For my Libertarian friends

At least World War II, though it was hardly a US war. Especially on the European front. I think it might be only a slight overstatement to say that Russia could have kicked the sh*t out of both the Japanese and Germany without our help, but I'm fuzzy on the Pacific front. I think WW2 was pretty damn clear cut as far as wars go.

WW1 was....just plain retarded. No reason for us to be involved, and no reason for anyone to fight anyway!

Vietnam/Korea: I suppose at the time stopping communism was a big deal, so I can see the motivation. Looking back on it, it wasn't even close to worth it in Vietnam. Korea? Not so sure.

Revolutionary war: yeah it was worth it. Freedom, constitution, you get it.

Civil War: probably not worth it. Not a whole lot changed de facto in the South after the war (Jim Crow laws) and people still seem to be fighting the war passively to this day. Perhaps it was inevitable the North and South would fight one way or another, either as a civil war or as separate countries after secession. I don't know. Tons of American deaths resulted as it was, though.

I guess this is a discussion of wars worth fighting, less on their justification. I'm not real torn up about freedom and autonomy for countries when they're aggressors and their motives seem wrong. Which makes....

Iraq (Desert Storm 2: Electric Boogaloo) a tougher issue. Clearly Saddam was a horrible ass but I'm not sure it was right to say f**k you to the world and go in guns lazing when they didn't have nuclear weapons.
I'll wait a century to see if the country's better off without a dictator.

Afghanistan. Taliban sucked, but the country seems like it can't live without a dictatorial entity. Whoops.

Paravion wrote: How is war justified?

I've always intuitively followed something close to a Rothbardian view:

Murray Rothbard wrote: My own view of war can be put simply: a just war exists when a people tries to ward off the threat of coercive domination by another people, or to overthrow an already-existing domination. A war is unjust, on the other hand, when a people try to impose domination on another people, or try to retain an already existing coercive rule over them.

Equality 7-2521 wrote: Epignosis wrote: Equality 7-2521 wrote: Epignosis wrote: Equality 7-2521 wrote: A question to thread participants: Which U.S. wars do you consider justified? Which do you not? At this juncture, I don't feel qualified to answer that. Why not? I've not studied most of our wars enough to give an educated answer. This is a place for baseless opinions, not informed debate.

I'm sure you'll get plenty of those!

I would ask you to clarify though: When you say "war," do you mean the basic reason why the war was fought initially, or the actual war, including the manner in which the missions were carried out?

Equality 7-2521 wrote: Padraic wrote: World War II. As justified or not justified?

I would think it's justified if we're attacked.  If one of our allies is attacked, and asks for our help, then we would probably have to consider helping....how to do so would be debatable.  Not really a fan of pre-emptive wars.  Am a big fan of peace-through-strength. 

thellama73 wrote: I am not as anti-war as many Libertarians. I recognize that there are times where violent conflict is the lesser of two evils. In particular, I support World War 2 and the American Revolution. Most of the others we have been involved in, however, have turned out to be somewhat unnecessary, hindsight being 20/20. I supported the Iraq War in the beginning, because I think it was necessary for us to hit the Islamic world hard to demonstrate that we do not take being bombed lightly, but it has dragged on for too long and the Afghanistan thing is pointless.

By that reasoning, I figured you'd be the other way around- in support of invading Afghanistan rather than Iraq.

Speaking personally, if you're going to strike back, better to do it smartly than with brute force.  Mossad anyone? (Get in there do it and get out.)   But then the military contractors wouldn't make all that money at the expense of the lives of our soldiers.

Edited by Slartibartfast - October 14 2010 at 12:17

What you may not know about US vs Iraq 1 was that they were given a green light by the US administration to invade.

Slartibartfast wrote: What you may not know about US vs Iraq 1 was that they were given a green light by the US administration to invade.

Equality 7-2521 wrote: I agree with most foreigners' assessment of American foreign policy. I have a very negative opinion of the American empire and in particular the disgraceful intervention over the past few decades by our CIA. I think the only justifiable US war was the American Revolution.