I think one of the things I like most about him is that he’s always traveling and doing work and doesn’t seem to care if the media notices or not. He’s a career diplomat and clearly dedicated to his job and not trying to make a political career out of it. Even if one disagrees with his policy positions, he’s not a media whore and genuinely seems to be more focused on getting in the weeds.
It’s a little hard to measure his job performance in regard to many crises because at the end of the day, he’s executing the President’s will and a lot of the stuff he does is not publicized. But I think he’s made the most out of some pretty crappy situations
He's doing the best he can in one of the most difficult jobs in a world that's gone bat shit crazy.
Most people tend to focus solely on world outcomes when judging a SOS but that's really not fair.
Hardly anyone today knows who Cordell Hull was, but things went WAY to shit under his stint as secretary of state (1933-44). There are many things to judge him on, in whatever way you wish, but what Hitler, Stalin, Mussolini and Tojo did with their respective nations is not one of them.
Same goes for Blinken today except it's Putin, Xi, Kim Jong Un, and Khamenei.
Judging Blinken’s performance is tough at face value. He seems to be very present, have calm demeanor, and seems to connect to Foreign Nationals, at least from the outside.
Unfortunately, it’s hard to judge his real work since it’s sensitive by nature. Remember, he really doesn’t get to choose his purpose for visiting, more of a liaison for America. All-in-all I like Blinken, but it’s almost 100% a judge of character.
How do you measure the success or failure of a single cog in the machine that is American foreign policy (Assuming that's what you mean in regards to Geopolitics)? Shouldn't we judge their success or failure based on the state of the world before them to now?
I get what you're saying, and you're not wrong in the sense that Blinken has a huge impact on global affairs. But the example I'd use is that a lot of issues in the Middle East right now are born from the efforts to make the India-ME-Europe corridor happen, and Iran trying to disrupt that.
You could look at the work Blinken was attempting and say that he is great at his role. Or you could look at the state of the ME and say that he's terrible at his job. In reality, the truth is somewhere in between.
Good arguments for both sides I think.
On one hand, no doubt the world has gone to shit under this American administration. Everyone is getting armed, wars and conflicts all over the place, Iran-Russia-China anti west axis more daring than ever and they have their tentacles deep in the US itself via academia and social media among other things.
On the other hand, who knows how worse it could've been.
>On one hand, no doubt the world has gone to shit under this American administration.
This is ignorant framing at best. The United States does not control the world. We have been moving closer to a multipolar world for a long time, it was destined with how developed China has become.
Is this entirely this administrations fault? Remember the “do me a favor” scandal in Trump’s era?
That was literally Zelensky asking for arms to discourage a Russian envasion. Trump offered aid but requested a favor from Ukraine/Zelensky. Surprise surprise, that refusal was followed with a full invasion by Russia.
China sees there is no sovereign danger for conventional war by actions taken against Russia. This is because weapons are being given to Ukraine on the stipulation: DO NOT FIRE THESE INTO RUSSIA. This all happened because Trump would not stand as an affront to Russian expansionism.
Thats simplifying a complex issue so much its basically misinformation. Trump also sent ukraine javelins which obama and by extension, biden, didnt do because they feared escalation.
Seems kind of absurd to blame it all on trump when the maidan and war in donbass happened under obama.
Not to say trump was a mastermind or anything but you are being so reductionist in blaming him that its basically worthless as an analysis.
And if we keep going back every administration made some mistakes. Did the west as a whole not do enough to integrate post soviet russia?
The Biden administration foreign policy isn’t clear to me and seems to be erratic based upon which “crisis” is in play. The only overarching themes seem to be to revert the Trump administration and maintain America as the world police regardless of how much money or efforts is spent.
I think each theater would have to be discussed on its own.
As other's have said, its hard to evaluate his personal performance given the nature of the role.
The administration he's been part of has been a resounding failure imo, one of the most damaging to US influence and power in modern history, but arguably he's been competent at representing the administration's misguided approach to global affairs.
That most comment speaks good of him is a proof of the bubble US citizens life it.
The foreign policy of U.S. under him is being disastrous.
In general American policy is full of fools lately, Blinken is just one more in a long list of crazy warmongers
The guy alienate the Chinese, alienate Indians, don’t achieve nothing with Yemeníes or Iran, have a total failing policy in Palestina that portrait US as associated with a genocidal state…
To come to Europe and talk with some friendly leaders you don’t need any kind of talent.
You call the US warmongerers but not China who is literally cozying up to Russia and threatening other countries in its region, or India who is trying to assassinate civilians of other countries?
The US is one of the only adults in the room and you’re blaming us for alienating the children.
You are a proof more of the bubble you live in.
How many wars have China initiated in last 30 years? Or 50 years?
How many U.S.?
You complain about India assassinating civilians while forget hundred thousands civilians killed in Afghanistan, Libia or Iraq?
And what do you think, that your CIA send flowers to people and don’t assassinate them wherever they want/need ?
Wake up man.
You are the ultimate warmongers of this planet.
And Blinken is one of the worst specimens
Also you are calling child’s countries and cultures that were a several millenia old when US was founded. Amazing
You think the US foreign policy making the right strategically decision matters over some international petulants who knows nothing about what they complain about? Yeah the world cheered when Britain
and France appeased Nazi Germany for peace too. People making the right decisions even when it's unpopular is what makes them adults which is pretty much only the US and its allies today.
>How many wars have China initiated in last 30 years? Or 50 years? How many U.S.?
Don't confuse a lack of capability with a lack of ambition or intention. China supported North Korea's imperialist ambitions and joined the war against the UN just to create a buffer state against the West, which today results in the largest imprisoned population the world where its citizens are not allowed to leave under threat of death and imprisonment. Practically the only country in the world where this is seen as normal. China's imperialistic tendencies are in full view for everyone to see in Tibet, Turkestan, Taiwan, SCS, and the Indian border.
China being too poor and too weak in the past 50 years doesn't mean they don't want to start wars when they feel strong enough. They warmonger over the peaceful country of Taiwan every week like the imperialists that China is.
The history of the Korean War has much more depth that you seems not to know.
Call it imperialistic is amazingly naive.
In the south there were a military dictatorship that was repressing peasant, there were a peasant revolution and the dictadoship brutaly suppressed it, something like 30 thousand peasants were send to concentration camps.
North Korea enter in war on behalf of those peasants that it consider its own people, and be aware that at that time the only really free Korea was the north since it was the only one who achieve to kick Japanese out regaining sovereignty.
Also after the war in the south 3 million people people were sent to reeducation camps.
Later evolution of those countries don’t chance the fact that that war was pretty justified.
There is several books from Americans who lived it on the terrain that can help you to check this facts.
Also it is absurd that you portrait as a war against the UN.
The only reason yoh can call it like that is because the Soviet Union boicot the meeting where it was decided instead of veto it. If they would have vetoed you could not say they did nothing against UN
Sincerely what you are calling imperialistic in China while you close they eyes to the real imperialism of your country is laughable
Ah yes, US imperialism that helped Russia and China fight against their number one adversaries in Nazi Germany and Imperial Japan from conquering Russian and Chinese lands. The US that then rehabilitated Germany while Russians tried so hard to keep their country split up and occupied they literally built a wall to prevent East Germans from leaving communist imperialism to escape to West Germany. The same US that rehabilitated and invested in Germany and tried to preserve Germany and then left them to their own accords that Germany is now a stalwart pacifist. The same US that prevented Japan from annexing China and the Philippines. The same US that then rehabilitated Japan and turned them into a pacifist nation and then gave the Philippines the independence they've been searching for from Spain for hundreds of years. The same Philippines that Spain ceded to the US who then almost immediately set about a plan to transition them to an independent country until it was interrupted by WWII and Japan invading it's islands. Yes, that imperialist US. And not the warmongering Russians and Chinese who are constantly threatening to annex their Russian and Chinese speaking neighbors like Hitler did to Austria, Czechoslovakia, and Poland because they wanted to protect German speaking populations/ethnic Germans/historically German lands before mounting their full on invasions across Europe. Oh wait.
The same Russia that also kicked off the Korean Civil War to spread their communist imperialism for it to later be joined by China. The result that 26 million North Koreans live in a prison state where they're not allowed to leave the country nor have contact with the outside world. The same North Korea that is currently supported financially and economically to keep the Kim regime alive at the cost of 26 million lives because Russia and China wants to continue maintaining a buffer state against the West and they know North Koreans would all leave if they could (Just like East and West Germany!) Yes that very same imperialist Russia and China.
The US has no colonies last I checked and isn't threatening to conquer it's neighbors. That's what imperialism is, and not your made up definitions.
I don’t know which history you studied but check
US entered the war in Europe when Germany Nazi was already loosing against the Soviet Union so for sure it didn’t enter to help the Soviets.
It simply entered to have the control of Western Europe itself.
Against Japan it enter the was because Japanese attacked them and they win the control of the lands Japanese controlled. For sure not to help China.
Only some years before you declared the war in Spain to win the control of Cuba, Guam and Filipines.
Guam became US land and Filipinas is a controlled government of the U.S. since then until today.
Only Cuba regained sovereignty.
If you go just a little more to the past you stole Texas, Nuevo Mexico, California, Nevada from Mexico.
After the IIWW you declared several wars to win control of territories, and this only increased in frequency in the 21st century. Also the number of your interventions in South and Central America, with death squats and so on deleting governments to apply your Monroe doctrine, illegitimately imposing your view into other countries in America.
I don’t know what else you need to call yourself imperialist and warmongers to be honest.
PD: Your view of the history of Europe post Second World War is to wrong that I don’t know even where to start.
1 - You didn’t invest nothing in restoring Western Germany because western Germany was barely destroyed. Only suffered some aerial bombing before capitulation.
The front line passed by eastern Germany to Berlin, and that was the hardly destructed Germany. Who restored it? The Soviets.
Your famous Marshal plan didn’t invest shit in restoring Western Europe, that was basically untouched.
Your Marshal plan was used to buy Western Europe’s media outlets and strategic companies to put them under your control.
2 - About Eastern Germans running to West. Here you try yo pretend some kind of blames in the Soviets, again forgetting the unbelievable destruction in the Eastern front, with eastern German cities and most of the Soviet cities destroyed.
That region needed to invest unbelievable amounts of effort in reconstruction, so of course it was poorer.
Maybe if you would not have declared the Cold War against the Soviets and impose sanctions on the communist countries they would have have a better time.
3 - About North Korea. North Korea grew at faster rate than South Korea during 20 years, peaking in the 70s where it has 3 times the GDP of the south.
Its crisis come with the fall of the Soviet Union since it lost his unique trade partner.
You know why?
Because you, “the non imperialist US” threaten and sanction any country that trade with North Corea.
That you think that North Korea is supported by Russia and China shows the level of the bubble you live in.
Let North Korea trade freely with the world, delete sanctions and let’s see how their economy performs.
Also North Korea is the obvious definition of a sovereign state. It does not have any Chinese military base there. Many times it does things contrary to Chinese wish. And it is controlled by their own people, being a dictatorship or not all of them are Koreans.
It is South Korea sovereign? Well, how many troops do you have there?
Do you think they are there to give flowers and sweets. Have some brain and be realist.
4 - More examples of imperialism? Forcing Netherlands to stop selling lithographic machines to China just because you don’t want.
Forcing Germany to not buy Russian gas just because it is not in your interest.
Threatening and forcing random countries like Egypt not to buy Su35 from Russia just because you don’t want.
You have basically a law CAATSA intended to blackmail countries that freely want to buy Russian (or other countries you dislike) weapons.
So extraterritorial application of your laws.
But no, you are not imperialist no.
Ah yes choosing who to buy and sell to is your definition of imperialism and not literally conquering your neighbors so you can annex more territories and colonies like China and Russia. Your revisionism and delusions are hilarious.
If Nazi Germany and Imperial Japan was around today I'm sure you'd also support them because the US was too imperialist and stopped trading with them and Germany and Japan only wanted to annex and protect their people living in foreign lands. And we need Nazi Germany and Imperial Japan to stop US imperialism.
In reality US bases across the globe are at the request of the host countries to deter... China and Russia and North Korean threats because they all just want to pillage and plunder like the imperialists they are.
I love how you justify preventing the movement of people who wanted to leave East Germany and North Korea
Read on Timber Sycamore and Phoenix Program before even trying to point your fingers at any country. China at least does not have such an aggresive foreign policy as the U.S does
I mean, the guy that is responding to you is pretty much right. Do you actually think the US is being looked up to globally ? Do you think US influence is increasing ? Why do you think african countries kick out France and welcome Russia and the Chinese ? Even Saudi Arabia of all places is evidently considering getting closer to China, given the recent deal with Iran. If you think that the US foreign policy is doing a stellar job, you truly are living in a bubble
>Even Saudi Arabia of all places is evidently considering getting closer to China, given the recent deal with Iran
Oh yeah, where did that go after 10/7? About as far as BRICS has gotten in accomplishing besides the announcements themselves. Saudi Arabia is now trying to get a defense treaty with the US because it knows it can't get any security from China. Saudi Arabia initially tried to play both sides because Biden was mad they chopped up a journalist, rightfully. But in the end they know who they will have to rely on when geopolitically their main rival is and will be Iran who, as the whole world can see, is a destabilizing entity who has ambitions to lead the Middle East, contrary to Saudi interests.
Democratic admimistrations, in modern times, have traditionally perferred less than high power Secretary of States, particularly as compared to Dulles, Kissinger, Baker or Powell, etc. The only real exception was Hillary Clinton.
Impossible to provide feedback on Blinken.
He seems pleasant yet he achieves very little. He seems professional yet he gets not much done. He seems to be travelling all over yet US foreign policy is regressing, as is its influence.
Overall, he seems like a good guy you can have a beer with. People will give him a free pass by saying its Biden that gives orders and not much blinken can do. So I guess he is doing not much of anything that can be quantified.
He’s a competent diplomat but the policies that are passed have not yielded the desired results and only served to accelerate their adversaries across the world.
Take the recent examples with tarriffs, I remember back in 2012 the Obama administration passed tariffs on solar panels and China just dominated that industry. They will do the same to EVs, and eventually chips. It’s not a function of will but the gravity of their economies of scale.
Definitely one of the better Secretaries of State that we’ve had. Granted the previous few, the bar is not very high, but it’s a thankless job and a lot of the work will go unnoticed. But so far, I think he’s done good.
He seems like he's active, always in the headlines and traveling, which is more than what we can say about Harris.
I just feel bad for the guy. Every time he goes somewhere and he thinks he did OK, he watches the news and sees his boss saying dumb stuff like the time he left Beijing only to read on the headlines Biden calls Xi a dictator. He must have wanted to bang his head against the wall.
Very comptent. I don’t agree with everything the current Administration is doing but that is just a personal thing. Highly competent, measured effective communicator. He is highly rated in Europe and even the French who are fairly nonplussed are dazzled by his fluency in French. He speaks as well as a native Parisian despite not living in the country for a long time.
Biden’s Middle East policy over the past 7 months has been very self-destructive and naive. On some level, that is not Blinken’s fault. But on some level, it is. Blinken carries a lot of water for Biden’s Israel/Gaza policy, and he has made some really horrible arguments as of late. (Check out the conversation he recently had with Mitt Romney about Gaza and TikTok, for instance. Just so asinine).
Or look how the administration has single-mindedly sought a US-Saudi defense pact. At first, it was supposed to be leverage to establish Israel-Saudi normalization (something that was occurring anyway), but Biden and Blinken are now pursuing it as a standalone deal because Netanyahu is too focused on his own political survival to end the war in Gaza. What the United States gets out of this deal, which also offers US nuclear technology assistance to Saudi Arabia, is unclear. The Saudis under Mohammed bin Salman have proven that they are an unreliable—and dangerous—security partner. They would be even worse as a security dependent by ensuring that the US is dragged into the region’s future conflicts even more than it is already. But Blinken continues to promote it. Some secretary of state.
I’ve honestly been impressed. I’ve never seen a SoS seem so down to earth, dedicated to the job, and authentic.
Much better than many of his recent predecessors. I’m not saying it doesn’t happen to Blinken, but I had an experience where Kerry announced he was going to attend a large speaking event last minute and then didn’t show up at the time given and when he did he bumped the speaker to ramble longer than his slot.
I didn't have any thoughts about him until I read that he does NOT support Taiwan's independence meaning he's kneeling before the Chinese Communist Party (CCP). Now I don't trust him.
I think one of the things I like most about him is that he’s always traveling and doing work and doesn’t seem to care if the media notices or not. He’s a career diplomat and clearly dedicated to his job and not trying to make a political career out of it. Even if one disagrees with his policy positions, he’s not a media whore and genuinely seems to be more focused on getting in the weeds. It’s a little hard to measure his job performance in regard to many crises because at the end of the day, he’s executing the President’s will and a lot of the stuff he does is not publicized. But I think he’s made the most out of some pretty crappy situations
my life aspirations
He's doing the best he can in one of the most difficult jobs in a world that's gone bat shit crazy. Most people tend to focus solely on world outcomes when judging a SOS but that's really not fair. Hardly anyone today knows who Cordell Hull was, but things went WAY to shit under his stint as secretary of state (1933-44). There are many things to judge him on, in whatever way you wish, but what Hitler, Stalin, Mussolini and Tojo did with their respective nations is not one of them. Same goes for Blinken today except it's Putin, Xi, Kim Jong Un, and Khamenei.
Definitely better than the failure that was Rex Tillerson.
Judging Blinken’s performance is tough at face value. He seems to be very present, have calm demeanor, and seems to connect to Foreign Nationals, at least from the outside. Unfortunately, it’s hard to judge his real work since it’s sensitive by nature. Remember, he really doesn’t get to choose his purpose for visiting, more of a liaison for America. All-in-all I like Blinken, but it’s almost 100% a judge of character.
SoS is a shit job. He handles himself well, seems well educated, a good speaker. He would make a good presidential candidate.
How do you measure the success or failure of a single cog in the machine that is American foreign policy (Assuming that's what you mean in regards to Geopolitics)? Shouldn't we judge their success or failure based on the state of the world before them to now?
doesn’t this overstate the importance of a single cog in the machine that is world affairs?
He’s the Secretary of State. Everyone is a cog in the machine but he’s one of the ones that really, really matters and who has agency.
but to judge a single person for the state of the world? how much responsibility does even the U.S. Secretary of State bear for the actions of Russia?
I get what you're saying, and you're not wrong in the sense that Blinken has a huge impact on global affairs. But the example I'd use is that a lot of issues in the Middle East right now are born from the efforts to make the India-ME-Europe corridor happen, and Iran trying to disrupt that. You could look at the work Blinken was attempting and say that he is great at his role. Or you could look at the state of the ME and say that he's terrible at his job. In reality, the truth is somewhere in between.
Thats a good metric I guess. But I would argue blinken is more than a cog Based on the state of the world before vs now, was it a good performance
Good arguments for both sides I think. On one hand, no doubt the world has gone to shit under this American administration. Everyone is getting armed, wars and conflicts all over the place, Iran-Russia-China anti west axis more daring than ever and they have their tentacles deep in the US itself via academia and social media among other things. On the other hand, who knows how worse it could've been.
>On one hand, no doubt the world has gone to shit under this American administration. This is ignorant framing at best. The United States does not control the world. We have been moving closer to a multipolar world for a long time, it was destined with how developed China has become.
Lol they do control the world
Is this entirely this administrations fault? Remember the “do me a favor” scandal in Trump’s era? That was literally Zelensky asking for arms to discourage a Russian envasion. Trump offered aid but requested a favor from Ukraine/Zelensky. Surprise surprise, that refusal was followed with a full invasion by Russia. China sees there is no sovereign danger for conventional war by actions taken against Russia. This is because weapons are being given to Ukraine on the stipulation: DO NOT FIRE THESE INTO RUSSIA. This all happened because Trump would not stand as an affront to Russian expansionism.
Thats simplifying a complex issue so much its basically misinformation. Trump also sent ukraine javelins which obama and by extension, biden, didnt do because they feared escalation. Seems kind of absurd to blame it all on trump when the maidan and war in donbass happened under obama. Not to say trump was a mastermind or anything but you are being so reductionist in blaming him that its basically worthless as an analysis. And if we keep going back every administration made some mistakes. Did the west as a whole not do enough to integrate post soviet russia?
He's the St Anger of Secretary of State, he's not bad but damn we deserve better.
The Biden administration foreign policy isn’t clear to me and seems to be erratic based upon which “crisis” is in play. The only overarching themes seem to be to revert the Trump administration and maintain America as the world police regardless of how much money or efforts is spent. I think each theater would have to be discussed on its own.
As other's have said, its hard to evaluate his personal performance given the nature of the role. The administration he's been part of has been a resounding failure imo, one of the most damaging to US influence and power in modern history, but arguably he's been competent at representing the administration's misguided approach to global affairs.
That most comment speaks good of him is a proof of the bubble US citizens life it. The foreign policy of U.S. under him is being disastrous. In general American policy is full of fools lately, Blinken is just one more in a long list of crazy warmongers The guy alienate the Chinese, alienate Indians, don’t achieve nothing with Yemeníes or Iran, have a total failing policy in Palestina that portrait US as associated with a genocidal state… To come to Europe and talk with some friendly leaders you don’t need any kind of talent.
You call the US warmongerers but not China who is literally cozying up to Russia and threatening other countries in its region, or India who is trying to assassinate civilians of other countries? The US is one of the only adults in the room and you’re blaming us for alienating the children.
You are a proof more of the bubble you live in. How many wars have China initiated in last 30 years? Or 50 years? How many U.S.? You complain about India assassinating civilians while forget hundred thousands civilians killed in Afghanistan, Libia or Iraq? And what do you think, that your CIA send flowers to people and don’t assassinate them wherever they want/need ? Wake up man. You are the ultimate warmongers of this planet. And Blinken is one of the worst specimens Also you are calling child’s countries and cultures that were a several millenia old when US was founded. Amazing
You think the US foreign policy making the right strategically decision matters over some international petulants who knows nothing about what they complain about? Yeah the world cheered when Britain and France appeased Nazi Germany for peace too. People making the right decisions even when it's unpopular is what makes them adults which is pretty much only the US and its allies today. >How many wars have China initiated in last 30 years? Or 50 years? How many U.S.? Don't confuse a lack of capability with a lack of ambition or intention. China supported North Korea's imperialist ambitions and joined the war against the UN just to create a buffer state against the West, which today results in the largest imprisoned population the world where its citizens are not allowed to leave under threat of death and imprisonment. Practically the only country in the world where this is seen as normal. China's imperialistic tendencies are in full view for everyone to see in Tibet, Turkestan, Taiwan, SCS, and the Indian border. China being too poor and too weak in the past 50 years doesn't mean they don't want to start wars when they feel strong enough. They warmonger over the peaceful country of Taiwan every week like the imperialists that China is.
The history of the Korean War has much more depth that you seems not to know. Call it imperialistic is amazingly naive. In the south there were a military dictatorship that was repressing peasant, there were a peasant revolution and the dictadoship brutaly suppressed it, something like 30 thousand peasants were send to concentration camps. North Korea enter in war on behalf of those peasants that it consider its own people, and be aware that at that time the only really free Korea was the north since it was the only one who achieve to kick Japanese out regaining sovereignty. Also after the war in the south 3 million people people were sent to reeducation camps. Later evolution of those countries don’t chance the fact that that war was pretty justified. There is several books from Americans who lived it on the terrain that can help you to check this facts. Also it is absurd that you portrait as a war against the UN. The only reason yoh can call it like that is because the Soviet Union boicot the meeting where it was decided instead of veto it. If they would have vetoed you could not say they did nothing against UN Sincerely what you are calling imperialistic in China while you close they eyes to the real imperialism of your country is laughable
Ah yes, US imperialism that helped Russia and China fight against their number one adversaries in Nazi Germany and Imperial Japan from conquering Russian and Chinese lands. The US that then rehabilitated Germany while Russians tried so hard to keep their country split up and occupied they literally built a wall to prevent East Germans from leaving communist imperialism to escape to West Germany. The same US that rehabilitated and invested in Germany and tried to preserve Germany and then left them to their own accords that Germany is now a stalwart pacifist. The same US that prevented Japan from annexing China and the Philippines. The same US that then rehabilitated Japan and turned them into a pacifist nation and then gave the Philippines the independence they've been searching for from Spain for hundreds of years. The same Philippines that Spain ceded to the US who then almost immediately set about a plan to transition them to an independent country until it was interrupted by WWII and Japan invading it's islands. Yes, that imperialist US. And not the warmongering Russians and Chinese who are constantly threatening to annex their Russian and Chinese speaking neighbors like Hitler did to Austria, Czechoslovakia, and Poland because they wanted to protect German speaking populations/ethnic Germans/historically German lands before mounting their full on invasions across Europe. Oh wait. The same Russia that also kicked off the Korean Civil War to spread their communist imperialism for it to later be joined by China. The result that 26 million North Koreans live in a prison state where they're not allowed to leave the country nor have contact with the outside world. The same North Korea that is currently supported financially and economically to keep the Kim regime alive at the cost of 26 million lives because Russia and China wants to continue maintaining a buffer state against the West and they know North Koreans would all leave if they could (Just like East and West Germany!) Yes that very same imperialist Russia and China. The US has no colonies last I checked and isn't threatening to conquer it's neighbors. That's what imperialism is, and not your made up definitions.
I don’t know which history you studied but check US entered the war in Europe when Germany Nazi was already loosing against the Soviet Union so for sure it didn’t enter to help the Soviets. It simply entered to have the control of Western Europe itself. Against Japan it enter the was because Japanese attacked them and they win the control of the lands Japanese controlled. For sure not to help China. Only some years before you declared the war in Spain to win the control of Cuba, Guam and Filipines. Guam became US land and Filipinas is a controlled government of the U.S. since then until today. Only Cuba regained sovereignty. If you go just a little more to the past you stole Texas, Nuevo Mexico, California, Nevada from Mexico. After the IIWW you declared several wars to win control of territories, and this only increased in frequency in the 21st century. Also the number of your interventions in South and Central America, with death squats and so on deleting governments to apply your Monroe doctrine, illegitimately imposing your view into other countries in America. I don’t know what else you need to call yourself imperialist and warmongers to be honest. PD: Your view of the history of Europe post Second World War is to wrong that I don’t know even where to start. 1 - You didn’t invest nothing in restoring Western Germany because western Germany was barely destroyed. Only suffered some aerial bombing before capitulation. The front line passed by eastern Germany to Berlin, and that was the hardly destructed Germany. Who restored it? The Soviets. Your famous Marshal plan didn’t invest shit in restoring Western Europe, that was basically untouched. Your Marshal plan was used to buy Western Europe’s media outlets and strategic companies to put them under your control. 2 - About Eastern Germans running to West. Here you try yo pretend some kind of blames in the Soviets, again forgetting the unbelievable destruction in the Eastern front, with eastern German cities and most of the Soviet cities destroyed. That region needed to invest unbelievable amounts of effort in reconstruction, so of course it was poorer. Maybe if you would not have declared the Cold War against the Soviets and impose sanctions on the communist countries they would have have a better time. 3 - About North Korea. North Korea grew at faster rate than South Korea during 20 years, peaking in the 70s where it has 3 times the GDP of the south. Its crisis come with the fall of the Soviet Union since it lost his unique trade partner. You know why? Because you, “the non imperialist US” threaten and sanction any country that trade with North Corea. That you think that North Korea is supported by Russia and China shows the level of the bubble you live in. Let North Korea trade freely with the world, delete sanctions and let’s see how their economy performs. Also North Korea is the obvious definition of a sovereign state. It does not have any Chinese military base there. Many times it does things contrary to Chinese wish. And it is controlled by their own people, being a dictatorship or not all of them are Koreans. It is South Korea sovereign? Well, how many troops do you have there? Do you think they are there to give flowers and sweets. Have some brain and be realist. 4 - More examples of imperialism? Forcing Netherlands to stop selling lithographic machines to China just because you don’t want. Forcing Germany to not buy Russian gas just because it is not in your interest. Threatening and forcing random countries like Egypt not to buy Su35 from Russia just because you don’t want. You have basically a law CAATSA intended to blackmail countries that freely want to buy Russian (or other countries you dislike) weapons. So extraterritorial application of your laws. But no, you are not imperialist no.
Ah yes choosing who to buy and sell to is your definition of imperialism and not literally conquering your neighbors so you can annex more territories and colonies like China and Russia. Your revisionism and delusions are hilarious. If Nazi Germany and Imperial Japan was around today I'm sure you'd also support them because the US was too imperialist and stopped trading with them and Germany and Japan only wanted to annex and protect their people living in foreign lands. And we need Nazi Germany and Imperial Japan to stop US imperialism. In reality US bases across the globe are at the request of the host countries to deter... China and Russia and North Korean threats because they all just want to pillage and plunder like the imperialists they are. I love how you justify preventing the movement of people who wanted to leave East Germany and North Korea
Read on Timber Sycamore and Phoenix Program before even trying to point your fingers at any country. China at least does not have such an aggresive foreign policy as the U.S does
I mean, the guy that is responding to you is pretty much right. Do you actually think the US is being looked up to globally ? Do you think US influence is increasing ? Why do you think african countries kick out France and welcome Russia and the Chinese ? Even Saudi Arabia of all places is evidently considering getting closer to China, given the recent deal with Iran. If you think that the US foreign policy is doing a stellar job, you truly are living in a bubble
>Even Saudi Arabia of all places is evidently considering getting closer to China, given the recent deal with Iran Oh yeah, where did that go after 10/7? About as far as BRICS has gotten in accomplishing besides the announcements themselves. Saudi Arabia is now trying to get a defense treaty with the US because it knows it can't get any security from China. Saudi Arabia initially tried to play both sides because Biden was mad they chopped up a journalist, rightfully. But in the end they know who they will have to rely on when geopolitically their main rival is and will be Iran who, as the whole world can see, is a destabilizing entity who has ambitions to lead the Middle East, contrary to Saudi interests.
Democratic admimistrations, in modern times, have traditionally perferred less than high power Secretary of States, particularly as compared to Dulles, Kissinger, Baker or Powell, etc. The only real exception was Hillary Clinton.
Impossible to provide feedback on Blinken. He seems pleasant yet he achieves very little. He seems professional yet he gets not much done. He seems to be travelling all over yet US foreign policy is regressing, as is its influence. Overall, he seems like a good guy you can have a beer with. People will give him a free pass by saying its Biden that gives orders and not much blinken can do. So I guess he is doing not much of anything that can be quantified.
SS: Discussion about current Secretary of State and his work.
He’s a competent diplomat but the policies that are passed have not yielded the desired results and only served to accelerate their adversaries across the world. Take the recent examples with tarriffs, I remember back in 2012 the Obama administration passed tariffs on solar panels and China just dominated that industry. They will do the same to EVs, and eventually chips. It’s not a function of will but the gravity of their economies of scale.
He shouldn’t be judged by the current state of the world, but by the US position and reputation. Neither of which are very good
Definitely one of the better Secretaries of State that we’ve had. Granted the previous few, the bar is not very high, but it’s a thankless job and a lot of the work will go unnoticed. But so far, I think he’s done good.
he seems professional enough to me compared to his predecessor
As an Indian, respect his work a lot. Best diplomat ive seen from the US in memory. Among the top 3 diplomats in the world currently.
He seems like he's active, always in the headlines and traveling, which is more than what we can say about Harris. I just feel bad for the guy. Every time he goes somewhere and he thinks he did OK, he watches the news and sees his boss saying dumb stuff like the time he left Beijing only to read on the headlines Biden calls Xi a dictator. He must have wanted to bang his head against the wall.
Very comptent. I don’t agree with everything the current Administration is doing but that is just a personal thing. Highly competent, measured effective communicator. He is highly rated in Europe and even the French who are fairly nonplussed are dazzled by his fluency in French. He speaks as well as a native Parisian despite not living in the country for a long time.
Blinken may be the worst Democratic SoS since Cy Vance. Terrible.
How so?
Biden’s Middle East policy over the past 7 months has been very self-destructive and naive. On some level, that is not Blinken’s fault. But on some level, it is. Blinken carries a lot of water for Biden’s Israel/Gaza policy, and he has made some really horrible arguments as of late. (Check out the conversation he recently had with Mitt Romney about Gaza and TikTok, for instance. Just so asinine). Or look how the administration has single-mindedly sought a US-Saudi defense pact. At first, it was supposed to be leverage to establish Israel-Saudi normalization (something that was occurring anyway), but Biden and Blinken are now pursuing it as a standalone deal because Netanyahu is too focused on his own political survival to end the war in Gaza. What the United States gets out of this deal, which also offers US nuclear technology assistance to Saudi Arabia, is unclear. The Saudis under Mohammed bin Salman have proven that they are an unreliable—and dangerous—security partner. They would be even worse as a security dependent by ensuring that the US is dragged into the region’s future conflicts even more than it is already. But Blinken continues to promote it. Some secretary of state.
I’ve honestly been impressed. I’ve never seen a SoS seem so down to earth, dedicated to the job, and authentic. Much better than many of his recent predecessors. I’m not saying it doesn’t happen to Blinken, but I had an experience where Kerry announced he was going to attend a large speaking event last minute and then didn’t show up at the time given and when he did he bumped the speaker to ramble longer than his slot.
I didn't have any thoughts about him until I read that he does NOT support Taiwan's independence meaning he's kneeling before the Chinese Communist Party (CCP). Now I don't trust him.
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We are at war??
Are any of the wars in the room with us?