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PaperclipPerfector  3d ago (text post)   17033 thread views

Culture War Roundup for the week of January 6, 2025

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Iraq was a bad war, but not expansionist. I think there should be a norm against invading to remove dictators, but it's okay that that's weaker than the norm against conquest.

I'm not sure which other wars you'd be referring to.

Ah so if you don't overtly annex the territory but control it in everything but name imperialism is okay? So also China invading Taiwan would be entirely ok since most countries recognize the one China policy and Taiwan as part of China?

The US does not control Iraq in everything but name, and did not control Afghanistan in everything but name. There were legitimate elections.

So also China invading Taiwan would be entirely ok since most countries recognize the one China policy and Taiwan as part of China?

Everyone knows they're separate even if there's a legal fiction otherwise

Yes everyone knows, they all know parts of Palestine, Lebanon and Syria were always part of Israel as well, but everyone knows Crimea was never part of Russia, just as Taiwan was never part of China. We've always been at war with Eurasia.

I think that legal fictions are important! If "everybody knows they're separate even if there's a legal fiction otherwise" in your personal life, you're still legally bound to your spouse until divorce proceedings are finalized.

The United States arguably should not have recognized the Chinese Communist government specifically for this reason.

Either "lol international law and treaties aren't real," in which case maybe things like Iraq and Afghanistan (or Ukraine or an invasion of Taiwan) were bad but they arguably weren't illegal, or any aggressive military force that a nation, including the United States, takes that is not in self-defense or approved by the UN Security Council are a violation of its obligations under both the UN Charter and, if the country happens to be a NATO member, Article 1 of the NATO charter, where all parties agree "to refrain in [its] international relations from the threat or use of force in any manner inconsistent with the purposes of the United Nations."

Now, someone is going to arrive and explain to me that there is some argument made somewhere that international law allows one to contravene what seems to be the absolutely kinda clear language of the UN and NATO charters. To which I say: it sounds like legal fictions are important. (But to which I also say: if you can launch an offensive military operation without UN approval and the UN General Assembly condemns it as a violation of international law but the UN Security Council never does anything about it because the member launching the operation sits on the Council, then maybe "lol international law and treaties aren't real.")

I happen to think that international law and custom is good and that it was arguably an absolutely massive mistake to tie any of that to a body as dysfunctional as the United Nations. But nobody forced us to sign the UN Charter or the NATO Charter.

Just like Putin has his ass out now, the west had their ass out in 2002

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