Whole eastern Europe, central Europe and Scandinavia disagrees with you.

A tiny population rarely in control of their own future, and ethnically + culturally acceptable to the US.

Let me rephrase your comment: "Eastern European opinion on Russia doesn't matter because they've suffered and continue to suffer from Russian imperialism".

No, please don't speak for me.

If anything, my point was the same but for people in Asia in regards to China/Russia.

Non US, non China citizen: the pool is from 2013, China and Russia got much worst with time

Trust me, Russia and especially China is a much bigger threat to democracy nowadays

Non-US, non-China citizens don't speak Chinese but they speak English (or their journalists do). US shenanigans are for the whole world to see. You probably can't read Chinese so you have no idea how the Chinese government and their citizen view the rest of the world.

That feels like a weak argument. OP is talking geopolitics, not domestic shenanigans. I think internationals news happily picks up Chinese international interventions.

The situation is like highlighting the British empire's horrible actions while downplaying Nazi Germany's because they haven't invaded anyone (yet) and not knowing what Hitler and his friends have in store because of the language barrier.

And that's not a Godwin because the CCP's rhetoric these recent years is extremely racist and aggressive. They are feeding their population with a warped view of non-Han, non-Chinese people.

CCP has always been extremely racist and aggressive, at least according to all the web novels i've been reading (translated into english, as i don't speak chinese).

Polls from 2017 and 2021.

Do you think that the answer to this question will be the same post Covid and Russia’s invasion of Ukraine?

And, in the same light, China’s increasingly threatening rhetoric against Taiwan?

Actually the first poll is from 2013, the post is from 2017. And the second is from 2020, again the post is from 2021.

The second poll is not about world peace, but about democracy. Historically, the US has been promoting democracy worldwide (and this has been a major contributor to their belligerence). With their ongoing schism between MAGA and WOKE, there is a risk they will end up non-democratic themselves, either as some kind of facisit or socialist.

THAT, and the fact that this conflict is being exported to other democratic countries is a threat to democracy, although not so much to World Peace.

2013 was before Russia's first hostilities against Ukraine and also before China started to flex their military muscles. Also, at that time, the Obama administration was involved in several wars as well as the use of drone warfare against their enemies elsewhere. I don't find it surprising that many would feel that the US was the greater threat at that time, even though the threat level overall was much lower at the time.

okay, go poll Ukrainians, Poles, Czechs, ...

Didn't the states just pull out of Afghanistan after 20 years of occupation? Or is that last years news?

20 Years!

Edit: Downvotes, whats the best way to deal with colossal failure... pretend like it never happened. Afghanistan, huh? what are you talking about.

Afghanistan is quite infamous for being the most difficult region to take over; the Brits and the Soviets tried before long the US did

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Invasions_of_Afghanistan

Well maybe those in power should have read up on their history before trying to 'take over' Afghanistan. Might have been a good idea for a country half a world a way, separated by a large ocean.

I’m confused if your point is that the USA didn’t end up completely ruling over Afghanistan, so their military occupation and genocide is excusable?

And latin America and Afghanistan and Iraq and cuba and Vietnam and Palestine and Yemen

The us occupied Palestine? I better review my history.

There's a lot of very nasty, bad-faith arguments in this thread, and you seem to be involved in almost all of them. It is time to take a step back and consider what this kind of derailing does to the quality of discussion overall.

The point is obvious to anyone even tangentially following the israel-palestine conflict: Israel is a close ally to the us and heavily supported by them in their brutal occupation of Palestine.

> It is time to take a step back and consider what this kind of derailing does to the quality of discussion overall.

Yes sir! Will do sir! Thank you for improving the quality of discourse sir!! Where would we be without your guidance sir!

iirc, Somalia, Congo, and Iran as well

Lol okay downvote but it's relevant and true.

CIA helped in getting Lumumba and wanted to put a halt to his movement. They along with Belgian officers even tried killing him by poisoning his toothpaste.

CIA overthrew Mosaddegh in Iran which lead to where they are today in terms of an oppresive theocratic government.

And US military and CIA are acting as world police in Somalia.

Yeah, because polling your closest friends is the best way to get an unbiased opinion.

By the way, those are countries near another warmonging superpower... What if you poll South America?

>The single biggest cited threat to democracy is economic inequality (64%).

These are the results of people that have lived under a unipolar world and have forgotten the horrors of pre pax americana.

You call the overwhelming majority of the world population unwashed savages whose opinion must be disregarded, and then sit there in disbelief that most people might dislike see your country (of which, sadly, that attitude is quite representative) as a threat.

It would be good parody if it weren't real.

This is wild. GP is correct. That poll is from 2013. In the 10 years since, which country has been "The Greatest Threat to World Peace?" It's Russia. Let's see how many got that right...

Only Poland.

History has actually shown how little popular opinion is accurate on this. Meanwhile, there's a swarm of sibling comments in opposition to GP? Do better HN.

The US and it's cronies have invaded more countries than Russia has since 2013. Not to excuse Russia, they'd be worse also if they could, but it's far from having been disproven - Libya is in a worse state right now than Ukraine thanks to the France, the UK, and the US (Libya in 2014, Syria continued after, then there was the sabre rattling in Iran, etc...). And of course Afghanistan, and the saga with Iraq where the US threatened military force if they were kicked out. And there's also the war in Yemen in which the US is a belligerent in all but name. And then there are also military actions in subsaharan Africa. Not to forget ongoing regime change initiatives. By all metrics the US has been more deleterious to peace than Russia in the past 10 years. Not out of inherent evil or any moral consideration of course, but mostly because of greater scope of action - which is of course an element in the magnitude of a threat.

Since 2013 US-backed wars have indeed led to more deaths and have broken the peace in more numerous countries with a higher population than Russia.

So no, you are incorrect in saying that they were wrong - they were definitely right. However, your media bias has led you to focus more on one event than on multiple others and from a different viewpoint.

> Since 2013 US-backed wars have indeed led to more deaths and have broken the peace in more numerous countries with a higher population than Russia.

Can you link to some sources here? I'm especially curious to see who initiated many of these conflicts. Because once in a while the US tries to back existing movements toward more democratic governance.

Don't take it personally. They do the same thing to locals who disagree with their opinions too.

> What people think is a threat and what is a threat are completely 2 different things.

Meaningless. A threat is by definition subjective and context dependent.

> First of all average people's opinions outside of western democracies are meaningless because those people don't have access to education or information to form any real opinions.

Get off your high horse. Most of the world have a terrible opinion of the US just for the arrogance you just showed. The US education system is in shambles, the divide between can and can't do is the one of the highest in its GDP class. Poverty is just a broken leg away.

> Second of all at least the first research is more or less a complete lie. In Finland people have throughout the history without a doubt kept Russia as the biggest threat.

Russia is seen as a big threat by the Fins. However, in the next conflict: who will supply the arms? Who will benefit the most? Who is likely to incite?

> 3rd, even if we assume that it isn't would be pretty fun to ask those same people the same question again. Finland, Sweden, Australia and Ukraine are begging for the help of US now that the curtains have opened and Russia and China have either started a war already or are threatening to start one.

Fun?

It's exactly 1 and 2 why the world largely considers the US such a threat.

Any disagreement is discounted as "you're just ignorant and don't have a real opinion" followed by "you need to trust The Experts, but only the ones that agree with us".

It has been a hoot to watch the US Democrats and all their useful idiots turn these arguments against the rest of the US over the last 6 years.

Probably ends as well as Afghanistan, Vietnam, Iraq, Syria, etc.

It's both parties. They're both awful, condescending in their own "flavor", and don't give two shits about you and me.

China has also invaded Vietnam

Russia has also invaded Afghanistan

FYI

The difference is that we don't have Hollywood movies about those.

The real reasons why people hate America so much is not US military actions (though that has contributed in some cases), but American culture.

Nationalists worldwide absolutely hate it when young people in their countries drink Coke, eat at McDonalds, wear Levi's, consume US Music, Movies and video games, social media, etc. US culture has been displacing other cultures gradually for about 100 years.

If you are a westerner, consider the impact of Tik-Tok, and multiply it by 100x, then you may even empathize with them.

Yeah westerners have so much access to information. I mean look at all those informed opinions about WMDs in Iraq. The US begged countries like Finland, Sweden and Australia to join them in their middle east occupation.

Australia has assisted US in most all major conflicts they have been involved in since WW2. Being a small democratic nation, the US is our most powerful ally and we have invested in that relationship for close to a century. We didn't just come knocking on the door yesterday 'begging' for help.

Yeah. Look up death totals from external conflicts from the past two decades and you’ll see one country is an absolutely colossal threat.

“ First of all average people's opinions outside of western democracies are meaningless because those people don't have access to education or information to form any real opinions.”

This is insane. Your arrogance and total ignorance about the rest of the world is just crazy.

Threats depend on who the attacker is in relationship to the victim. The United States is quite a big threat to PRC and the persons who claim sole citizenship there.

> all average people's opinions outside of western democracies are meaningless because those people don't have access to education or information to form any real opinions.

Please do better. This is incredibly naive and insulting.