> The US did not retreat. We fought multiple wars to maintain our power and influence. We toppled multiple regimes to maintain puppet governments. Very much the same as the USSR and China have done.

As much as I am critical of the US, until now the US did behave very differently from other superpowers. Consider the end of WWII. The US did not inflict reparations on the vanquished nations but rather, invested huge sums in their rebuilding, in the process making stalwart allies of them. These were not puppet governments, they became thriving democracies.

This is not to excuse the many bad things the US has done in Latin America, Vietnam, etc. But there is really no comparison between US behaviour and that of the USSR (or of colonial European countries, for that matter). People in Soviet-controlled East Germany were quite keen to go to the west and did not perceive the presence of US military bases there as evidence of American totalitarianism.

That, of course, has changed and now America is seen as a predatory hegemon. But that has not always been true.

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tharkun__ 3 hours ago | parent | next [-]

The US did not keep bases in all of West Germany though.

There were different sectors. The US had essentially the South. There were also the British sector and French. The Soviets were the fourth sector but we all know how that one was quite different from the other three.

While the French and British have mostly left, the US stayed. Though to be fair even the British still do have some bases it seems as NATO troups. But no more large garrison in many larger cities.

The US on the other hand is still there with much larger force. Like think back to "Air Force One" (the movie with Harrison Ford) which used Ramstein Airbase in the movie (though they didn't actually film there) and that airbase has come up in the Iran conflict as a conflict of its own. Meaning Germany didn't want the US to use it as a hub for US operations (supply logistics) for the Iran war.

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adriand 2 hours ago | parent [-]

> The US on the other hand is still there with much larger force.

To provide for European security! That’s the deal in terms of Europe and NATO and also specifically to handle Germany. The idea was that America would provide security to Europe including the nuclear umbrella, and one benefit - among many others - was that Germany would not need to have a powerful military.

Can you perhaps guess why people might be concerned about a heavily armed Germany in the postwar period? Those same concerns are bubbling up in European capitals right now, as Germany rearms due to the loss of the US as a reliable partner.

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tharkun__ an hour ago | parent [-]

Which is now out the window.

And yes I definitely remember Colbert quite some time ago quipping about exactly that (paraphrased from memory): US no longer reliable NATO partner and nuclear deterrent. So Europe needs to step up. Let's have Germany have nukes. What could possibly go wrong!

The obviously funny thing being, that the US has, for a long time and Trump doubled down, asked Europe including Germany to spend more on military. And the "moderate forces" in Germany are not an issue in that regard. Those are the ones not wanting Trump to use Ramstein airbase in a war he started.

But would you want the AfD to come to power and wield those ramped up, potentially now nuclear, forces? The party that was ruled as "definitely extremist right wing aka neo nazi" in some federal states by Germany's own "Federal Office for the Protection of the Constitution". Oh and also was that not the party a certain Elon Musk and Trump were trying to prop up? Which is doubly funny because of the AfD's alleged ties to Putin (sometimes more than alleged).

	▲	adriand 42 minutes ago \| parent [-]
		> But would you want the AfD to come to power and wield those ramped up, potentially now nuclear, forces? Totally! That’s what makes the situation doubly maddening. It would be one thing if these actions were bad for the world and good for the US. But they’re bad for the US too! I forget who it was that said this, and I’m sure my paraphrasing is bad, but I listened or read something I found chilling. It was something like, ordinary Americans are totally unprepared for the level of danger they will experience over the coming decades. The only reason Trump is able to destroy global institutions so easily is because Americans take their security for granted. But that security is the result of institutions developed in the aftermath of an utterly devastating war. Now those institutions are damaged and America’s friends are alienated, right when they are most needed to deal with China, Russia, AI, drones, cyber, nuclear, climate…talk about bad timing.

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eucyclos 2 hours ago | parent | prev | next [-]

The US was preferable to the British who were preferable to the Spanish. Hopefully the next global hegemon is similarly preferable to the US.

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thaumasiotes 37 minutes ago | parent | prev | next [-]

> As much as I am critical of the US, until now the US did behave very differently from other superpowers. Consider the end of WWII. The US did not inflict reparations on the vanquished nations but rather, invested huge sums in their rebuilding, in the process making stalwart allies of them.

That is also how Rome routinely dealt with the border tribes that it defeated. It's not a new idea. That's just what superpowers do.

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cogman10 3 hours ago | parent | prev [-]

The US treated both Germany and Japan well. It did not and has not treated any other nation whose government it's meddled with well. That's my point.

Edit Actually we probably could throw in South Korea into the nations the US has treated well after meddling.

	▲	bdamm 2 hours ago \| parent [-]
		Spain, France, the entire iron curtain following 1992 dissolution of USSR, Taiwan, Phillipines, Costa Rica, Panama ... and speaking of central America, Venezuela isn't doing so bad either. Perhaps more expansive lists could be produced once the definitions of "meddled with" and "treated well" are more refined.