Former US general advises Switzerland to prepare for war
www.swissinfo.ch
According to former United States general Ben Hodges, the withdrawal of US troops from Europe is only a matter of time. He advises Switzerland to prepare for war.

According to former United States general Ben Hodges, the withdrawal of US troops from Europe is only a matter of time. In an interview with SonntagsBlick, he advises Switzerland to prepare for war.

    • DiplomjodlerEnglish
      7•3 months ago

      So how do you decide who gets to govern, if not through elections? And yes, I am very much a “hurr ml” person. I’ve rarely seen such an accumulation of blockheads outside r/thedonald, back in the day.

        • SkilurosEnglish
          2•3 months ago

          This reads like satire, a parody of tankies.

            • SkilurosEnglish
              1•3 months ago

              No, it’s delusional bullshit. Copy-pasta for LARPers.

                • SkilurosEnglish
                  1•3 months ago

                  I am not a “sheltered westerner”.

                  Your world salad about bourgeois elections leading to facaism is complete bullshit and clearly not true, be it in the west or anywhere in the world.

                  Fascist/oligarch take over via democratic means is a lot more complex than that and has more to do with local social attitudes and certain qualities of a given political system.

                  You have no clue what you are talking about.

        • DiplomjodlerEnglish
          1•3 months ago

          So what is the solution? Violently overthrowing one bunch of bastards will only end up with another bunch of bastards. Completely smashing the system will lead straight to warlordism. Lasting positive change was only ever achieved at the ballot box. And if you despise democracy, I despise you as much as the fascists and I fail to see the difference.

            • @Waphles@lemmy.worldEnglish
              2•3 months ago

              So personally, as a Scandinavian social-democrat and union member I would like to ask this question in response to “communism is the history proven way”: show me. What examples from history do you have?

                • @Waphles@lemmy.worldEnglish
                  1•3 months ago

                  I am not sure what you are trying to say, and I am not sure why you are reacting as you are.

                  My only point by mentioning Scandinavia was to say I believe in social benefits, unionization, and heavy market regulation by the state. That being said, I personally know of no successful communist state (successful in the eyes of the average proletariat) from history. I don’t believe it is intellectually honest to call Cuba and China successful examples.

                  I do not see that getting rid of capitalism is a sensible or viable option (or that it has ever been done without famine or other such terrible side effects), but I never doubt that the invisible hand, is the invisible hand in my pocket - so it is our duty as voters to make sure that we regulate the hell out of everything and our government has the teeth to do so.

                  I believe you mentioned above that you didn’t vote, but you are dissatisfied with foreign companies extracting resources (and presumably your government failing to sensibly tax and regulate the practice). I’m not sure you will be able to change that without either voting or taking part in revolution.

                  • ☂️-English
                    2•3 months ago

                    assuming you are arguing in good faith you are, again, in a comfortable and privileged position to take when northern europe is pillaging the third world for our resources using capitalist imperialism. you don’t represent the average proletariat, and thats peachy coming from the place that colonized us for centuries.

                    china was the poorest hungriest planet in the world before the revolution and is now an industrial world power, cuba has achieved amazing things despite a brutal blockade by the most powerful empire in history, compare it to haiti. look up why some africans are having revolutions right now.

                    beyond that i don’t know what to tell you, you mention all the nice things you have because of the aforementioned imperialism like its a natural thing to have everywhere in the capitalist world.

                    here is the problem: the rest of the world can’t vote imperialism away. we get invaded and destroyed, look up what happened to the elected chilean socialist government i mentioned before if you want to get an idea of what i am talking about.

                    I believe you mentioned above that you didn’t vote

                    I definetly did not say that at all.

              • @Takapapatapaka@lemmy.worldEnglish
                2•3 months ago

                If we evict the socialist dictatures/guerillas led by marxist-leninist parties and other authoritarian flavors of communism, remains some attempts at libertarian communism, some surviving longer than other : Paris in 1871, Ukraine in 1917, Spain in 1936-1937 are short lived examples of past communist situations that brought social changes a century or half a century before they could be obtained again, for those we obtained back. Nowadays examples are Rojava and Zapatistad territoried in Chiapas, Mexico.

                • @Waphles@lemmy.worldEnglish
                  2•3 months ago

                  Thank you for answering. I appreciate the efforts of your listed examples, especially considering their attempts at establishing human rights or dignities before it was even a thing. What I do feel is a counterpoint is how short lived they all were. I also feel for the Kurds (tough neighborhood) but I am not quite ready to move to Rojava, despite their developments I also fear that in time it may be added to your list of short lived examples. Do you feel that libertarian communism is the best theoretical alignment for a modern communist state?

                  • @electric_nan@lemmy.mlEnglish
                    4•3 months ago

                    The whole world is a “tough neighborhood” for small states. Cuba has been remarkably successful given its adversaries.

                  • @Takapapatapaka@lemmy.worldEnglish
                    1•3 months ago

                    Thanks for your appreciation. We of course agree that they all are very very short lived. Sadly, the Kurds will effectively probably have a rough time in the near future. Zapatistas are quite an exception in here, they manage to stay steady for some years now, but of course their situation is quite unique (though in all examples I gave it was unique situations).

                    The common point in all those cases are that the reason for their short durations are more or less authoritarians states, in its diverse forms (Republic in 1871, Fascists+Republic in 1936, Communists in 1917, Turkey for Rojava, etc.). So i feel like if every system that has been criticized as bad all fought against libertarian communism, maybe that’s a hint about how good a system it is. I’m not sure if it’s the best for modern communism, maybe nowadays situation requires something else, but thanks to its versatility, I think it could adapt. So yeah, I kinda feel that libertarian communism and its declinations are the best theoretical alignment for communism in general (though it’s not necessarily a state, precisely).