Yeah I dont count the Soviet Unions vetoes against Russia. Why would you? And even if you did the vast majority of Soviet votes happend over 50 years ago. Anything past the mid 80s and the US has quite a bit more than Russia\crumbling Soviet Union.
If you don't count the Soviet Union then you are counting 65 years of US vetoes vs 22 years of Russian votes. That hardly seems like a good idea. If your statement is that in recent years the US has used its veto more often than other countries I agree with you, but we are simply not the all time veto leader.
This is a really minor point in the piece imo. A valid critcism but imo not worth fretting over.
I strongly disagree. The entire reason we are having this discussion is due to the mass murder of about 1500 people. This line more than any other shows just how willing Putin is to transparently lie to his audience.
I think his point is the UN would go the way of the LoN when it comes to having credibility to stop aggression. And I think he has a point. And you are proving it by pointing out all the times security member nations have disregarded the UN. And this point comes into play when certain nations are trying to acquire WMD. They dont have confidence the UN will stop aggressor nations(mainly the united states). So they are taking defense into their own hands.
Why would the UN suddenly go the way of the LoN with this intervention when it has not with so many previous ones? (some of which were undertaken by Russia) States have never deferred to the UN to establish their security, nor would they ever, regardless of the outcome here. That is simply not going to happen no matter what. Even if a state were 100% certain that UN Security Council resolutions would be followed no state would ever farm out their security to a separate voting body.
Ever.
You chopped off the point of bringing this up. International law requires authorization for the use of force by the UN unless in self defense. Unless we get the security council to authorize our use of force. We are in violation of international law.
I didn't chop off his point, of course we would be in violation of international law. That has literally zero to do with why Putin is protecting Syria however. Like... absolutely zero. Russia has made it abundantly clear over the years that they don't give a shit about international law.
I am curious who you believe is funding\supplying weapons to the rebels? In the videos I have seen they are using rather sophisticated equipment for a poor rebel army. A lot of western equipment with western optics.
And of course now we have this.
http://www.washingtonpost.com/world...cf2ed8-1b0c-11e3-a628-7e6dde8f889d_story.html
Wait, why did you think I was arguing that we weren't supplying them with weapons? We have publicly stated that we are. We and other western nations are supplying the rebels with arms but the conflict existed before weapon #1 came into the country. Remember when all the protests against Assad were peaceful and Syrian troops were just straight out shooting people in the streets?
Unless you mean that if we weren't supplying the rebels with arms they would all have been murdered by Assad already, that is not fueling the conflict.
i think his proliferation is the strongest part of his piece. Iran, NK, and Syria. Two of the three axis of evil are or have developed nuclear weapons in the last decade? Why would they go about doing such a thing now? We like to believe it is because they want to funnel it to a terrorist organization to detonate on our home soil. Makes for a nice Tom Clancy novel. But what are the chances we will invade NK now? Once Iran goes nuclear think we dare step foot in their borders? Iran watching Iraq and Afghanistan go boom and now Syria about to go boom. It makes complete logical sense for self preservation to develope a nuclear weapon.
Syria wasn't part of the 'axis of evil', but both Iran and North Korea have pursued nuclear weapons long before any US invasion of Iraq. To tie their development program to US actions in Iraq is simply inaccurate.
As for the spread of terrorism. What do you think people in the ME will think when seeing American bombs dropping on another ME capital unprovoked? Think they will run to join our side or the side of the nutjobs? How about after a drone kills their friends and family?
As for the rest of his piece. It is pretty spot on. Discusses civilian casualties from our bombs, the examples of our interventions killing so many and solving nothing(Iraq,Afghanistan), and our getting involved with civil wars that ends not so well for everybody involved.
As an anecdote. On the anniversary of Benghazi killing 4 US citizens, including a diplomat. A car bomb detonates in Benghazi.
http://www.nydailynews.com/news/world/explosion-damages-libya-foreign-ministry-article-1.1451904
Mission accomplished!
Yes, civilian casualties have the potential to spread terrorism.
