I don't pretend to have the answer in the case of Syria, and I'm not advocating anything one way or another. I'm just pointing out that your model of the world doesn't appear to predict the past, let alone the future.
Kosovo is also disputed even in terms of actual casualties, let alone projected casualties, and is probably not a good case for intervention.
I fully agree there is not a good answer either way (syria included)... Just pointing out that your examples don't really predict the past or future either. Prediction in any case seems like a waste of time. (Unless you're The Doctor that is.)
A group of armed Tutsi's is ultimately what ended the Rwandan genocide. So yes, that likely would have worked well.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rwandan_Genocide#Rwandan_Patrio...
Genocide tipping in exactly the opposite direction is another (obviously unintended) possibility. Oh yeah... The rest of the wiki you link talks about that... Oops!
You can't predict a future that didn't happen. (Again unless you're The Doctor).
Also it isn't so convincing to link to a wiki section that supposedly proves your point about reducing bloodshed, while the very next section on the page describes 5 million people killed in the same area in the following decade.
Also, I'd be a little embarrassed to suggest that the solution is to not have any media or political coverage. At the very least, there should be more coverage on the world stage.
It can only help if leaders know the world is watching, their acts are being recorded, and someday they may be held accountable.
Yes.
How many have died in the US Civil war? I read ~215K combat deaths and ~500K civillian deaths.
Should someone had intervene, e.g Britain or France, aiding one side over the other (and pushing their own agenda)?
>Until after the WWII, the US really didn't involve itself in much of the world's conflicts. Our tradition is to pretty much leave the world to fix its own problems. We joined WWI during the last year of the war and WW2 was already 3 years in before we officially joined.
Actually, in historical terms, joining WWII was an already made decision, not something the US was "dragged on". The Pearl Harbor was just a pretext, and they worked quite hard on provoking that kind of aggression from the Japanese. They US (not the people, the policy makers and large interests) saw the decline of the old colonial powers, and reached for the opportunity to get a large slice of the post-colonial pie.
Plus, it had a long colonial/invasion history of its own, from Philipines to Mexico and beyond by that time.
Yes, WWII is well documented. The point was we didn't send in our full military until 1941. It's possible tens of millions more people would not have died if we had joined earlier.
That's not the civil war I asked about though -- the revolutionary war was already between 2 different nations (well, one under construction).
And there was other differences: France did it to weaken Britain (the part which was their rival to their colonial and trade empire). Not to "bring justice/democracy/what have you".
And if France could do much power-wise, it would have taken whatever much it could from the new nation.
http://www.reuters.com/article/2013/12/02/us-syria-crisis-to...
By some accounts, 1 in 10 killed was a child. Why don't we ever discuss this on HN?
Until after the WWII, the US really didn't involve itself in much of the world's conflicts. Our tradition is to pretty much leave the world to fix its own problems. We joined WWI during the last year of the war and WW2 was already 3 years in before we officially joined.