French military (catch all)

[Fuchs]

Given your often stated rationale for the use of force best being applied only to issues of national survival?

While those above named operations you would support would be of beneficial humanitarian impact their continuance poses no threat to Europe while the two you do not support can arguably have an adverse impact on Europe, probably not to an existential level but certainly to an increased terrorism and dissent level.

Priorities...

I believe I discussed Afghanistan in detail somewhere in this forum. I see no useful contribution to national security in contributing to that civil war.


Actually, I wrote a rule set for application of military power and alliances long ago and checked it against many historical cases - and was satisfied to have fixed my own compass for such affairs.
It had/has two sufficient justifications for warfare;
- a promising attempt to protect th own national security (possibly enlarged to collective defense of the sovereignty of all members of an alliance)
- (non-obligatory) intervention against genocide (not violent ethnic cleansing) for ethical reasons

That's just a personal rule set and nobody needs to agree with it - but I can guarantee that I am consistent in my stance towards the question "war or not war". It's just not a very obvious and simple rule set that could be understood by fragmentary observation of symptoms.

[Ken White]

I believe I discussed Afghanistan in detail somewhere in this forum. I see no useful contribution to national security in contributing to that civil war.

by any reasonable definition -- are a part of the effort to dissuade some Islamist fundamentalists from violence. If you believe Germany has no interest in deterring that for long term benefit, I'd suggest you may be in error. If, OTOH, you believe there's a better way to go about that dissuasion, that's a different matter but it appears that the folks in Berlin have opted for that approach -- even if many Germans disagree.

Actually, I wrote a rule set for application of military power and alliances long ago and checked it against many historical cases - and was satisfied to have fixed my own compass for such affairs.
It had/has two sufficient justifications for warfare;
- a promising attempt to protect th own national security (possibly enlarged to collective defense of the sovereignty of all members of an alliance)
- (non-obligatory) intervention against genocide (not violent ethnic cleansing) for ethical reasons

That's just a personal rule set and nobody needs to agree with it - but I can guarantee that I am consistent in my stance towards the question "war or not war". It's just not a very obvious and simple rule set that could be understood by fragmentary observation of symptoms.

All well and good. As long as you realize it is a personal rule set and allow others to disagree in good faith, no one should complain.

I'd simply suggest that anyone disagreeing with you is not necessarily stupid or immoral; they might just have arrived at different and perfectly acceptable conclusions from the same or similar facts.

You might consider that a change in circumstances you have not foreseen may cause you to add a reason or two -- and that economic, military or political reality may cause others to ignore your rules. You're entitled to your rules and others are just as entitled to theirs. All of us should be able to accept differing ideas without implying anyone who doesn't agree with our ideas is dangerously ignorant.