Resolved: Failed nations are a greater threat to the United States than stable nations.

[Roaming East]

Piracy effecting trade? barely. Picking off one or 2 average sized ships every now and then isnt causing even a minor glitch in the US' operations.

[Afterburner]

Originally Posted by Roaming East

Piracy effecting trade? barely. Picking off one or 2 average sized ships every now and then isnt causing even a minor glitch in the US' operations.

It makes shipping companies pretty uncomfortable sending things through infamously pirate infested waters, however.

Ultimately it is in the U.S. government's best interest to have stable governments for the simple fact that you can't invest in a war torn country nearly as well as you can in a fairly stable country. The only people that benefit from having countries in chaos are arm's dealers, which is a small segment of U.S. companies. The big ones like automobile manufacturers, clothing companies, oil companies and so on benefit from having a stable country.

You especially want nuclear powers to stay stable, for rather obvious reasons. In the ideal world for governments (and this goes for every nation out there.) every country would be stable, but weaker then you, and fairly fractured between themselves. Means you can dominate any group, and the groups can't work together to fight you.

[EO Violation]

Originally Posted by Meyerlifts

I don't want to the arguements to be all about military power. I want military, economic, and environmental arguements. Don't verbally assult the other side. Also, find good sources and cite them! Use them in your arguements! The more evidence you have in your cases the better!

Yes dear.

Of course they are. A stable, modern, nation realizes that peace is in its best interest, and will not go to war. It is the failed state, your Venezuelas, Irans, North Koreas, etc... that seek to cause problems, mainly because they feel they are without other options.

[Warforger]

Originally Posted by Mr.Bouncer

All the Balkan states like former Yugoslavia, and the Middle East are full of former Soviet states that were run by Russia or under heavy influence and are the most conflict-filled, though they don't pose much of a threat.

Yugoslavia for one, is no longer a country. Not all the Balkan States, I come from Bulgaria, I visit there every year, there pretty stable and are getting close to surpassing the US Dollar, a few years ago there were troops and a tank at the airport, along with a nuclear radiation thing. Now its gone, aside from a threat to poison the tap water in Sofia (and from what I hear its pretty shitty to begin with) its pretty stable.

Serbia had a problem with Kosovo because the Albanians who lived there wanted there own country, and they were discriminating against the Native Serbians and attacking, likewise the Serbian government sent troops to defend. This is not surprising since the Balkans has the Orthodox vs. Islam battle (not due to religion, its merely a seperating factor, it has to do with curel rule from the Ottomans), and Albania is largly Muslim. What IMO makes the Serbians justified, is that the Albanians have there own country, so there nothing like the Kurds, who are disciminated against there own governments Iraq and Turkey.

[Mandalore]

Originally Posted by EO Violation

Yes dear.

Of course they are. A stable, modern, nation realizes that peace is in its best interest, and will not go to war. It is the failed state, your Venezuelas, Irans, North Koreas, etc... that seek to cause problems, mainly because they feel they are without other options.

It depends on what is considered a failed nation. North Korea may be regarded as failed in western eyes but in itself it has been stable for the last few decades.

[Junk angel]

To be honest the greatest threat is not a failed nations, but the political system that emerges from one.

These are very often based on needing to rally against an enemy, in rallying the population against someone else. And this rallying can lead to stronger distrust and fanatism inside of the population itself.

A hate that can be easily targeted at the US. Or the western world at general.
Just take Nazi germany as the prime example. A nation that failed, a constitution that while good was ignored and a very quick rise of certain fanatic tendencies among the population escalated into what is one of the biggest, if not the biggest, wars in history.

Another pretty good example is the CCCP. Once more a failed nation that quickly girated towards a strong focus against and d enemy. This being Poland and Finland first, Nazi Germany after that and once the war stopped, the western world.


Admittedly this is not always the case. As a general rule it isn't. It usually is if the nation has to get on it's own legs by itself without any real external help, or is even held down by other nations. (Again the Weimar republic after Versailles)

[Smitty025]

Failed nations are a much greater threat to the US because we can't seem to help ourselves from invading them. We seem to thrive on picking on the small guys that pose no threat (e.g. Iraq), while we ignore the larger countries that often actively support organizations that threaten our security (e.g. Saudi Arabia). This creates a problem for us because as our government and military commanders have so aptly demonstrated in Iraq (and to a lesser extent, Afghanistan in recent years), we are ill prepared to fight in many of these areas.

[Crazy Wolf]

First we must define "failed state". As far as I can tell, the best definition of a "failed state" is a state that is unable to enforce its will or (for nicer states) care for its people. Somalia is an example, Mexico is looking more and more like one.

Failed states, being unable to devote much effort to a military, are less of a threat to the USA. However, the people of a failed state are much more of a threat, as an ungoverned people is usually unruly, and without a group to promote groupthink, is more likely to have a few people willing to go do something counter to what the gummint wants.

[The Body Popper]

I think this Meyerlifts guy may be using us to write his paper for school...

[Commissar MercZ]

Like JA said failed states can be breeding grounds for extreme elements which can pose a threat later on to the developed nations.

However in regards to actually developing a nation into stability, this varies. The US and other nations are only interested in getting it "stable" in regards to a market that they can trade with- anything from ordinary trade to arms sales. This doesn't mean the society has to be free however, the US supported various dictatorships across Latin America. In regards to this, Chile was "stable" in most ways, but after Salvador Allende's election the US saw fit to help engineer the conditions for a coup and catapulted General Pinochet to his rule over that country.

Additionally, these states that are only stable so far as to give economic benefit can end up causing problems later on. A good example is how the oppressive and harsh conditions in Monarchical Iran gave rise to the Islamic Revolution and created a mess for the US.

But if the US chooses to genuinely help a nation "develop" in the fullest sense of the word, then it won't be as desirable of an economic prize. The nation will have greater control over their resources and will be less likely to be easily exploited.