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Comment by justin66 | Hacker News Reader

> I feel like I'm thrown back to the 80s, all this military and fear mongering and propaganda and war.

I can't imagine what sort of lens you were using to view the last thirty years, such that those were the peaceful, propaganda-free times and all this shit with balloons is troubling.

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The 80s is too far back, probably 2003 was the last peak, but since it became clear Afghanistan and Iraq were disasters the war propaganda complex was muted for years. Remember when Romney said Russia was the US's biggest threat in 2012, and Obama mocked him? Now both parties are back in on the war machine with Ukraine and Taiwan, and the propaganda's running at levels we haven't seen for twenty years.

> since it became clear Afghanistan and Iraq were disasters the war propaganda complex was muted for years

If it weren't for propaganda, we would have found the will to exit those wars well over a decade ago.

Leaving Iraq earlier would have been fucked up. We would wrecked the country, destabilized it, raised the problem of sectarian warfare, and then bounced. We still basically did that, but at least helped it with ISIS before leaving.

As it is, we arguably owe it more.

You can see what the result of leaving Afghanistan has been. We should have devoted more resources to nation building there.

Not sure what you think is "propaganda" about concerns about Russian aggression in Ukraine or about China's evils.

Even Afghanistan wasn't a matter of propaganda so much as other flaws/isaues, such as overreactivity and hubris.

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