Comment by hajile

Comment by hajile 10 months ago

The Saudis aren't getting my tax money. If they get weapons, it's because they are paying big money for them. I don't believe we should be selling them weapons from a moral perspective, but I do understand (though I don't agree with) the economic argument that they would buy from Russia instead which would boost Russian weapon production.

In contrast, Israel got 14.1B plus the usual 3.8B. This is the equivalent of an almost $200 stimulus check for every person in Israel. Personally, I'd rather spend that money on infrastructure or at least give it to the poorest Americans.

Answering most of your questions quickly: Aid to Pakistan was cut under Trump (though Biden is asking for aid again). Mujahideen funding to fight the USSR during the Cold War is materially different AND it blew up in our faces when we invaded Afghanistan. We invited the Russian Premier who presided the second half of the Korean War (killing way more Americans than the Taliban ever has) to Camp David too (refusing to deal with foreign leaders because they are unsavory or evil is pretty much always a recipe for even bigger problems).

You don't hear US politicians calling the Saudis or Pakistanis good people, but you DO hear this claim about Israel while the hypocrisy is blatant to anyone who researches with even the slightest bit of objectivity. This alone is a massive difference.

L0stLink 10 months ago

Also the most egregious thing: Israel knew about 911 (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hdiQuU7upfw) and did not share that intel with the USA. There is more evidence of this but it gets harder to find as time passes and it gets taken down, perhaps no entity benefited more from 911 than Israel.

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Arkhaine_kupo 10 months ago

> The Saudis aren't getting my tax money.

They are the largest military buyer of the US, with a 60 billion order signed in 2010 and a 110 billion signed in 2017. Both of which include the US army training and providing support for the Saudi Military.

Are the army dudes training them not paid with taxes? Do you think the Saudi Royal family being the richest in the world after becoming allies with the US is a coincidence?

If you wanna ignore the reality of the situation because there is an explicit bill in congress that says "2 billions to Israel" and there is no bill in congress that says "vote in tandem with Saudi in the UN, help them in Kuwait, help them in destroying Yemen and keep local gas prices low at the expense of horrible human abuses far away while they buy our military equipment and we train them up to have a local partner if we ever wanna invade iraq again" then yeah your tax dollars aren't going to Saudi.

> I'd rather spend that money on infrastructure or at least give it to the poorest Americans.

That money IS going to americans. You do not understand how the aid is sent to Israel. America pays an american company, like Lockheed Martin to produce X amount of stuff and the surplus is then gifted to Israel essentially.

This works in two ways. One is that it keeps war production pipelines running, countries that dismantle their weapon shops and then try to run them again have lots of trouble (see russia), however america does not need yearly the amount it produces and the jobs in certain industries are expensive. Engineers and union factory workers make good money in those companies so your tax dollars pay for those jobs, and Israel essentially takes the extra missiles (of the 3B yearly 2 are for the Iron Dome which has no offensive capability). No israeli is getting 200$, but some dude in an american factory makes 125k and has weekends off thanks to that 14B bill

> Answering most of your questions quickly

thats not an answer, thats a rationalisation and a poor one at that. You said america does not fund terrorism, and then you said "oh but it blew up in our faces" that is not lack of funding that is just what you get when you fund terrorism.

> This alone is a massive difference.

You have Trump meeting Bin Salman calling him a good friend in April of this year. So clearly you in the rhetoric department there is no massive difference. we have people in goverment like Bernie Sanders that criticise Israel and people who criticise Saudi, and both get your tax dollars.

The Saudi fund also has more money in lobbying, more money in US universities, has more overt corrupt deals like a 2 billion investment in the son in law of Trump or renting the entire top floor of Trump tower without anyone staying there. And at the same time they have killed 400k people in Yemen, funded the genocide of the Tigray in Sudan. And there has been 0 backlash.

I do not think it is outrageous to claim that the disproportionate attention on Israel might have reasons beyond the moral or the economic for its magnitude.

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hajile 10 months ago

The Saudis are handing over their own money rather than using US taxpayer money. That's a very different situation. Likewise, most of the maintenance and training is done by ex-military working as contractors.
You don't understand the broken window fallacy.
Further, that stuff isn't actually surplus. Russia had way more "surplus" than we do, but the Ukraine war showed just how quickly that equipment gets used.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Parable_of_the_broken_window
Fact is that this pager attack is something like the second or third largest terrorist attack in modern history by number of casualties.
Everything else here is trying to eliminate all nuance and create a bunch of whataboutism to defend terrorism.

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- Arkhaine_kupo 10 months ago
  
  > The Saudis are handing over their own money rather than using US taxpayer money
  Sure if you pretend billateral multi decade trade agreements that have made the country insanely rich are in no way benefited from american taxpayer dollars specially in military then yeah, they get none of your tax dollars.
  > most of the maintenance and training is done by ex-military working as contractors.
  That is easily verifibly untrue. Part of the 110 billion dollar buy in 2018 was using american corps for training. That is part of what they bought.
  > You don't understand the broken window fallacy.
  I do, but this is not a case of broken windows. Its the case of the american industrial military complex needing to be active even during non war times. Countries cannot stop and start the military industry, similar to a big furnace. Its expensive to get going, its not cheap to mantain but it is impossible to stop and start it at a whim. Therefore a on going level of fire is needed, for america that is military spending, and military aid for partners. In the case of Saudi that is military orders in exchange for many many benefits. In the case of Israel is repleneshing the Iron Dome which america has access to the technology for. Seeing them as distinct things is rhetoric, when the material effect is the same. American jobs are paid, military companies produce goods and america holds bilateral benefitial relationships with right wing countries in the middle east.
  Pretending they are extremely different based on payment method is looking for an excuse to morally only condemn one relationship.
  > Fact is that this pager attack is something like the second or third largest terrorist attack in modern history by number of casualties.
  How is it terrorism? Terrorism is using fear for political goals. Disrupting enemy comms is a military goal, not a political one. And its effect, making the enemy unable to talk, plus potentially hurting people who use those comms is not intended to cause fear but actual damage.
  I grew up around terrorism think Ireland in the 80s. The effects of terrosim are fear, are people unable to say certain things, are people being killed for pushing political ideas.
  Bombing a military radio tower in Russia is not terrorism, neither is destroying walkie talkies from Hezbollah members. The fact it was a crazy operation does not make it more terrorism than Russia launching a 400kg payload against a Ukrainian data center
  
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