Is Internationalism Dead?

I've always been in favor of a robust foreign policy and a ready military not because I believe the United States should get involved in every international conflict, but because I recognize the reality of where we are today.

Strength is the only thing authoritarian despots recognize. Diplomacy and petty sanctions do little to deter dictators. You can't negotiate with evil people. They cannot be reasoned with. When are we going to get that through our heads? How many more wars is it going to take for us to understand this?

Neutrality never helps the oppressed. It only helps the oppressor. The cost of doing nothing in the face of chaos and evil is far greater than the evil of tyranny itself. We haven't always gotten it right from Iraq to Vietnam, but it's been this nation's responsibility to be the defender of freedom and democracy since 1945.

We have to retain that world status because if we don't China, Russia, or some other rogue state with big enough influence will take our place and they'll be able to export their ideas around the globe and those ideas are often not democratic ideals. In fact China is already trying to do that and succeeding in some aspects.

Non-interventionism doesn't work. It didn't work in the lead up to WWI and it has never worked. Even during the interwar period of the 1920s before the rise of Hitler the US and Europe were very much involved especially economically. It's only when we've turned to only domestic problems and discarded foreign ones have problems erupted. What goes on around the world effects domestic issues too.

The world is far too interconnected to say "Its none of our business what happens in the world". That statement is rooted in ignorance. Injustice anywhere it exists is everyone's responsibility. The US felt the exact same way in the lead up to WWII about not getting involved. It took the Japanese attack at Pearl Harbor and the deaths of 2,400 people to change minds.

Our complacency about what goes on in the world is what helped lead to the crisis in Eastern Europe. It goes beyond Biden even though he's partially responsible for the current crisis. It goes to the misguided foreign policy of our country for years from the mismanagement of the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan to our appeasement of North Korea and our own naivete to China in the 1990s.

The US has the largest military spending in the world because we're the world's largest democratic superpower and the second largest country based on population. So yes I am going to favor keeping military spending high and I'm not going to apologize for it.

This is why libertarians and some liberals are naive in foreign affairs because they have no understanding of the post-war order and think if you just leave everyone alone that fixes problems. No it doesn't and history has shown that especially regarding our own past inaction. It's why I don't take either seriously when it comes to foreign policy, especially libertarians when they talk foreign affairs because they still believe it's 1914 and not 2022. And the more radical ones want to do away with the institutions that were created after 1945 designed to keep the peace and resolve disputes. These institutions (UN & NATO) are not perfect, but they are better than having nothing and doing nothing. That's not to say they are not in need of reform.

We don't need to be involved in everything. We just need to be smart about each individual issue because each one is complicated from China to Russia to Iran and others. The problem is we are run by both idiots and people who still can't grasp that you can't reason with animalistic dictators. I'm a big believer in what Theodore Roosevelt called 'Big Stick Diplomacy'. We can be diplomatic and at the same time keep our enemies aware if they misbehave there will be repercussions.

The world is not what it was before 1945. You don't have to be a "warmonger" as some like to call it to support these ideas. Internationalism is the current world order even in spite of Russia trying to disrupt it. And it should remain that way. To think otherwise is both naive and not based in historical reality.