European theory. Premodern, Modern, Post modern.

[Qdeathstar]

Ok, So i was reading these book, written by European Robert Cooper called the "Breaking of Nations".

Its quite a good read for anyone who is politcally minded, so i'd suggest you take a look. What it discusses is the interaction between pre-modern, modern and pre-modern states. It defines most of europe in the "post modern" and the United States and a few other contries in the modern catogory, with the rest of the world in the pre-modern, with Russia and china bordering the modern and Pre-modern.

Robert cooper claims that the Pre-modern states are the states that are most dangerous in the globalized world becuase they can become breeding grounds for terrorists and the like Pre Modern states are states in which the force is not controlled by the legitamit governement He goes on to say that states that are in the modern catogary are there because they have a private military and are less open about what they are doing, what kind of army that have, and also they spend more on military. Thats why the US is in this catagory. The post-modern contries are the contries primarily belonging to the the European Union that are very open about there military, and who spend very little to no money on military.

Robert cooper says that the reasons that Europe has moved to a Post-modern type of foriegn policy is because it is no longer interested in playing "power-politics"because of the bloodshed it has seen as a result of it. However, all foriegn policies need force to back them up, and the european contries no longer have the force nessacary to "back up" there foriegn policy objects and therefore they rely on the only remaining superpower, the United States to back up there policy with force.

Rober cooper makes a couple of other interesting comments:

1. That the whole worlds army combined couldnt attack the United States, and Win. So that means that the United States Military is the only one that matters, as no other military, even combined with other militaries could match it.

2. The United States with its open-boarder policies and generally "open" society is one of the most vulnerable to attacks

3. The "unilateral" movements by the united states may increase fanatisim and further terrorism, but it may also prevent terrorism, given continued commentment.

4. This means that the United states is the Most powerfull and most vulerable at the same time.

Rober cooper had explained that during the cold war, Europe had been the center of attention has relative to the battle between communism and capitalism/democracy and that had put them in the center of powerful. After the fall of Communism and america winning the cold war did most of Europe move from a policy of "Amoral" fighting, in the "nation state" since, supported by Machivelli in "the Prince" to a system of whether or not war was legal. They Relized that as none of them had a "powerfull" army, the old system of "balance of power" wouldnt work for them and they would loose influence, so in an attempt to retain influence they became attached to the UN and the EU has a way to discuss the legality of war, and to practice diplomacy.

Robert Cooper then closes by saying that the European Union relies on the US for support (the United States is the leading contributor to NATO). He also says that the European Union is begginging to have a problem with its source of "force" because now the United States has began to act Unilaterally. Robert cooper says that that is the EU's fault because it has nothing to bring to the table in terms that matter to the united states and suggests that if the EU wants to regain its influence it needs to do so in the way of force so that it can bring something to the table in terms of force, IE troops.




I thought it was very interesting, I would suggest you all read it.

[roadrunner_0]

tl;dr

[Qdeathstar]

hmm? Thats spam isnt it O.o

[queball]

Erm... thanks for the summary!

[SilverSmoke]

Originally Posted by roadrunner_0

tl;dr

[roadrunner_0]

Originally Posted by Qdeathstar

hmm? Thats spam isnt it O.o

moi be spammy? surely you jest

[JonnyBGood]

I pray that you're doing that book a grave injustice.

[Qdeathstar]

thats what it says.. read it yourself....

He actually calls for Preemptive attack and the like.

[JonnyBGood]

Those points are ludicrous though. The fact that the whole world's conventional (I'm presuming he doesn't think there could actually be a "victor" in a nuclear war between the US and the rest of the world) armies couldn't attack the USA and win is idiotic. Most countries lack real reasons to spend large amounts of money on their military but it's not like they physically couldn't. The EU (europe is such a poor word for generalising, switzerland and germany hardly have the same foreign policies) spends about a third of what the US spends on it's military (which is about a third of what the US spends as a percentage of GDP). I wouldn't exactly call 120 billion dollars (this is 2002 so I'm sure my figures are slightly off) little to no money on defense.

The modern/pre-modern/post-modern divides are fairly ridiculous as well (based on the justifications you state he gives). Ignoring the inherent difficulties in commenting on entire societies I don't exactly see many brazilian or canadian terrorists around. What exactly is the relevance of the US having more military power available? If you're killing a bug it hardly matters if you use a hammer or an M-60 machine-gun. No powers with nuclear weapons are going to attack each other with conventional military forces so the only thing that matters is force in relation to that of non-nuclear powers. I don't think the billions spent on stealth bombers has come in that useful in terms of hunting down individual terrorists.

Saying that the EU relies on the US for support is so stupid my head is hurting. Support against what? Communist Russia? Terrorism? In case you didn't notice having the world's most expensive armed forces didn't exactly protect the USA against terrorism. You could make the claim economically, but then it applies in reverse (and in other directions) so you're not stating anything different about the geopolitical relations between the EU and the USA.

Skipping over America winning the cold war (well done on that guys ) the debate over the concept of legal (or just) war has been going on for a lot longer than since the collapse of the USSR. Politically speaking the "balance of power" concept hasn't exactly been the foreign policy for the last four hundred years.

Most of the implicit premises used are catastrophically shit so it's hardly a major surprise that the arguments are pretty poor. In summation learn more about history and economics and for the love of god read better books.

PS And where the hell does the UK fit in in this piss poor theory? In case you forgot the British army is in Iraq right now.

[Qdeathstar]

Most countries lack real reasons

And that reason is the United States.

All legitimate power needs force, and that is what the US provides to the EU..

The fact that the whole world's conventional (I'm presuming he doesn't think there could actually be a "victor" in a nuclear war between the US and the rest of the world) armies couldn't attack the USA and win is idiotic

No, its not. America is the only remaing super power and German and the like spend a whole lot less and have a whole lot less when it comes to military power. Plus, they spend there money ineffeinctly. Whereas the EU could speciallize and use the same type of airplains and helecopters to provide MUTUAL security, it is instead spending TWICE on the same things that arnt interconnectable.

The reason that they dont have real reason to get an army is because the United States had backed them as a source of force when entering the balkans and the like.

Politically speaking the "balance of power" concept hasn't exactly been the foreign policy for the last four hundred years.

Yes, it was. There was imperialism during the "nation state" phase, but never the less, "balance of power" was the foriegn policy in europe for quite some time. That was in fact stateds as englands goal, that no one country should have control over all of Europe. Thats why they tried to contain Germany in world war 1 and in world are two. Alliances were formed against contries that had gotten too powerful time and time again. It was all about "balance of power"

Before that was the "imperial" form of rule.

[JonnyBGood]

Addressing your points in reverse order history is longer than a hundred years, and for god's sake the fact the EU doesn't have an army as efficient or as large as the US is precisely because the US army is there. There's no need at the moment, or in the immediate future, for the EU to spend twenty billion dollars on stealth bombers. It's hardly like the Yugoslav army was the equal of NATO minus the US and the only reason anything could possibly be done was the fact the US was there. They flew at 40,000 feet and bombed the crap out of people.

PS T&F is right, the US is the most vulnerable country in the world point is utterly stupid as well.

[JammyJim]

google for robert kagan and his article in 'policy review'
i believe it was published 2000

[queball]

Originally Posted by JammyJim

google for robert kagan and his article in 'policy review'
i believe it was published 2000

?

[furball]

http://www.policyreview.org/jun02/kagan.html


(found the thread where JJ linked to it)

[Snurx]

That book sounded like crap.