Re: National Sovereignty

Carlos Alzugaray Treto wrote:
> 
> Pat, the historical record in region where I live is quite clear. Trujillo,
> Duvalier, Somoza, Batista, Pinochet were all the result either of U.S.
> military occupation or intervention.
> 
> Many of the cases you cite are open to a lot of interpretations. I would
> posit that the Japanese political system is more the result of the internal
> development of its institutions than of any outside intervention. The same
> could be said about post-war Germany. South Korea had to suffer Syngman
> Rhee, supported by the U.S., for many years. One can even wonder if it were
> not for U.S. support if Rhee would not have been overthrown before. What is
> the soverignty case in Taiwan?. Hong Kong is so special that it can be
> considered an exception.
> 
> The Soviet Union suffered a foreign intervention during the early years of
> the civil war and was defeated. Hitler came to power through elections which
> nobody could question. In my opinion no foreign intervention could have
> stopped him. China is one of the countries of the world which has suffered
> more foreign intervention. Whatever you might think of the history of the
> People's Republic, it has now the best government China has ever had and I
> do not think that there is any doubt that it is not the result of foreign
> intervention.
> 
> To call the Vietnamese war for reunification a Northern aggression against
> the South is quite a misrepresentation of the historical record.

To Carlos, etc.

My claim is not that the U.S. directly promoted democracy for its own
sake. And especially it is not that U.S. bombing had this goal. It is
that the cold war, in which the U.S. was a major participant in its own
self interest, created an environment of peace within which economies
and democracies were given an opportunity to develop. My implied claim,
as anti-capitalist Andrew Austin has recognized, is that the environment
of peace and U.S. open markets toward selected countries was conducive
to economic development and, further, that as a country develops
economically, its people will eventually demand and get democracy. I
included the case of Japan because this was a country where the U.S.
actively intervened to create a democratic government, at least in part.
I included India because my recollection is that India's greatest fear
was an invasion from Communist China. All expansionist aims by Communist
China ran up against the wall of prospective U.S. intervention. But
India is probably not a good example because of its more complex
geopolitical situation. And my mixing together of very different cases
probably obscured my main point.

One cannot deny that the U.S. has often supported dictators and, partly
because of this, its policies have forestalled the development of
democracy. For the democrats in those countries, this is frustrating and
sometimes even deadly. I am not defending U.S. policy. I am mainly
pointing out that one consequence of that policy has been relative
peace. This in turn made economic development possible for countries in
which it would otherwise have been impossible. Economic development, in
turn, is conducive to the development of democracy.

Peace and the protection of countries that supported it was a clear goal
of U.S. postwar policy, although this was not the only goal. Whether
U.S. leaders foresaw the economic and political development that later
occurred as a result of this policy is doubtful. So one might argue that
these developments were unintended effects.


-- 
Pat Gunning, Sultan Qaboos University, Oman
Web pages on Subjectivism, Democracy, Taiwan, Ludwig von Mises,
Austrian Economics, and my University Classes
http://www2.cybercities.com/g/gunning/welcome.htm
http://www.fortunecity.com/meltingpot/barclay/212/welcome.htm