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We've spent close to two trillion over two decades in the middle east to do nothing but kill more people.

Because Iraq & Afghanistan aren't about winning wars, they're about transferring federal money to arms manufacturers so that people working for the military and working in politics have jobs after they leave the military and politics.

There's a reason Eisenhower waxed on about the military industrial complex.

>>330
Would they not have jobs if we rebuilt the Middle East?

Didn't all those political and military people still have jobs after WW2? I've seen all those weepy movies about how the men came home and tried to put women back in their place, used GI bills to found homesteads, etc; it didn't seem like unemployment was an issue of serious concern at the time. I feel like they'd certainly find something else to do with themselves, if they ever finished making people dead.

But don't get me wrong, my heart isn't bleeding for all those dead sand niggers. What really gets me is the lack of return on this investment. Add in the cost of the war itself, and we put less than $500 billion into Europe for five decades of (mostly) peace and prosperity; not one dollar sunk in Middle Eastern war thus far is ever coming back.

>>335
Sure, after WW2 they had jobs. But they also worked.

The scumbags these days pick up jobs that you don't even have to show up to in order to get paid.

>>336
I've been trying to think of a reply, for days.

I thought about a lot.

We're fucked. The American Empire will fall in on itself, and once again complacency and lack of foresight will be our undoing. Just like the Khans, just like the Romans--it's all going to come crashing down and we have no one to blame but ourselves.

Not like tomorrow or anything; I'd give it a few more decades.

>>338
If it makes you feel any better, the Chinese and Russians are much further along. Minor changes in inputs or outputs yield massive disruptions and political upheaval due to their corruption being so much further along the curve. As each of their governments are toppled by political dissent it will send ripples across the planet.

Basically we're all fucked, and it's going to get progressively bumpier before we flatline.

>>339
>As each of their governments are toppled by political dissent it will send ripples across the planet
I'm not so sure about this. These countries have been cultivating their current generation of drones for quite some time. The people living there aren't arming themselves for revolution; they're scrambling to get whatever money and education they are capable of just like all the capitalist drones, doing jobs and keeping their heads down while they try to live quiet, normal lives. It's only the people who speak out; the occasional ethnic minority; and criminals not employed by the government who have to worry.

I've heard rumours that China's economy has lost momentum, but it's still set to overtake the US in trade within a decade or two, and Putin obviously has in mind to take back all former USSR territory. Those governments are going places; the US is about to pull out of Syria, ditch our Kurdish lackeys, and lose the Middle East to Iran and Russia. Oh, and we have to fix Europe again.

We are so fucked, and I agree, it's only going to get worse before the end.

>>342
The sad thing is that the right wing's view of Russia is based purely on decades of carefully built up propaganda.

Putin is actually a very, very weak leader. He was put in power by the oligarchs and serves at their pleasure. The minute he stops being useful to them he will disappear, replaced by whoever they choose to succeed him. The only question is whether the public unrest that causes that replacement will yield a successful transition to a new leader or a lot of heads on pikes (oligarchs, Putin, and other leaders of the corruption).

>>343
>The only question is whether the public unrest that causes that replacement will yield a successful transition to a new leader or a lot of heads on pikes (oligarchs, Putin, and other leaders of the corruption)
Again, I doubt large-scale public unrest is a concern for Russia--but if you're right, let's not leave out the likelihood that it would lead to yet another despot and yet more oligarchy.

>>347
You'd be surprised just how little of the public supports Putin vs. just puts up with him because no reasonable challenger has come along.

The older populace are Putin's base, while the younger populace mostly loathe him. That's why when there have been widespread protests the crowds are always full of young people. In the middle are people who don't vote because they believe there's nobody on the ballot worth voting for.

However since alcoholism is doing a pretty good job of decimating the Russian population, his base is shrinking every year. The only way he's held onto power this long is by getting rid of all reasonably competent challengers. He dealt with Navalny by creating charges to stop him from qualifying for the presidential ballot, but most are either poisoned or murdered in the streets.

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>>348
>no reasonable challenger has come
>getting rid of all reasonably competent challengers
>most are either poisoned or murdered in the streets
Do not underestimate this method, just because you live in a country where it is unacceptable.

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>>361
Its unacceptable in Russia too, otherwise they'd just publicly admit who killed who.

They're maintaining a facade to keep the willfully ignorant placated.

Soviets might have done the same for east europe if their economy didn't suck ass. The problem wasn't communism so much as east eruopean cultures are just... bad. Fortunately, American culture is also bad now. Thanks millennials.

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>>367
It might have something to do with the Soviets history of pillaging eastern europe.

Just look at the Holodomor, they exported everything to Russia so Russians wouldn't suffer, leaving Ukrainians to starve to death.

>>367
To some degree, most certainly this >>368

The USSR didn't commandeer eastern europe for eastern europe's sake; they only intended to exploit these countries in every possible way to benefit the motherland. They might have made a show of propping them up for propaganda purposes, to make it look like they were on par with the west, but it was always the plan to take more than they gave.

>>369
And take more than they gave they did. I'm not disputing that. What I'm asking is, what better propaganda for the motherland if not showing off to the world its ability to not just prop up, but to make its satellites PROSPEROUS. What country wouldn't want to be in its good graces and under its wing? If the USSR had had the ability to do such a thing, the way America did, they probably would have. The exploitation they engaged in, as I see it, is in part A RESULT of their inability to compete with America. America didn't have any need for such behavior. So why would we engage in it? We stood nothing to gain from raping Western Europe. So why would we do that? You might say that, given how war-ravaged it was, there was nothing to take to begin with. But Eastern and Western Europe were equally war-torn. And yet the USSR still found something to pillage. The point is, we could have done the same, but we didn't need to. Helping Western Europe instead made us look infinitely better than the USSR on the world stage. I'm not saying that it was a purely cynical move. I am saying that it was only possible for us to do because we had the means, and that therefore it was a no-brainer. Any great power whose power was great enough to grant it the ability to do such an ostensibly benevolent thing would have done the same. We happened to be the only one that could.

>>372
You could be right. Particularly about this:
>The exploitation they engaged in, as I see it, is in part A RESULT of their inability to compete with America
That's likely. It would have been great for them to have prosperous nations along their border, but they probably couldn't have sustained them--let alone the USSR itself. It was certainly more cost effective to strip their remaining resources, though not as profitable.
and this:
>You might say that, given how war-ravaged it was, there was nothing to take to begin with
Don't be too quick to put anything past the United States. We've done a good deal more than our fair share if international dickery, but only when the profits from doing so significantly overcame the costs. The USSR was willing to accept a thinner profit margin for immediate gains; we wanted countries that would depend on trade with us and be able to give us loans in the future.

It does seem very much like both sides took advantage of the opportunities they had to the fullest capacity they were able.

Why isn't anyone thinking like this in our Middle Eastern wars? Both sides keep swapping incompetency and half-measures while the situation only gets worse and the staggering costs continue to skyrocket.

>>373
Look on the bright side. Now that Russia has openly started killing citizens of the middle east, now they're going to discover what actual terrorism looks like, instead of just Putin's false flags.

They might even discover that their own citizens become disillusioned with being a perpetual underclass and start joining in.