Bill, pray tell, when have I EVER said the US needs to "fix" the governance of others?
I merely point out the broken part we should be concerned about. Governments and their populaces must make these repairs for themselves. But most government have no interest in making such repairs when they can simply play the "might makes right" card and suppress the illegal actors. As you say, governments have the right to do this. Such is sovereignty. But equally, when the people under such a sovereign system find it to be intolerable they too have both the right and the duty to rise up and challenge it.
You may think the principles contained in our Declaration of Independence to be uniquely American, or concepts that have become somehow quaint or irrelevant with time. America and all we think we stand for is sadly doomed when that becomes the case. If a man or a nation is not what they proclaim to be, then they are little or nothing of value at all.
And your example of Communism is "borderline irrational" as well.
Do you think the people Russia looked to Communism because they wanted to be communists or because they wanted to get rid of the Tsar?
Do you think the people of China looked to Communist because they wanted to be communists or because they wanted to be free of external Colonial powers and their puppet regime?
Do you think the people of Vietnam, Malaya, etc, etc turned to communism because they wanted to be communist or because they wanted to be free of Western Colonial powers and their puppet regimes??
Again, I cannot emphasize enough, revolution does not happen to bring something new, it happens because their is tremendous energy within a significant segment of the populace to remove something that exists and is deemed intolerable.
Do governments have the right to simply ignore the reasonable concerns of their evolving populaces and enforce the rule of law in a war-like way to sustain the status quo? Certainly. But the US and our interests are not well served by dedicating our reputation, our treasure and the blood of our young men and women to such efforts.
Does Dayuhan suggest effective ways to kill the current crop of complainants? Sure. No rocket science there. That may well reduce a particular threat in a particular place for a short period of time. Congratulations. Mark all your tactical metrics Green, give yourself a top block ORE and go home. But such tactical successes are growing the deep roots of strategic failure. Such "successes" validate the anti-American message of organizations such as AQ, and serve to extend the reign of governments no longer wanted by their own people in their current form. It allows such governments to treat their people with impunity and to rely for their sovereignty upon the protection of the US rather than upon the consent of those they govern.
That is not who we are Bill. And those who rationalize such poor behavior in the name of national security are, IMO, dangerously wrong. Wrong about who we are, wrong about how we best secure our interests, wrong about why such conflicts occur and how to resolve them, and wrong about what the long-term results of this reactionary abuse of the sovereignty of so many others in the name of preserving the sovereignty of ourself will bring.
We cannot fix others. We cannot resolve their insurgencies or repair their relationships with their own people. This they must do on their own. But we can work across the DIME spectrum in a neutral way in those few places that are actually critical to our interests to force governments to listen and to help keep violence (state or insurgent) within the bounds of clear red lines.
What you suggest is little different than practices of the last century to take out Union organizers, and to send pipe-swinging goons into a mass of striking workers. To me, that is irrational. And not in a borderline sort of way.
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