Quote Originally Posted by circmand View Post
Being nice hasnt gotten the USA anything but contempt from other countries
I'm surprised you say that when I've already given an example where diplomacy has been successful. It is no isolated incident either - for example even France has strongly endorsed the new "surge" in afghanistan with NATO troop counts expected to reach at least 47,000.

I'm not saying diplomacy is 100% effective, but I'm confident it is a whole lot more effective than trying to boss everybody around. And, its not like we have to act tough to scare anyone - everybody knows we've got the biggest stick in the world and have used it more than enough times since the end of WWII. Why do you think Iran wants nukes in the first place? We showed them what we will do to a country that we don't like who doesn't have nukes.

Every country has been invaded the USA is the only one that gives the country back and taxes its citizens to rebuild the defeated country leaving them better off than they were when they started.
Perhaps you can name an example where beating on a country that was down, or just leaving it to rot, ended up as a net positive for the USA in the long run? Or at least a case where rebuilding ended up as a net loss?

The kind of treatment you seem to be advocating really backfired with respect to the Weimar Republic. Yet rebuilding paid huge dividends with Germany and Japan after WWII. Maybe I've just got a big blind spot, but I can't think of a single case where determined rebuilding of a defeated country was not a massive net benefit for the USA in the long run.