this post was submitted on 01 Jul 2024
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I seriously recommend you to read about imperialism. Imperialist nations (i.e. late stage capitalistic, industrialized nations, with sufficient accumulation of capital and sufficient development of monopolies, trusts and cartels, to the point of the most profitable action being the export of capital to other, poorer nations, with or without the consent of the locals), clash with each other in these attempts to expand their sphere of influence. This happened in WW1, WW2, and we're seeing it again with the Russian-NATO conflict which led to the Ukraine invasion.
Primarily the Russian government's fault, but of course NATO is partly at fault. Belonging to NATO isn't a human right, and the expansion of NATO further east than Germany shouldn't have taken place. If European countries wanted a military alliance, they should have made their own. I don't believe I need to preface every comment saying "I wholeheartedly condemn the actions of the fascist Russian government in Ukraine", which I do, as much as I don't preface my comment saying "I wholeheartedly condemn the actions of NATO in Iraq", which I also do.
Why should the expansion of NATO past Germany not have happened? No one forces countries to join NATO, they all willfully joined, often having to jump through several hoops to do so.
As I said, I know they willfully joined, I'm saying they shouldn't be allowed to join a military alliance with NATO, the same way I would want China not to create a military alliance and then incorporate Mexico and Canada, even if Mexico and Canada wanted to. Joining a military alliance isn't a human right.
Actually that is a human right. Countries are free to ally with whatever country they want pending any previous agreements. Eastern European countries made zero promises and had zero obligation to not join NATO. Russia doesn't have fucking "dibs" on them, just like the US doesn't have "dibs" on Canada or Mexico. I wouldn't have a problem with Mexico or Canada willfully joining an alliance with China because that is, in fact, their right to do so. And it would speak volumes to how far relations would have had to deteriorate between them and the US to get there, but that is their right to do so. Maybe if Russia wasn't such a shitty, untrustworthy neighbor, more countries would be willing to ally with them instead of NATO, but hey, that's Russia's problem.
Source?
Free to do so, for sure, I'm not claiming illegality, I'm claiming it's wrong. It leads historically to escalation, not to mitigation of tensions. Remember the missile crisis
Again, you're not understanding me for some reason. I'm not putting the blame on those countries, I'm putting the blame on NATO itself. It's not that these countries shouldn't want to join a pre-existing military alliance, it's that a supposedly defensive military alliance shouldn't incorporate member countries ever closer to the declared enemy of the US of A.
I would have immense problems with China fostering military relations with the neighbouring countries of their geopolitical adversary, and if you don't, I think you should rethink that.
I don't want any countries to ally militarily with Russia. I fully understand that Russia has a fascist aggressive government and I'm glad I don't currently live next to it as a Spanish citizen. My whole point is that NATO isn't a "purely defensive military alliance of independent countries", it's an organization subservient to the interests of the USA which has shown no remorse to act on foreign countries which didn't threat military action against member states of NATO, as was the case in Libya and Yugoslavia, and unofficially in Iraq.
Find me the source for ANY human right.
I hope you're a troll but here you go
https://www.un.org/en/about-us/universal-declaration-of-human-rights
That's a declaration of human rights, not a philosophical logical demonstration of why we are endowed with rights. The person was pointing out the silliness of your original question.
They literally said "Actually it is a human right", referring to the right of a nation to join a particular military alliance. They are the ones defending that, not me.
It might be a language issue. You asked for a source that nations have a right (some would argue a 'human' right) to join alliances:
So the question asking for a source on 'human rights' is kinda nonsensical, that's why they responded the way they did. You can't provide a source for 'human rights'. That's a philosophical / metaphysical question. There is no official source for human rights hence why the question makes no sense.
On another note, are you the guy I was discussing a while back about conscription in Ukraine? Can't remember. Hope you are all right if you are.
No, but thanks for the good wishes anyway
The question would be nonsensical when brought up randomly, not when brought up in the context of asking someone who claimed "joining a particular military alliance is a human right" . I wouldn't be asking that question if they didn't say "actually it is a human right to join a military alliance". When categorically affirming what is and what isn't a human right, in my opinion, it's understood that this would be the consensus of some international organization, or some resolution signed by almost every country on earth. Of course there's dissent, and discussion is good, but saying that "joining a military alliance is a human right" is extremely fringe and, frankly, the first time I've seen it, so I'd like to see where they got that from.
Yea I agree. It's a strange way to phrase it