[HN Gopher] Nicolas Guillou, French ICC judge sanctioned by the ...
___________________________________________________________________
Nicolas Guillou, French ICC judge sanctioned by the US and
"debanked"
Author : lifeisstillgood
Score : 339 points
Date : 2025-12-30 11:13 UTC (11 hours ago)
(HTM) web link (www.lemonde.fr)
(TXT) w3m dump (www.lemonde.fr)
| mkleczek wrote:
| https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46432107
|
| I wonder if (when?) elites are going to use and support Bitcoin.
| Oppressive governments will force citizens - even such powerful
| as judges - to search for escapes.
| tgv wrote:
| First, a French judge has no power in the US. Second, Bitcoin
| is utter shit: it is not sustainable and mainly used to prop up
| criminals. Third, if money can be hidden and taxation becomes
| very difficult or impossible, society will collapse, and the
| "elite" loses its position. Bitcoin is not an alternative.
| integralid wrote:
| Cash is more anonymous and less trackable than Bitcoin and
| the society didn't collapse.
| krior wrote:
| Then why should we use bitcoin?
| lmz wrote:
| Cash is a bit bulky and can't be sent over fiber.
| rounce wrote:
| https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hawala
| mothballed wrote:
| Hawala is such a simple, effective, and relatively
| anonymous system that bypasses banking that the
| government had to convince the populace that anyone who
| uses it is a terrorist. It also helps they use the arab
| name even though it is of Indian origin.
| CaRDiaK wrote:
| Because it's faster, easier, safer and cheaper to
| transfer large volumes of capital than say loading a
| plane with gold or sending a bag of cash.
| bdcravens wrote:
| As long as you're quick to cash in and cash out of it.
| Potential gains are fun, but losing 10% a month isn't.
| xvector wrote:
| That's not a real problem though, stablecoins exist.
| bdcravens wrote:
| You're not wrong, but the conversation was about Bitcoin,
| not cryptocurrency in general.
| tgv wrote:
| You can't get (much) cash without the transaction being
| traced or criminal in many countries. There's a limit to
| legal cash transactions.
|
| Arguments about amount are immaterial to me. Cash
| transactions of say $500k are physically doable in many
| systems.
|
| And cash transaction don't require burning the Amazon, of
| course.
| OutOfHere wrote:
| Cryptocurrencies work fine. If the debanked were to use them,
| they would find 90% of their restrictions lifted immediately
| and without permission from anyone.
|
| No, society will not collapse; it will stabilize. There are
| many forms of taxation, e.g. property, tarrifs, etc. that are
| unaffected.
|
| Those who call Bitcoin utter shit always have an agenda and
| insecurities rooted in a feared loss of status.
| alecco wrote:
| The banking cartel will outlaw any real alternative. Bitcoin,
| Brics crypto system, whatever. And they will confiscate gold
| like back in the 30s. If they don't their magic money faucet
| will end. And they started wars for much smaller threats to
| their dominance.
| hiq wrote:
| https://archive.is/DFHM6
| praptak wrote:
| _" What is the purpose of the American sanctions mechanism?
|
| Initially, it was created to address human rights
| violations[...]"_
|
| Yet here we are: it's being used to harass judges who address
| human rights violations.
| crazybonkersai wrote:
| Correction: it was created to advance own geopolitical goals
| and harrass unfriendly regimes using human rights abuse as an
| excuse. So in that sense nothing has fundamentally changed.
| raverbashing wrote:
| "Always has been" ;)
| epistasis wrote:
| _Which_ geopolitical goals was it created for? Certainly not
| the ones it 's being used for right now.
|
| This sort of fallacy, of widening a category such that the
| initial meaning is lost, and then advancing an argument on
| that false category, is something I'm seeing a lot more these
| days in political topics. But I'm not sure I have a name for
| the fallacy.
|
| It's like people that argue that the US civil wars was
| "actually" about states' rights and economic differences
| rather than slavery. It wasn't a war about the concepts of
| states rights in general, it was about the right of states to
| do one thing: legalize slavery. It wasn't about the idea of
| economic differences in general, it was about one specific
| economic difference: chattel slavery and whether those slaves
| get paid and have economic freedom.
| JumpCrisscross wrote:
| > _Which geopolitical goals was it created for?_
|
| American interests. (America, like China and Russia, is not
| subject to the ICC.)
| piva00 wrote:
| Not only judges in the ICC, the USA also used sanctions against
| a Brazilian Supreme Court Justice that is responsible for
| Bolsonaro's attempted coup case.
|
| It's even more egregious it used the Magnitsky Act for that...
| pcthrowaway wrote:
| The U.S. has also sanctioned Francesca Albanese, the United
| Nations Special Rapporteur on the occupied Palestinian
| territories
| FridayoLeary wrote:
| Well she's a bit crazy isn't she? I don't see how consistently
| failing to address palestinian terrorism helps her do her
| stated job.
| adhamsalama wrote:
| Who addresses Israeli terrorism?
| bawolff wrote:
| The more wild US gets with its sanction powers the more it draws
| other countries to move usa away from the center of the financial
| system.
|
| Nobody cares when usa was sanctioning random Iranians or Russians
| comitting human rights abuses, but the ICC is relatively popular
| in europe and the optics of this makes america look like
| gangsters. Obviously nothing is going to happen in the short
| term, but i wonder how it will errode american soft power in the
| long term if they keep this sort of thing up.
| BLKNSLVR wrote:
| The US has any soft power left?
|
| I think Trump has successfully destroyed all of that and
| replaced it with (rhetoric about) threats of hard power.
|
| The Trump administration is the equivalent of a lazy/absent
| parent. The kids have no respect for them whatsoever, but
| they're sick with them for time being and aware that belt hurts
| when it's deployed.
| jeltz wrote:
| It still has quite a bit. It took decades to build it up, and
| Trump has not yet managed to destroy all of it in one year,
| but maybe four years ...
| mdhb wrote:
| No I think it's properly ruined at this point. There is no
| possible way any of their formal allies will ever be able
| to trust them again without a LOT of people going to jail
| and such fundamental changes to how power works in the
| country that I don't think they are even remotely capable
| of pulling off.
| xvector wrote:
| I am deeply skeptical of this statement. Soft power is
| great but actual power comes from the ability to project
| your military and economy.
|
| As such, the US's soft power will remain until the EU is
| willing to compromise on its welfare state to build an
| actual functioning defense industry and an economy that
| prioritizes innovation over taxes/regulation.
|
| But I am skeptical the EU/UK will ever reach such a
| compromise (see: mass riots in France over raising the
| retirement age, despite it being objectively and clearly
| necessary; the UK's reluctance to release the triple lock
| pension despite it impoverishing the country, etc.)
| mdhb wrote:
| I take it you don't follow the European defence industry
| news but the wheels are very much turning already. They
| are planning an independent future and are hyper aware
| that it is now official US nation strategy priority to
| try and destroy the European Union as a political body
| and make it into a vassal state
| xvector wrote:
| I do follow EU defense news and I have seen that things
| are heating up. But I'll believe it when I see it.
|
| This will require a significant shift of public funding
| allocation away from welfare, and the public will need to
| approve it. Will they? I doubt it.
| heresie-dabord wrote:
| > this makes america look like gangsters
|
| It is understandable that you would have this impression, given
| that the US leader has total legal immunity, directly controls
| the judiciary, Congress, tariffs and formerly independent
| financial agencies, openly threatens journalists and news media
| companies, appoints untalented lackies and openly enriches
| himself and his family and associates, openly uses federal
| legal entities to pursue opponents, deploys the military within
| the country against its own citizens, and has made federal
| arrest without warrant a common daily event.
|
| It you live in a country where your government does not exhibit
| such characteristics, it's easy to mistake the above as an
| indication of something suspiciously unlike democracy.
|
| From TFA: "In concrete terms, the rule of law is equality for
| all individuals, globally, before justice."
|
| The rule of law has now become -- for those who enjoy American
| expressions -- a type of _fan fiction_.
| beloch wrote:
| "Without commenting on ongoing cases, he called on European
| authorities to activate a mechanism that could limit the impact
| of US restrictions."
|
| -------------------
|
| ICC member states should take steps to ensure the sanctioned
| judges and prosecutors do not suffer as a result of U.S.
| sanctions. The goal should be to ensure that they feel no
| repercussions that might bias them one way or the other in future
| cases and thus maintain impartiality. If this is not done, it
| could create an apparent feedback loop, if only in the public's
| imagination. i.e. After some future ICC ruling goes against them
| (or Israel/Russia), the U.S. may claim that ICC judges and
| prosecutors are prejudiced against them and are seeking revenge.
| Protecting ICC personnel now could blunt such claims. Sadly, I
| fear that the U.S. may have need of defence from ICC rulings
| relatively soon.
| bawolff wrote:
| > Sadly, I fear that the U.S. may have need of such a defence
| relatively soon.
|
| When it really comes down to it, usa is a super power. Might
| makes right in international politics. The ICC has had quite a
| lot of successes when it comes to small and even medium sized
| countries, but at some point pragmatism has to win out. Nobody
| is going to war with the USA on behalf of the ICC. I highly
| doubt the ICC is going to push any issue with america unless
| the evidence against them is extreme. Its simply not powerful
| enough.
| giva wrote:
| Meet the "Hague Invasion Act":
|
| https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/American_Service-
| Members%27_Pr...
| mytailorisrich wrote:
| Considering the relations between the US and the
| Netherlands it is inconceivable that the Dutch government
| would allow US military personel to be detained that way on
| its soil, and if that did happen I think a call from the
| White House would "clear any misunderstandings"...
| amarcheschi wrote:
| Given the current us government, I would not be surprised
| if it happened instead
| ben_w wrote:
| Until last year, sure.
|
| Trump's been doing a lot of "inconceivable" things with
| the US's international relations.
| mytailorisrich wrote:
| Nothing has changed. The Netherlands are staying on the
| straight and narrow even if they might blow hot air under
| the guise of "EU solidarity", and that gets them cushty
| NATO jobs, too ;)
| ben_w wrote:
| Trump's threatening the sovreignty of two NATO members
| while also being skeptical of the value of keeping the US
| itself in NATO and suggesting the US won't defend any
| NATO member that gets attacked.
| mytailorisrich wrote:
| Maybe so but that does not change a thing to the
| bilateral relation between US and Netherlands... which is
| as tight as can be, shall we say, we've seen it as
| recently as October with Nexperia.
| Nicook wrote:
| Bluffing and theater are not reality and should not be
| confused for it.
| ben_w wrote:
| Shouldn't, yes.
|
| Trump himself makes this difficult.
|
| He has already done things that a reasonable outsider
| would expect to be mere bluffs. And also TACO'ed
| backwards, turning things he's done into, effectively,
| theatrics.
| anthk wrote:
| Invade The Hague, and the next you see it's the whole US
| bases' set kicked out from Europe _and_ potential Russian
| /Chinese missiles in Cuba pointing to Silicon Valley.
|
| And OFC Wall Street heading down faster than in 1929.
| Fucking up your main client would yield a disaster so huge
| to the US economy than no war would save them. If any, they
| would be fucked, because the EU might even temporally
| _ally_ with Russia. Then the shit would hit the fan in
| Alaska.
|
| Your army it's the best in the world? Say hello to a
| coallition between Europe-China-Russia. No one would dare
| to throw any single atomic bomb because the outcome would
| be MAD for everyone.
|
| The US would attempt then to invade Mexico/Canada. But that
| would yield to its own people siding up _with_ Canada and
| Mexico against an obvious corrupt US war-machine-corporate
| state, up to the point to getting former Mexican territory
| back to Mexico.
|
| Texas and California might have declared indepent countries
| themselves to avoid any war. The smart move, you know.
| throwaway3060 wrote:
| There is no circumstance under which a unified EU would
| temporarily ally with Russia against the US.
| anthk wrote:
| Under an invasion you can expect anything.
|
| I've seen far right regimes in Europe -Spain- siding up
| with the Communist Cuba because of the common backgrounds
| over politics.
|
| And the Cuban regime itself under Castro mourning over
| Franco's death. As crazy as it sounds.
|
| Under an US-invaded European Union Spain would team up
| with Cuba and Venezuela the first day no matter which
| party would be ruling, left or even neocon-close right.
| The Spaniard state's survival would be the top priority.
| No state, no economy, no Ibex 35. And shit would hit the
| fan from Latin America too.
|
| Oh, and expect hell with guerrillas spawning here and
| there from Latin America backed up from Europeans and
| maybe the Moccromafia and the former Italian Mafia
| themselves. Spain, France and Italy have contacts over
| all the Mediterranean and you knows what Mediterranean
| means. I wouldn't be there if I were an American trying
| to invade Europe... because once you kick the wasp nest
| of the Islamic regimes being generously supported from
| Mafias, you would have both the Jihad and the
| Narcoguerrillas at home with European army support. Try
| to stop _that_. Because something the Southern Europeans
| know well it 's learning to have friends even in Hell
| "just in case". Spain has the Hispano-spehere, they know
| how to put a whole political spectra on its side with
| ease, and the French have the Francophonie. And for sure
| they have contacts in the Arabic world as I said.
|
| If they don't have a badass archive of ETA contacts with
| Islamic camps beforehand, and they own the triumph card
| of Marbella too. You would be nuts trying to invade some
| sickos there; they know who to call in case of
| emergencies. The Spanish state already did that against
| terrorists themselves.
| JumpCrisscross wrote:
| > _Under an invasion you can expect anything_
|
| You can. But if Russia is threatening American troops in
| Europe, irrespective of the local framing, that's a
| nuclear proxy war.
| anthk wrote:
| That what happen because, ahem, rudely said, eveyone it's
| grabbed from the balls from everyone's else.
| Economically, I mean. We are tangled and dependant of
| each other.
|
| The US has the most advanced software and CPU's, the EU
| has sofisticated and pretty complex industrial hardware
| not even seen in the US. China, well, it's China, the
| factory of the world.
| JumpCrisscross wrote:
| Sure. But if someone is fantasizing about Europe kicking
| American troops out with Russian help, they're
| fantasizing about nuclear war on European soil.
| (Admittedly, a short one given Russia's a paper tiger in
| conventional terms.)
| throwaway3060 wrote:
| You severely underestimate the level of animosity between
| half the EU and Russia. They would revolt if the other
| half tried to openly ally with Russia.
|
| The example you gave isn't too surprising if one believes
| authoritarians attract authoritarians.
| throwway120385 wrote:
| Maybe in the event of some kind of World War, in which
| there was a very clear aggressor against both the EU and
| Russia?
| kyboren wrote:
| This is cute, like a little boy charging you with a
| cardboard sword. Better take him seriously or you're
| gonna get "attacked" by his model airplane collection
| next!
|
| _pats head_ That 's nice, Billy, it sure is fun to play
| pretend. Now you run along and play with your marbles.
| Hikikomori wrote:
| USAs superpower is their inability to see their own
| hypocrisy.
| eptcyka wrote:
| Hypocrisy is an argument losers make. Might makes right.
| roenxi wrote:
| Yes and no, there is a bit more to it. When dealing with
| democracies hypocrisy tends to actually harm the people
| practising it to some extent. If a polity insists on
| living in a fantasy rather than reality the political
| process will start optimising for outcomes in that
| fantasy world rather than reality. It is quite funny
| watching US politics where the voter base are
| unprincipled and opportunistic in how they vote then get
| hoist on their own petard when they get leadership that
| reflects their voting patterns. It is also interesting to
| think how effective a country could be if the voter base
| tended to be honest and forthright.
|
| With enough power people would rather accept bad in-
| practice results rather than have to confront the fact
| that they screwed up. So in practice the people in power
| don't usually care about hypocrisy. But they would be
| materially better off if they had actually cared about
| it. It is a bit like the oligarchs in some traditional
| communist country. Living the lie got them lifestyles of
| unbelievable wealth and luxury - but the oligarchs in the
| capitalist countries got lifestyles of even more
| unbelievable wealth and luxury, and passed on a much more
| impressive legacy. Not to say they weren't still
| hypocritical, but the degree of the disconnect from
| reality matters.
|
| If you keep your eye on the places where hyper-competent
| people gather and accumulate power they tend to actually
| be quite honest. Organised groups of talented people tend
| to have the easiest time securing a social advantage when
| honesty and straightfowardness are abundant. The people
| who would naturally be socially weak are the ones who
| rely on saying one thing and doing the opposite.
| tormeh wrote:
| For individuals, there's often a strong incentive to
| display certain beliefs, and the easiest way to do that
| consistently is to internalise them. The cost of voting
| for a bad party to you personally is zero. In other
| words, the government is a commons, and anyone can abuse
| it without consequence, but when we all do it...
| Imustaskforhelp wrote:
| > If you keep your eye on the places where hyper-
| competent people gather and accumulate power they tend to
| actually be quite honest. Organised groups of talented
| people tend to have the easiest time securing a social
| advantage when honesty and straightfowardness are
| abundant. The people who would naturally be socially weak
| are the ones who rely on saying one thing and doing the
| opposite.
|
| I think its also about the moral ambiguity itself and
| perhaps even the meaning of life in my opinion.
|
| Because like, I really think that world has its flaws but
| at the end of the day, this is perhaps still the most
| rarest moments in the whole universe when we think about
| it
|
| So I'd much rather do work which benefits other humans
| that I enjoy (although I sometimes think of it from, I
| would probably want to do something after retirement,
| maybe I get retire early or not suppose, but if I can
| already make the thing I want to do as retirement as job
| [computer related] and they pay really nicely, why not
| just do them right now)
|
| It's a shame to me that tech right now feels so inhumane.
| I don't want really a billion trillion dollars. I just
| want "enough" and I want to perhaps help people once I
| get that "enough" not this hyper growth-focused almost
| will sell you snake-oil kind of tech
|
| Perhaps most people don't have that definition of
| "enough" or they have materialistic desires or fame
| desires which one wants to get through money but I don't
| have many of such desires but I don't really know why
| people want to be so materialistic.
|
| Like take Elon Musk, richest man in the world, Man, his
| ego is really fragile. Donald Trump feels like having a
| really fragile ego to me as well.
|
| I really don't understand what's the point of having all
| these billions of dollars? Yes nobody is offering me a
| billion dollars but I'd rather just take "enough" and
| then give others to some projects I want to help smh
|
| Also logically, it doesn't make sense to lie to me that
| much. To me trust seems the most valuable resource and
| the easiest way of generating and securing trust for a
| long time is being honest. And this helps me grow into a
| better person (who has his flaws) but still honesty
| mostly helps I guess idk.
|
| I think we all just want our lives to have meaning in one
| way or another but it would be so much better if the
| sources of generation of meaning were human and not
| inhumane stuff as I was saying
| integralid wrote:
| I surely hope you don't _really_ think "might makes
| right" and only cynically say that to express your
| thoughts about international politics. Between humans
| might does not make you right.
|
| Of course parent's comment is weird anyway. US is a
| superpower and that's a fact.
| cjbgkagh wrote:
| That's why it's extremely important to remain mighty. The
| US is in serious decline and I don't see them turning
| that around anytime soon.
| tormeh wrote:
| The US seems mostly healthy except for corruption
| skyrocketing. I don't even need to see the stats. If the
| president is this bad, and Americans overall think that's
| fine, then a lot of lower offices will soon be filled
| with corrupt officials. Attitudes shape incentives, and
| incentives shape behavior. Otherwise, both in terms of
| labor laws and capital markets, the US looks very
| healthy. But corruption in itself might create huge
| problems in the long term.
| cjbgkagh wrote:
| In many ways electing Trump was a reaction to the
| corruption, but of course instead of getting less of it
| voters got more of it. That's why it's so hard to turn
| the ship around, profits from corruption are reinvested
| into more corruption.
| Imustaskforhelp wrote:
| > profits from corruption are reinvested into more
| corruption.
|
| Beautifully explained.
|
| And I want to ask is there anything we can do bottom line
| about it?
|
| I think like stricter rules against corruption should be
| in check, but that requires the govt. to do something and
| I feel like govt.'s themselves are being corrupt
|
| It's this cyclical loop and I don't know if there is
| rather anything that we can do to break out of it.
|
| We have the rights to vote, but those end up being
| squandered in most/all countries with corrupt
| politicians, those right to vote aren't really used
| mostly to bring real change, maybe a different name
| perhaps
|
| At the end of the deal, its more so an faith in overall
| humanity that we can figure out what's right for all of
| us but we just fight over petty differences sometimes.
|
| Do you guys have faith in overall humanity in aggregate?
| At times I feel like some instances restore my faith
| whereas others reduce it so its all just feelings for me
| perhaps.
| cjbgkagh wrote:
| An internal reform would look like the catholic
| reformation. There was hope that having an external
| adversary like China would spur the US into self reform
| to save itself but it appears that our leaders have now
| figured out that despite recent attempts at puffery we
| would not win such a war and have instead chosen a
| managed decline. It also means we're in the looting phase
| of collapse. It can last a long time as there is a lot of
| wealth to loot. I personally gave up hope and left the US
| 10 years ago. I wish those who remain all the best with
| it.
| Imustaskforhelp wrote:
| I am not really familiar with the catholic reformation
| sorry.
|
| Regarding your comment, its very interesting, where have
| you shifted now if I may ask or more details about it?
|
| I am not really American but I still hear that its
| startup culture is well although with all of the other
| downsides we have mentioned, it does become moot.
|
| A lot of people feel like the system is unfair but they
| want to be on the other side of unfairness rather than
| making the system fair from what I've observed. And this
| observation kind of fits globally sometimes imo
| cjbgkagh wrote:
| Somewhere cheaper, I expect the downturn to present as
| things generally becoming too expensive to afford so I
| got a jump on reducing expenses.
|
| If you want to be in startup culture SV is still the
| place to be. I didn't like it because of all the trend
| following, if you want to succeed there it's best to jump
| on a trend. I'm more of an applied researcher and had my
| own ideas I wanted to explore.
|
| As inequality continues to get worse those who initially
| benefited from it will generally find themselves on the
| other side of the transition and losing out.
|
| AI is going to increase inequality far more than economic
| policy, I'm 5x more productive with AI and am able to
| compete with much larger orgs. What happens when they
| lose their job, what happens when someone does the same
| to me. The Pareto distribution of productivity is about
| to get a hell of a lot steeper.
| Imustaskforhelp wrote:
| Hm Interesting, I already live in India and its already
| really cheap and still has a really good startup
| ecosystem. When I wrote that comment, I didn't mean that
| I wanted to go to startup, I am a little annoyed by some
| of the things happening there too
|
| So I guess India's the best option considering all
| factors I guess.
|
| but one of the problems especially in India is the
| saturation of the market for software engineers and the
| competition to get into college is so cut throat that I
| can't even start to tell smh
|
| I think perhaps remote jobs from india might make more
| sense but I clearly am not the only one with this idea so
| might be hard to differentiate I suppose
|
| > AI is going to increase inequality far more than
| economic policy, I'm 5x more productive with AI and am
| able to compete with much larger orgs. What happens when
| they lose their job, what happens when someone does the
| same to me. The Pareto distribution of productivity is
| about to get a hell of a lot steeper.
|
| That's great but I think I have nuanced discussion on AI,
| I think that we are gonna have much bigger financial
| issues all around the world because of the AI bubble
| itself
| mylifeandtimes wrote:
| skyrocketing corruption is a cancer. You might "seem
| mostly healthy" at first glance while you are rushing to
| the grave.
| piva00 wrote:
| Might makes right, you are correct.
|
| The USA's might is highly dependent on the world order it
| fostered after WW2, and especially after the Cold War.
|
| Erode that, and the USA as we've known the past 70 years
| starts to crumble. If in a couple decades the rest of the
| world works to decouple from the dollar as the main
| reserve currency; decouple from the dependency to sell to
| the USA; and decouple the dependency on American tech you
| still have a rich country but definitely not the
| superpower with the might as it exists today.
|
| It's not possible for the USA to be funded with the
| astronomical deficits it runs to keep its war machine,
| it's not possible for the US, culturally and politically,
| to majorly increase taxes to cover this deficit. Slowly
| there would be cuts to its defence spending, diminishing
| its might.
|
| Not sure why Americans decided this was a good path,
| didn't expect to see the era of Pax Americana to be so
| abruptly shaken during my lifetime but here we are.
| Imustaskforhelp wrote:
| I am not American so perhaps I am curious but I don't
| think that any Americans got a real say in it?
|
| I was discussing this with my cousin today and about how
| here in my country, we have multi party system. Sure,
| there is still two major parties but there are definitely
| small parties as well and we were discussing that even
| India should move towards more decentralization akin to
| switzerland.
|
| I really hope we have a more decentralized option and
| where people from all around the world feel that their
| vote, in fact, does matter.
| mylifeandtimes wrote:
| > the dependency to sell to the USA
|
| What interests me about this comment is the statistic
| that 50% of US consumer spending comes from people in the
| top 10% of earnings (first google link, probably not the
| best source: https://www.warc.com/content/feed/top-10-of-
| wealthy-american...)
|
| So while the US might look like a really juicy market, I
| start to wonder how much juice is in the lemon?
|
| Why the dependency to sell to the US if 90% of the US
| population doesn't have the free cash to buy things?
|
| Yes, I know I'm stupid, and look at all the cheap stuff
| americans buy; I've seen the miles of warehouses from
| companies like 5 Below. My concern is how long this
| lasts?
| megous wrote:
| Might does not make right. Might just means you're
| holding the biggest stick, not that you have the faintest
| clue how to use it responsibly. Power sustained purely by
| bullshit, as it is these days in USA, eventually drowns
| in it. I'm not looking forward to it happening, but when
| it does, I'm sure to at least get some satisfaction out
| of watching the scum drowning.
| master_crab wrote:
| It's not a valid argument. But it is a valid observation.
| HappyPanacea wrote:
| Most people are hypocrites.
| ulbu wrote:
| most people poop but some do cholera poop
| Eddy_Viscosity2 wrote:
| Hypocrisy is itself a show of power. That you can openly
| allow for yourself that which you deny others.
| epistasis wrote:
| It's a show of power that, for the US, is lessening that
| power.
|
| Most of the US's power is from being a land of
| opportunity and of high ideals, with military power being
| secondary backup. As the US lessens opportunity and
| openly betrays its ideals, that power disappears. The
| Greenland and Canada threats alone probably require
| $500B-$1T/year in additional military spending to try to
| gain through force wha was previously given freely to the
| US. Add in the huge cost to the US from the tariff idiocy
| and cutting things like USAID and we could never spend
| enough militarily to make up for it.
|
| Look at Putin's weakness in Ukraine. He tried to take by
| force what was not his, and ended up costing himself far
| more in lost trust than he could ever have gained with
| the war, and he has gained so little in the war. Putin
| had a better chance by continuing to try to divide
| Ukrainian society internally and have the majority of
| society side with Russia. Much like what is happening in
| the US right now.... but attack with bombs and the
| charade disappears. The US is going to discover the same
| loss of power through its attempts and threat of force.
| anal_reactor wrote:
| Yes but the thing about power is the more you use it the more
| the other party learns to live without it. US has such a
| giant leverage over Europe because Europe believed US would
| never actually use its power against it. Imagine US
| sanctioning Chinese officials - they would shrug at best
| because China has its own everything because they always knew
| US would bully them.
|
| The consequence is that Europe will slowly move its financial
| and IT systems away from US solutions. It's a very, very slow
| process because it was believed for almost a century that US
| wouldn't actually bully Europe. But for example, there will
| be more pressure to roll out Wero and have the systems
| completely European. Before Trump, there was decent chance
| the whole thing would be just Visa/MasterCard with extra
| steps. Now it's clear that EU needs its own independent
| payment system.
| mrexcess wrote:
| >Might makes right in international politics.
|
| But the whole point of Nuremberg was to prevent this, the
| whole idea of international law was meant to prevent this.
| The judges of Nuremberg warned us about this outcome.
|
| In a world where human rights are not respected, why would we
| think that the Jewish people are anything but disadvantaged?
| Have we forgotten the important parts of history, in our
| urgency to prevent it repeating?
|
| If might makes right, you've already accepted that the world
| belongs to China.
| embedding-shape wrote:
| I kind of feel like if one of the superpowers always been
| against international law although trying to enforce it on
| others, and not really wanting to participate in ICC in any
| shape of form, already made the whole idea dead in the
| water.
|
| Lots of people realize the importance of this, but if the
| country who plays world police doesn't want to collaborate
| on making it reality and they literally still perform
| violent actions against other sovereign states without
| repercussions, what is the purpose?
| lucketone wrote:
| What you say is true, but idealists should not give up
| just because a murderer exists.
|
| While it will not _control_ the murderer, it can and will
| influence it (violence going 10% down is better than 0%)
| MangoToupe wrote:
| > violence going 10% down is better than 0%
|
| This is also what protection payments look like on paper;
| surely we can reduce violence much more.
|
| I say: let every country have nukes, or let no country
| have them. This halfway bullshit is worse than either.
| coldtea wrote:
| > _While it will not control the murderer, it can and
| will influence it (violence going 10% down is better than
| 0%)_
|
| Idealists create worse outcomes than realists and
| pragmatists.
|
| Violence going down 10% can be worse than it going down
| 0%, if the difference comes from reducing counter-
| violence done by the oppressed - and reducing based on
| the agenda and whims of the big time abusers responsible
| for a big chunk of the other 90%.
| frumplestlatz wrote:
| The sovereign legal authority of any government derives
| from its monopoly on violence. If, at the end of the day,
| men with guns will not come to your home and force your
| compliance, then the "law" is nothing but paper.
|
| The ICC could never be anything but what it is -- powerless
| against those with bigger guns. This is the fundamental
| nature of law and power. Barring the subjugation of all
| states to a supranational sovereign capable of universal
| enforcement, there is, ultimately, no such thing as
| international law.
| lucketone wrote:
| It should be renamed to currently accepted "international
| traditions and customs" (ITAC)
|
| Queue's/line's in shop are not formally enforced by some
| authority to my knowledge, but most participants adhere
| to such order. (I would call it tradition)
| MangoToupe wrote:
| > But the whole point of Nuremberg was to prevent this, the
| whole idea of international law was meant to prevent this.
|
| That seems a little silly on the face of it when you
| realize most people complicit during the war in what we
| would now call war crimes weren't even charged to begin
| with. Many on the losing side found lucrative jobs with the
| side that won, and the side that won wasn't even considered
| for charges.
|
| > In a world where human rights are not respected, why
| would we think that the Jewish people are anything but
| disadvantaged?
|
| That also seems a little farcical any way you twist it
|
| > If might makes right, you've already accepted that the
| world belongs to China.
|
| Actually, I think we're moving towards a world that is more
| earnestly determined by market forces. Or, these were
| always the same concepts; we just can't force the world to
| take our "deals" anymore.
| Nicook wrote:
| >If might makes right, you've already accepted that the
| world belongs to China.
|
| So what, you should just keep your head in the sand
| instead? Not that I accept that claim anyways (quitter
| talk).
| coldtea wrote:
| > _But the whole point of Nuremberg was to prevent this,
| the whole idea of international law was meant to prevent
| this._
|
| The whole point of Nuremberg was to put on a show against
| the defeated, and establish the "good guys" who now run
| international order.
|
| Acts like Dresden, Hiroshima, Nagasaki, and the rest of
| allied abuses weren't on trial there or elsewhere.
| unyttigfjelltol wrote:
| Yes, imagine the ICC existed in 1945 and ... let's say
| ... Bolivia ... petitioned for the arrest of Winston
| Churchill and Dwight Eisenhower over the Dresden bombing
| and whatever else.
|
| Better, imagine the ICC ordered the arrest in 1943 of
| Franklin D. Roosevelt over ... let's say ... the forced
| relocation of Unangax (Aleut) villagers in the Alaska
| Aleutian Islands.
|
| The result wouldn't have been better for the ICC than the
| Gaza warrants.
| BartjeD wrote:
| You were there? No? You watched the taped proceedings
| then?
|
| I don't think you appreciate the way justice becomes
| irrelevant in fascist and tyrannical countries.
|
| The 'show' of fair justice, dispensed with care and
| deliberation, is something you seem to take for granted.
|
| In most countries you get put up against a wall, and
| shot, for saying the wrong things about the right people.
|
| I find your argument uniquely cowardly: Power without
| justice is a recipe for tyranny. And the position that
| tyranny should be the norm is something an evil or
| cowardly person espouses.
|
| Yes, there is plenty of atrocity. Pretending the allied
| behavior is as atrocious as Stalin, Mao, Mussolini, or
| Hitler, is pretentious relativism.
| 0xbadcafebee wrote:
| There was already a world court before Nuremberg: the
| _Permanent Court of International Justice_ , established
| after WWI, as part of the _League of Nations_. It didn 't
| stop WW2 and the holocaust. After WWII, they form the exact
| same thing with new names: the _International Court of
| Justice_ , as part of the _United Nations_.
|
| You know why the _League of Nations_ didn 't work
| (supposedly)? Because the US wasn't involved. So with the
| _United Nations_ , the US is involved. What do you think
| happens when the US decides to not abide by the United
| Nations' decisions? Nothing.
|
| The US has vetoed UN resolutions 89 times, and ignored
| resolutions dozens of times. It voted against Palestinian
| rights, and its Iraq war and ongoing foreign drone strikes
| go against the UN charter. Basically, whatever the US
| wants, goes. If they don't want you to have rights, you
| won't have them. If they want you to control some piece of
| land and anyone who lives on it, it's yours. If they don't
| like your government, they'll take it away and install
| their own, or call it terrorist and sanction it.
|
| The whole thing is a sham and everybody knows it. There is
| no justice, there's just the powerful and the powerless.
| JumpCrisscross wrote:
| > _US has vetoed UN resolutions 89 times, and ignored
| resolutions dozens of times_
|
| So have China and Russia. The rules-based international
| order has been explicitly rejected by the world's great
| powers.
|
| > _whole thing is a sham and everybody knows it_
|
| There was a legitimate attempt. It had flaws. But so does
| any system of justice. It was ultimately done in by a
| combination of Russian and Chinese revanchism, American
| neoconservatism and global nihilism.
| pfortuny wrote:
| International Law predates Nuremberg by at least 300 years
| (see the School of Salamanca). I am not trying to nitpick,
| honestly, it is that the rights of other nations and
| peoples were recognized well before the US even was an
| idea.
| JumpCrisscross wrote:
| > _Nuremberg_
|
| You may be mixing up the ICJ, which "settles legal disputes
| submitted to it by states" and is 80 years old [1] and the
| ICC, which was created in 2002 [2].
|
| [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/International_Court_of_Ju
| stice
|
| [2] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rome_Statute
| vasac wrote:
| You're in for a big surprise once you discover what
| happened after Nuremberg.
| throw310822 wrote:
| Europe isn't a superpower but it's a giant entity with 450
| million people and 15% of the world's gdp. It has the means
| to oppose the US and retaliate against its sanctions, if it
| doesn't it's because of the cowardice of its politicians and
| the weakness of its institutions.
| embedding-shape wrote:
| More importantly, the bilateral relationship between the US
| and Europe represents 30% of global trade, and 40% of the
| global GDP. Both economies complement each other naturally
| (at least right now), and neither partners don't want it to
| end, so even with the relationship becoming more fragile as
| the US tries to close itself off from the world, I think
| both will still try to remain collaborative with each
| other, regardless of this posturing that is going on.
| ben_w wrote:
| It will take a lot to shift that trade dynamic, but the
| current US administration seems quite energetic about
| rapidly tearing down Chesterton's Fences that it doesn't
| understand nor want to spend the time to understand, so
| I'd not bet on this remaining so even for the next 3
| years.
|
| And yes, I do understand how utterly bonkers it is to
| suggest something this big changing over just 3 years.
| tormeh wrote:
| I don't believe this is possible, even at Trump speed.
| It's much easier to wreck NATO than to reshape the world
| economy to that extent.
| ben_w wrote:
| Indeed, but it's not impossible for him to simply wreck
| the economy faster than it can be correctly reshaped.
| ethbr1 wrote:
| Boris Johnson: Hold my pint.
| ben_w wrote:
| Fortunately for the UK, the photos of Boris Johnson
| holding a pint during covid lockdowns he'd ordered, mean
| that Boris Johnson is no longer a threat to the UK.
| golem14 wrote:
| I didn't believe Brexit would happen either, until it
| did.
| SllX wrote:
| That trade dynamic isn't going to shift unless the EU
| becomes a lot more insular.
|
| The War in Ukraine is dampening trade with Russia. The EU
| is struggling in their trade relations with the PRC even
| more than with America right now, and fears them more
| than they fear us. A trade deal ("Mercosur") with South
| America is in the process of potentially blowing up, and
| if it's not passed in its current state, Brazil is
| looking to walk for the remainder of their President's
| term in office.
|
| So the EU's options are limited.
| ben_w wrote:
| The EU certainly has limited options, I agree about that.
|
| The problem I see is the risks are not under the EU's
| control. We may face becoming much more insular
| regardless of what any of us ourselves actually want.
|
| Trump is behaving in a manner not consistent with EU
| nations retaining indepdendence and sovreignty. And also
| betting the future of USA on economic development plans
| (and military plans) that do not seem realistic.
| SllX wrote:
| The insular part was a very small, maybe too subtle of,
| joke.
|
| That's also not a viable option for the EU, or more
| specifically: the constituent nations of the EU. They're
| as dependent on trade as we are, maybe even more so, and
| so we are stuck in this relationship where we constantly
| piss each other off in various ways, and believe me when
| I say it goes both ways.
| ethbr1 wrote:
| > _So the EU's options are limited._
|
| Part of the issue if that as you move up the value chain
| your list of potential trading partners shrinks, as
| lower-income partners aren't viable.
|
| Look at GDP per capita (I picked nominal, for export
| consumption purposes): https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List
| _of_countries_by_GDP_(nomi...
|
| Europe's options for high-value exports at scale are...
| who?
| chrisweekly wrote:
| "neither partners don't"
|
| I think your main point is valid, but it would be more
| compelling if you'd taken a few seconds to read it before
| submitting, to catch this double-negative.
| ExoticPearTree wrote:
| Europe (as in all european countries combined) does not
| have a military powerful enough to oppose the US. And that
| is all that matters.
| reactordev wrote:
| No, but China and Australia do if they were to, you know,
| alliance themselves against the tyranny of the US. Much
| like we did against the tyranny of the Nazi regime.
|
| Add in other nato countries and we're cooked.
| inetknght wrote:
| That would only matter if US invaded Europe or vice
| versa. That's not going to happen. So the size of
| military expenditures doesn't really matter.
| ExoticPearTree wrote:
| You can't be that naive to believe that military might
| has nothing to do with political might.
| inetknght wrote:
| That's not what I said. I said that it doesn't matter.
|
| Military might has plenty to do with bluffing. That's
| what politics is all about.
|
| But when the music stops and the ball drops, US and EU
| aren't going to war with each other any time soon. So
| measuring military might doesn't really matter.
| coldtea wrote:
| And you can't be that naive to believe is gonna make any
| difference. The US that had to get out of Korea, Vietnam,
| all the way to Afghanistan, will take on Europe? Lol...
| criddell wrote:
| It's not what the US _might_ do, it's what they might
| _not_ do.
|
| If Putin decides Poland is propping up Ukraine he might
| expand the war into Poland because right now it isn't
| clear that the US would honor their NATO commitments.
| ahtihn wrote:
| Europe doesn't need the US to defend Poland against
| Russia.
|
| If EU countries commit to a conflict, Russia has no
| chance. It makes nuclear escalation a real risk though.
| nothrabannosir wrote:
| Ukraine was not a NATO country, never mind a EU country.
| I'm all for speaking truth to the weakness of the eu and
| its indecisive pussyfooting on the military front but
| let's not start getting high on our own supply: Russia
| absolutely does not have the military nor industrial
| power to invade Poland and take on the actual EU in a hot
| war. NATO or no NATO it wouldn't even be close.
|
| Or it could just end with mutual total nuclear
| annihilation of course.
|
| Edit: now if they were to attack the eu over a decades
| long interference campaign with its member state
| democracies, funding anti eu parties, stoking separatist
| sentiments, and covertly subverting the fundamental
| pillars of its liberal democracies, on the other hand...
| criddell wrote:
| I think Putin would use nuclear weapons. I don't think
| the EU would retaliate in kind.
| nothrabannosir wrote:
| If we're accepting as a given that somehow Putin launches
| nukes into Europe to invade Poland, _and_ the EU doesn 't
| retaliate in kind, then the USA definitely wouldn't--NATO
| or no NATO--so I'm not sure how it's relevant to the
| original comment.
| vidarh wrote:
| Russia is has tried and failed for a couple of years now
| to push particularly far into Ukraine, and you think
| Europe would have a problem stopping a Russian attack on
| Poland?
|
| Poland alone has a population comparable to Ukraine, and
| a significantly larger economy.
| toomuchtodo wrote:
| Labor shortages abound in the US military. It is slowly
| approaching paper tiger status, unless we're talking
| about delivering long range ordinance. The US can engage
| in a small handful of conflicts at the same time; it
| cannot take on the world. The Coast Guard didn't have
| enough staff to commandeer an oil tanker near Venezuela
| recently [1] [2]. The US Navy has mothballed seventeen
| supply ships due to labor shortages [3]. Total global US
| military headcount is ~2.6M as of this comment, ~1.14M on
| US soil [4] [5] [6] [7]. There are also military sourcing
| single points of failure, like L3 [8] and the US Air
| Force.
|
| China can already detect and track stealth aircraft using
| a combination of ground based passive radar and StarLink
| signal, as well as satellite reconnaissance. Europe could
| have this capability whenever they're ready to spend and,
| in the case of a satellite, lift to orbit. Use hypersonic
| vehicles for anti air defense and carrier busting [9].
|
| [1] https://moderndiplomacy.eu/2025/12/24/u-s-hunts-
| sanctioned-t...
|
| [2] https://www.stripes.com/branches/coast_guard/2024-03-
| 06/coas...
|
| [3] https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46130106
|
| [4] https://www.gao.gov/military-readiness
|
| [5] https://usafacts.org/articles/how-many-people-are-in-
| the-us-...
|
| [6] https://usafacts.org/articles/is-military-enlistment-
| down/
|
| [7] https://www.pewresearch.org/short-
| reads/2025/06/06/6-facts-a...
|
| [8] https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46355005
|
| [9]
| https://www.defensenews.com/global/europe/2025/12/18/eu-
| flag...
| xnyan wrote:
| Would you say that the United States had a much larger
| and more expensive military than Vietnam? How did that
| work out for the United States?
| jonnybgood wrote:
| The US was winning the Vietnam war militarily. The US
| pulled out because it wasn't winning it domestically.
| tor825gl wrote:
| This is a fiction.
| praptak wrote:
| Well, "not winning domestically" can happen as likely
| today as it did in the sixties.
|
| If anything, the US society is more divided today.
| randallsquared wrote:
| In the event that someone is directly attacking Americans
| in America, I think you'll find that Americans are more
| united than it appears.
|
| Americans culturally have seen ourselves as the "Good
| Guys" for the last century or so, and Good Guys imply Bad
| Guys. If there aren't any credible Bad Guys external to
| the US, Americans start thinking the Bad Guys are the
| rich, or the coastal elites, or flyover country, or
| liberals, or whatever. That's just 'cause there's no one
| else to be against, though; it'll pass.
| jvdvegt wrote:
| > In the event that someone is directly attacking
| Americans in America
|
| Didn't Trump have the army attack democratic cities
| earlier this year?
| ExoticPearTree wrote:
| No, he did not. Where did you come up with this idea?
| ethbr1 wrote:
| It's a complicated bit of American constitutional /
| federal law. Tl;dr...
|
| The US military cannot be used to perform domestic
| policing functions (Posse Comitatus Act
| https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Posse_Comitatus_Act ),
| except in times of insurrection or when state unable or
| unwilling to suppress violence that threatens citizens'
| constitutional rights (Enforcement Acts
| https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Enforcement_Acts ).
|
| Hence Trump's continual (and false) claims that the
| cities he's targeting are lawless and dangerous places.
|
| The above applies to federal US _military_ forces. The
| laws specifically exclude the US Coast Guard. Non-
| military federal forces (FBI, ICE, etc) are also
| excluded.
|
| It also, in the more complicated quirk, excludes _state_
| military forces (i.e. "National Guard" units). These
| forces can be activated under a variety of different
| legal frameworks (see https://www.nationalguard.mil/Porta
| ls/31/Resources/Fact%20Sh... ), some of which allow their
| use for domestic police functions (Title 32 and SAD),
| because they're still under the command of the state
| governor (who _can_ use military forces to perform
| domestic policing functions inside their state or a
| neighboring state).
|
| There's also a special exclusion for Washington, DC, as
| technically the president is sort of its governor for
| many purposes.
|
| Given that background, what actually happened...
|
| - Trump activated National Guard units under Title 10
| (aka federal active duty service), because this doesn't
| require the consent of a state's governor
|
| - Trump then deployed these units to several cities, some
| with the support of Republican governors and some without
| the support of Democratic governors
|
| - The administration's legal team realized performing
| policing functions with the above forces was on extremely
| shaky ground
|
| - Therefore, they mostly _claimed_ (loudly) that they
| were deploying "the military", but in actuality used
| them for extremely limited, non-policing purposes
| (picking up trash, talking to tourists, guarding federal
| buildings, guarding other federal agents performing law
| enforcement functions)
|
| - After state governments sued, the courts generally
| agreed the deployment was unlawful (
| https://www.reuters.com/world/us-supreme-court-rejects-
| trump... )
| samrus wrote:
| "Actually we did find weapons of mass destruction"
| randallsquared wrote:
| Another potential goal of the war may have been to
| demonstrate that the USSR couldn't hope to win a
| conventional war against the US (the 1973 Easter
| offensive fielded 700-1200 tanks of various kinds, and
| the US destroyed 400-700 of them with trivial losses to
| US forces). The Soviets were using 15-20% of their
| economy to produce, among other military items, 4000
| tanks a year, so a demonstration that the US could
| destroy so much without significant losses or any
| particular economic strain could have been shocking. If
| that was a real goal, though, it probably couldn't be
| openly discussed at the time, which would have
| contributed to the "why are we even there?" mood of the
| American people.
| DiogenesKynikos wrote:
| The US was barely treading water militarily, at enormous
| cost in both lives and cash. It was not progressing
| towards its military and political goals. That's why the
| US public pulled the plug.
|
| The US could have continued to tread water for another 5
| years, or another 10 years, or another 15 years, and
| would have lost even more men and spent even more money,
| and it would still have faced the same problem: there was
| no way to win the war. Every day that the war continued
| just meant more deaths and more money wasted.
| anthk wrote:
| That doesn't matter. One or two atomic boms from France
| and say goodbye to a good GDP from the US coasts.
| Everyone losses, but the US it's set back to 1940.
| ExoticPearTree wrote:
| This will only happen if France decides to commit suicide
| at a national level, which is very unlikely.
| anthk wrote:
| There's no difference between suicide and an invasion
| from the US with total control of the neocons against a
| social-democratic state. That being a puppet state a la
| Vichy, I mean; not something being bribed upon with
| corruption and money.
|
| What the US needs is to invest right now in fusion
| technology and learn the damn Math right. Hint:
| hypercubes and physics.
|
| They have it easy:
|
| https://phys.org/news/2025-02-fourth-dimension-
| scientists-gl...
|
| https://wt3000.substack.com/p/scientists-just-built-a-
| fourth...
|
| They don't need a war to feed the industry, they need the
| balls to evolve themselves as the Chinese did. First from
| pure Maoism to Deng Xiaoping, and next from coal to clean
| energy. It's a decades bound plan, but if Beijing becames
| clean it would be one of the greatest things for China
| (and the world) ever.
|
| This would mean acknowledging that some sectors are best
| stated supported, such as healthcare; while others are
| best company supported/evolved, such as telecos and R+D,
| but with proper regulations, so net neutrality stays as
| is and patents get open over few decades so everyone can
| play the game.
|
| And, no, you don't need to put social credit, social
| surveillance or any other bullshit such as Chat Control.
| reactordev wrote:
| If the EU goes against the US and happens to recruit
| allies, we're cooked.
| 0xbadcafebee wrote:
| Not really. We have the most money, the most guns, and
| world economies depend on us. Europe won't even fight
| Russia when they literally invaded a country in their
| backyard, and Russia is much weaker than the US.
| lesuorac wrote:
| Fighting Russia or the US is basically the same; you're
| just going to get nuked. Ukraine doesn't get nuked
| because Russia isn't in a real risk of losing it's own
| territory and doesn't want to annex irradiated lands.
|
| But also Europe (besides Ukraine) doesn't have much to
| gain from fighting Russia. They're happy to assist in air
| raids in North Africa / Middle East for energy reasons
| (see Libya) but it's fighting for practical purposes.
|
| The table can also be turned against the US. Despite the
| endless complaints about Mexico sending drugs & drug
| dealers into the US it's not like we are doing effective
| (or drastic).
| astrange wrote:
| Europe has a lot to gain from fighting Russia, because if
| they conquer Ukraine they're going to invade Poland next.
| womitt wrote:
| Your most money won't buy you much resources in a decade.
| most of the natural resources exporting countries feel a
| bit cheated with 20 year contracts and two "quantitative
| easing" in the same period
| JumpCrisscross wrote:
| > _most money won 't buy you much resources in a decade_
|
| You're vastly underestimating how resource rich America,
| North America and the Western Hemisphere are.
| reactordev wrote:
| You're vastly underestimating how quickly we can exhaust
| those resources.
| JumpCrisscross wrote:
| > _You're vastly underestimating how quickly we can
| exhaust those resources_
|
| ...to where we need to mine or drill _Europe_?
|
| What is your source for any of this?
| reactordev wrote:
| The only resource suppliers to EU other than the United
| States is Norway (natural gas pipeline, crude oil 14%)
| and Australia (coal 36%). The US supplies a a huge
| minority in those as well as a majority in LNG.
| (https://ec.europa.eu/eurostat/web/interactive-
| publications/e...)
|
| If the EU ally's with Australia, pics up an enemy of an
| enemy - China, they can withstand a US embargo.
|
| About our increasing consumption, you can read the report
| here (https://www.unep.org/resources/Global-Resource-
| Outlook-2024).
|
| We can't extract our way out of this. We'll have nothing
| left. We need space minerals and more rocks that aren't
| home. We're fighting over less and less sand in the
| sandbox.
| JumpCrisscross wrote:
| > _they can withstand a US embargo_
|
| We were never debating if Europe could survive an
| American embargo.
|
| You said "most money won't buy you much resources in a
| decade." This was about America surviving a European
| freeze-out. The simple truth is, there are more resources
| in America and within its military's undisputed reach
| than there are in Europe.
|
| Your UNEP report doesn't show why America alone couldn't
| extract its way out of an embargo. (While it puts its
| military to use.)
| reactordev wrote:
| You must have me mistaken with someone else. I didn't say
| that. I said that it wouldn't matter as resource
| exhaustion is faster than it was previously and we will
| run out of resources, money or not. So if one side
| decides to horde or exploit the other hemisphere, it's
| like kids fighting over the last bit of sand in the
| sandbox.
| JumpCrisscross wrote:
| > _it wouldn 't matter as resource exhaustion is faster
| than it was previously and we will run out of resources,
| money or not_
|
| Oh. Sure. Fair. But not relevant in our lifetimes, at
| least not from the position of the United States. If push
| came to shove, we'd take those last bits of sand. That's
| one of the problems with might makes right: it lets those
| in power put off hard choices.
| reactordev wrote:
| China has more sand
| nradov wrote:
| I hope that the USA will maintain strong relations with
| the EU. But the EU is structurally incapable of taking
| any coordinated action more significant than mandating
| USB-C chargers for cell phones.
| buckle8017 wrote:
| Europe would need to increase military spending to 20+% of
| GDP to plausibly defend themselves.
|
| The EU is a vassal state through and through, they just
| haven't accepted this yet.
| nosianu wrote:
| > _they just haven 't accepted this yet._
|
| What on earth are you talking about???
|
| We have accepted that for a long time, and there are no
| plans to change it.
|
| Why do you think there is zero movement to disentangle
| from any important US dependencies? Such as software.
| There is nothing whatsoever happening to be any less
| dependent on the US, part from defense, and that only
| after repeated urging and finally some real force-
| pressure to get the EU moving (even after Trump's first
| term little to nothing actually happened).
|
| European countries are perfectly fine with where they
| are, if any less dependency on the US is to happen, it
| will only be after huge pressure from the US.
|
| That is deliberate, they just don't see value in e.g.
| trying to recreate the Microsoft and other software
| ecosystems. After all, it already exists, so why compete
| at that point? It does not make economic sense. Also, it
| is not Europe's strength: Every country would, in
| practice, (have to) develop their own version, while in
| the US a company can easily scale across the entire
| nation. For Software, it makes no (economic) sense for
| Europe to compete in an area where this kind of scale is
| important.
|
| And that strength argument, only some minor politicians,
| and some journalists, keep bringing up headlines such as
| "Can Germany save Europe?", or celebrating "Germany back
| on the world stage" when there is some minor meeting
| hosted by Germany (seen recently). The vast majority of
| people could not care less about being "number one" and
| "leading (anything, politically)".
|
| Not trying to reinvent the wheel, or many wheels
| actually, out of some "pride" moment seems pretty foolish
| to me. If the US is good producing this or that, we get
| it from there, so what? Everybody, including the US, made
| even more far-reaching similar decisions with industry
| moved to China. Compared to that, European reliance on
| the US is not much, and pretty much unavoidable, unless
| one gives up lots of wealth.
| crote wrote:
| Defend against _what?_
|
| France has nukes, so those aren't a plausible threat. Any
| kind of land invasion is doomed to fail - the US didn't
| even manage to beat a bunch of goat herders in one of the
| poorest countries of the world. A naval blockade is the
| most likely to succeed - except for the whole "land
| bridge to Asia/Africa" part. And if the blockade _does_
| succeed and the continent starts to starve, there 's the
| whole "France has nukes" part again...
|
| Besides, do you really think China/India won't get
| involved? And do you really think the US public is going
| to accept their friends and family dying because some
| power-hungry politician got the braindead idea to send
| them against _Europe?_ The reception will be worse than
| Vietnam!
| tucnak wrote:
| EU is not a state, it's a union of states.
| pfdietz wrote:
| Where ICC could win against someone in the US is if the
| opposition comes to power in the US and does nothing to
| protect that person. "Oh gosh, bounty hunters grabbed them
| and smuggled them out of the country? What a shame."
| expedition32 wrote:
| One of the things that made America a superpower is "soft
| power". Continuing to piss off their allies will eventually
| blow back if the US ever needs something from the UN.
|
| Or worse they may need that French aircraft carrier if war
| breaks out with China.
| kyboren wrote:
| The US is under no illusion that France of all countries
| will go to bat for the US in a Pacific war. And Macron has
| made clear that they will not:
| https://www.straitstimes.com/world/europe/france-
| president-m...
| youhatetheleft wrote:
| Im sorry the latter part of the 20th century was all about
| trying to avoid the whole might makes right mindset and in
| international politics it still should be. Wasn't the whole
| justification for the west supporting Ukraine that might
| shouldn't make right? The fact that people have just
| swallowed the might make right narrative just shows what kind
| of a dire situation we are in when it comes to international
| politics and how far standards have fallen since 2001.
| mikewarot wrote:
| >When it really comes down to it, usa is a super power.
|
| It _was_ a superpower, until Trump got back in office. He 's
| been taking an axe to US soft power, and our institutions in
| general. We're on the edge of losing Global reserve currency
| status. That's what's driving the re-monetization of Silver
| and Gold.
| mikkupikku wrote:
| Nobody needs to go to war with America on behalf of the ICC.
| We merely need member nations to declare they won't enforce
| any American sanctions against ICC judges or other personnel.
| The US might cry and stamp their feet, maybe even threaten to
| invade France, but this is all impotent rage if the EU
| decides to wake up and call America's stupid bluffs.
| SpicyLemonZest wrote:
| I don't think that's accurate. Which sanctions,
| specifically, would become ineffective if Emmanuel Macron
| stood up and said "Our government won't enforce this
| sanction against ICC judges or other personnel"?
| tensor wrote:
| If the sanctioned individuals can still use French that
| would make the "debanking" sanction much less effective.
| SpicyLemonZest wrote:
| Would it? The source article doesn't say that he's unable
| to find a French bank account. The practical "debanking"
| problems it describes - _some_ non-American banks won 't
| do business with a person under American sanctions, all
| payment card systems popular in Europe are American -
| aren't subject to the French government's enforcement or
| lack thereof.
| pixl97 wrote:
| >all payment card systems popular in Europe are American
| - aren't subject to the French government's enforcement
| or lack thereof.
|
| I disagree. Tomorrow France can tell Visa/MC/Banks they
| must service ICC judges or lose the ability to bank in
| their country and suddenly said providers will be
| concerned about the predicament they are in.
|
| The EU better pull its head out of its ass about
| following everything the US does at this point. It's
| obvious over here in the states things have gone off the
| rails, and they'll go down with us if they want to remain
| so tightly coupled.
| mikkupikku wrote:
| > _Tomorrow France can tell Visa /MC/Banks they must
| service ICC judges or lose the ability to bank in their
| country and suddenly said providers will be concerned
| about the predicament they are in._
|
| Absolutely. You get the Visa executives lobbying the
| American government to stop this madness and it will
| stop.
| HDThoreaun wrote:
| If French banks with US presence start banking sanctioned
| individuals the US would start confiscating their American
| assets. It's just not worth it for them. The military is
| irrelevant as long as usd is the reserve currency most
| countries use.
| mikkupikku wrote:
| Why does it need to be all French banks? The French
| government could establish a special class of bank for
| domestic business, that isn't subject to international
| pressure except pressure applied to the French government
| itself. They should be able to find a way that a judge in
| Europe, living in Europe, paying European taxes to
| European governments, paying rent to a European landlord,
| doesn't have to give a shit about what America thinks.
|
| This is a tractable problem, except for the lack of
| political willpower to create a solution.
| nradov wrote:
| Sure, France could in theory create such a domestic bank.
| But it wouldn't be allowed to connect to any US based
| financial institutions or transfer funds through networks
| controlled by those institutions. This would be so
| limiting as to make it hardly worth the effort.
| Ultimately I expect that France will just try to wait out
| the current US administration.
| pixl97 wrote:
| If it's a French bank the country of France can tell said
| bank they _must_ service said customer regardless of the
| loss of their US assets.
|
| Every country that works at an international level
| assumes said risks.
|
| I for one am tired of internal national companies playing
| pick and choose on the best options and ignoring
| everything else. If the world wants to go multipolar
| again it's time for corporations to get kicked in the
| sack.
| HDThoreaun wrote:
| Sure, they could, but they won't because the banks
| business would be fucked and most governments aren't
| trying to destroy their domestic businesses.
| crote wrote:
| Yes, and Europe will start confiscating European assets
| of American companies. Your point being?
|
| > The military is irrelevant as long as usd is the
| reserve currency most countries use.
|
| The USD is rapidly losing this status, though. The
| current president's policies has turned the US into an
| extremely unreliable trade partner, so more and more
| trades are being done in EUR.
| mikkupikku wrote:
| > _Yes, and Europe will start confiscating European
| assets of American companies._
|
| At this point, they should do so. With America weakened
| and behaving erratically, this is a good time for Europe
| to assert itself and put America in our place.
| DiogenesKynikos wrote:
| Which is why the way to deal with this is by sanctioning
| US companies in retaliation. Europe can't shield its own
| companies from the US, but it can inflict equal pain on
| US companies.
| coldtea wrote:
| The Roman Empire was a superpower too, until it made too many
| stupid mistakes not dissimilar to modern ones.
| ycombinary wrote:
| Fuck the US.
| drivingmenuts wrote:
| The only way we would ever answer to the ICC is if anyone could
| force us, by military threat. That's the only way people are
| put in front of that court.
| throwaway3060 wrote:
| The US is not a signatory of the Rome statute. The ICC has no
| jurisdiction over the US, and any scenario where it claims it
| does would be an abuse of power.
| FridayoLeary wrote:
| The same goes for israel, which provides some helpful
| context. "Us sanctions ICC for abusing their power"
| fusslo wrote:
| I'm not saying I agree with the following.
|
| From what I've read from the ICC:
|
| 1. Palestine acceded to the Rome Statute.
|
| 2. The ICC recognizes the Gaza Strip and the West Bank to be
| Palestinian territories
|
| 3. The ICC Article 12(2)(a): "The Court may exercise its
| jurisdiction if the crime in question is committed on the
| territory of a State Party to this Statute."
|
| 4. Therefore, ICC argues it does have jurisdiction
|
| So, according to the ICC, you don't need to be apart of the
| Rome Statute for the ICC to have jurisdiction
|
| at least thats the argument for ICC's jurisdiction over
| Israeli nationals. IDK if the ICC ever tried that with the
| USA
| throwaway3060 wrote:
| IIRC, the prosecutor on the ICC responded to the sanctions
| by suggesting that they could charge individuals
| interfering with the court with obstruction. Which, as far
| as US sanctions are concerned, they definitely don't have
| the jurisdiction to do. I don't think anything legal came
| of it, but that is exactly the sort of threat that, from a
| prosecutor, sounds like abuse.
| fusslo wrote:
| Why do you say they don't have jurisdiction in that case?
|
| Article 70:
|
| "It shall be a crime for any person to commit any of the
| following acts:
|
| (a) giving false testimony;
|
| (b) presenting false or forged evidence;
|
| (c) corruptly influencing a witness, expert, or court
| official;
|
| (d) interfering with or intimidating a witness, expert,
| or court official;
|
| (e) committing any other act which perverts the course of
| justice in relation to proceedings before the Court."
|
| Article 70's jurisdiction is not tied to member states.
| It applies to anyone, anywhere that may affect the
| court's functioning.
|
| edit: maybe you're saying the ICC cannot have
| jurisdiction over people/nations that never agreed to be
| apart of their jurisdiction, regardless of what the Rome
| Statue says?
| throwaway3060 wrote:
| Yes, just because the Rome statute claims jurisdiction
| doesn't make it true, if the jurisdiction in question
| didn't agree.
|
| In the US, this has all the legal power of Joe Sixpack
| declaring legal power, or a Russian court. If the ICC
| tried, the US would tell them to pound sand (or more
| likely, increase sanctions).
|
| Since the US is not a signatory, as far as they are
| concerned, the ICC is just a random organization claiming
| to hold powers it doesn't have.
| bawolff wrote:
| If a foreign national threatened or tried to improperly
| influence a US judge, you better belueve the US courts
| would claim juridsiction.
|
| Generally speaking courts usually claim juridsiction over
| actions that take affect in their territory even if
| comitted outside of it (e.g. someone running a scam call
| center specificly targeting americans would likely get in
| trouble with us courts even if they never step foot
| there. Someone hiring an assain to kill an american will
| still get charged even if they never step foot in
| america). The ICC is not unique in this regard. The
| limiting factors here are politics and power not
| traditional views of how juridsiction works.
|
| There is a difference between juridsiction and actual
| ability to execute judgements/orders.
| nradov wrote:
| That's really not legally correct. Unless the case is
| specifically tied to terrorism, US federal courts don't
| claim jurisdiction over murders of private US citizens
| abroad.
|
| https://www.justice.gov/archives/jm/criminal-resource-
| manual...
| breppp wrote:
| In the giants legal overreach death match of USA vs ICC,
| I am betting on the USA as a force that can actually
| enforce out-of-jurisdiction law against the other
| bawolff wrote:
| I think the argument is subtley different (sorry if this is
| nitpicky)
|
| 1. Palestine is a state, whose territorial extent includes
| the gaza strip (the most controversial proposition)
|
| 2. Under international law, a soveriegn state has the right
| to prosecute any crime that takes place on their territory.
| In many ways this is kind of the definition of soveriegnty
| - the ability to control and make decisions in your
| territory (in the caee of war, subject to the restrictions
| imposed by the geneva convention)
|
| 3. Soverign states can delegate this power to anyone they
| chose
|
| 4. Palestine delegated this power to the ICC, subject to
| the provisions of the Rome statue.
|
| > So, according to the ICC, you don't need to be apart of
| the Rome Statute for the ICC to have jurisdiction
|
| The idea that courts have juridsiction over foreign
| nationals who commit crimes in their territory is very
| standard and is generally true for all courts.
|
| E.g. if you are a tourist visiting another country and
| murder someone, you still get arrested by local
| authorities. There is no get out of jail free card because
| you are a foreigner. What is relavent is where the crime
| took place not who comitted it.
|
| In the case of the ICC, the ICC is acting on behalf of
| Palestine. So its juridsiction would be the same as
| whatever Palestine's would be minus any additional
| restrictions imposed by the rome statue.
| soldthat wrote:
| The fact that the Palestinian Authority has made no
| attempt at arresting the Hamas members also charged by
| the ICC, shows they do not have sovereignty in Gaza -
| they don't have the ability to control and make decisions
| there.
| JumpCrisscross wrote:
| > _ICC member states should take steps to ensure the sanctioned
| judges and prosecutors do not suffer as a result of U.S.
| sanctions_
|
| This would be lovely. It's not going to happen, and it would be
| stupid for Europe to pursue alone.
|
| The ICC was born out of the optimism of the 1990s. When China
| was accepted into the WTO because trade was equated with
| democracy. When the world powers at least pretended to heed an
| international rules-based order.
|
| That order is dead. The EU is--nobly--trying to resurrect it.
| But the great powers, together with most regional powers, have
| explicitly rejected it in favor of spheres-of-influence
| _realpolitik_.
|
| Upholding the Rome Statute would mean picking simultaneous
| fights with America and Russia, and probably Israel, Iran,
| India and China, too. It's simply not a tenable situation in a
| world where the rules are being re-written in multiple
| theatres.
| throwaway198846 wrote:
| Nitpick:
|
| > Both men are indicted for war crimes and crimes against
| humanity for their roles in the destruction of the Gaza Strip.
|
| Role in destruction isn't a war crime they are being indicted for
| and as such irrelevant in this context.
| tovej wrote:
| The destruction of Gaza is obviously the context in which the
| war crimes and crimes against humanity occur(red).
| throwaway198846 wrote:
| No, you missed the point. They have been indicated to "as co-
| perpetrators for committing the acts jointly with others: the
| war crime of starvation as a method of warfare; and the
| crimes against humanity of murder, persecution, and other
| inhumane acts". Physical destruction can occur without being
| a war crime and those war crimes can occur without any
| destruction. So it didn't add any useful information infact
| it was actively misleading because some people might think
| they were indicated for destruction.
| jeltz wrote:
| Your nitpick added zero value to the discussion.
| tovej wrote:
| I have a hard time understanding what you're upset about.
| "The destruction of Gaza" is clearly a context that anyone
| in the world can recognize.
|
| The statement is simply referring to that. Not everything
| has to be maximally technical.
| fleahunter wrote:
| Using a human-rights sanctions framework against judges of a
| court literally created to prosecute human-rights violations is
| the snake eating its own tail. Sanctions used to be targeted at
| people trying to blow up the rule of law, now they are being used
| at people trying to apply it in ways that are politically
| inconvenient to a superpower and its allies.
|
| This is why so many non-Western states call "rules-based order" a
| branding exercise: the same legal tool that hits warlords and
| cartel bosses is repurposed, with no structural checks, against
| judges whose decisions you dislike. And once you normalize that,
| you've handed every other great power a precedent: "our courts,
| our sanctions list, our enemies." The short-term message is
| "don't touch our friends"; the long-term message is
| "international law is just foreign policy with better
| stationery."
| ExoticPearTree wrote:
| Unpopular opinion, but the US and a handful of other countries do
| not recognize the ICC and in their eyes it does not exist; hence
| the US has no obligation to support them in any way.
|
| The ICC was warned before picking on Israel, but it did not
| listen. Now they're paying the consequences.
| youngtaff wrote:
| The ICC didn't 'pick on Israel'...
|
| While the events on Oct 7th were horrific and undoubtedly
| deserved eliminating Hamas, Israel has collectively punished
| the civilian population of Gaza in the extreme (as they have
| been doing for years)
| _aavaa_ wrote:
| Let's grant the worse case scenario argument against Israel's
| actions. Their point still stands: neither Israel nor the USA
| recognize the authority of the ICC; they have not signed on
| to the treaty to be governed by it, and hence the ICC does
| not have the authority to look into either of ther actions.
| rcMgD2BwE72F wrote:
| They prefer war to justice. Got it.
| saubeidl wrote:
| The crimes took place in Palestine, which recognizes the
| ICC.
| eschaton wrote:
| Crimes against humanity are subject to universal
| jurisdiction. A state need not be a member of the ICC to be
| subject to its (or any other entity's) jurisdiction in
| investigating, prosecuting, and adjudicating such crimes.
| throwaway3060 wrote:
| The US does not recognize such an argument. If that is
| the argument being made, then no wonder the US issued
| sanctions; it would perceive such a precedent as a threat
| to its sovereignty.
| IlikeMadison wrote:
| Except Netanyahu and Galland are not US citizens.
| Therefore why is the US so involved in?
| throwaway3060 wrote:
| They don't want the precedent established. Same reason
| why uninvolved parties in US courts submit "amicus
| briefs" - the precedent from a case may affect them down
| the line.
| ExoticPearTree wrote:
| Because the US protects Israel pretty much at all costs.
| For the same reason no one attacks Israel for fear of
| reprisals from the US.
| eschaton wrote:
| Not quite: The US helped _invent_ that argument, and has
| used it extensively to pursue its foreign policy goals
| since World War II.
|
| What the US has argued historically is that American
| people and institutions are not subject to it because the
| US has a functioning civilian and military justice
| system, and so prosecution for such crimes can be handled
| within it, even by foreign nations and NGOs.
|
| Obviously that's a load of bullshit, especially (but not
| only) these days, but "sovereignty for me but not for
| thee" has long been the rule and with its weakening
| international position the US may come to find that to be
| less achievable in the future.
| tzs wrote:
| Since when does authority to look into a country's actions
| require consent of that country?
|
| Anybody can look into any country's actions unless that
| country has authority over them and forbids it.
| mrexcess wrote:
| >Their point still stands: neither Israel nor the USA
| recognize the authority of the ICC
|
| Many others have already pointed out the fact here - that
| Palestine is under ICC jurisdiction.
|
| Instead what I want to focus on is WHY YOU DID NOT KNOW
| THIS, despite the fact that the ICC literally ruled on this
| matter quite a while ago, specifically. The court itself
| approached this question, evaluated the evidence, and made
| a ruling. You missed all that?
| dlubarov wrote:
| "Palestine is under ICC jurisdiction" is the court's
| claim; that doesn't make it a legal reality. It relies on
| the theory that PA is the government of Gaza, despite
| never having controlled it.
| potatototoo99 wrote:
| What authority did the world have to trial the Nazis at
| Nuremberg? Countries are going to get called on crimes
| against humanity, simple as.
| dismalaf wrote:
| > Israel has collectively punished the civilian population of
| Gaza in the extreme
|
| So is any atrocity allowable if you have enough civilian
| human shields?
| jeltz wrote:
| Are you talking about the IDF or Hamas? Both sides are
| recorded to have made extensive use of human shields.
| Kim_Bruning wrote:
| ICC also charged the responsible Hamas officials at the same
| time.
| HappyPanacea wrote:
| ICC also failed to charge Palestinian authority officials
| for the money they give war criminals who are in prison
| because of their actions. Palestinian authority joined the
| ICC in 2015, 10 years ago plenty of time to act.
| youngtaff wrote:
| If we're going to go down that route then ICC could also
| charge Israel for funding Hamas
|
| The birth of Hamas was quite literally supported by
| Israel because they wanted to undermine the unity of the
| Palestinians
|
| https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Israeli_support_for_Hamas
| kombine wrote:
| Israel committed crimes against humanity in Palestine over
| which ICC does have jurisdiction. Whether US supports the ICC
| or not is irrelevant.
| _aavaa_ wrote:
| Why does it have jurisdiction? Israel has not ratified the
| Rome Treaty, and have stated they will not do so. Without
| that the ICC does not have legal jurisdiction over their
| actions.
| saubeidl wrote:
| Palestine has. The actions took place there.
| eschaton wrote:
| Crimes against humanity are subject to universal
| jurisdiction.
| dlubarov wrote:
| Even if we had some legal theory under which ICC _could_
| assert universal jurisdiction for certain crimes, the ICC
| doesn 't do so. It has to abide by its own jurisdiction
| rules, which have no such mechanism.
|
| The ICC's jurisdictional claim is here is rather based on
| the idea that PA is the de facto government of Gaza, even
| though they never controlled it.
| firesteelrain wrote:
| I had to dig this up because this was from August. Not sure
| why it is coming up now.
|
| [1] https://www.state.gov/releases/2025/08/imposing-further-
| sanc...
|
| I don't think the ICC was plotting to undermine US or Israel
| sovereignty. The dispute is about jurisdiction. The ICC has a
| pretty expansive theory that says it can go after nationals
| of non-member states if the alleged conduct happened on the
| territory of a member state. That theory has been around for
| years and mostly lived in briefs and conferences. What
| changed in 2025 is that the ICC started acting on it and
| advancing real cases that implicated non-members. At that
| point it stopped being academic and started looking like a
| real-world precedent with consequences for allies and
| potentially US personnel. That's the slippery slope. The
| administration had already tried protests and non-recognition
| and concluded it was not changing behavior. The August
| sanctions were framed as a last-resort escalation to draw a
| hard line against what they saw as ongoing overreach, not as
| a response to some new hostile intent.
| vidarh wrote:
| The long term consequence is that the US is proving that the
| rest of the world how dangerous it is to rely on US financial
| institutions. I very much doubt destroying the trustworthiness
| of its financial institutions in order to protect war
| criominals is beneficial for the US in the long run.
| ExoticPearTree wrote:
| After WW2, the US did a lot of bad things but it did not
| change its status in the world. Nothing will change now or in
| the foreseeable future. And the "problem" is pretty simple:
| there is no one able to take its place.
| vidarh wrote:
| After WW2, the US had a lot of political capital and the
| governments with economic clout were largely either highly
| positive to the US or already quite hostile, and the US at
| the same time had a tremendous financial advantage.
|
| A lot of the US' bad things post WW2 were _seen favorably_
| by the governments that were already US-friendly, and who
| either way saw the US as a critical ally.
|
| That has drastically changed _in general_. The situation is
| not remotely comparable.
|
| Europe in particular is more confident, isn't bordered by a
| power that Europe believes it can't handle alone if it has
| to (a threat, yes, but not an existential one like the
| USSR). There isn't remotely the same sense of needing the
| US at all costs.
|
| The ICC decisions simply _wouldn 't have been allowed to
| happen_ in a way that caused a rift with the US shortly
| after WW2. It'd have been inconceivable. That the ICC
| decisions have not just been allowed to happen but haven't
| caused uproar from most European governments is itself
| evidence of how much weaker the US position is seen by
| European eyes in particular.
|
| But in terms of finance in particular, it's also just not
| the case that there is no one able to take its place.
|
| Of the top 20 largest banks in the world by assets, only 5
| are American, the top 4 largest are Chinese, and China has
| 7 total, UK 2, France 2, Japan 3, Spain 1.
|
| Extend that list to the top 50, and it only adds one more
| US bank.
| sva_ wrote:
| > a handful of other countries do not recognize the ICC
|
| Those "handful of countries" who do not recognize the ICC have
| more than 2/3rd of the world population btw.
| Lysander1 wrote:
| What's good for the goose is good for the gander. The US is
| acting to impose sanctions on individuals with no direct ties to
| it by using its legal authority over American entities. The
| reason the US wants to do this is because the ICC is seeking to
| impose its legal authority over individuals whose state has not
| joined the ICC with novel legal theories and using its legal
| authority over ICC states. If the ICC had remained in areas where
| its legal authority is clear and not disputed, its judges and
| prosecutors wouldn't be facing this issue.
| piva00 wrote:
| So explain why the US used the same mechanisms against a
| Brazilian judge responsible for Bolsonaro's coup attempt case.
|
| Was Brazil's justice trying to impose its legal authority
| outside of its jurisdictions? Nope. Was it hurting humans
| rights? Nope.
|
| It's simply to bully, and meddle with entities that go against
| the interests of the current administration.
|
| I don't buy your justification why this case is not the same,
| at all.
| Kim_Bruning wrote:
| Can you be more specific? Which individuals and why (not)?
|
| Note that eg if you're from (picking two random countries)
| Nepal and commit a crime in Italy, then Italy still has
| jurisdiction. Italian police can arrest you. [1]
|
| Also, there's certain crimes that any country is allowed to
| arrest you for, for instance piracy on the high seas.
|
| [1] Also explicitly taken into account in the Rome statue
| 12(2)(a) https://legal.un.org/icc/statute/99_corr/cstatute.htm
| MangoToupe wrote:
| The only way the theory of international law holds any water is
| if countries are held to it regardless of the treaties they've
| signed. Any country that hasn't signed with the ICC is clearly
| a country run by criminals.
| soldthat wrote:
| There's a fundamental flaw in the concept of "international
| justice".
|
| On a nation level the power of a court to prosecute individuals
| is supported by a policing force that is capable of resorting to
| violence on a local level that is acceptable for the greater
| peace.
|
| On an international level, enforcing justice would ultimately
| require going to war, with mass casualties and likely numerous
| incidents of potential breaches of the law itself.
|
| In the example of Israel vs Hamas, the ICC warrant included the
| leaders of Hamas - but the ICC had zero chance of actually
| arresting them, they were killed by Israel though. So half of the
| defendants carried out the justice sought by the ICC on the other
| half.
| saubeidl wrote:
| This only applies if the individuals are a) protected by their
| country of residence and b) never leave it.
|
| Neither of those are certain and even for people that a)
| applies to, b) can be a big hassle.
|
| Just ask Netanyahu.
| soldthat wrote:
| If the country itself has a justice system that can prosecute
| the individual, the ICC has no jurisdiction.
|
| In the case of Israel the ICC used a loophole to work around
| this, since the Israeli courts are actually able to prosecute
| Netanyahu (and are currently doing so on other matters).
| saubeidl wrote:
| Whether Israeli courts are able and willing to prosecute
| Israeli war crimes is... up for debate.
| soldthat wrote:
| Regardless, the international law is that they are
| supposed to be given a chance to do so, which they
| weren't.
| potatototoo99 wrote:
| Israel did not and doesn't appear to be planning to
| prosecute Netanyahu for crimes against humanity, just for
| corruption.
| amanaplanacanal wrote:
| How long should they wait, do you think, so that they are
| given a fair chance?
| saubeidl wrote:
| It's been over a year now, with no prosecution having
| started on the Isreali side.
|
| Don't you think that counts as a chance that wasn't
| taken?
| bawolff wrote:
| Israel was given notice of an investigation being opened
| as was required when the investigation was first opened
| many years ago.
|
| So far, Israel has not provided any sort of proof that
| they have initiated a serious independent criminal
| investigation into the alleged misconduct. If they did, i
| suspect the warrant would go away.
| soldthat wrote:
| Find me another case of "justice" where the prosecution
| started before the crimes being prosecuted were allegedly
| committed.
| bawolff wrote:
| The prosecution hasn't even started yet. The prosecution
| doesn't start until the alleged perpretators are either
| captured or turn themselves in (neither of which is
| likely to happen). Neither an investigation nor a warrant
| is the same thing as a trial. No evidence has been
| publicly presented yet, nobody has been found guilty.
|
| Almost no other justice systems require notice that a
| mere investigation has been opened. So to answer your
| question, basically all of them.
| MPSFounder wrote:
| Netanyahu was just in mar a lago. A jewish diaspora in
| positions of power (think Stephen Miller, the Adelsons,
| Ivanka Trump) will never abandon an Israeli president.
| netanyahu can shit in the oval office of the white house and
| the American people must accept it, for our masters say so
| sdeframond wrote:
| > So half of the defendants carried out the justice sought by
| the ICC on the other half.
|
| ...without trial. And assuming guilty and sentenced to death.
| rounce wrote:
| Indeed, conflating execution without trial with 'justice' is
| utterly bizarre.
| soldthat wrote:
| There are no trials in combat.
| lejalv wrote:
| These answers are assuming that the individuals killed
| were also those responsible. With Israel's stranglehold
| on media access to Gaza (perhaps better: open hostility),
| we will likely never know who was killed and what were
| the charges against them.
| dlubarov wrote:
| Responsible for what? In war, enemies combatants aren't
| slain as punishment for crimes, but simply because
| they're enemy combatants. Likewise prisoners of war
| aren't (typically) detained on suspicion of crimes,
| they're detained simply for being enemy combatants.
| sdeframond wrote:
| Is there justice in war?
| soldthat wrote:
| Trial by which court?
|
| This is standard rules of war. Soldiers don't have to convene
| a court before shooting at enemy combatants.
| sdeframond wrote:
| > Trial by which court?
|
| Well, the ICC ?
|
| OP states that "one the defendants carried out the justice
| sought by the ICC". That's incorrect. One of the defendants
| went farther than any sentence the ICC would have decided.
|
| As you say, this is an act of war (killing ennemies), not
| an act of justice (trial and prosecution) .
| flyinglizard wrote:
| I think this comment shows how far removed is the modern
| person living in a sheltered, matcha-sipping western
| environment from actual human historical reality. Do you
| seriously suggest that during an active war one side would
| bring the other to trial rather than just destroy them?
| graemep wrote:
| I agree. Having lived with a civil war and with non-western
| roots I find the Western attitude to things like this to be
| hopelessly naive. It is the product of a golden age
| following the collapse of communism and the subsequent
| unrealistic "end of history" optimism.
| chimineycricket wrote:
| You're missing the point, "justice sought by the ICC"
| implies that the ICC just wanted to execute them, which
| is obviously not true.
| rounce wrote:
| So in the case of Sri Lanka, was the LLRC set up and
| subsequently criticised as a mechanism to lend legitimacy
| to the way in which government forces conducted
| operations against LTTE? If so, would its mere existence
| not indicate some level of societal buy-in to the idea
| that actions should take part according to some judicial
| form of 'justice'?
| graemep wrote:
| The idea to enquire into whether actions were justified
| in the context of war. Very different from a criminal
| trial before actions are taken.
| kubb wrote:
| Have you heard about Nuremberg trials?
| dlubarov wrote:
| Those were after Germany's defeat, and those put on trial
| were no longer active combatants.
|
| I'm pretty sure no military in history has ever delayed
| taking out an active threat in order to conduct legal
| proceedings. They don't need to, because enemy combatants
| don't have to be guilty of any crimes to be valid targets
| under IHL.
| jeltz wrote:
| The winning side destroying the losing has historically
| been the exception, not the rule. So why not?
| nradov wrote:
| Huh? You have that backwards. Since the dawn of human
| civilization, when two societies went to war the winner
| usually annihilated the loser: steal anything of value,
| smash the artifacts, execute the men, and take the women
| and children as slaves. Thousands of cultures were
| utterly erased this way. It's only recently that warfare
| has become a bit more "civilized".
| sdeframond wrote:
| I am saying that "half of the defendants" DID NOT carry out
| the justice sought by the ICC on the other half.
|
| They did something else (an act of war) that should not be
| conflated with justice.
| arlort wrote:
| There's no such flaw in most cases brought to the ICC
|
| The ICC is an international court but it administers trials
| (mostly) local to the members' jurisdiction so this point is
| moot. A warrant from the ICC doesn't ask the member states to
| go to war and hunt the target, it asks them to arrest them if
| the target is within their jurisdiction
|
| The fact that the ICC warrant was unlikely to lead to Hamas'
| leaders arrest in the short term is not particularly meaningful
|
| The "mostly" qualifier is because IIRC there are some
| provisions for truly extraterritorial prosecutions in the Rome
| treaty but I don't know that they've ever been actually used
| soldthat wrote:
| "Justice" without enforcement is meaningless.
|
| They have a warrant out for Putin, has that made any impact
| on the war in Ukraine?
| arlort wrote:
| > has that made any impact on the war in Ukraine
|
| The objective of the ICC is not to stop wars
|
| The objective of the ICC is to provide a framework to
| enable prosecuting and punishing the people ordering
| particularly egregious acts in a way that is more
| consistent with liberal rule of law principles than post-
| hoc tribunals like after WW2 and that is more accessible to
| fragile / new countries due to having the legal
| infrastructure set up and at least partially legitimized by
| it being an international body
|
| The fact that Putin (for example) might at some point get
| extradited / captured, prosecuted and jailed for whatever
| crimes he gets found guilty of is a moral good in and of
| itself
|
| If this being done at the ICC rather than in an Ukrainian
| or Russian (in an hypothetical regime after Putin's) helps
| others accept the verdict as more based on fact than
| politics then that's why the ICC exists as an entity
|
| If this makes someone down the line think twice about
| ordering war crimes then that's an added benefit but it's
| not the point
| potatototoo99 wrote:
| If for example Putin was overthrown and had to flee Russia,
| and happens to fly over an ICC signatory, he could
| rightfully be arrested and brought to justice. What is the
| alternative? CIA assassinations and kangaroo courts?
| xvector wrote:
| He could be arrested and brought to justice regardless,
| the ICC provides literally zero value-add here. Sovereign
| countries will do what they want regardless of the ICC's
| rambling, and they never needed the ICC to justify their
| actions to begin with.
| bawolff wrote:
| Putin & the Israeli warrants are a bit for show since it is
| very unlikely to result in an arrest (although it does
| serve to isolate both, which i suppose is a punishment)
|
| However don't let that take away from the other work the
| ICC has done. They have thrown people in jail.
| soldthat wrote:
| They are actually an attempt at weaponizing the court,
| conveniently only to one side in these conflicts.
| bawolff wrote:
| For the palestine situation, hamas leadership has
| generally fared poorly (no tears from me, they started
| this war after all). However you can't issue a warrant
| for a dead person.
| flowerthoughts wrote:
| The national policing forces don't report to the courts.
| Instead, there are promises between the two. The argument that
| international courts cannot work because they don't have their
| own enforcement is weak. But you are right it would be
| equivalent to war, or "special military operations" such as Bin
| Ladin, if a ruling party is convicted.
| BLKNSLVR wrote:
| I am intrigued by the fact the US acts despite no US citizen
| having an arrest warrant put out for them.
|
| Israel can't do sanctions for Israelis?
|
| I mean, the realpolitik of these sanctions by the US is in hope
| that the USs involvement in Gaza doesn't get arrest warrants for
| their own officials / Presidents. Or for war crimes and human
| rights violations against Venezuelan boats.
|
| Does make Israel look either weak or like a small person
| puppeteering a much bigger person though.
|
| Additionally, tangentially, I find it interesting the reluctance
| the US has had, for three entirety of Trump's term so far, in
| extending sanctions on Russia for it's continued bombardment of
| Ukraine.
|
| Speaks volumes about the (confusing, although maybe just rapid
| direction/ally change) motivations of the current administration.
| flyinglizard wrote:
| In international institutions Israel _is_ weak. It 's vastly
| outnumbered by Muslim countries, which is why traditionally
| Israel has received more criticism in the UN compared to any
| other country.
| smcl wrote:
| It's receiving criticism in the UN because of the horrible
| crimes it's committing
| _DeadFred_ wrote:
| When Israel was starving Gaza it was allowing in 3 times as
| much calories per person as the United Nations is supplying
| 400,000 Sudan refugees per person. Is the UN commiting
| crimes? The UN said is had food to increase what Israel was
| letting in, so the UN said it had resources to provide more
| than 3 times what it is providing Sudan refugees to 5 times
| the population (2 million verses 400,000).
| mrexcess wrote:
| >It's vastly outnumbered by Muslim countries, which is why
| traditionally Israel has received more criticism in the UN
|
| How is this anything but DARVO? Israel receives criticism in
| the UN for reasons that are easily verified and quite
| understandable - namely its deliriously racist, brutally
| violent, textbook illegal, and long-lived occupation of
| Palestine and attempts to annex its territory.
|
| Blaming Muslim countries writ large for the UN complaining
| about Israel's blatant and continuous violation of the UN
| Charter and various other international laws is shockingly
| racist.
| zappb wrote:
| Muslims are not a race.
| amanaplanacanal wrote:
| Race is an invention, people assign themselves and others
| to races based upon nothing but their own beliefs.
|
| It's just a way of "othering" some group of people, which
| certainly seems to fit the facts, regardless of whether
| you personally think some set of characteristics should
| be called a race.
| soldthat wrote:
| Many members of the UN are openly biased against Israel,
| many are officially against the very existence of Israel
| and have always been, and they happily vote on any
| condemnation of Israel regardless of what Israel does.
|
| This includes countries that have ethnically cleansed their
| Jews, and countries that do not allow Jews to enter.
| GordonS wrote:
| Isn't it difficult _not_ to be biased against an
| apartheid, rogue nuclear state with a history of
| terrorism that is currently carrying out a genocide?
| pcthrowaway wrote:
| > Many members of the UN are openly biased against
| Israel, many are officially against the very existence of
| Israel and have always been, and they happily vote on any
| condemnation of Israel regardless of what Israel does.
|
| "regardless of what Israel does" they haven't tried
| ending the occupation yet; do you really think they would
| be condemned for doing so?
|
| > and countries that do not allow Jews to enter.
|
| Which countries are these exactly?
| soldthat wrote:
| This predates the occupation.
| flyinglizard wrote:
| In 2005 Israel end the occupation in Gaza by evacuating
| all Jews from the strip and leaving it in Palestinian
| Authority control.
|
| Next came Hamas, then the rockets, then the incursions
| and finally October 7th.
| forgetfulness wrote:
| Many countries were also "biased" against Apartheid South
| Africa, the bias was disapproval of apartheid, much like
| the one enacted on the West Bank and Gaza.
| soldthat wrote:
| The bias predates the Israeli occupation of Gaza and the
| West Bank.
|
| The litmus test is if they were just opposed to the
| policies of the South African government, or did those
| countries also hate South Africa and South Africans?
|
| Did they have a history of persecution of South Africans
| in their own country?
|
| Were they funding armed groups to attack South Africa?
|
| Did they believe that South Africa has no right to exist
| anyway?
| kergonath wrote:
| > Many members of the UN are openly biased against Israel
|
| OTOH, why would anybody _not_ be biased against an
| agressive, xenophobic theocracy bent on illegally
| occupying and annexing its neighbour, all the while
| whining that "they want to destroy us and deny the
| existence of the Israeli state", and then with the other
| side of their mouth "all Palestinians must die and their
| homeland belongs to us"? The mind boggles.
|
| > many are officially against the very existence of
| Israel and have always been
|
| Here we go.
|
| > and they happily vote on any condemnation of Israel
| regardless of what Israel does.
|
| Israel following up on their promise and actually
| applying the treaties they signed never got them any
| condemnation. Them doing the exact opposite _obviously_
| does.
|
| > This includes countries that have ethnically cleansed
| their Jews, and countries that do not allow Jews to
| enter.
|
| Someone being oppressed does not justify them then
| oppressing others. I can't believe this still needs to be
| said.
| soldthat wrote:
| > Someone being oppressed does not justify them then
| oppressing others.
|
| That's not the point. A country that has a history of
| hatred against a group, to the point of ethnic cleansing,
| and has not changed on the matter, has no legitimacy in
| critisizing or making judgments on that group.
|
| I think this would be obvious in any other context.
| soldthat wrote:
| The Hague Invasion Act covers Americans and allies.
|
| https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/American_Service-Members'_Prot...
| crest wrote:
| Time to protect EU citizens from US human rights abuses. Require
| EU banks to ignore foreign sanctions and call the US bluff.
| jeltz wrote:
| Yeah, the EU should just call the bluff. The US is not going to
| do anything other than shake their fist angrily.
| GordonS wrote:
| The problem there is that the EU has started copying the USA,
| and has just recently sanctioned multiple journalists for
| telling stories that don't align with their narrative on
| Russia/Ukraine.
| watwut wrote:
| Russia invaded Ukraine in its quest to enlarge the imperium.
| Russia is an aggressor seeking to expand even more.
| GordonS wrote:
| Regardless, should we really sanction our own citizens
| simply for reporting, in good faith, something that goes
| against the state-sponsored narrative (true or otherwise)?
|
| This is legit the kind of stuff we used to use as examples
| as why "Russia is bad".
| watwut wrote:
| There is no equivalency bettween what Russia actually
| does here these days ... or between what was going on in
| Russia as Putin cemented his power, ressurected Stalins
| mythology about Stalin as a great leader and how
| communist Russia operated.
|
| These false equivalencies amd attempts to hint that
| Ukraine war is anything else then a territorial expansion
| are not just "regardless".
|
| They are the core issue.
| GordonS wrote:
| You've side-stepped my question entirely - should we
| really be sanctioning journalists? Is that really a sign
| of healthy democracy and free speech?
| emilfihlman wrote:
| Time to protect citizens from EU human right and political
| abuses, too.
| miroljub wrote:
| Good so. Many European activists have been sanctioned and
| debanked by the EU without the judicial process.
|
| It's good to see an European politician (ICC judge is a political
| role) to test own medicine.
| jeltz wrote:
| The only lesson they will learn is that they need to control
| sanctions themselves and likely to use them more. Nothing good
| about this unless you want to see a weaker US and lilely a more
| federal EU.
| lejalv wrote:
| Do you have a source?
| mariusor wrote:
| Generally when you say these kinds of things, it's polite to
| not let your audience guess at what and who you mean. Could you
| please give us some links?
| submeta wrote:
| The US is now literally sanctioning UN experts and ICC people if
| they push too hard on accountability for alleged Israeli war
| crimes, e.g. Francesca Albanese over her Gaza reports and support
| for ICC cases. In Germany (and elsewhere) it often doesn't need
| formal sanctions: people get disinvited, smeared, or quietly
| pushed out of jobs if they're too vocal on Palestine - think Ai
| Weiwei, Greta Thunberg, Masha Gessen, Ilan Pappe, Ghassan Hage
| and others running into cancellations, funding cuts, and public
| delegitimisation instead of explicit legal punishment.
| submeta wrote:
| Wow, unbelievable, downvote everything that states the obvious.
| This platform practically silences any criticism of Israel.
| Just like any other platform.
| fguerraz wrote:
| The ICC was never meant to be used against the West.
| rchaud wrote:
| What's the process for initiation into the "west" these days?
| Colonizing someone else's territory and sweeping it under the
| rug as brazenly as possible? It certainly isn't freedom of
| expression or respect for the rule of law.
| djohnston wrote:
| FWIW it's kind of refreshing to see a judicial official on the
| receiving end of this treatment. I know he's not one of the
| judges who permitted the debanking of protesters in Canada, but
| 1:1 of like-kind is probably all we can ask for.
|
| Those who so flippantly censor and ostracise dissidents deserve a
| periodic taste of their own concoctions.
| dmantis wrote:
| There should be no way the government can 'debank' someone in the
| first place. Monetary relations with other people have always
| been untouched by the state until very recently, even for
| revolutionaries. A private transaction is not anyone's business
| apart from the counterparties.
|
| Assuming that someone should not be allowed to freely earn,
| spend, invest and participate in the economy without a proved
| felony is a dystopian concept.
|
| Either have a proper fair public trial and put criminals in
| prison for serious violations or don't discriminate against
| anyone's stuff at all if you don't have any proofs. Otherwise
| it's massively used to give advantages to citizens of several
| nations to do business and earn while discriminating against
| others because of 'high risks' without any public court hearing,
| based on nationality, citizenship or organizational relations.
| hopelite wrote:
| Unfortunately this seems to be exactly the slope the West is
| going down after dismissing all the crazy talk of conspiracy
| theorists who warned of this very thing.
|
| I haven't seen anything about it here, but another example that
| is worse because it's an attack on a private person, is the EU
| recently sanctioning the former Swiss intelligence officer
| Jacques Baud, living in Belgium which he now cannot leave, for
| seemingly, essentially reminding the people of Europe and EU
| politicians' of the things they said.
| cyberpunk wrote:
| I'm sure there's a nice pad in Moscow for Baud should he
| finally have the nerve to come clean about his paymasters.
| hopelite wrote:
| You should consider not being such a manipulative, abusive
| person. Or do you have some kind of evidence for what you
| are implying, gossip-girl?
| Zigurd wrote:
| So many commenters here assume US global hegemony that, in
| reality, expired after the 1980s. Without its allies in Europe
| and Asia, the US can't act effectively.
| vorpalhex wrote:
| It seems odd to me that the US supposedly isn't a major power,
| yet still finances both NATO and the UN primarily and if it
| lowers it's support it's "leading the destruction of those
| things".
|
| Likewise if it backs off it's foreign support, hundreds of
| millions will die.
|
| Are we singularly carrying the worlds on our backs - which
| sounds hegemonic - are is the US free to stop spending our
| money on everyone elses problems?
|
| Perhaps the UK or Germany can fund everything for a few decades
| and be the next major world power for a bit.
| kuerbel wrote:
| The premise is off. These aren't "everyone else's problems",
| NATO, the UN, trade stability, and foreign aid exist because
| they serve US interests too: security, markets, alliances,
| and predictability. The US isn't benevolently carrying the
| world; it's investing in systems that reduce the cost of
| conflict and instability later.
|
| The question isn't whether the US is allowed to stop
| spending, but what it wants the world to look like if it
| does.
|
| It's just the case that some people at the top don't seem to
| understand that.
| flowerthoughts wrote:
| Trump is fixing the UN glitch:
| https://www.cfr.org/article/funding-united-nations-what-
| impa...
|
| Whether NATO still exists as a defense organisation is a good
| question.
| convolvatron wrote:
| despite how common this opinion is, it fails to recognize
| that the US itself wanted to structure things that way. this
| was a politically viable way to continue to funnel huge
| amounts of money into weapons development and research. its
| not unlikely that European dependence on the US was a bonus.
|
| were the host countries in Europe pushing for US base
| deployments or was it really the US and its insane desire to
| land explosives anywhere in the world in 30 minutes or less
| and sustain two simulateous land conflicts.
|
| none of this is that simple. were the Europeans happy to take
| the security and invest more in their civil societies?
| absolutely, but they eroded their own sovereignty by doing so
| and the US was more than happy to act like the big brother in
| control of the whole situation.
|
| the US wanted worldwide military dominance and the dependence
| of its allies. it really quite weird to say its all their
| fault.
| Zigurd wrote:
| This _" It seems odd to me that the US supposedly isn't a
| major power, yet still finances..."_ does not mean what you
| seem to think it means. Soft power and alliances are vastly
| cheaper than hard power. We are in the find out phase of
| having lost soft power.
| Zigurd wrote:
| The US accounts for a share of the UN budget roughly equal to
| the US share of global GDP. The US accounts for a fairly
| small fraction of the NATO budget. Very little of the US
| defense budget is spent via NATO. The US being "ripped off"
| has no basis in fact. Letting Russia impale itself on Ukraine
| is a pretty good bargain compared to meeting our NATO
| obligations should Russia invade Europe. We've been getting a
| good deal, which makes throwing that away pretty insane.
| stackedinserter wrote:
| And yet, they imposed FATCA and the whole world asked "how
| high"?
| whynotmaybe wrote:
| Isn't it similar to how many countries kept using Russian gaz
| after the invasion in Ukraine, they weren't ready to turn the
| switch off?
|
| The US seems "winning" right now because its imposing measure
| that need time to be bypassed, but will be bypassed.
| stackedinserter wrote:
| FATCA turned 15 years now, nobody bypassed it, although
| everyone whined a lot.
| drowsspa wrote:
| Yeah, for instance: even if Trump's bullying works for now,
| he made sure that most governments in Latin America,
| including right wing ones, will prioritize uncoupling the
| country from the US economy. Even if they won't say this
| quiet part out loud.
| JumpCrisscross wrote:
| > _Without its allies in Europe and Asia, the US can 't act
| effectively_
|
| They're all vastly mutually beneficial systems of alliances.
| That said, America flipping out over the ICC is basically as
| old as the ICC.
| deaux wrote:
| Fantastic news. The more of this, the sooner Europe wakes up and
| starts accelerating sovereignty. Please keep it coming!
| realusername wrote:
| Indeed, I think those sanctions did better than 10 years of
| talks for the digital euro
| password54321 wrote:
| Sovereignty? Sounds like doing Israel's bidding is the opposite
| of sovereignty.
|
| Last I checked I never voted for Netanyahu.
| MPSFounder wrote:
| Yet America and Europe's foreign policies are largely
| dictated by rich people like the Adelsons who are attached to
| a foreign land. By accepting that policy and the mere
| existence of AIPAC, we have effectively voted for it
| rchaud wrote:
| A 27-country bloc will struggle to accelerate on anything when
| one veto is all it takes to hit the brakes. Only 12 nations
| needed to agree when when the EU voted to institute a common
| currency in 1992.
| deaux wrote:
| A French university doesn't need to consult Hungary when
| reducing their dependency on US tech. Finland doesn't need to
| consult Czechia when deciding to invest more into domestic
| defense industry. And so on. The huge majority of
| dependencies can be eliminated without needing such
| consensus. It's a gradual process anyway. China didn't wane
| themselves off the US overnight. They still haven't entirely.
| See NVIDIA/ASML. Step by step, bit by bit.
| MPSFounder wrote:
| Europe supports Israel... Do not fool yourself. You serve the
| same master we Americans serve.
| josefritzishere wrote:
| This tactic broadcasts Trump's guilt, and the guilt of others by
| association. It's hard to imagine how this will play out. It's
| very worrisome that the USA is collapsing into a fascist state. I
| feel bad for young people who inherit the consequences of these
| terrible decisions.
| eduction wrote:
| The problem is many people -- not here on HN but in general --
| were happy or at least unperturbed when this happened to right
| wing figures like Donald Trump, the trucker protestors in Canada
| and the 1/6 capitol riot people in the US.
|
| It was incredibly obvious this would be inflicted in the other
| direction to anyone who followed what happened to Wikileaks
| supporters or people around Ed Snowden.
|
| To everyone saying this is about US hegemony, note not only
| Canada but also UK (see Nigel Farage) has inflicted this on their
| own citizens - so they certainly helped lay the groundwork for
| what amount to extremely petty sanctions (and they too have
| participated in sanctions efforts).
| pcthrowaway wrote:
| > were happy or at least unperturbed when this happened to
| right wing figures like Donald Trump
|
| When was Trump debanked?
|
| > the trucker protestors in Canada
|
| Speaking as someone on the other end of the spectrum from the
| trucker protestors in Canada, I was mortified by this
| __float wrote:
| Trump was never debanked. To my recollection, no protesters in
| the trucker convoys were either.
|
| Some social media accounts were suspended and fundraisers were
| stopped.
| xvector wrote:
| Trucker convoys were absolutely de-banked.
|
| Your media consumption may be particularly biased if you
| didn't hear of this! I recommend following outlets from "both
| sides" even if you find the "other side" offensive. I hate to
| shill for Ground News, but it's great for this.
| tensor wrote:
| You are spreading typical misinformation/propaganda.
| Temporarily freezing accounts until the law is played out
| is not the same as debanking someone globally and
| permanently.
| xvector wrote:
| As far as I'm concerned, it's on the same order of
| badness. "Temporarily freezing" until when? The whim of
| some government official? No practical difference from
| using debanking as a political weapon.
| tensor wrote:
| Niether Trump nor the "truckers" in Canada were debanked.
| Freezing your funds in a given country can happen for a variety
| of reasons and is not remotely the same as debanking someone.
| ilamont wrote:
| The US did this to a slate of Hong Kong administrators in 2020
| for implementing China's repressive national security law. It
| didn't seem to act as a deterrent, as the US did it again to a
| different group of officials earlier this year.
|
| https://hongkongfp.com/2025/04/01/us-sanctions-6-officials-i...
|
| One of the sanctioned officials reportedly keeps "piles of cash"
| at her house.
|
| https://news.bitcoin.com/unbanked-hong-kong-leader-carrie-la...
| ChrisArchitect wrote:
| News from 2 months ago;
|
| Discussion then: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=45706056
| ChrisArchitect wrote:
| Related:
|
| _' It's surreal': How US sanctions lock ICC judges out of daily
| life_
|
| https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46293048
| coldtea wrote:
| On surely unrelated news:
| https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46403276
| emilfihlman wrote:
| I think the important thing here is that governments shouldn't
| have the right to make life hard for ordinary people with
| punishments like taking away access to banks and finance system
| etc.
|
| As for the US slapping European politicians etc, it's high time
| the people on high horses in Europe feel the shit they push on
| ordinary people.
| rchaud wrote:
| > "On top of that, all payment systems are American: American
| Express, Visa, Mastercard. Overnight, you find yourself without a
| bank card, and these companies have an almost complete monopoly,
| at least in Europe."
|
| On one hand, this shows how important it is for paper cash to
| have first-class citizen status when it comes to legal tender.
|
| On the other hand, how does the largest single currency zone in
| the world not have its own debit card settlement system? The
| Germany-only Girocard appears to have been mostly phased out, and
| doesn't work outside Germany unless it's co-branded with MC/Visa.
| Same with France's Card Bancaire. Besides that, 39% of online
| purchases in Germany are made through PayPal or MC/Visa.
|
| [0] https://stripe.com/en-ca/resources/more/payment-methods-
| germ...
| mdhb wrote:
| There's a digital euro launching next year AFAIK which is
| designed to replace Mastercard and Visa. It's been in the works
| for ages and is coming online at a pretty critical time it
| seems.
|
| It comes with a full digital wallet infrastructure part of it
| too. So some of the fundamental tech scene is definitely
| changing in Europe.
|
| https://www.ecb.europa.eu/euro/digital_euro/html/index.en.ht...
| tucnak wrote:
| GNU Taler is not coming? :-( Whatever happened to NGI Taler
| program anyway?
| crote wrote:
| > Besides that, 39% of online purchases in Germany are made
| through PayPal or MC/Visa.
|
| This is currently being solved with Wero, which is intended to
| be an EU-wide online payment platform which can replace
| PayPal/MC/Visa, and a bunch of national payment systems.
| Sammi wrote:
| Antagonizing it's allies is having exactly the effect on US
| soft power as expected.
| ekjhgkejhgk wrote:
| The Israelis control the US government.
| MPSFounder wrote:
| Regardless of your views on this, it is highly concerning that
| America the giant bends over for a foreign nation built on human
| rights violations, that does not respect life or property (i.e,
| West Bank). Rich Jews dictate foreign policy driven largely by
| religiosity that is reminiscent of the Jones cult, while
| Americans just accept the fact we do their bidding. Nothing short
| of insulting. I visited Israel and was very much surprised at the
| Polish and Russian inhabitants that feel some delusional
| connection to a land and could use it to murder children and
| steal more land (just look at Lebanon and Syria right now, where
| Israelis are inching every day). It is beyond delusion, but
| religion does wonders. Some cultists in Utah justify marrying
| teenagers, the Israelis are similar in that regard. They can
| justify mutilating children because a Russian feels he is owed
| that land. However, Europe has long stood with Israel, so let
| them reap what they sow. Gentiles will learn one way or another
| that Israelis care not for the West, for they only serve their
| evil interests. The lesson of the Holocaust for our Jewish
| friends was kill an enemy (and here, the definition is broad, for
| a 1 year old that is still nursing in his mother's mutilated arm
| is an enemy because they were so born) before they even think of
| inflicting damage, and leave no child behind. And again, for our
| Jewish friends, never again has a fine print. Never again not for
| Christians, nor muslims, nor atheists. Only for the tribe.
| Remarkably, there is so much damage this is causing for the
| tribe. Every white man 18-30 views not Nazis, not atheists, nor
| Muslims are an enemy, but Israel. The schism in the right wing
| reflects this. Hopefully, America will one day demand reparations
| from Israel, for America has no masters. Our ideals are far
| greater than those of vile people that could hurt a child while
| smirking in Mar-a-lago near a puppet president that sits at their
| command.
| silexia wrote:
| Summary: far left liberal judge who sanctions others for their
| political opinions is in return sanctioned.
| ycombinary wrote:
| The US is not a serious country anymore.
| duxup wrote:
| The whole banned via banking thing is scary. A local business in
| my area was flagged as some sort of illicit operation. There was
| almost no way to know it even happened outside being unable to
| take payment ... that was it.
|
| No notice, no reason why, no recourse for them. They had google
| for their life for weeks talking to people online who it happened
| to and make dozens upon dozens of phone calls and explain the
| whole saga every time. Tons of false leads and promises for folks
| to call them back who never did.
|
| They eventually found that it was some old bank they were in good
| standing with who after weeks of not responding, still couldn't
| explain why, but they said they apparently flagged them. It was
| undone after about 12 weeks and ultimately only because someone
| at this random bank took the initiative to lift the flag, but
| they didn't have to.
|
| The process is completely opaque and you effectively have no
| rights to know or resolve anything.
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