I am an admirer of Chomsky, and no fan of most U.S. foreign policy, but in my opinion it is tough to deal with his slant on matters like this. In this line of argument we are led to believe that what came to pass in Afghanistan was almost entirely the fault of U.S. meddling ("what 'we' did to Afghanistan") -- the fact that the Soviets literally invaded the country to satisfy their own imperialist ambitions barely draws mention.
And while it's accurate to say that domino theory didn't really end up making sense, it's easy to say that writing from the far future where the Soviet Union has already collapsed and America became the hyperpower. It's a different matter to put yourself in the shoes of politicians and bureaucrats (and a general public) who had a legitimate fear that a Soviet takeover of the world would mean a nuclear holocaust and the death of everyone they knew.
It's also easy to make fun of our backing "freedom fighters" and how predictably these folks supposedly will turn into international terrorists who will end up killing each other plus many of Americans too. But again -- hindsight. Is it really that predictable that every set of "freedom fighters" we back end up becoming terrorists? Is that what we should expect Ukrainians to do?
I know that what Chomsky would say to this (among other ways he would rhetorically annihilate me) is that of course he condemns Soviet expansionism and Islamic terrorism and etc etc but that it's so patently obvious that those things are bad that he doesn't need to say them out loud. But the end result of that is still typical Chomsky output.... many thousands of words on why U.S. intervention was murderous, a couple sentences at best about the other parties who, by the way, did plenty of killing themselves.
When the U.S. does something, it's "smashing" or "brutalizing" citizens of other countries (not quoting from your article, just using words that Chomsky uses in his books). When some other entity does it, they're just looking out for their interests ("The aim of the Soviet Union was to put a friendly government on their border.").
You're dead on in your conclusions about American interventionism, IMO. But it's also my view that this particular line of reasoning mostly serves to shock us out of our Ameri-centric stupor and consider things from another perspective.... not necessarily to depict the world in entirely fair or accurate terms.
I am an admirer of Chomsky, and no fan of most U.S. foreign policy, but in my opinion it is tough to deal with his slant on matters like this. In this line of argument we are led to believe that what came to pass in Afghanistan was almost entirely the fault of U.S. meddling ("what 'we' did to Afghanistan") -- the fact that the Soviets literally invaded the country to satisfy their own imperialist ambitions barely draws mention.
And while it's accurate to say that domino theory didn't really end up making sense, it's easy to say that writing from the far future where the Soviet Union has already collapsed and America became the hyperpower. It's a different matter to put yourself in the shoes of politicians and bureaucrats (and a general public) who had a legitimate fear that a Soviet takeover of the world would mean a nuclear holocaust and the death of everyone they knew.
It's also easy to make fun of our backing "freedom fighters" and how predictably these folks supposedly will turn into international terrorists who will end up killing each other plus many of Americans too. But again -- hindsight. Is it really that predictable that every set of "freedom fighters" we back end up becoming terrorists? Is that what we should expect Ukrainians to do?
I know that what Chomsky would say to this (among other ways he would rhetorically annihilate me) is that of course he condemns Soviet expansionism and Islamic terrorism and etc etc but that it's so patently obvious that those things are bad that he doesn't need to say them out loud. But the end result of that is still typical Chomsky output.... many thousands of words on why U.S. intervention was murderous, a couple sentences at best about the other parties who, by the way, did plenty of killing themselves.
When the U.S. does something, it's "smashing" or "brutalizing" citizens of other countries (not quoting from your article, just using words that Chomsky uses in his books). When some other entity does it, they're just looking out for their interests ("The aim of the Soviet Union was to put a friendly government on their border.").
You're dead on in your conclusions about American interventionism, IMO. But it's also my view that this particular line of reasoning mostly serves to shock us out of our Ameri-centric stupor and consider things from another perspective.... not necessarily to depict the world in entirely fair or accurate terms.