When Did the West Stop Investing in its Own Capabilities?
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Archived from the IMDb Discussion Forums — The Soapbox
Innocent User — 11 months ago(April 09, 2025 02:18 PM)
When WWII ended we made the mistake of thinking we'd won. We hadn't. All we'd done was remove the Nazis and the Fascists from the equation, freeing up our other enemies, Russia and China, to begin what we called the Cold War. The Cold War wasn't a new conflict, it was the continuation of the same global war.
In 1990 we further exacerbated the problem by jumping to the disastrous conclusion that the "new" war had ended, and we ramped up the globalization and further reduced our capacity for war. All the while, our enemies continued the fight through economic subtefuge, proxy wars, political interference, and cultural and societal sabotage.
So, the answer to my question is 2nd September 1945.
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Innocent User — 11 months ago(April 09, 2025 03:10 PM)
From less free trade to more.
We have been steadily reducing our capacity to produce war materiel since the end of the 40s. At no point have we ramped that up. We've been increasingly offshoring all the means of producing tanks, aircraft, boats, boots, and bullets ever since then, as if it'll just magically be there when the first shots are fired.
Being rich is great. Being powerful, and able to sustain that power under fire, is greater.
Japan, Korea, Singapore, Qatar, Kuwait, Switzerland, and in fact all of Europe, are only rich because America is preventing the likes of Iran, North Korea, Russia, and of course China, from mugging them.
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Innocent User — 11 months ago(April 09, 2025 02:28 PM)
It is. We moved away from war and disharmony, Russia and China could not. Communism requires that freedom and democracy do not exist as options in the political marketplace, otherwise their own people will see the utopian lie for what it is. Dystopia.
Don't blame us. We tried. They couldn't play nice. Some people just want to watch the world burn. Why so serious? Pwned. Whatever that means. Who cuts the grass on this show? Please discuss.
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Innocent User — 11 months ago(April 09, 2025 02:23 PM)
I thought I'd misspelled subtefuge, because it looks like this on my screen:
subteIgnatiuse
But I haven't, obviously. I'm seeing that because using the filter words function I swapped all forms of Fugazi's name to Ignatius, in reference to the character from A Confederacy of Dunces.
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Uncreative — 11 months ago(April 09, 2025 03:01 PM)
The Washington Bullets defeated the Seattle Supersonics in game 7 of the NBA finals to win their first and only championship.
It was the beginning of the end. 20 years later the Bullets would no longer exist. They're now the Wizards. 10 years later the Sonics went extinct too after relocating to Oklahoma City. -
Innocent User — 11 months ago(April 09, 2025 03:12 PM)
I knew there was a defining moment, an actual second, in which it all collapsed for the west, but I couldn't quite put my finger on it. Thank you. I feel fully informed now.
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