What the German or French people believe is largely irrelevant to the force those nations wield. Most Americans distrust the US also. Doesn’t stop any of these partners from their shared project of hegemonic dominance and economic subjugation over vast parts of the world. I suspect that the shared cultural and historical root that you’re referring to is the belief that we somehow deserve to exploit, without consequence, people and resources everywhere.
No, that is not a western characteristic, but a human one. Given the condition for exploitation each system of government will do that. China does it, India does it, Saudi does it. If you consider also Russia “not western” then also Russia does it. The fact that some western countries were better at hegemonic dominance is the result of historical military prowess, more than cultural alignment. Finland, Austria, Ireland are not particularly different in cultural makeup from Sweden, Germany and Britain, but their role in historical colonialism and exploitation differs a lot.
The point I was trying to make originally was that bad is bad, and the badness of your opponent doesn’t make you less bad. I will add that claiming that everyone is bad doesn’t excuse badness.
What the German or French people believe is largely irrelevant to the force those nations wield. Most Americans distrust the US also. Doesn’t stop any of these partners from their shared project of hegemonic dominance and economic subjugation over vast parts of the world. I suspect that the shared cultural and historical root that you’re referring to is the belief that we somehow deserve to exploit, without consequence, people and resources everywhere.
No, that is not a western characteristic, but a human one. Given the condition for exploitation each system of government will do that. China does it, India does it, Saudi does it. If you consider also Russia “not western” then also Russia does it. The fact that some western countries were better at hegemonic dominance is the result of historical military prowess, more than cultural alignment. Finland, Austria, Ireland are not particularly different in cultural makeup from Sweden, Germany and Britain, but their role in historical colonialism and exploitation differs a lot.
The point I was trying to make originally was that bad is bad, and the badness of your opponent doesn’t make you less bad. I will add that claiming that everyone is bad doesn’t excuse badness.
NATO is trash.
France and Germany still have functioning democracy, however imperfect. What people think has a lot of bearing, it’s just it’s not immediate.