gato, they either don't know, or have conveniently forgotten that fact when they start chanting!

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Lucky is he (sic) who has been able to understand the causes of things
Virgil

of course the USA acted in its interest. i believe US hegemony is far more beneficial to many people than Soviet hegemony would have been. is any one interested in COMPARING U.S. action to Soviet foreign policy? wheres our Hungary rebellion in the fifties?? would that type of action been a better model for freedom?

Man, you couldn't have picked a worse example. That WAS our Hungarian revolution in the '50s. The US encouraged it, creating a belief among those Hungarians who rose up against the Soviets that we would provide material support for their struggle. But the US--and the rest of Western Europe--just sat on the sidelines while Soviet tanks crushed the revolt. Of course, that's not the way the situation was portrayed over here. But that's the truth from the Hungarian perspective.

The US did take in many refugees from that struggle, though. My father was one of them.

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There you are!

thats exactly what i was referring to. the manner in which the Soviets repelled that rebellion. where is a comparable instance of American brutality towards civilians during the cold war?

It's incredible, your abysmal ignorance of,not only the history of the US, but the history of our planet.

Cuba,
Guatemala,
Vietnam,
Nicaragua
Chile,
Laos,
Cambodia,
Phillipines,
that little Island whose name escapes me, but we all know that Clint Eastwood 'liberated' it from a few turtles and dolphins,
the first red scare in the US
the second red scare in the US
the religious right denying woman the right to their own bodies, denying stem-cell research, denying the right of people to love whom they choose,

Iraq (ongoing)



Bloody hell, I could go on but I have to leave shortly.

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Lucky is he (sic) who has been able to understand the causes of things
Virgil

I forgot the Kurds in the first gulf war. The Hungarians could have taught them a thing or two about US 'support'!

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Lucky is he (sic) who has been able to understand the causes of things
Virgil

Sorry, I just noticed that you live in Georgia. I should have made allowances..

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Lucky is he (sic) who has been able to understand the causes of things
Virgil

in which of those cases did the US murder thousands of civilians with its own forces in order to impose its own government upon them? you see, us georgians pay attention to detaills.

thousands of civilians were murdered in the red scare?

i was never aware US Military stepped foot in Cuba during the Cold War... interesting research, where did you find that??

Oh and people using thier freedoms to express their conviction that ripping fetuses out of women is not a good thing is the same thing as Soviet tanks murdering civilians..

and im ignorant. riiiiight.

Me too. It still doesn't make the USA innocent of the things it has been accused of. And don't bother to say that the USA did what it did because there was no other way, because neither you nor me know if that's true.

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Your right, neither of us know if that was true. Niether did the U.S. government when it made those decisions, however. They did not have the liberty of waiting around and seeing what would happen, and argue from hindsight as we are. The United States, contrary to popular belief, does not posess omnipotence and unlimited power. It must compromise. Any one can ignore context and demonize the United States. it takes no intellect or ability.

That's right, it just takes pointing out some facts .

And I'm not demonizing the USA or ignoring the context, just discussing US conduct during the Cold War.

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there is no use in discussing facts outside of their context. i know you arent doing that but others demonstrate an eagerness to do so.

I agree with the original post's point of view. Yes terrible things took place with US support (indirect as well as direct support). However, the hegemony of the US has been a stablizing force in the world which allowed international commerce to take off and which allowed more people to act somewhat freely.

"Democracy is the worst form of government - except for all the other forms." Churchill ?

The US may not be perfect, but it is a positive force in the world.

When you train and arm those who do murder tens of thousands, you're as guilty as those who did the murdering, and we're not just talking about murder, either, but the most gruesome acts of terrorism imaginable.

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Who does vote for these dishonest shitheads? Who among us can be happy and proud of having all this innocent blood on our hands? Who are these swine? These flag-sucking half-wits who get fleeced and fooled by stupid little rich kids like George Bush?

--Hunter S. Thompson

Yes, some responsibility belongs to the trainer and supplier of groups (nations, armies, rebels), but often the atrocites that are commited by those groups are contrary to the wishes of the supplier.

Are the police as a whole responsible for the illegal acts of crooked cops? Don't the actual actors bear responsibility?

When groups are trained and equipped and they do a good job, should the supplier get all the credit?