Is the US a warlike country?

[Patroklos]

I think this belief is deeply ingrained in the American psyche. Many Americans here get defensive when someone mentions a 'absurdly' high amount of Iraqi casualties.

That is because the casualty count is NOT absurdly high when you think about ths scale and character of what we are doing over there.

Of course I like the framing of that statement, anyone who doesn't agree with you is defensive

And as far as the supply line thing, that is the biggest exaggeration I have ever heard. The reason things like that look that way to you is because every single casualty, especially at that point, was rebroadcasted over and over again untill everyone thought there was some wholesale slaughter instead of three supply trucks who got attacked because they got LOST, not becuase the lines of comm were not secure.

I don't think Europe is any different from America, they just realize that in the current age they do not have a strong enough military to make war a viable option anymore.

If you did though....

[Pax]

Spiffor,
Thanks for an impartial assessment.
I can agree with the majority of the points you made on both sides of the argument except I wholeheartedly disagree with #4.
I also think that there are more than 2 reasons we are not warlike.
My personal opinion is that we are no more warlike than any other country would be if they were in our position. Probably less so. I would think that we are historically less warlike than the Roman Empire, The British and the French, The Isrealis/Isrealites, The Spanish, Chinese, Russians, and the list goes on. Let's face it. Other than a few countries like Switzerland and Costa Rica, most countries are warlike.

[Az]

I don't think that the US is a warlike country, especially for the "decisive solution" and related arguments. Americans do seek decisive solutions, but that doesn't mean that they're warlike, and perhaps it's an argument to the contrary. True warlike societies are built much better to withstand grueling long-term wars, sometimes them being a way of life, and a pillar of an average person's existance in that society. America isn't such a society, for better or for worse.

[Sava]

Originally posted by Smiley
I'm still waiting for the game America: Total War

[Odin]

Oh, and about the question,, NO the the US is not a warlike country. Gulf War 2 was from Bushist propaganda and Vietnam was anti-soviet paranoia. The interventionalist attitude in the US today is from, I think, 3 things, a backlash against the isolationist attitide prevailing before WW2, the US's superpower status, and the Cold War.

I'm still waiting for the game America: Total War

THAT would be a fun game.

[Kuciwalker]

Originally posted by DanS
I think France is much more warlike than most other European countries.

[Elok]

I've read editorials noting that if you consider the number of troops involved, the time frame, and the vast increases in medical technology since Vietnam, the current casualty rate in Iraq is actually proportionately worse than Vietnam. We just don't have as many troops there, haven't been there as long, and are much better at treating wounds so that they don't become deaths. Maybe that was already mentioned, but I don't feel like sifting through all these pages of vitriol.

And the question's still a troll, and the term "warlike" too vague, like in Kuci's parody thread.

[Elok]

Originally posted by Sandman
There was no Second American Civil War, no American-British war in the 19th Century, no return of Nazism.

Aside from the considerable turmoil of reconstruction and the polarizing fight over segregation and civil rights, you might want to look in a history book under the year 1812. It's just fascinating.

Honestly...

[Spiffor]

Originally posted by DanS
I think most Americans follow the centuries-old notion that war is an acceptable extension of national geopolitics, if the proper case is made. Of course, making this case follows a particularly American track, where the correctness of the action is weighed in the public discourse as well as the benefits and costs. The correctness of the action is what is thought to sustain the morale of our soldiers in the field and the easy pursestrings of the congress.

Always remember that the US is one of the very few countries in the world that is not based on ethnicity but rather ideology. Ideology is what unites the U.S. Any potential action has to have strong backing from the underlying ideology in order to be sustained and effective.

[...]

Regarding clean wars, with great power comes great responsibility. Our military has the doctrine of bringing overwhelming force to bear to achieve its objectives. If you don't have something balancing the application of that overwhelming force, you start turning countries like Iraq into class factories. Our national "code" is such that we have spent hundreds of billions of dollars to narrowcast that overwhelming force, when possible.

Thanks for your post, DanS

I am interested in what you consider to be the American ideology. More precisely, I'm interested in knowing whether you think the American ideology is significantly outwardly (i.e. if an important part of the American ideology is to do good to the world) or not.

As for the clean wars, I think there is a great difference between the American and European understanding of it. To most Europeans I got to discuss the issue (and to myself), war is hell no matter what. For many Americans, war can be more-or-less helln and the military should strive to make it the least hellish as possible. This leads to a wholesale refusal of war by many Euros ("no matter how hard you try, you still slaughter thousands of people"), while it makes war more acceptable to Americans.

In a related idea, I have witnessed here a strong difference between Europeans and Americans wrt colateral damage. It's only a bit of a charicature to say that the Europeans consider every civilian casualty as being as terrible (no matter whether the Civilian was caught in an explosion killing a military target, or in a terrorist explosion targetting civilians), while Americans are prone to excuse the killing of innocents if it was motivated by the termination of an actual enemy, while they consider the deliberate targetting of civilians to be the epitome of evil.
I have noticed the same pattern with Israelis, btw.

[Drake Tungsten]

I'm more interested in why Europeans cling to such a simplistic and naive view of war than I am in whether they think Americans are warlike. Is the more interesting issue, IMO...

[Spiffor]

Originally posted by Oerdin
Let's make one of these lame polls for every country in the world.

If I was in a forum chock-full of Russians, I would have probably thought about creating such a thread about Russia indeed (however, unlike the US, I think the answer for Russia is a one big "yes, duh")

I think the Americans is the only numerous enough population in the OT, that there is enough variety for us foreigners to have a real peek in your collective culture. If you're interested in the French collective psyche, the samples of French posters here (myself, and sometimes Davout and LDiCesare) is desperately small. Same for Germans, same for Russians etc.

Only the American sample is numerous and varied enough for us foreigners to explore what can look like collective ideas rather than individual ones. Most of my conceptions (that I shared in the OPs) are what I gathered from reading 'Poly for years. I know the OT is not a perfect sample, far from it, and I know there are things that have escaped me, and others that I have misinterpreted.

However, should you know what precisely I didn't get, or what precisely I misinterpreted, I'll be really happy to read it.

[Spiffor]

Originally posted by DanS
I didn't think this discussion was about right and wrong, Ted. Rather, it was a discussion about what Americans perceive and do and why they perceive and do it.

DanS nails it

[Spiffor]

Originally posted by OzzyKP
I voted no instinctively. And I think Spiffor was a bit weak on presenting the arguments for why the US isn't a warlike country.

True, and I'd like to see more. There are probably more arguments, even though I didn't think of them.
Azazel presented an interesting point: warlike societies are suited to experience long and painful wars much more than the US appears to be.

After some thinking about adding some arguments, now I"m worried. Are we a warlike country?

I am glad that your reflections let you think over your preconceptions.

Many Americans here (including liberals, to my surprise) see this thread as a troll, which it is not. I didn't expect this question would be considered as trollish (which I read as "absurd, exaggerated, provocative, nothing more than a cheap shot"). If you're willing to reflect on the question instead of outright dismissing it, I'm gald about it

Perhaps the best argument against a warlike America would be a comparison between other cultures at other periods in history. Is America's view of military power and exercise of it considering its absolute dominance in the globe significantly different from other's? I'd argue it is absolutely. Compare the 1800's British to the late 1900's Americans. The Brits used their power to enrich themselves, America uses its power to protect others or ourselves. Even misguided wars (in my opinion) like Vietnam and Iraq were done primarily for altuistic or defensive reasons at great cost to ourselves.

Interesting
I have thought such a point could be easily rebutted: the 1800's British rulers did not have to worry of the public opinion, and thus didn't have to propagandize the belief that they were doing good for the world*.
But on further thought, I think that even if the British rulers had to care for their public opinion, the "We'll become rich" meme would have worked. The attempts to get the moral high ground would have been far less essential than in today's US.

It mirrors DanS' idea that the correctness of the war is assessed by the public opinion (I don't think many British subjects of the 1800's would have cared for the correctness of a war, except maybe philosphers).


*It is my firm belief that the US government has never engaged in major operations out of altruism. When push comes to shove, and when the US government has to put the lives of thousands citizens on the line, the rulers do it only when the US will benefit. This opinion is compatible with the fact that many American wars were defensive, or can be percieved as defensive.

[Imran Siddiqui]

I don't think of this as a troll. Spiffor you're too nice to troll people .

Though it is an interesting question.

[Spiffor]

Originally posted by Elok
but I don't feel like sifting through all these pages of vitriol.

I haven't noticed any vitriol in this thread, save for one comment by Dannubis.

Remember that most posters (ignore the poll's results) of this thread are Americans. And even the liberals are non-vitriolic.