Yeah yeah yeah. America! Fuck yeah!
Wish I could show this to the guy on Mastodonwho was defending them, that “we don’t what was in their heart when they joined”, because after I replied “No no wait, if they joined now, they absolutely know what’s going on” he blocked me. 🤷
The capitalist version of the Nuremberg excuse… “We all have a mortgage to pay”
Former Marine here. This illustrates the prevailing excuse endemic to the whole imperialist war machine. Every bloody cog has some way of passing blame up the chain. I fixed electronics so I never had to personally pull a trigger but the electronics I fixed helped fix aircraft whose pilots and aircrew were responsible for atrocities I can only imagine. I used to rationalize that this separation erased my culpability but now I understand it actually enhanced it. At the level of maintenance I was at a broken twidgit tip unaccounted for could ground an entire air wing for several days.
If you have made the massive mistake of joining the military please use your power of being a rusty cog. Report every chip on every tool to maintenance control, send every piece of gear missing a screw or emp braiding in for parts/DRMO don’t run to the hardware store for a quick replacement, CDI time is valuable and limited so make sure to never skip a CDI verification step and ask for their opinion on every anomalous reading, if you drop a torque wrench or break a cal seal ground that gear and send it back to the shop, take your time and verify every measurement, don’t gundeck MAFs, and follow all procedures to the letter. Don’t be afraid to involve maintenance control to make sure your shop is fully compliant and not taking shortcuts. If you had just sat on your rack and refused to work you would just get replaced, now you have weaponized the regulations and bureaucracy in a way that covers your ass for the rest of your enlistment while crippling the whole air wing. You can now get out and try to make amends for the catastrophic damage you have done to the world. However if you reenlist fucking die in a fire.
I regret every day that I joined and wish I was aware of the evil the system I was a part of was perpetrating. The few times I talk about my time in the Marines in the last few years is to warn people about how fucked up it is, how they brainwash and strip the individuality from recruits, and most importantly the reality of what the US Military does to innocent people all over the world and the environment.
You recognize what’s going on and not brush it off, you didn’t directly kill and rape people, so that puts you really on the good side.
There is a reason that 18 is a prime recruiting age - not enough life knowledge to know better.
It’s pure exploitation by the state of the ignorance and naivety of the average recruit as well as the capitalist system weaponizing its own failings. Most people in my boot camp platoon were under 20 and the vast majority of us came from disadvantaged backgrounds. I didn’t know the term at the time but most people joined for the hope of class mobility along with getting the fuck out of wherever they came from. It also showed the strength of the US propaganda machine, especially in the immediate wake of 9/11, where the media was complicit in a massive coverup of US/ISAF atrocities and a whitewashing of the savage inhuman brutality that is implicit in war.
That does not excuse our ignorance since millions of people our age marched against the wars, especially Iraq. In retrospect we unconsciously chose cowardice and selfishness and cloaked it in a delusion of honorable sacrifice.
Prefrontal cortex stops developing at 23 to 25. Let that sink in as you remember all the decisions you made prior to 23.
Thats actually just pop science and a misunderstanding on one studies wording.
We’ve not reason to believe there is any sudden stoppage of development vs trailing off.
I always make it a point to NEVER utter the words “thank you for your service” to these so called “heroes”. However, I do say this to people who have actually earned this phrase, such as teachers, nurses, etc.
Those words and honours are reserved for actual service workers.
Although they better unionize the fuck up already
Bam!
“Just doing my job.”
Nuremberg o’clock yet?
Inaccurate. The child is still alive and not raped.
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How is this “westoid” logic? As if no other country does this kind of bullshit.
We only have a chance at peace when ALL soldiers refuse to invade foreign lands.
As if no other country does this kind of bullshit.
Most countries can’t conceive of operating at the scale of the US. And a great deal of that military surplus is derived from wealth and labor looted overseas.
You’re stacking up Jeffrey Dalmar against the Enola Gay.
Adjusted for purchasing power, China is pretty close to the US in defense spending.
Adjusted for purchasing power,
The yuan doesn’t buy $8 worth of commodity or labor on the global market. Crazy that anyone would believe this.
Who said anything about the global market? Labor is the single biggest cost to the US military and the gap between What a US private earns and what a Chinese private earns is enormous. This is true of all Chinese labor; weapons and kit manufactured in country are all cheaper for them than imports. And the cost of US weapons are hugely inflated: in the US, the most important consideration in defense appropriations has long been steering the most jobs possible to the most congressional districts possible efficiency be damned.
If you are considering that then you would have to divide it to be per capita as well
What? Why?
So how is the original picture “westoid logic” if it only applies to the USA?
It applies to the entire Western block. You can toss in everyone from the French to the Philippines.
The US just happens to be the folks operating on a global scale. You’ll find American military goons engaged in this kind of wreckless, pointless bloodshed from the coast of Venezuela to the highlands of Yemen.
Wait, then why did you show that photo? US spends more on army than China therefore US bad, but in the same photo China spends more than France therefore France still bad?
And maybe not only foreign lands, but also their own ones.
The problem there is that it allows a foreign invader to invade everyone that is peaceful. I think the first step needs to be to refuse to march across the border.
The rest of the world would like to sincerely apologize for making up 0.8% of all unprovoked invasions and war crimes in the last 100 years. We really should do better.
0.8%? At that point I have to ask wtf you consider the west to include as it sounds like you must be ignoring anything done by everyone else.
not every other country is the usa, and not every other country is meddling in every world situation and creating world situations.
sit the fuck down redwhiteandblue underwear, this comment wont hurt you.
Ahem take a look at Russia right now ahem. Or Israel, or China…
Has China been bombing people recently?
2 questions bombing only specifically, and what do you consider recent? Do the Uyghurs count? Tibet? All the shit they pull in the South China sea? Korea? Vietnam? Shit they might be bombing Taiwan soon.
Shit they might be bombing Taiwan soon.
Western chauvinists have so little to hold against China that they have to resort to things that China isn’t doing, but “might” do in the future.
Oh no, someone criticized China. 🥺
Not surprised to see this jerk face banned.
Conviniently skipped all the other points
I support their intervention in Korea. America was the aggressor in that conflict and the Chinese defended Korean sovereignty from imperialism. Did they bomb Uyghurs without my knowledge? Even if you believe everything western media says about Chinese treatment of Uyghurs their conditions are remarkably better than Palestinians. When Tibetan peasants were freed from serfdom and the culture of the Tibetan ruling class that justified their oppression was suppressed was that equivalent to American imperialism? To the Palestinian genocide? The shit China does in the South China sea is military postering at worst. Nothing they have done has left a place as ruined as Iraq, Libya, and Afghanistan. Nothing has come close the the shear destruction we see at the hands of western imperialism. They are not comparable. You can exaggerate their actions and lie about them to an extreme and they still do not compare to what our countries have done to the world.
Vietnam was fucked up though and I will die mad about it
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Ok explain the South China sea bull shit and stealing international waters and being the aggressor to the Philippines an neighbors? Genocide of the Uyghurs? You just jumped right over that part and used only a select part of the statement to make a weak ass strawman argument.
Ah, good old “their war of imperialism” vs “our liberation of good people”. Right after “oh yeah, you think our genocide is bad? Check out tvis different genocide on the other side of the planet”.
You realise two things can be bad at once, right?I didn’t say “not bad” I said “not equivalent” and “not comparable”. China does not belong on that list next to Israel and Russia. That’s just patently ridiculous.
If you really need me to say it, yes china has done bad things lol
Whataboutism
Yeah? I’m looking at China, and I’m not seeing anything.
Tibet, Taiwan, Hong Kong, South China Sea, India… off the top my head.
India and China have a border dispute using sticks and rocks.
I am not American
We only have a chance at peace when ALL soldiers refuse to invade foreign lands.
You’re not wrong, it’s just that that statement historically doesn’t apply to the US. Very few US wars started because we were attacked.
that… exactly means US soldiers need to lay down their arms and refuse their commanding officers orders. but more importantly it means that those of us who get it have to talk to soldiers about that they are not out there in the world defending freedom. they have been lied to and what they’re really doing is stealing wealth for oligarchs
So US soldiers need to refuse to invade foreign lands. How does that not apply to the US?
There are a very small number of problem countries. Your statement implied otherwise.
Take a look at the list of wars over the past few decades. Sure the US shows up and they are a problem but they are hardly alone in that. This is why I said everyone needs to refuse because with even a small number not refusing you can’t have peace.
Look at the List of Wars over the past century and a half. The US is the most frequent followed by the British and Russians. These 3 countries account for most of the problem.
This is a pretty conservative take. Does OP understand why someone living in desperate circumstances would join their local gang, or why they would choose a much larger and much more powerful gang like the military? Does OP understand the difference between explaining why a bad thing happens versus excusing that thing?
I don’t think adults should give heroin to vulnerable children and traffic them into sexual slavery either, but the reason that’s happening isn’t because a bunch of heroin selling hobbyists decided to be as evil as possible for fun, it happens because of economic context producing survival-orientated people who behave ruthlessly for their own self interests. People making anti-social livings probably wouldn’t have chosen the road they’re on if they had the opportunity to have a comfortable life doing something safe. A lot of the time they were conned into it in the first place and can’t get out. Nothing justifies murder, but to stop the murders you have to understand the context of why they’re happening.
Joining the military is not ok. Trying to understand why a kid would be think it’s ok to kill people overseas and then willingly do it is ok.
I assume we also blame Chinese citizens for everything the CCP does too or does that only apply to western nations.
Does it even apply for all western nations? What about Norway?
When was the last time China invaded a country again? I’ll wait…
Not sure about “last time”, but this is pretty famous: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Annexation_of_Tibet_by_China
In recent years they have colonised more subtly: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Belt_and_Road_Initiative#Accusations_of_neo-colonialism_and_debt-trap_diplomacy
plus all their bullshit around the nine dash line: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Spratly_Islands#Conflicts_in_the_21st_century
LMAO 1951
I suggest you learn about Tibet’s history as well. They were a slave state before China liberated them. Dalai Lama has been shitting and pissing himself for decades trying to get his slaves back lol.
Those islands also belong to China. If you think defending it from western imperialism is “bullshit” you might not actually be a leftist…
I would caution against attributing altruistic motivations to the actions of nation states. The Spratly Islands are having their ecosystem trashed so the various powers can have a fucking dick measuring contest over imaginary lines on a map. So far a bunch of fishermen have been killed and irreplaceable coral reefs have been destroyed, all in service of building artificial islands for reasons that vary depending on the state actor.
Debt trap diplomacy is a problem with every large power including BRICS, the west is currently the biggest offender because the World Bank and the IMF has the implicit backing of US military power projection. It is easier to strong arm “client states” into onerous loan terms and “free trade zones” when there is the threat of their nation being labeled as “supporting terrorism” and have a carrier battle group off shore within days.
I have no reason to doubt that once that BRICS has the ability to project power, basically whenever China has several modern carrier battle groups, they won’t operate any differently than the west does now. The flag and justification will be different but the global south will continue to be exploited.
Less than half a decade ago with Hongkong…
Are our blindspots this wide?
Wow China invaded… themselves???
They took their city back from foreign imperialists. Get fucking real.
Foreign imperialists consisting of residents that want their freedom who already were independent from their prior occupiers?
This is one way to say you don’t support freedom in a very literal anti democracy sense.
Hong Kong belongs to China. Not western imperialists. Their “freedom” can suck my nuts from the back.
You are quite literally ignoring the will of the people who lived there, who lived there before the prior take over too, being ruled by some third party they don’t want to be ruled by.
How can you justify that?
lmao “ruled”. A city full of capitalists afraid their workers will be liberated with economic democracy. Boo fucking hoo.
But we need imperialist war mongers for our “true working class” movement they are obviously more important than basic international solidarity.
Without the imperial dogs, who will protect us from all the scary foreigners who threaten our livelihoods every waking hour?
The Red Dawn! The Yellow Peril! The Antifa Supersoldiers! Save me from them, fascist daddy!
Doesn’t this same also fit for example Russian troops too
I mean sure but also way less people disagree with that and I don’t see how it’s relevant to this meme.
It just targets “Westoids” meanwhile that’s what Russia is doing right now, that’s why I wanted clarification
It’s really all nation states. But yeah it doesn’t take away from criticising the west who loves to paint themselves as guaranteer of human rights or whatever.
Could have easily criticised the wealthy and those in power instead.
that’s what Russia is doing right now
Russia has been part of the West since Yeltsin shelled the Moscow Parliament into submission.
The Cold War ended 30 years ago. Capitalism won. What we’re experiencing today is post-Soviet imperial powers in a turf war.
When people talk of Western world Russia is pretty often not counted in that
When George Bush Jr was meeting with Vladimir Putin to coordinate the War on Terror across Central Asia, “people” did.
That was 15 years ago. A lot changed since then. A lot.
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Yhea, but I think it is more important to criticise “your” side for doing that. I hate when russians do that, but I am not going to call or write my Kremlin representative? I am in Michigan and so I call and write to my representatives and hope they are primaried the fuck out.
Like the BS of “do you condemn Hammas”? yhea, i did, I called my Hamas representative and gave them a mouthful? you see? condemning the other side, especially if you only condemn the other side is just BS propaganda. Condemn your side for the crimes your representatives are supporting and your taxes pay for.
Just following orders
Boot boys frag your officer challenge
People down voting this makes me puke
Probably for the “westoid” part - as if eastoid (lol) soldiers have never “just followed orders”
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Even if I agree with the opinion, I don’t want to associate with them. It’s like someone using twitch lingo outside of twitch
Eastern soldiers are not infantilized the same way as western troops. American soldiers are just naive boys that got tricked by evil Washington. It’s okay they killed those innocent people because they got free college for it.
Additionally, when you look at the military actions of the west vs east in the 21st century, it’s a pretty silly comparison.
Ok sure man you’re right, no eastern army has ever been brainwashed into atrocities
Saying “westoid” makes you look like a manchild on 4chan regardless. Not a word a serious person users lol
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I never implied otherwise. You didn’t even engage with a single point I made. You just made one up then knocked it down lol.
westoids’ feelings were hurt, i see.
My feelings are hurt? At least I’m allowed to have them without a trip to a re-education camp.
at least i’m allowed any education instead of being sent straight to slave-labor prison camp for my opinions.
You mean the ‘education’ that teaches you how to report your neighbors, build the re-education camps, and thank Dear Leader for the privilege of not being sent there yet?
I don’t like my country so there’s no amount of western insults you can hit me with that will do anything but make you look like a terminally-online manchild
then why are you so mad we are calling you names?
Making fun of you isn’t the same as being mad at you, but I wouldn’t expect someone who says “westoid” to have the capacity mental capacity to recognize it
Not true. Everyone’s soldiers are innocent beautiful boys. The enemies are ruthless monsters. Has been forever.
They’re all dumb as fuck. Why is signing up to kill people ok because it paid off your loans?
Not sure how you are quantifying “infantilized” or even “eastern”. However, most soldiers throughout history are barely adults who are manipulated by governments to do horrific things and have horrific things done to them as well.
A good book that I think addresses all your claims is Zinky Boys by historian Svetlana Alexievich. It’s a book of memoirs from the Soviet invasion of Afghanistan.
“Sorry I killed your parents kid, the big evil government manipulated me! I’m just a 21 year old child like you!”
Lol, yes. Once you grow up a little, you too will think 21 year old people are still basically kids.
Do you actually think any 20 year old has valid personal reasons to go to a different country to kill someone? Of course they are being manipulated by things like nationalism.
Your rebuttal offers nothing but insight to your own immaturity.
lol you heard it here folks! 21 year old children… If you kill someone and you’re 21, oopsie!
Lol, my dude… No one is claiming that being a young adult absolves you from war crimes. Just that young people are easier to be led to do war crimes.
My claim was that virtually all wars are fought by young people being misled by governments with varying degrees of alternative motives. Not that those young people are free of blame, just that they are also victims to a lesser extent.
Zinky Boys is a haunting but great read
Also her Voices from Chernobyl is fantastic
Afgantsy by Roderic Braithwaite is similarly great, and is written with a more historical perspective in terms of the political landscape that led to that conflict being so bitter. (relatively – all conflicts are bitter)
Lotta western “leftists” arent actually leftists.
Being a leftist and pro imperialists are mutually exclusive concepts.
I want workers rights end poverty, but also bomb the shit out of poor courtiers because fuck them poors. no solidarity no leftism
