This is genuinely worrying. It shows contempt towards (American) democracy. Worse still is what it means - is this because of the changing nature of warfare?
AI, drones, missiles, missile-shields etc. means that unless you want to occupy a territory, you don't really need to send your army / troops to a country any more to "punish" them. If you aren't going to put boots on the ground, you don't have to worry about body bags returning home and generating (unmanageable) political anger. Thus, politicians (from superpowers) who hold a contempt for the general public may feel that there is no need any more to get the public's approval for a war as these "ungrateful" citizens aren't anyway going to volunteer for a war without a reasonable justification. The Gaza genocide has already shown that unless the victims are "white, blue-eyed blonde Christians like us" ( https://www.newslaundry.com/2022/02/28/europeans-with-blue-e... ) western politicians are genuinely not going to care about such kind of war crimes. Combine that with extremist right-wing views of a new wave of imperialism (that is all about "regime" changes and killing leaders to install puppets) all stemming from the right- in the US, a multi-polar world order doesn't just seem like a "nice idea" but a political necessity.
This is only true if you define this to be a “war” and don’t define other similar actions to be a “war.” Obama announced the air strikes on Libya in 2011 after they had already begun: https://www.cnn.com/2011/WORLD/africa/03/19/libya.us.missile...
> U.S. President Barack Obama confirmed that he had authorized "limited military action in Libya" and that "that action has now begun." He is planning for the U.S. portion of the military action in Libya to last just a few days, according to a senior administration official.
You’re correct that U.S. Presidents haven’t sought to persuade the public when the engagement involves air strikes instead of boots on the ground. But that’s been true for a long time.
Trump called it a war. Hegseth called it a war. Rubio called it a war. Israel is calling it a war. Iran is calling it a war. Gulf states are calling it a war. Literally everyone outside of America is calling it a war. Majority of people inside America call it a war.
There is real consensus about this thing being a war.
1. That those in power believe they are so beyond consequences that literally nothing will happen to them, ever
or
2. That the time wasn't there to build the narrative since someone else forced their hand (e.g. Israel going in solo and either relying on the allies or having some Kompromat on specific actors)
https://www.theguardian.com/global/commentisfree/2026/mar/08...
There was never oversight, and never a United Nations control.
Or, if your fascist government is so incompetent that it thinks it has this kind of control.
I really, really don't think there's anything deeper here than just the fascism.
Vanilla authoritarianism, or other forms of government don't need approval from citizens. Oligarchy, monarch, etc... but at the end of the day, even a dictator needs to keep some critical level of people happy.
Classic CGPGray series on this:
US is done with the UN under Trump. Will we see a rethink if/when Democrats come back and then whipsaw back when Republicans gain power again?
That's a false dichotomy. The alternatives includes giving each country an equal standing without a veto, votes proportional to the population, or even fully direct democracy by every person in the world, and a million other alternatives I could think of if given an afternoon.
It's absolutely logically valid to think that international coordination is valuable but that the UN is a poor solution for this, and is blocking off a better solution. Recall also that before the UN we had the League of Nations, which had a similar mission but an even worse implementation, and there's a wide consensus that it's good that it was replaced.
1984 was about you after all more than about anyone else. What a disgust
