Great NYT story on the Syrian War

[eynon81]

[Indy]

[Gremlin]

Its clear the high water mark for the American Empire was a decade ago.

American exceptionalism is dead, and the days where the US can do as it pleases is over. The world knows that this nation is run by lunatics and tyrants thus leading to a continual movement to choose their own tyrants over the brutal over lords that control the US. Soon the US will only be a regional power and the bitter clingers at ground level will still be fighting the last battle for consciousness directing nonexistent forces in a Hitlarian fashion.

Time to get back to the earth, because the state is in its death throws.

[Professor]

Good. I can't wait until the rest of the world comes to realize that the US is not going to come to their aid, and stops expecting us to.

[eynon81]

[The Dharma Bum]

[exploited]

[Indy]

Well Iraq by most accounts was a complete loss and Afghanistan--I don't even know what you call that at this point.

Let's be real here--with the exception of Desert Storm, which was a cakewalk but also a conventional war against a completely overhyped "enemy," whenever we send U.S. troops into Middle Eastern countries it blows up in our faces (sometimes literally): Lebanon, Iraq, Afghanistan.

I guess you could add Somalia to that as well since it's in the neighborhood.

And here we are yet AGAIN considering military actions against a middle eastern country? Yeah, that's what I would call "insanity."

With each of these wars--Iraq being the most damaging--we just chip away at the previously held notion that we are militarily scary. Nobody's afraid of us anymore. This will probably further solidify that opinion.

[eynon81]

problem is Americans don't really consider Iraq a loss. and we can always claim that we may have lost Vietnam but we kicked a lot of ass. Afghanistan is ongoing.

no we're going to need a real defeat, militarily, before our foreign policy changes. Like the Syrians using a Russian ship missile to sink one of our war-ships or something.

[Professor]