any more. No one now will cut our policy slack because we meant well.
Trump wants to restore the PNAC agenda. That train’s long gone.
Do me a favor and…
…pour me a big tall glass of that.
Trump’s potential audience knows that their taxes are around the same magnitude as their housing costs.
That potential audience knows that we have troops in Japan and that the military budget is about half of the budget
They reason that if we are paying for Japan’s defense and the Japanese are paying much less, Japan’s business have a leg up in competing with US businesses. One way to level the playing field is for Japan to pay for the services that the US is delivering as the “world’s sole superpower”.
Most likely the next step is to trot out some domestic metaphor about neighbors and security service firms. The idea that US jobs suffer because foreign nations are not paying their fair share for defense and foreign firms are essentially unfairly subsidized is a notion that has been around since the Japanese auto industry ate the US auto industry for lunch in the 1970s, 1980s, and 1990s. For a contrasting take, see Michael Moore’s Roger and Me.
It is a common notion. Why not let our imperial tributaries pay for their own protection has a long history as a means of imperial finance. US citizens should recognize this proposal well; the British paliament made the same edict after the French and Indian War. Why don’t the colonies pay for their own defense, said Parliament, The American response is why Trump’s argument seems off kilter. But once again, the unseriousness of context and intent is the real issue with Trump and his campaign.
Well, at least he didn’t use the usual slur or celebrate the WWII internment of Japanese. There’s that.
By unseriousness, I mean that he has no clue how it all fits together, is incurious to find out, and continues to speak off the cuff from that deliberately limited understanding.
That’s why I didn’t mention the auto industry above. They self-destructed.
I get you point about the French & Indian War, but instead of trying to get them to pay for it, why not just cut them off? “Pay for your own damn Aircraft Carriers to protect you from China and North Korea”.
That would necessitate Japan becoming a nuclear power, but with North Korea and Pakistan being nuclear powers the goal of non-proliferation is effectively dead anyway.
Would you please just take this…
…and hit me in the head with it?
I’d welcome a serious discussion about making our clients pay for the privilege, but this isn’t even close to that. The colonies for instance should have paid but they were too hot to massacre the indians and take their land.
The bigger difference is that the Japanese are not settler colonial extensions of the US worldview but hostages after nominal “unconditional surrender”. With changed relative status, they might not take kindly to Trump’s bullying. After all there is the Shanghai Cooperation Organization in which they could negotiate a special relationship with China after acknowledging their former status as occupiers.
Maybe the government would do it quietly, but I have my doubts considering things like the controversies over government (as opposed to non government) stances toward unit 731 and the other units. Which I am aware, we assisted in dropping down the memory hole for our own advantage.
So to, Chinese jet just buzzed the senkaku islands so there seem to be a number of thorny issues to work out. Yeah, Trumps bullying would be bad but a quiet discussion somewhat like we’ve been having is warranted.
I owned a number of those Trashmobiles built by Detroit – until I discovered a little car company called Toyota.
I don’t know what we should do about being Japan or anyone else’s military guardian. But let’s be careful what we change.
For many years I drove a car made in Maryville, Ohio — by Honda.
There are two separate issues that get conflated. (1) The competence of US manufacturing corporation executives and (2) the costs of American empire that fall on, uh, Americans instead of our allies and competitors.
I don’t know what it is with our car companies, at least in the past. I was involved with them as a supplier for a number of years. Even if you told them – repeatedly – their design did not work they did nothing.
If you are going to have an empire to hold the peace, it gets expensive. No doubt about it. But the alternative may not be too great either. We surely don’t want a return to the two world war eras where so many were armed to the teeth and somebody wanted it all. No savings in that.
Generic management and financial management domination of engineering and production. Unrealistic financial goals to make Wall Street happy. Lack of serious commitment to customers and overemphasis on commitment to analysts.
Pretty much the illnesses of any business with financial trading and stakes in New York or London.
I would add…failure to listen to analysis from experienced WORKERS and other feedback.
Compare and contrast with German car manufacturing.
Does Trump’s potential audience also reason that Japan’s businesses have a leg up on competing US firms because their government provides healthcare while US businesses bear this cost here?
I think you are giving them too much credit.
You’re thinking logically here. That is a mistake. Trump’s audience is looking for places that “others” are taking advantage of them. Medicaid would fit that but not the Japanese healthcare system.
The folks on Okinawa are ready for us to go home.
Tired of being American troops’ “R&R playground” are they?
The rapes might have something to do with it??
I’m not angry. I’m having the time of my life watching Trump self destruct and take the Republican party with him. What’s not to love about this? Just keep opening your maw, Donald, and allow the idiotic stream of consciousness to flow through. You go Donald. Go, go, go!
You can’t be serious.
It get the sentiment, but it overlooks the invasion of the rats fleeing that rusty bucket for the safe haven of the Democratic Party. That makes for a neoliberalcon solid majority in the Democratic Party.
I agree, Marie. And even though those aren’t the bedfellows any of us prefer, if we can achieve majorities in the House and Senate, the benefit to progressive causes will be far larger than what might be gained by having a smaller, purer party in control of just the presidency and the senate.
The Democratic party is already a centrist party, filled with centrists and conservatives. I can’t imagine that you disagree with this.
The Republican party is a regressive, reactionary party.
Before liberals and progressives are able to start dragging this country further leftward, the Republican party, filled with regressive reactionaries, needs to become a hollow shell of itself that implodes and never comes back. Or, perhaps better yet, becoming a very small party of white nationalists that acts as a third party to split off support of the new conservative Democratic party that will be, just by default.
Sane, reasonable conservatives need to be able to find a home in the Democratic party, so that the liberals and progressives in the Democratic party can create their own party, with a sane, reasonable, conservative Democratic party as opponents, rather than a regressive reactionary party currently operating as the Republican party.
Until this happens, the Republican party will continue to provide enough electoral might to prevent liberals and progressives from enacting legislation that this country requires to effectively operate. If the Republican party can continue owning and operating a majority of states and Congressional seats, then liberals and progressives inside the Democratic party will continue being anchored to a centrist party, as there isn’t a strategic choice to make other than staying put.
The bigger the Democratic victory, the better, as sane conservatives from the Republican party will need to join the sane conservative party, d.b.a. the Democratic party. Which frees liberals and progressives to either take over the Green Party (a shell of a political party) or create something from scratch.
While I highly doubt this occurs in 2016, it could happen by 2020, which would be decent timing, in re: gerrymandering. Anything that hastens the destruction of the Republican party is an ultimate good.
The Republican party is beyond salvage. It needs to be put down. Once that occurs, the right wing of the Democratic party can default to what it already wants – to be the Conservative big-money Establishment.
The left can go back to doing what it does best, dragging everyone to the left against their will when necessary, and will be free to form or assimilate their own liberal and progressive political party.
The more sane conservatives find themselves stranded from a political party, the more they’ll likely attempt to carpetbag the Democratic party. And they might as well, because the Democratic party has lost all usefulness as the party that cares for the economic well-being of the people…as the most ardent anti-Hillary, anti-neoliberalcon people will say over and over and over again.
First the Republican party needs to die. Then liberals and progressives will have the opportunity to run their own political party. And not a moment before.
I’ve always viewed “sane conservative” as an oxymoron. Except for the super wealthy among them because that’s their best deal to hold onto and increase their wealth. But even spokespersons from that faction sound nutty and paranoid when they appear in public.
Your “sane conservatives” regardless of whether they identify as a Democrat or Republican promote war and income/wealth inequality. Sane people support peace and a fair deal.
Then you don’t know sane conservatives.
Again, this seems to be implying that if Republicans join the Democratic party, the party will for some odd reason just adopt GOP positions. Makes no sense to me. It’s the new arrivals who get to conform, not the 99.9 percent already there.
Yes, this doesn’t really make sense to me either unless one argues that this is a permanent realignment of sorts.
That would be something similar to the GOP becoming a far right party with the infusion of Dixiecrats and other former conservative Democrats post-CRA.
I don’t think anything like that is happening today.
The Democratic party is the near enemy for a few on the left. So, it’s far more important to them that moderates might be fleeing to the Democrats instead of the fact that the modern GOP is becoming an obsolete rump.
Go back to vacation! It’ll do you good
you got that right.
The linked article says, “the alliance with Japan is crucial for America’s Asia-Pacific strategy and security.”
Trump is a damn fool but I can certainly understand why folks might like to hear this message of disengagement from all these commitments. This so called strategy is utterly useless and irrelevant to the vast majority of Americans. They are geopolitical games played by the elites. The people don’t want our bases in Okinawa and we ought to leave.
This ought to be the policy goal of liberal democrats. We can’t afford, so we’re told, to do anything for Americans and yet there is plenty of money available for wars and security guarantees. It’s time to move on. That should be the message of democrats, not an idiot like trump.
Would abrogating our treaty with Japan, an act that would lead to Japan building up a large military and going nuclear, be a better guarantor of peace than the status quo? Got to ask that.
See you reply to you below. Why is the status quo good?
Why assume a nuclear and armed Japan?
Have you seen the recent population drop statistics? Furthermore, the population is top heavy with the youngest members making up a smaller and smaller percentage of the population. The burden of military service falls mainly on the population from 18-26 (normally). I see evidence that Japan physically cannot have a large military expeditionary service.
Moreover, the resources it takes to dramatically increase the military presence (including nuclear) is incredibly expensive. I’m by no means sure the current Japanese society will allow the resource to be diverted. At the least, it would lead to incredible disruptions in social services.
I’m not adverse to having the discussion of the cost of defending Japan. Personally, I think every treaty ought to be reviewed every 20 years. Things change. Treaties need to change also. But the middle of a presidential election with a deranged would be dictator is not the place to have it.
Back to your question about how can Trump make a ton of money off his campaign, Time
http://time.com/money/4349354/donald-trump-hurt-hotel-bookings/“>Hotel Bookings at Donald Trump’s Hotels Are Way Down
What’s Trump’s ownership share in these properties? That’s a big guessing game but may not be much. He trashes the places, the value of the investment drops precipitously, and the investors want to get out quickly. Trump has played this game a few times to his advantage, but not known if he was merely lucky or he was the producer.
Trump billed his own campaign to use various Trump properties for campaign events. As you say, his actual ownership share in the properties is unknown, but it appears that the Trump Organization has made money from the campaign.
If Trump were elected, I am sure that he would continue to use the Trump-branded properties for speeches, press conferences, photo-ops with Putin, etc. etc., while leaving the business of governing to others, and would try to bill the Federal government for use of same. Wonder if anyone has told him that would be conflict of interest?
If Trump were accessing federal financing for his primary and general election campaigns, the FEC might take a close look at this. If a donor to his campaign filed a complaint about this with the FEC, it would be dismissed unless that complaint demonstrated that the costs for those venues wildly exceeded customary and usual costs or were excessive compared to the usual and customary rental charges to others.
As it is, any profits Trump properties could be generating from his campaign are peanuts compared to the amounts he has donated and loaned to his campaign. Doesn’t appear that any vendors and contractors have extended credit to his campaign (his reputation precedes him).
There are protocols that have to be followed by presidents. Trump couldn’t fire the GSA and budget offices and do whatever else he pleased. IOW, no big, gold painted Trump sign would be slapped onto the White House. (There would be plenty of opportunities for photo-ops with Putin; just as there was for GWB and Obama. This has to be one of the dumber sounding fears/objections to Trump that those on the left are pitching.)
I don’t fear photo-ops with Putin, but I do object to the taxpayers’ paying Trump to host the photo-op at the Jupiter Golf Club, complete with Trump Steaks and Trump Ice.
Strawman. Hasn’t happened. Won’t/can’t happen (even if by some unimaginable miracle he were to become president).
Whatever protocol was in place for the many foreign dignitaries that GWB hosted at his Crawford bolthold will be followed. Rightwingers can’t seem to get it through their thick skulls that Obama’s government paid for travel follows the same protocol as that for GWB and prior presidents. Thus, they get all bent out of shape every time the cost of a particular trip reported.
Trump’s sleazy “university” also didn’t get any taxpayer funds. OTOH, plenty of taxpayer funds went to the one that employed WJC in some capacity and paid him $16 million over a few years.
Trump isn’t about reexamining treaties. He’s about turning everything into an extortion racket.
Will we really go to nuclear war if Japan is attacked? Ask yourself that.
Doesn’t do any good to ask ourselves that because first one would have to identify all the variables that would have to be in play. I’m sure it’s all been “gamed” out by the Pentagon.
Then who is going to perform freedom of navigation operations in the South China Sea, for example? Are you willing to bet your prosperity on Vietnam, the Philippines or Malaysia standing up to China’s obvious bullying?
The free market will take care of that. The corporations will spend their tax free profits on their navy to perform freedom of navigation operations. There is no need for government when the free market will provide.
Now that is good snark.
Why do we need to secure freedom of navigation in the south china sea? Don’t you think the Chinese want to ship their goods to america?
But it is not Chinese freedom of navigation which is being guaranteed in this case as would seem obvious.
Is there some benefit to the status quo worth preserving? If the Japanese feel threatened they should feel free to defend themselves? What’s wrong with that?
We don’t want nuclear proliferation or other military confrontations. North Korea has been running launch tests with missiles which could carry a nuclear warhead, which they now have the capability of assembling. And China is also well-armed with nukes.
It is difficult to imagine a worse time to walk away from our agreements with South Korea and Japan. Helping protect these and other allies in the region is a good investment.
Encouraging Japan to gear up militarily has been a bad bet in the past.
A bad bet in the past? I hope you aren’t suggesting that US support is keeping them from waging expansionist wars as they did 75 years ago. Germany, Italy, and Japan are not going to relive their fascist pasts.
The point is that a huge change in the treaty has to be worked out carefully. “They should free to defend themselves” is a glib remark that ignores the fact that the status quo is more than 60 years old. It also implicitly validates Trump’s remark about, say, not defending NATO’s Baltic state members from Russian attack. Do you want to tell the Baltic states also that they are free to defend themselves? “They should feel free to defend themselves” strikes me as a sort of Libertarian stance that on the surface is a statement about self reliance, but is really an attack on the whole idea of collective action.
Glib indeed. What happens when everyone has lots of guns? Will we really have less and not more conflict?
Not when the rivals are still the old ones.
This Map Of US And Russian Arms Sales Says It All
https://www.google.com/webhp?sourceid=chrome-instant&ion=1&espv=2&ie=UTF-8#q=US+supplies
+one+half+of+the+world+s+weapons
When is the Yakuza going to take out Trump?
We outsource/offshore everything else, why not this one?
If someone’s going to challenge international orthodoxy and the rôle of the U.S., fine, I want it to be Noam Chomsky (or, like, John le Carré)…not Donald fucking Trump.
○ Worse!
It makes me angry, too. The zero-sum thinking that the only equation involved is how much we pay for Japan’s defense vs. how much Japan pays is absurd. And the notion that Japan is a “trade enemy” from whom we should withhold our military support, is really dangerous thinking, in my opinion. U.S.-Japan relationships — in defense, trade and a host of other arenas — are complex, inter-related and large scale. The ignorance of assuming that the United States’ only interest in its relationship with Japan is reducing the amount of money it spends is, to me, so short-sighted it makes my head spin (to use a Trumpism).
The U.S.’s defense agreeement with Japan was not set for all time in 1945, but has been revised over the years, notably in 1997 and most recently in April 2015, with agreement on new Guidelines for U.S.-Japan Defense Cooperation. In December, 2015, Japan agreed to a new five-year package of host-nation support for US armed forces stationed in Japan. Under this agreement, Japan will spend about $ 1.6 billion annually toward the cost of U.S. bases. Recent legislation in Japan also strengthened Japan’s “collective defense” capability, although it was opposed by many legal scholars and popular protests on the ground that it was unconstitutional. Did Trump take a position on this legislation? I don’t recall reading.
The purpose of the U.S. military presence in Japan is not primarily to deter Japanese aggression, but to protect the mutual interests of the U.S. and Japan in maintaining the balance of power in East Asia (think: North Korea, South China Sea, etc.). The U.S. uses the bases for surveillance missions in N. Korea and China, among other purposes.
Aside from the importance of the U.S. military bases in Japan to the strategic interests of the United States, the cost of mintaining those bases must be understood within the larger context of U.S.-Japan cooperation in a number of different arenas. For example, Japan may spend less on defense, in large part because of constitutional prohibitions, but more than its share of non-military foreign aid. Economic aid to Third World countries may help stabilize societies in which economic conditions contribute to terrorism, but is unpopular in the U.S. Japan has supported the various sanctions advocated by the U.S., even when it is not in its interest to do so (as in the case of sanctions against Russia for annexing Crimea). Japan has provided support to U.S. military activities in other parts of the world to the extent its constitutional limitations allow it to do so. Japan and the U.S. are cooperating in areas such as cybersecurity, counterterrorism and climate change that are extremely important to U.S. interests and U.S. citizens.
I couldn’t begin to summarize all the aspects of the complex relationship between the U.S. and Japan, which together produce about 30% of the world’s GDP. Of course there are conflicts and differences in the relationship, conflicts that are best resolved by skilled negotiation. Not by short-sighted laying down the gauntlet and threatening “Pay up or else.”
The notion that our defense obligations are set in concrete and can never be questioned is odd. How involved should we be in NATO? Should we continue to be the main defender of Japan, 71 years after the end of WWII?
While his language is coarse and inartful, his questions are good. Let’s discuss the notion of stopping the defense of Japan. Let’s end our bases in many other countries. What are we doing in them, anyway?
What in the ever loving fuck?
I want to stab my eyeballs out.
I want to disembowel myself with a samurai sword.
I’m half inclined to do an auto-da-fé myself.
The use by community members of Sputnik News and Russia Today reporting to factually supplement their suppositions and Trump apologias has become a Thing.
The conclusion of the POTUS nomination process has unmoored some people, to a degree and frequency that genuinely surprises me.
True Caucasian Leftism cannot fail, it can only be failed.
Is that what’s going on? Is that the source of the assertions by community members that Russia didn’t really invade Ukraine or annex Crimea?
The derp is powerful these days. The same posters over and over, no matter the subject.
.
Ukraine and Crimea were part of the Soviet Union. When Ukraine seceded from the Soviet Union, it took a while but there was an agreement between Ukraine and the Russian Federation about the disposal of the military assets of the former Soviet Union. That agreement gave Russia a lease of Sebastapol and rights of use. It allowed parts of Russion previously annexed to Ukraine during the Soviet era to remain part of Ukraine. It specified universal human rights for all citizens of Ukraine regardless of ethnic background. Almost immediately ethnic-based political parties began to whip up various ethnic nationalist political positions and anti-Russian parties began advocating closer relations with the European Union, then in the midst of striking prosperity.
What remained is the determination of Moscow not to lose its warmwater port on the Black Sea for its Black Sea and Mediterranean fleets. Apparently among the PNAC crowd, that was the perfect reason to threaten it.
Because, for over a decade, the US has been meddling in Ukraine domestic politics and providing support to some “democratic” groups over others. And Russia has also been supporting ethnic Russian groups, particularly in eastern Ukraine and Crimea in whatever inter-ethnic conflicts have arisen. These are facts that were widely covered by the media.
The role of Geoffrey Pyatt and Victoria Nuland in the timing and selection of leadership after the Euromaidan protests has been well-documented by invetigative reporters after the fact. The involvement of the Banderists parties and Right Sector, two Urkraine nationalist parties bordering on neo-Nazi policies also has been the subject of investigative an analytical reporting.
The result is that the story of Russian aggression has been debunked time and time again in mainstream European sources if not in the Wall Street media.
Trying to discredit what these mainstream sources have found with stereotyping them as readers of Sputnik (a source tied to the Russian government) and Russia Today (RT, another source tied to the Russian government) misses how the Russian government now manages its news sources and propaganda. Russia’s management of media now is very much like that of other countries (US, UK especially). There is much straight reporting especially of stories not implicating Russian interests and investigative reporting of stories that other countries are trying to hide. Things get strongly manipulated only when there are major embarrassments or pretty straightforward agendas.
The agenda of the US is encirclement and containment of Russian and Chinese power. Halford Mackinder’s arguments still work their magic. Russia and China have the agenda, now since US policy has once again driven them together, of forcing the US into a bipolar (at least) and preferably a multipolar global system in which they have potential swing powers (Europe would be one, or India, Pakistan, or ASEAN nations, or even Japan) that can strategically counterbalance US military force or begin to roll back US forward deployment.
The question for observers and US citizens (other nations’ citizens as well) is how to deal with those competing agendas so that a stable global order emerges that allows and supports peace, prosperity, human rights, and freedom. And it also must unpack what those abstract values mean.
Knee-jerk saluting of US propaganda or believing Russian and Chinese propaganda does not answer that question.
In fact, it is the military institutions in all countries that benefit from additional expenditures for conflict, even that less than full scale war. And the corporations that supply them. I don’t hear any political discussion of this issue.
Nor do I see the observation that wars degrade and destroy the infrastructure necessary for global economic recovery gain much traction.
Or the fact that the wars of the past half century have left massive deposits of unexploded ordnance that must be made safe if normal life is to return to those areas.
The lure of authoritarian book burning is just too strong for some.
I’m interested in a discussion about how, for example, NATO might better move forward. But this is happening now in response to Trump’s protection racket vision of how we should engage in international treaties and agreements, and the discussions here suffer from that association.
I’ve read the claims you and others make here, and their supporting journalism: in these readings, the U.S. is the belligerent actor in Ukraine and elsewhere, and the Russians are the victims. I’m just not in full agreement with many of the claims and their associated evidences.
For example, the inconvenient fact that Russian military incursions and weapons provisions have facilitated and made real the goals of the separatists in Eastern Ukraine, many of whom have their own moral problems, makes the claim that “Russia has not annexed parts of Ukraine” less than dispositive.
I’m also a lot less confident than you about the freedom of the news media in Russia. As imperfect as freedom of the press is in most of the Western world, it is far superior to Russia’s and China’s.
I agree that we secretly meddled in Russia’s sphere of influence, and will continue to support more effective lobbying of my Congress and President to reduce or eliminate these sorts of counterproductive meddlings in the future. That doesn’t mean I go along with the more extreme arguments here against America and our alliances, and I consider the rhetorical methods of many current discussions to be dangerously destabilizing.
Every world order in recent centuries was inferior to the current world order. Many people don’t reflect an understanding of that truth.
About Russian military incursions. Russia has a huge base in Sebastopol that is somewhat equivalent to some of the US major domestic naval and marine bases because it was until the breakup of the Soviet Union a domestically located base. Russia used to have a base in Odessa as well; that has been turned over to Ukraine under agreements during the late 1990s and early 2000s.
As long as Russia has free access to its Sebastapol base, which at some points in the post-Soviet era has been a shared base with Ukraine. So the assumption of motives for Russian agression are not necessarily correct. Russia knows what it means to administer Ukraine and what dealing with Chernobyl would mean. I don’t see strong motives for occupying the part of Ukraine that is hostile to Russian governing and foreign policy.
I’m less confident of the freedom of the news media in the United States. The difference is where the pressures to mislead are coming from. (At least with regard to Sputnik and RT). My sense from reading them is that Russia is less doctrinaire in its foreign policy outside of NATO and the US and some of the areas of its relationship with China. China’s press is far more restrictive than Russia’s it seems from the way evidence is presented.
Aside from Crimea, a good part of which is the Sebastapol base itself, not much of Eastern Ukraine has been annexed. What has happened is that Russian pressure prevented the ethnic cleansing of Russian Orthodox Ukrainians in the eastern regions of Ukraine. (Here using Ukrainian as a nationality of citizenship instead of ethnically).
The main issue is not victim vs. perpetrator but what pushes Russian responses over the edge into war. I argue that threatening Sebastapol is equivalent to Russia threatening the Norfolk VA Naval Base.
World orders from the background of international political and economic (and then cultural) relationships. Better and worst seems to be either a moral judgement or an aesthetic judgement. I’m not sure that we have made the moral progress we pretend as much as we have made progress in not assuming that certain conditions are inevitable.
Our current world order is very expensive for the amount of stability it provides, is too much dependent on the stability of domestic politics of one nation, is marked by schemes by the economic classes that benefit from the order to avoid paying for the privileges that they enjoy. It has promoted continuous war ever since World War II and all attempts to extend infrastructure and peace have ended in corruption on a major scale. In the 1960s, most African countries were places of peace and hope except for those with major mines. Those nations were sending substantial numbers of youth to study engineering, economics, business, and other subjects in the US. How is it that in almost every country those hopes were undermined in tandem with the interest of the US and Soviet Union in their resources for the Cold War. Just plain out cynicism.
“the rhetorical methods of many current discussions to be dangerously destabilizing” … an out-of-the-way political blog? with lots of ordinary folks participating? destabilizing? dangerously?
Tell me how we have that power and what the dangers you see are.
Back to your sense of the current world order. I might have agreed in 2000 and possibly in 2008. This is not the same world order and the more I learn who is making the decisions in the top-level management tier on national security policy, the less comfortable I am that we can avoid a US-led catastrophe no matter who wins the election.
I am still shaking my head of the US policy in Syria of trying to dump Daesh and Assad at the same time because one cannot negotiate with enemies (Russia and Iran). If not ended soon, it will prolong Daesh’s presence and allow yet another al Quaeda foothold. My enemy’s enemy is not necessarily my friend, nor is my enemy’s friend necessarily my enemy. Yes, the Saudis and Erdogan; an the Republicans in Congress; and of course, Israel; those have dictated this awkward crabwalk.
IMHO, what that weakness is symptomatic of is foreign lobbyists in DC with their hands deep into the pockets of strategic members of Congress. Ready to drop some cash or ready to do a very painful maneuver.
Kerry looks ridiculous primarily because he has to navigate those bought members of Congress at the same time that the Republican caucus is undercutting everything that he is doing.
Now tell me about how what the 99% write on blogs is dangerous.
I generally agree with much of this but I think the Russian claim to wanting to prevent cleansing of ethnic Russians is something similar to the right to protect doctrine used liberally by the West. It sounds like a pretext to justify securing one’s interests.
Your comments are interesting. One point about the former CCCP and the current states is that the relationships are complex. With some (Ukraine, Georgia, Byelorus), there are historical ties that go back many centuries. With others (Latvia, Lithuania), the ties are similar to a hostage situation. So, making a simple overall conclusion about all former republics is probably a bad idea.
I know a number of Russians, and the Russians are often quite concerned about the loss of Crimea. The history is complicated, but apparently the Crimea was transfered, during the CCCP time, from Russia proper to Ukraine about 50 years ago. So, now Russia wants part of it back.
We have the Monroe doctrine, and we are not happy when others stick their big oar into our local waters. I myself am a little respectful of Russia, and consider that the situation there in Ukraine to be more Russia’s business than ours.
My nephew just finished his masters in Industrial Management at University of St Petersburg (in Russian, amazingly enough; he does translation on the side some). I will ask him for his impression.
I’m not interested in a lengthy back and forth on this. We appear to have too many unpersuadable places of disagreement.
It’s a matter of fact that the percentage of people being killed in violent acts meant to influence political outcomes, from civil wars or nation state conflicts to asymmetric warfare, has reduced over the years that the current world order has existed.
There has also been net increases in civil rights during this era. One of the conflicts in our views here is your declaration that pre-’60’s Africa was preferable, while I remain preoccupied with the fact that Africans in the pre-’60’s were still largely under colonial rule.
It is entirely possible to agree with many of the points and views you bring here and hold to the view that the current world order is superior to those that preceded it. It is also possible to recognize the superiority of the current world order while seeking ways to continually improve that order.
The dangers of the discussions here is that the person who is threatening the current world order wants to overthrow it in favor of his own mercurial needs. Trump does not want to remake the world in ways you claim to want. His vision would be a repudiation of yours.
It would be ridiculous to pretend that the discussions of our actions and alliances are taking place in a vacuum. They’re taking place because Trump says he want to turn the fucking chessboard over. Intensely disliking positions on the chessboard fails to meet the moment we are in.
The world order, and how it will continue to change, is complicated. Trump’s threat to all that we hold dear is not complicated at all. It’s existential. And if we don’t agree on that, we don’t agree on anything of great importance at the moment.
Not pre-1960s. Immediate post-independence state.
My discussion is taking place because (1) Clinton’s position is considered preferable to Trump’s (It is indeed) and (2) Clinton’s views represent a change to Obama’s and Clinton’s policies under Obama are highly troubling.
It is possible as a citizen to criticize government policy and at some point expect the democratically elected officials to eventually acknowledge the criticisms instead of doubling down.
So your anxiety is that my arguments might lead someone to vote for Trump. That is quite a stretch for someone like Trump who is very much in the sole superpower camp.
Your arguments are more responsible than others’. Nationwide, mostly beyond the readership of this blog, there are a disappointingly large number of liberals who are refusing to see Trump as the existential threat he is, and are attempting to justify his appeal instead.
In response to their doing so, I feel disappointment at the lack of commitment these misguided people have for the liberal project, and am angered by the utter lack of solidarity they hold for non-whites and women.
As evidence of this last point, note that, literally no Frog Pond commenters who have shared that they are African-Americans are actively trying to shave points off Hillary’s vote count by throwing around rhetorical kerosene here. In fact, we’ve seen less participation from them here recently. Gee, I wonder why.
I see the discussions here as both personal to us at the Pond and representative of millions of discussions taking place around our great nation.
Not disputing that, just not a phenomenon I’m aware of.
Just a comment on the press coverage there and here wrt US-Russia relations, from a non-expert in FP who speaks no Russian but who does watch RT regularly.
Imo, there is a far wider open discussion of the current frictions, the Syria and Ukraine situations, on RT than what we are spoon fed in the mainstream US media. In fact, this latest Cold Warriorish round (since early 2014, Ukraine coup) of what I consider anti-Russian/Putin propaganda is virtually uniform throughout the MSM — as if all mainstream electronic and print outlets, even many mainstream lefty online outlets (Kos, TPM to name two) are reading from the same script. Kinda scary to consider actually, in the alleged land of the free and home of the Braves.
In terms of domestic Russia media, not speaking the language I rely on the informed views of Stephen Cohen, one of the great experts in modern Russia who used to live there and who speaks the language. According to him, ordinary Russians are exposed to a far greater spectrum of opinion on their evening news/geopolitics talk shows than we are over here.
Meanwhile, Cohen contrasts how he was a regular commentator on CBS during the detente debates of the 70s/80s versus today where he’s lucky to get invited for a 4-minute quick discussion on CNN (I can’t recall him ever in recent times being invited to give his considered views on the so-called liberal outlet, MSNBC). He has said repeatedly (on the one mainstream outlet — on radio, hosted by the Repub conservative but open-minded and smart John Batchelor) that in his 40 years of publicly discussing the US-Russia situation, he’s never seen such a shut-down of contrary opinion as is occurring currently.
What has been most eye-opening in the past half-decade is not how different outlets in the West and East report something differently, but how often US media overlooks major international stories and have to backfill in the days and weeks afterward.
Fascinating.
Well I see more “covering” a story– in Ukraine, Syria, Russia — by deliberately omitting key facts, such as the chronology and context of certain events, done cleverly to make Putin/Russia look like the aggressor.
Pure propaganda tactics by our media. And in most important omissions, no, they don’t bother to go back later and correct/backfill. The point is to get the reader/viewer worked up against the evil Putin and aggressor Russia. Correcting the record later wouldn’t be helpful in that cause.
Dataguy, the questions may be good, but why assume that they have never been asked until now? In fact, those questions have been asked repeatedly over the years. Our relationship with Japan has certainly been adjusted.
See, this is Trump’s method. He asks dramatic questions like this as though they have a basis in fact, even though they don’t. He does so in tones that suggest he expects that he and his audience have a common basis of knowledge. His method is rhetorically effect in a speech at a rally, but would never survive close questioning in say, a Presidential debate.
Trump’s “America First” position and his isolationism are ultimately contradictory. Trump complains that China is “killing us” but wants to undermine our strategic defense relationship with Japan, which serves as the principal counterweight to China in East Asia. What does he think would be the result if his positions were adopted? (That would be a good question in the debates.)
For those who think that the balance of power is a game of the elites, sort of like chess, and has no relevance to the average American, I urge you to review your history lessons, especially the events that led to WWI and WWII.
We need to be internationally involved. Do we need to be involved at the level we are at currently? Hillary says yes, and has never questioned our international involvement, except to want MORE involvement – more boots on the ground, more policeman of the world.
Trump is an idiot, but is right to question and rethink our current status quo. The reflexive “Hillary good – Trump bad – Trump ideas are stupid” ethos of this blog is getting a little tiresome, honestly. Getting mad is not the same as careful reasoning, and throwing crap at the wall is satisfying but not a long-term strategy.
Our level of international involvement (not diplomatic) is just one piece of a larger narrative Trump is selling that might appeal to quite a few libertarians and left-leaning voters.
The danger to Democrats, as long as they remain wedded to the consensus, is that someone will come along with a similar message but without the baggage.
Trump ideas are stupid because its Trump saying them. He hasn’t put any thought into any of it. I would say these ideas are generally fringe and need to be mainstreamed before there’s any progress. Let’s see where we are post-Trump.
The Russian press views Clinton as the war candidate and there are articles over there about preparing for nuclear war. I’m not too sure how deep any Russian support is for Trump but they certainly know who they think will crank up the war machine against them.
Maybe one thing that would help is more Americans reading international press.
Almost missed this bit of Mugabe statecraft (h/t billmon1):
I wonder who’s been tugging on Mugabe’s chain?
LOL Uncle Bob is in a world of hurt right now.
Good catch! Wonder if Manafort served as a go-between.
Mugabe can’t catch a break:
Hard to get good help these days.
Raises the question of whether North Korea is on Manafort’s client list.
This is relevant:
Got your back, This American Life
I’ll second your recommendation for the “Absolutely Stabulous” segment. In particular the comments by Dennis Ross. His “never, ever …” rule for diplomats has probably not been heeded by some.
On a related note – the latest from Charles P Pierce. He’s been slumbering for months; so, not sure why he woke up yesterday.
Heard Dennis Ross on weekend NPR news the other day, offering the “diplomatic” solution in Syria of bombing pro-Assad forces in order to force regime change. Like that’s worked so well for us in the past 13 years.
Yeah, I heard that Ross interview. He did not convince me that his plan would plausibly accomplish our goals while avoiding unacceptable risk of blowback.
The difference between old Cheddar Headed Trump and President Barak Hussein Obama comes down to this for me: When Obama visited all of us here in Hiroshima in early June, it was awe inspiring. From our townhouse on a ridge over-looking Hiroshima Bay we joined our neighbors in watching Marine helicopters and Osprey’s usher in the President. Our neighbors are mostly retirees, and we seldom see them as they prefer a quiet secluded retirement behind curtained windows and paper shoji screens. Obama’s visit changed all that. For the first time ever, I saw Japanese people standing out on seldom used balconies, and hanging out of windows to watch that fleet of helicopters come in. I hadn’t seen that sense of down home, letting it all hang out humanity since my days growing up on the Northside of Chicago. You can’t imagine the profundity of that man’s visit. Have I forgotten to mention that several of our neighbors are Atomic Bomb survivors, and still, they craned their necks to witness one of the most powerful historic moments I’ll ever witness in my lifetime? It was the first time a sitting U.S. President has visited Peace Memorial Park in Hiroshima. Later in the evening at an Italian open air cafe’ less than a mile from the detonation of the Atomic Bomb, I sat at table with a whole host of Hiroshima business professionals drinking wine and savoring President Obama’s visit. The incandescent lit cafe was abuzz with Hiroshima people reflecting on the extraordinary event. Booman, everyone, we are privileged to have been alive and witnesses to the fruition of John F. Kennedy’s camelot. If you think that’s hyperbole, all I can say is Ambassador Carolyne Kennedy was beside our President for the duration of his visit. It was a somber, beautiful passing of the torch, the eternal flame from Arlington where JFK rests along with Bobby Kennedy to Hiroshima’s own eternal flame in Peace Memorial Park. To end on a sour note, Donald Trump, you are nothing.
Some good commentary here on the topic. What Trump is promoting here is an American empire.
What he’s proposing is to leverage our role as “protectors” to demand tribute. That is imperial and its a long ways away from what some people here seem to find appealing about this.
Trump wants us to act like mobsters visiting businesses and demanding protection money.