American Imperialism: Crash Course US History

[czokletmuss]

Quite interesting video:

[rpayne88]

Being an American myself, I will admit that the majority of that video is true. America went through an imperial "stage" between the Civil War and WWI. But I also find that video biased. It appears as if it only focuses on the wars caused by imperialism. It barely touches on the massive economic gain our economy made, listing only a few resources we were able to tap. To be honest, I will admit this was a dark period in American history. The video only focuses on America as if America was the worst "empire," completely overlooking the suffering being caused by European powers in Africa.

I honestly feel this video may have an underlying political message, but maybe its just me. To be honest, I didn't expect to find something like this on the KSP forum. If you don't mind me asking, if you are in Poland, why did you find a single video and post it here that only talks about American imperialism. Why did you not find other videos that talked about European imperialism in order to prevent a biased, although mostly true, perspective on late 19th century history.

[czokletmuss]

I honestly feel this video may have an underlying political message, but maybe its just me. To be honest, I didn't expect to find something like this on the KSP forum. If you don't mind me asking, if you are in Poland, why did you find a single video and post it here that only talks about American imperialism. Why did you not find other videos that talked about European imperialism in order to prevent a biased, although mostly true, perspective on late 19th century history.

Well, this being an international forum I expected some people from USA to post their thoughts as you did because I find it interesting. As a European and a little of history geek, I know quite a lot about European imperalism and colonialism, so I find this video more interesting - I didn't know some things which were showed in it. And I don't think that Crash Course has any political agenda - have you seen their videos? They are about history (one series about world's history and one about USA history), they are made by te team from the USA and they are quite interesting. I watch them to learn some new facts, that's it.

Oh, and in this video there was a link to the imperalism in general:

It's interesting however that you feel the need to defend international policy of USA in this period when nobody is criticising it. Every country has it glorious and dark moments, so please don't feel offended or something - I was just curious

Edited September 6, 2013 by czokletmuss

[Michael Kim]

I would say this is a good video. Just learned some US history.

rpayne88, I don't think this video, or czokletmuss who posted the video here, wanted to suggest anything. You seem too sensitive

[Flymetothemun]

I agree with payne, it mostly looks at the wars and barely looks at the economic benefits to imperialism. It looks to be biased against imperialism, probably because nowadays taking over a country with military might and using their resources is a bit of an a-hole move. I certainly wouldn't like it if I were the leader of some country. I'm not really offended, because as you said every country has light and dark patches. All you can do is learn from them and try to do better in the future. To say that America has done no wrong (I'm American) and is the best country on earth is incredibly arrogant and ignorant.

[Michael Kim]

Oh we've got two Americans here. May I ask a question

How do you think of the wars US got involved in this century? (Afghanistan, Iraq, Libya [not directly involved, but behind NATO] and Syria [about to start]) How do you distinguish US from imperialism on starting these wars?

I know there are things like terrorism, democracy, liberty, humanism, chemical weapons, etc. The list can go on, but they are all excuses. After all what US did was putting people of other countries into misery for US's own national interest.

[Diche Bach]

I've had a lot of fun engaging in these sorts of discussions in various forums I've been active on over the years. However, it is my understanding that all political discussions are out of bounds for KSP, so I'm gonna sit this one out

[air805ronin]

I've had a lot of fun engaging in these sorts of discussions in various forums I've been active on over the years. However, it is my understanding that all political discussions are out of bounds for KSP, so I'm gonna sit this one out

I don't doubt this will wind up closed for that very reason.

I am American, I used to be in the military. I have served in some way supporting 3 of the following conflicts of the current century. Bear in mind what follows is my opinion.

I don't necessarily agree with all of our uses of force, but I don't think that everything we do is an act of an Empire trying to maintain its hold on influence, power, and our Empire.

Afghanistan - justified, but was probably a bad decision

Iraq - Unjustified, definately a bad decision

Drug interdiction in South America - multiple generational waste of money

Training/peacekeeping in Djibouti - Requested, good humanitarian mission

Libya - Our presence was requested and it wasn't a unilateral decision, we didn't play a combat role. Largely the rebels won their own war, the NATO presence was largely to keep the Laws of Armed Conflict in place.

Syria - We don't know enough to justify boots on the ground, the rebels are begging for our help. If it can be completely proven that chemical weapons were used it is a breach of the Laws of Armed Conflict

When I say something is justified, I mean there is a Causus Belli. Example, Afghanistan harboured and helped the group that attacked us. This justifies our initial action, but we should have thought twice before doing it.

Edited September 6, 2013 by air805ronin

[rpayne88]

I've said my two cents, let leave it a that and not send this thread spiraling in to "political" territory.

[lajoswinkler]

Yeah, Lybia turned out awesome, just like Syria will.

I'm not against meddling per se, but if you're going to involve yourself, do it right. Stuff in Lybia and Syria started as a call for help, and has already, in both countries, turned to a festival of war crimes. There's no trace of people who wanted freedom anymore. It's just criminals right now, and USA is about to help them and help Syria be pushed into the rule of gangs led by tyrants.

I'l never support monsters like Assad, and I'm quite sure those chemical attacks were not someone's lie, but if someone is going to help them, that help must be better than the "help" we've seen in the last 20 years. Almost every "project" turned out to be a failure. You can't just come there, bomb people at random and then abandon everything, leaving lucrative contracts behind. Saying that doesn't have anything to do with fossil fuels is naive.

USA politicians think they are going to succeed one more time, but they forget that you can't do it too often. You have to wait until people start to forget. Too much projects in short time and people start to connect the dots, especially in the era of web.

The worst problem I see is that USA is continuing to refuse the authority of UN. That's unbelieveably dangerous. Not only that, but so far we've seen that not only the UN is being ignored, but also the Congress. Gentlemen, that's not how legal systems work. The country is dancing on the thin wire above the abyss of modern dictatorship.

Afganistan was cooked up decades ago by criminals from CIA and the military. You know, the ones that help with the drug bussiness in South America. That's common knowledge. Now America is reaping what her protected criminals were sowing. The Congress should smash those "organizations" with an iron fist and send those "agents" to courts and then jails, and then limit the money assets that flow towards the military.

I'm afrad that would be very hard to do because criminals are too infiltrated in the political structures.

Edited September 6, 2013 by lajoswinkler

[Leonov]

Thread closure in reference to Forum Rule 2.2B