The AI dooooooom thread

[crazy canuck]

Absolutely but also more than just killed - people forced from their homes, states collapsed, impacts on people even outside the actual countries suffering the conflict etc.

Making the claim that American power has created "some version of peace" for more than a century ridiculous.

American power has been involved in a number of wars over the last 50 years that has greatly destabilized the world. American power caused the overthrow of a democracy elected leader in Iran, which is directly implicated in the war that is now occurring. American power is the opposite of a stabilizing, peaceful agent over the last century.

It takes complete historical ill literacy for somebody to think the claim has any validity. Well, maybe not complete historical literacy, but maybe significant historical blinders that focus only on the interests and goals of the United States.

Note that they qualify it as a great power conflict, in the actual passage that you didn't finish reading before working yourself into a lather.  The major powers didn't directly fight each other as they had in previous generations.  That's all they're claiming, and they're right to do so. 

Note that that is the last sentence. You need to read the whole of the claim to understand the conceit upon which it is based.

But even if one were to read the claim as narrowly as you propose, it is still preposterous given the fact that many of the wars the United States has engaged in since World War II have been based on a great power conflict in the Cold War and the domino theory.

I am beginning to think that people have completely forgotten about the Korean War and the Vietnam war.

Anybody who heard that claim in the late 70s or early 80s would've laughed. But somehow it's now being taken seriously.

[Valmy]

as a great power conflict, in the actual passage that you didn't finish reading before working yourself into a lather.  The major powers didn't directly fight each other as they had in previous generations.  That's all they're claiming, and they're right to do so. 

I will say the requirements for being a great power are now much higher. There used to be lots of great powers. Now there are really only two. Under these circumstances we can still have a devastating war that kills millions without it involving China and the US. The regional powers are now far stronger than historic great powers ever were.

[Jacob]

I will say the requirements for being a great power are now much higher. There used to be lots of great powers. Now there are really only two. Under these circumstances we can still have a devastating war that kills millions without it involving China and the US. The regional powers are now far stronger than historic great powers ever were.

Alternately there's a category of "super power" that sits above "great power". Though really it's just a definitional quibble.

[Tonitrus]

I will say the requirements for being a great power are now much higher. There used to be lots of great powers. Now there are really only two. Under these circumstances we can still have a devastating war that kills millions without it involving China and the US. The regional powers are now far stronger than historic great powers ever were.

Alternately there's a category of "super power" that sits above "great power". Though really it's just a definitional quibble.

A quibble that I think might work well if one were to say that for a number of years after the fall of the Soviet Union, the US was a "super power" comparatively.  But then slipped slightly down to a "great power" during the war on terrorism, the rise of China, and now alienating our alliance network.

I would contend that even Russia might still cling to "great power" status...if mostly because of their large nuclear arsenal (though not alone)...and for that same reason India might be knocking on that door (less for the nukes than for economic/population levels).  The main thing that China/Russia/India lack though is global conventional military reach...which is the US's primary claim to fame.

[crazy canuck]

as a great power conflict, in the actual passage that you didn't finish reading before working yourself into a lather.  The major powers didn't directly fight each other as they had in previous generations.  That's all they're claiming, and they're right to do so. 

I will say the requirements for being a great power are now much higher. There used to be lots of great powers. Now there are really only two. Under these circumstances we can still have a devastating war that kills millions without it involving China and the US. The regional powers are now far stronger than historic great powers ever were.

Another problem with the post, there was no such thing as a "great power" after world war I but if one wanted to push the point there was no such thing after WWII so Neil's defence that there were no wars between great powers after WWII is both technically correct, and facile.

[Sheilbh]

Making the claim that American power has created "some version of peace" for more than a century ridiculous.

American power has been involved in a number of wars over the last 50 years that has greatly destabilized the world. American power caused the overthrow of a democracy elected leader in Iran, which is directly implicated in the war that is now occurring. American power is the opposite of a stabilizing, peaceful agent over the last century.

It takes complete historical ill literacy for somebody to think the claim has any validity. Well, maybe not complete historical literacy, but maybe significant historical blinders that focus only on the interests and goals of the United States.

American and Soviet power created and structured the post-war order and were its twin pillars. There was, as I said, displaced wars as competition between those superpowers or great powers, which impacted many millions. However for many millions of others it never became a hot war. There was, instead, a structured, structuring logic to that world order (based on American and Soviet power) that allowed for differing degrees of escalation, competition, cooperation and conflict resolution between those powers without a direct war between them. Since the end of the Cold War we have lived in a world and order built, maintained and enforced by American power.

Peace does not necessarily involve democracy or human rights or other good things. It can be Tacitan.

I'm similarly not necessarily sure that peace is necessarily stabilising in and of itself. If anything I think it can be the opposite. Peace is often (perahps always?) imperial and some of the other things you often get within an imperial space is cosmopolitanism and diversity and movement. The positives that peace generate (trade, movement, cosmopolitanism) can act as forces that undermine and threaten the coercive force that maintains it, which undermines the peace and has a centrifugal effect on those positives. You think of the peace for long periods within the Ottoman, Russian and Austrian spheres and then their breakdown.

Alternately there's a category of "super power" that sits above "great power". Though really it's just a definitional quibble.

Yeah I take the point on definitional quibble but I think there is probably a difference (I'd also throw in the French concept of the US as a hyperpower after the collapse of the USSR).

These are nonsense terms and meaningless and impossible (and pointless) to define.

However A pointless, nonsense, meaningless attempt. I feel like "great power" is basically a 19th/early 20th century concept. To my mind it describes a world that has industrial power, states that can operate if not globally then well outside of their immediate region and a plural world - so a balance of power. So to my mind it describes powers like France, Britain, Russia, later Germany and the US and Japan, plus maybe Italy, Austria and the Ottomans (with the slight caveat that the US never really operated within a balance of power because of its focus). And perhaps because of that balance of power - or just technological limitation none has truly global aspirations - it's more spheres of influence.

Superpower to me is the Cold War - industrial powers, with nukes that can operate globally and do. So the USSR and US. I think because of that global aspiration perhaps it's less plural and more bipolar (but that might just be because the prhase comes from the Cold War.

Hyperpower is all of the above without competition - the US post-Cold War.

I think there's an argument we are moving back to great power world because I do't think either China or the US really aspire to build or maintain a global order. And I think arguably the big open question is still the one Larry Summers raised about 10 years ago: can the US share power?

I will say the requirements for being a great power are now much higher. There used to be lots of great powers. Now there are really only two. Under these circumstances we can still have a devastating war that kills millions without it involving China and the US. The regional powers are now far stronger than historic great powers ever were.

I think it depends what we mean by stronger.

[crazy canuck]

And so if the conclusion is that the Americans and Soviets together created a more stable world, even though they engaged in terrible regional wars, think about how different that is from the claim being made.

[grumbler]

Absolutely but also more than just killed - people forced from their homes, states collapsed, impacts on people even outside the actual countries suffering the conflict etc.

Making the claim that American power has created "some version of peace" for more than a century ridiculous.

American power has been involved in a number of wars over the last 50 years that has greatly destabilized the world. American power caused the overthrow of a democracy elected leader in Iran, which is directly implicated in the war that is now occurring. American power is the opposite of a stabilizing, peaceful agent over the last century.

It takes complete historical ill literacy for somebody to think the claim has any validity. Well, maybe not complete historical literacy, but maybe significant historical blinders that focus only on the interests and goals of the United States.

It was the Brits that staged the coup in Iran. Some loudmouth CIA officer at the time claimed he'd done it, but he was just a fool.

As to your claim that US power was purely a destabilizing and violent agent over the post-WW2 period, that is as moronic as the claim that it was purely stabilizing and peaceful.  The truth never rests in the absolutes.

[Valmy]

It was the Brits that staged the coup in Iran. Some loudmouth CIA officer at the time claimed he'd done it, but he was just a fool.

As to your claim that US power was purely a destabilizing and violent agent over the post-WW2 period, that is as moronic as the claim that it was purely stabilizing and peaceful.  The truth never rests in the absolutes.

The Brits were definitely the driving force but I wasn't aware we weren't involved at all.

[crazy canuck]

Absolutely but also more than just killed - people forced from their homes, states collapsed, impacts on people even outside the actual countries suffering the conflict etc.

Making the claim that American power has created "some version of peace" for more than a century ridiculous.

American power has been involved in a number of wars over the last 50 years that has greatly destabilized the world. American power caused the overthrow of a democracy elected leader in Iran, which is directly implicated in the war that is now occurring. American power is the opposite of a stabilizing, peaceful agent over the last century.

It takes complete historical ill literacy for somebody to think the claim has any validity. Well, maybe not complete historical literacy, but maybe significant historical blinders that focus only on the interests and goals of the United States.

It was the Brits that staged the coup in Iran. Some loudmouth CIA officer at the time claimed he'd done it, but he was just a fool.

As to your claim that US power was purely a destabilizing and violent agent over the post-WW2 period, that is as moronic as the claim that it was purely stabilizing and peaceful.  The truth never rests in the absolutes.

You should go back and read the history books. And the Americans were definitely behind the overthrow of the Iranian democratic leader.

[Valmy]

The Brits were one of the big beneficiaries though. They certainly were involved. I just had never heard they did it without us.

[The Minsky Moment]

The myth of the US overthrow of Mosaddeq came from Kermit Roosevelt's book, which was mostly a bunch of baloney.  The CIA at the time was content for it to be published because back then they still wanted to play up their influence.  The influences behind Mosaddeq's fall were mostly domestic; he rose to power on the back of a broad popular coalition but couldn't hold it together.