I want us to look at the question at different view. US have military bases around those countries. Why don’t we put our foot into their shoes? We may afraid of another 911 but think about this: if Iraq has a military base in Mexico and have hundreds of missiles aiming to major cities of US. Would you fear every day? So we can imagine what they’re feelings about us. And this video, it’s made by Americans and showed to us, but it just a video collection full of US ideology. Have you ever thought about why those attack only aiming to US and US allies? I know it has a long history, but the basic thing is the ideologies are so different. And all the governments and Medias are fomenting heating and misunderstanding. The only difference is that US is rich and have well equipped army and they are poor and can only use suicide bombers to kill innocent citizens.
Few years ago I’ve read a report about the conflicts and suicide bombers of all these years. And most of them are related to Muslims. The basic reason is that in Muslim dogmatic they think if you are not Muslim you must be a heathen and heathen are bad. I used to have a roommate who is Muslim, and at first when some Christians talk to him, he was so frightened. He thought they might kill him. So he didn’t talked to them and be so cold. But I know, he’s a good kid and also a very pious Sunni Muslims. He prayed five times a day, and never wanted to do bad things. But in the situation above, like instinct, he wanted to self-defense. Muslim is not like other religious, it’s not only a religion but also a way of life. In Quran, it also teaches people how to live and how to celebrate. The Muslim is a complete social system. In another word, those people are been “brainwashed” and hard to change. They have a different moral system. So Jihad is a part of their life. It not fit in the cosmopolitan values today but might useful in ancient times. Obviously, it’s so bad that they can’t reform Quran and make it more updated.
Some people may think that if we just cut 10% of the military budget and use that money to do some good things would be perfect. But the fact is, if that got cut, can you make sure we won’t get another “911”? The fact is nobody can. What we see, we heard, we read, are all from the media. On the other word, all of them are not 100% right. You have no idea what’s going on, even somebody think they “have” some ideas.
Like the title of the video, US Army is an empire. All empires will eventually end. The only problem is when. I can say the system right now is not good. Most people don’t like it; parties use it like a bargaining chip. And like we heard from today’s class even troops built roads, hospitals for local people, they still hate US Army. Like an old saying, war is always a bad thing.
I think maybe some robots like the Terminator can be made in the future, that make things a little easier. Those Terminators are not belonging to any country but just to keep peace. On the other word, they are real world office.
Like the pie graph we saw in class, the military fee of US is nearly half of the whole world. And US have the most powerful troops all over the world. From my point of view, the military is necessity for a country but now the problem now is we spend too much on it and utility is decreasing. The few wars these years seem hard to define as defensive wars. For many countries, US Army is like a “world cop”. US troops are everywhere in the world. Don’t you think it’s ridiculous? Why there’s US Army in Japan, Iraq, German, Kyrgyz Republic, etc. It doesn’t make sense. Like the governor of Kyrgyz Republic said in the video, how about we send some troops to Miami? What would America people think? Obviously, people have no idea why government doing this. I think there got is a solid reason. For us, it at least makes us feel a little saver. But people are worry about the budget or humanitarian crisis in those countries.
Obviously, the speaker tried to raise social concern about “another side of war”. But honestly it’s not good “news content”. It’s happening every day and can’t be called “news”. And in information age, they can hardly arousing people’s interest. When talking about money for war or women, she just compares the amount of money. I’m not a bellicose elements and my major is economics, so in my opinion, to start a war is more profitable for government than just give them to people. For instance, Iraq war cost more than 300 billion at the same time oil price increased rapidly and the government and enterprises earned more than 300 billion from stock, bonds, manufacturing, etc. While, nobody would send troops to Africa, there are only jungles. Human rights crisis are just excuses. People may care about it but the government won’t.
War is always related to death. Like the speaker said, people are not fear about dying; they’re fear about losing loved one. I think the atmosphere would change if a community has too many people losing their relatives and finally lead to the source of most of the conflicts today “revenge”. As the topic here is women and war, it reminds me the shakhidki, the feminine Russian variant for the Arabic word meaning holy warriors who sacrifice their lives, known as “black widows”. Usually their husbands or children have been killed in the war and the whole community turned them into suicide boomers. They are living in lots of “revenge invisible strings”. They been trained to carry out attacks, and they’re proud of it. It makes sense but it not normal. Like the speaker said the society fiber has been tore. Most of the women in the war are just like she said; they’re trying to living and hoping one day they will have peace.
When I was a child, I thought it’s quite peace now a days. But few years later, I found out that I was wrong. Wars are happening every day. Right now there’s a modern warfare in Libya and many armed conflicts in Middle East and Africa. There are many people living there and like the speaker, “woke up in the night and heard a big explosion”. I haven’t experience war myself and I’m not sure about the statues of people in there. Due to the speaker, they seem living in both silence of war and “singing and dancing everyday”. I think the “silence of humanity” is been used by the speaker to describe the most hard time of the war.
......From my point of view, I can accept that few rich people have more incomes than others. What I want to say is those people are not only rich guys they also became famous, powerful, influential, and symbolized. For example, Bill Gates and Warren Buffett. They’re rich and they also use their knowledge and money to do charity these years. And I believe they did much better than some of the ordinary NGOs or government. Because they’re talented people which can rationally allocate resources. On this aspect it’s not bad. You can’t blame somebody only because his rich, right? And I believe most rich people are hardworking and did a great job.
.....But overall, it’s bad for the society, and I believe it’s one of the major differences of developing country and developed country. The problem is more common in developing countries. I think the best way to deal with it is to improve the legal system and law enforcement system. Obviously, US have one of the best legal systems in the world. But they still have to improve it to prevent “cheating” in the politic or finance system. With certain laws, government can easily eliminate irregularities. One the other hand, the law enforcement need to be more effective. Like some rumors, law enforcement might be bribed sometimes and make those “cheaters” at large......
I know that wealth is unequally distributed in the World. But the world is like this, isn’t it? It reminds me the famous quotation "All men are created equal". But actually it’s not. People have different background, different IQ, different EQ, etc. So everybody is in an unequal world. Although US may be the most equal country in the world, but there’s still inequality classes in here. Like Sam said in the article he’s struggle with people who cheat and “game” the system and give themselves and their friends and companies unfair advantages. I think it’s common in every country. In any country you can find a group of people who are taking advantage from policies and they are trying their best to protect the situation. Although it’s unfair, from aspect of economic it makes sense. Those guys who cheated in the society took adventures while others don’t. What’s more, they may have cost more money on bribe. It makes sense from the quotation “high input high output”......
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