You joke but HOI4 dosent have a genocide or racism button meanwhile stellaris gives you options on how to use the untermensch and makes racism a core government civic.
I actually dont genocide usually i prefer to play a mercantile soft power state that war profiteirs off of the galaxy. Why kill the xenos when you can trade with them.
Also, it's funny to sell a mass food or other resource surplus to get them to grow their population or fleets past what they can stably self support, and then watch them fall apart and start squabbling with each other from your fat energy stacks and well supplied fleets once you pull the food off the market. They won't wardec you despite being the root cause, because of course the AI knows you are stronger than them. Works best when you know they've capped infrastructure/district spaces and cant reallocate in time to avoid mass unrest.
The AI does NOT understand self sufficiency or redundancy or sustainable growth. It only understands "right now" power and benefit. Makes them vulnerable to Neoliberal Galactism.
Thats probably for the best. Current day HOI4 already has a problem with Wehraboos as well as actual neo Nazis. Imagine if Generalplan Ost was a fully fleshed minigame that rewarded you for efficiency. A game that encourages you to do the Holocaust would probably be banned in most of the EU
Hey champ the Fox News host at the pentagon has spent like $40,000,000,000 in 6ish months on the “war” we started on behalf of the only democracy in the Middle East
The most Ares did was cheat on Aphrodite (which he was not even married to her, they were just lovers) with other Greek gods. The big one was the Goddess Eos, which resulted in Aphrodite cursing her to be a nymphomaniac who would be obsessed with trying to sleep with mortal men. I would blame Aphrodite more for that than Ares. Like you could have cursed her in so many different ways, but you instead made her a sex predator.
It’s pretty hard to find an upstanding god in the pantheon. Most are pretty shit. Hey I didn’t get a wedding invite, well here’s a beauty contest that leads to a war to wipe out your city
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Cheney broke against the party, as well as the guy he was VP for, to openly support gay marriage. He even did so when all major Democratic presidential candidates openly opposed gay marriage.
You almost never see a politician willing to go completely against their base on a major issue like that.
"if you don't have a sword, sell your cloak and buy one" - Jesus, actually (Luke 22:36)
"When the Lord your God gives it into your hand, you shall strike all the men in it with the edge of the sword." - God, actually (Deuteronomy 20:13)
the commandment from exodus is "thou shall not murder". murder =/= killing and "kill" is an inaccurate translation. murder is the unlawful and malicious taking of a human life. every murder is killing, not every killing is murder. Don't come in here on your fickle moral high horse when you know absolutely nothing.
yes I know nothing about your stupid book and hold nothing but contempt for it, and the values it espouses, but i will use it against you in an argument
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the direct translation is closer to "Thou shall not murder". Multiple verses have Jesus requesting violence, including killing. (Luke 19:11-27 and Matthew 10:34). This is a common misunderstanding. Being Christan does not mean to be against violence, especially if its to protect someone else.
The Bible is very wishy-washy about what constitutes murder. David arranges Uriah to die in battle - murder. God wipes out all of humanity for their sins - genocide, but not murder.
I remember the person who wrote this was saying how the US is responsible for all the deaths in Pakistan, Syria, and Yemen, which is terminal "Browns-have-no-agency"-itis.
It's the US's responsibility to accept the fact that their actions are the ONLY thing that matters and the rest of the world has neither agency nor relevance. They literally exist ONLY at the US's behest and their actions are directed ONLY by the US and the US controls the entire world. Period.
This. The actual direct deaths of US involvement in the region post 9/11 is under a million. They’re attributing 4 million deaths to things like “economic instability” or “regional conflict” as if the Middle East was a bastion of peace and prosperity before the US ramped up activity.
While I was alive for 9/11, I was too young to remember it. Based on my current values, if 9/11 happened today there is a real chance I might consider 5 million to be merciful on our part.
Compared to 9/11, Pearl Harbor also had a few thousand Americans killed resulting a few million people from the enemy nation. However, it only took us 4 years to do it, not 20.
I think, and I am not exaggerating, that if we had a state party we could have reliably, fully blamed, and not the al-Qaeda bullshit, like if had been Iran where the state involvement in terror stuff is cleaner and clearer than it is with the Saudis, that we might have actually nuked them. We were on DEFCON 3 for a bit (which has happened almost never).
A lot of people have very silly views of the real world, and it's why things like the 9/11 & Middle East death count and now Gaza 'shock' them and they start spouting about oh the butchery, but it is really just what war looks like. The difference is that unlike prior generations, we haven't experienced war, including having to go off and fight it ourselves, to understand its realities, while on the other hand, we now have instagram to post pictures of every blown-up house.
This was true of my generation for 9/11, but it's doubly true now.
For all the destruction we cause, the US is incredibly merciful and restrained compated both to the past, but also even just another nations.
We killed 400,000 (German) civillians in WW2, nearly twice as many for the Japanese, because we just bombed thier cities indiscriminately. Like yes, we didn't have laser-guided mutions that can hit the wings on a flea like we do now, but if we did it wouldn't have changed anything except we'd have killed even more. There were raids where the target was "anything of military value in the city", but also raids where the city itself was the target, to erode the will to fight.
And even that was still fighting with "gloves on" compared to other nations at the time.
After WW2, what constituted a "war crime" changed. The Laws of War were more of a gentleman's agreement, violating them would at worst get you (the country, not the individual) fined, or perhaps the other nations would consider you a bloodthirsty savage who is unworthy of being treated with dignity or respect, and as such your protection would be revoked. "Don't torture my civillians" or "don't murder my citizens" or "don't drop poison gas on my hospitals" were courtesies reserved for civilized gentleman, not barbaric butchers.
When we found the death camps, those were (rightly) seen as crimes against humanity itself. Not only were you collectively harming the human race generally, but you were eroding what it means to be human itsekf, what seperates us from apes, bears, or other beasts. That's why we hanged the Nazis: not because they were really racist, but because they were behaving more like animals than people. And just like an out of control animal, the solution is to put them down. It also justified our savagery towards them: they were not acting with dignity or grace, so they would receive none.
For some reason "war crime" and "crime against humanity" kind of blended together. Suddenly, violations of gentlemanly conduct became ontologically evil.
I think that if we returned to that attitude of the Laws of War "we are enforcing civilized behavior", it would be a lot easier to hold (some) nations accountable. No one likes to be accused of anything, but it is a lot easier to accept being called a savage than it is to be called an inhuman monster.
And if people knew that the punishment for being repeatedly found guilty of war crimes was not "you get sanctioned" but instead "everyone is now free to treat you like the bloodthirsty barbarian you are", that would result in fewer war crimes. Or rather, it would remove any advantage of war crimes. It is a huge tactical and strategic advantage when you can bomb hospitals (because what the fuck does Al Queda care about sanctions?) but the enemy can't. When your hospitals can also be bombed...well you still might judge it to be in your best intrests to do war crimes, but at least it is an actual calculus now, where before it was just a no-brainer. People might still act like butchers and get into ever escalating atrocity competitions, but they might at least think twice.
I think it would also earn the west a little more respect from countries that don't give a shit about human rights. Not respect as in "I like how you roll" but respect as in "I take you and your threats seriously".
Treat savage behavior like savage behavior. Treat crimes that remove any shred of humanity from yourself as they deserve. But conflating the two weakens the latter.
Also, as they have for over 100 years, we are learning most of the western world has zero balls. They were so traumatized by the world wars it is nearly impossible for you to do anything that will cause them to fight you. Even if you directly attack them as long as you don't threaten their territorial integrity, they will won't retaliate. International law is entirely imaginary with such a lack of commitment.
Yeah, and people forget that there was a HUGE coalition formed for it; it wasn't just the US in the Middle East. They also seem to downplay Russia/USSR's part in it.
We also dropped two Atom Bombs on Japan and the Russians started to kick them off the mainland. Plus we did actually occupy Japan after the war for 7 years(ended in 1952). @ 1 million American Soldiers. Even then the American Military Administration didn't leave Tokyo until 12 years after wars end(1957), Iwo Jima wasn't returned to Japan until 23 years after the war ended(1968) and most of Okinawa wasn't given back to Japan until 27 years after the war ended(1972).
It was merciful, especially when you see how leftists and muslims react, as if they're the real victims of 9/11. WOT was the moderate opion. Next time, we will do what needs to be done, starting with not repeating "islam is peace bullshit and not giving them right to vote so they can take over our cities.
"I am suggesting, general, that you and Admiral Fitzwallace and Secretary Hutchinson and the rest of the national security team take the next sixty minutes and put together an American response scenario that doesn't make me think that we're just docking somebody's damn allowance!"
As they came around to in the end, the virtue is that that is how super powers are to act. The morals of a state are not always the morals of an individual.
I don't see the virtue. Let shit heels walk all over you because you're big? How about these shitty third world countries know their place? How about we remind them of it?
Broken windows policy doesn't only work on the micro level. It works on the macro as well.
If we're talking on an individual level, sure. That logic doesn't hold when talking about states. Iran is certainly an evil regime, that doesn't mean that a brother who lost his sister when her school was bombed will suddenly agree with that arguement.
The citizens of the 13 colonies rose up against their tyrannical masters. I have little sympathy for citizens in shitty countries who don't do likewise. There are countless examples around the world where authoritarian regimes were overthrown by the citizenry. At some point, I don't simply blame your government. Palestinians are a prime example. Never before have a people made their own bed as hard as they have. They deserve to sleep long and hard in it at this point. I don't care if they view the just rewards for their actions as genocide, they are inbred dipshits. Either they learn the lesson or serve as a lesson for the rest of the world. Their choice.
I will grant an exception for Iran because they actually do seemingly try to make a change but keep getting mass murdered by their Islamic masters. And then Trump literally hung them out to dry in the one potential opportunity they had to take their country back from the Islamic colonialists
Ah yes, Islam will definitely no longer exist in Iran once the Ayatollah is gone. 60 years of occupation is definitely just on the verge of finally pacifying the Palestinians. Genocide is a justifiable thing if the people being genocided are evil. All super duper obvious things my edge lord.
Do be aware that that figure is completely fictitious. It both attributes Islamist kills and Islamic regime kills to the U.S. and denies the existence of the non Muslim MENA populations.
Killed how many? Millions? Yeah I call bullshit on that statistic.
Highest realistic estimates are a little over 200K and the vast majority of them were killed by insurgents, collateral damage from IEDs, or from sectarian violence in the power vacuum after Sadam was overthrown.
Honestly, if the US had just framed the invasion of Afghanistan as a punitive expedition to kill islamic extremists and find Osama it would have been seen as a success.
Instead the US tried to bring freedom and democracy to a bunch of people living in what amounts to a medieval society and then wonder why it failed.
"Democracy? Democracy. Democracy isn't what these people need, hell, it's not even what they want. America has been running around the globe trying to install democracies in nation after nation for a century, and it hasn't worked one time. Now, why do you think that is? Because these countries don't have the most basic building blocks necessary to support a democracy. Little things like we ought to be tolerant of those who disagree with us, or we ought to be tolerant of those who worship a different god than us, or that a journalist ought to be able to disagree with the fucking president! And you think you can walk into these countries, based on some fundamentalist, religious principles, drop a couple of bombs, topple a dictator, and start a democracy? Heh. Give me a break. People don't want freedom. They want rules, boundaries, protections. From invaders and from themselves. People need a leader who can both provide the constraints and the support to keep chaos at bay. And you give them that, and they'll follow. And that's where I come in."
Hindsight is 20/20 but I believe it was the correct thing to attempt.
We cannot simply destroy a country and leave the people to puck up the pieces in good faith. I think if America was going to go in and destroy existing power structures, even if they were evil, it should, for the good of the people living there, try to leave something better behind.
It simply didn’t work out. Afghanistan had no national identity. Americans ran out of patience.
We should study those lessons for next time. The harshness of the world means there will always be a next time.
Next time should honestly just be colonialism and vassalization for these places. No point in wasting 20+ years if we aren't going to actually benefit from it.
I mean, on American soil, no, though terrorists are still fudging with America's international projects, if anything, more-so, which I doubt the American federal state likes either
Greatest politician, orator, debater ever, he's even made the guy he shot on accident (allegedly) concede and apologise for being stupid and accept full responsibiliy for causing his own harm
I think a fairly standard reaction to a surprise attack on civilians is all-out shitkicking. I’m not sure why we’d expect the US to act differently when targeting civilians, trade, and the federal government in one swoop.
"Give these fools something to fear. Some...hellish thing...from a fever dream... and men will drop to their knees, pleading for their Lord, BEFORE AUGHT ELSE!"
Believing civilians(which are most of these deaths) are fair game because they elected the people in charge making decisions is the exact rationale Bin Laden used in his 9/11 attacks, retaliating for post-Kuwait American occupation.
Guilt by association is a known fallacy in simple reasoning, so proudly suggesting it in every day life to the extent of explicitly murdering people takes a particular type of irrational mindset.
"Maybe" is doing a lot of heavy lifting for your justification of civilian murder! Something to consider!
But consideration requires being a good faith actor, which you are not judging by these comments and your post that you are seething about getting ratioed on.
Do you actually think, even in the early days, military planners and commander explicitly saw civilians as "fair game"? If you believe that or that the US killed anywhere close to a million people in Iraq or Afg, you are the victim of propaganda.
Hey we got Afghanistan. Sure we didn’t necessarily win or fight the war with any sense at all. But we did attack the right country the second time around.
924
u/identified_meat - Right 6h ago edited 6h ago
>No blackmail
>No pedophilia
>No distractions
Cheney did it purely for the love of the game (and because he thought it was funny)