jfuh

True, but in Taiwan the view is to strike against ethnic tensions between islanders themselves with the communist mainland as a "told you so" kind of deal rather than anything solid.

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Cataclysmic 7.9 earthquake in China, how to donate to the relief fund.

GarzaUK

In Northern Ireland only about 30% want to break from the UK, in Scotland it is almost 50% in some polls.

The Scottish have this notion they survive on their own, inspired from the very fictional Mel Gibson's version of Braveheart.

As of the Isle of Man, they are not part of the UK, but a royal dependency. I don't think they can survive own there own as well.

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jfuh

what is a royal dependency?? Is travel there considered domestic or international??

GarzaUK

Oppps I meant crown dependency not royal. Yeah I is considered domestic, same currency etc.

Evolution of the British Empire - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

GySgt

A bit ridiculous and tunnel sighted here. President Bush is merely the President at the time of these events, which are naturally occurring.

Did you know that much of the world is seperated by unnatural borders created during the imperial/colonial period? This means that for a very long time, tribes who have a long history of fighting each other were forced to live together and tribes that got along were torn apart. In effect, what we have is hundreds of millions of people who wish to be seperated and tens of millions of people who wish to re-unite.

Now, none of this was a big deal to those of us in the free world who define "stability" as "peace" during the era in which Soviet and American sponsered dictators enforced the "peace" and enforced pressure against the other's dictators. But with the fall of the Soviet influence, we also saw America release its reigns of influence. Today we are wildly criticized for our moves during the Cold era by our friends as well as our foes.

But we have seen this tribal break up occurring ever since the fall of the Kremlin. We saw the former Yugoslavia crack up into their respective tribes (Yugoslavia was the only country in Europe that didn't have its borders re-drawn after WWII by the way). We saw it in Somalia where tribal warlords found themselves free to claim their territory as "rightful" rulers. We saw Afghanistan prove that it couldn't immediately find unity amongst the tribes as soon as the brutal regime was lifted. We see it in Iraq where tribes seek violence and slaughter in the absence of one of our old dictators instead of seeking a path of cooperation. There are plenty of naitons in Africa where the tribes are protesting and even fighting their governments out of a sense of re-discovering their former tribal establishments. And even before the Cold War ended, we could see this in every country where the local populaiton was left to govern themselves. Pakistan, as an example, should have been a contender for democracy given its British colonial occupation, but it eventually devolved into tribal factions and introduced the old frictions. And why? because they aren't capable as a people? No. Because they are a mixture of tribes who should have never been trapped within a crayon'ed in border under foriegn leadership to begin with. And to these cultures, a member of another tribe is a foreigner. In these countries, even the more democratic ones vote for the guy from their tribe, not necessarily the best man for the job. Chaos ensues and tribal identity becomes the focus. Doesn't make for unity within borders.

Seperating from the Frankenstein's Monster creations thrust upon them is exactly what is going to happen today and in the future. This means that we will see plenty of people declaring that they want independance and it will be up to us to tell them they either deserve their long ago denied independance it or they must remain forever fixed in violence, racial hatred, and threats of civil war. Our role in this new era should not be to enforce the rules of the last two eras. They are going to declare independance and identity anyway, so we should find a way to grease the wheels as best we can.

If we're not going to do it, then who is? Your views about how things should be organized in this world is very colonial and imperialistic. Two things we are hated for simply because we are lumped into the European history of things. They did it. We later enforced it. What do we do today?

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GarzaUK

That's a long mini essay to conclude that Bush and his polices were ****! lol lol lol

I can ensure you that most Europeans don't hate Americans...whatever you believe.

American

Another nonsense-based, Bush-hating rant.

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GySgt

Well, think about it. Despite Iraq looking far better today than yesterday and despite the tribal cooperation now evolving, what we refused to believe was that what may be best in the end is a break up into three distinct tribal nation states. But, like we did with Yugoslavia, we encouraged and almost demanded that they stay whole, despite the obvious hatreds brewing and the continual threats of "civil war" and terror between the tribes.

And what about the Kurds? Long have they been split in two on either side of the Turkish/Iraqi border. Recently, the southern Turkisk side of the tribe has declared that they wish independance from Turkey and seek to unite this creation with the Kurds in northern Iraq. Is this fair to Turkey? Is this fair to the Kurds? This is the problem much of the thrid world is facing and we have to be involved because many of our allies are affected.

Just two immediate examples, but this has been happening since the beginning of the 90's all over. Natural instability is going to reign just to fix the unnatural stability we created and maintained for over a century. Our definition of "stability" has never been in the local populations best interests. They have to create their own stability and it is in our best interests to help.

I don't believe that most do. But it is the loudest minority that sets the pace. It's the intellectual arena that accuses and over analyzes. It's the institutionally indoctrinated opinions that become most profound and most celebrated.