What is your greatest international concern at the moment?

[Chain Chungus]

Putin has no interest in seeing Russia destroyed on a vainglorious invasion, quite the opposite from what I can tell as he wants to put Russia back on the map, not have it wiped off.

We could go at this all day, but it feels like I'm a dog chasing his own tail.

Germany also wanted to be "put back on the map." Or so Hitler claimed. That was much of the justification for taking things like the Rhineland and the Sudentenland.

[Kalis]

We could go at this all day, but it feels like I'm a dog chasing his own tail.

Germany also wanted to be "put back on the map." Or so Hitler claimed. That was much of the justification for taking things like the Rhineland and the Sudentenland.

Germany would have been fine had they not invaded Poland, which he didn't think would piss off Britain and France enough for them to go to war, but even if it did provoke them, Germany rightly thought they might be able to beat them. Whereas Putin isn't going to invade any EU nation as he knows for certain it means going to war with the entire EU and the US, plus whatever allies they can muster, which he knows Russia can't win.

There aren't the similarities in the two situations that you think there are.

[Revi]

History books.

Those who do not know history are doomed to repeat it.

I meant about Russia and Putin. Knowing what lead to WW2 doesn't mean you're informed about what's going on in a different country, with a different leader and in a extremely different situation 70 years later.

[Independent voter]

The US economy is the only economy in the world that's doing good. Germany, France, China and Japan have to stop slacking off. They're killing our buzz.

[Deleted]

none of those things really matter, not important at all in the grand scheme of things. The fact that 40% of wildlife populations globally have been wiped out in the last 40 years is much more important.

[larrakeyah]

The fact that 40% of wildlife populations globally have been wiped out in the last 40 years is much more important.

That's even more irrelevant.

[PaladinBash]

Boat people breaking into Australia. The vermin don't stop and the government is finally being bullied into letting them in by the UN even though it's us taxpayers who have to pay up for those scumbos. I credit the Navy for working so long and so hard to keep them out all this time but eventually, our government just has to give into the UN which once again fucks over Australia so it can act like it matters. The more America or Russia wave their dicks at the UN, the more the UN tries to push around smaller nations like Australia. I'm all for America and Russia to give the UN the middle finger. The sooner it falls apart or is discredited, the sooner Australia isn't under its thumb again.

[larrakeyah]

Boat people breaking into Australia. The vermin don't stop and the government is finally being bullied into letting them in by the UN even though it's us taxpayers who have to pay up for those scumbos. I credit the Navy for working so long and so hard to keep them out all this time but eventually, our government just has to give into the UN which once again fucks over Australia so it can act like it matters. The more America or Russia wave their dicks at the UN, the more the UN tries to push around smaller nations like Australia. I'm all for America and Russia to give the UN the middle finger. The sooner it falls apart or is discredited, the sooner Australia isn't under its thumb again.

Now that is a real concern, fucking boat mongrels.

The UN is already discredited by the way.

There's still hope though: http://www.scotsman.com/news/world/c...visa-1-3574248

[Deleted]

I'm not really concerned about anything that's happening outside our borders. Watching the news would be pretty boring if nothing happened at all. Ebola and the border crisis aren't really international so I guess they don't count. I also doubt ISIS will ever make it here.

[May90]

For me it is Russia. I'd lived there most of my life before moving to the US, and it pains me to see what Putin is doing to that country and its neighbors. I hope this bastard gets what he deserves soon and Russia finally becomes a modern democratic country.
China is alarming too, but those guys don't seem to be interested in military expansion much. At least, for the moment.

[Raeph]

It's definitely possible to take a laissez-faire approach, the western allies tried that in the 1930s. How would you even begin to accomplish what you're talking about? You'd need mass dictatorship and protectionism to start with. And how would the US banking/financial sector even survive if they didn't invest in other countries, or if they didn't account for any international changes? Are there any countries that have successfully been isolationist?

Difference in being isolationist and non-interventionist. Basically take the stance of "We'll do business with you but if there is any conflict on your borders we cut off our connection to you until the conflict is resolved. The problems of others are not our concern."

Sign no mutual defense agreements, or treaties, just business, trade and environmental compacts.

[Aeluron Lightsong]

The amount of $$ the people have in order to live comforably(As in not in dire straits).

[Skroe]

Chinese Expansionism is the only one of these with truly lasting significance.

Afghanistan -> Low level brushfire concern.
al-Qaeda & Terrorism -> long since managed concern.
Chechnya -> dead issue
Egypt -> Boat has long since sailed
Euro Crisis -> Nothing urgent.
EU Integration -> The very definition of slow, steady change, for better or for worse.
Iran -> managed concern.
Islamic State / ISIS -> The problem du jour... but not a threat to the United States or world order. Another "3 out of 10" manageable concern.
Israel-Arab Conflict -> Americans and Europeans will ahve colonized mars and they'll still be arguing about the same old crap. Doesn't effect anything anymore.
Kurdistan -> See ISIS
North Korea -> The Hermit Kingdom will continue to be a mostly harmless Hermit that will occasionally throw a tantrum.
Somali Civil War -> Regional concern.
Ukraine-Russia Conflict -> Ironic given how much I wrote about this, but it's another 4 out of 10 concern. Russia is not a power. It's a regional spoiler. And the conflict is dangerous only in sofar that it requires resources to counterbalance Russia. But it's only served to drive NATO together in a way it hasn't been. In any event, we clearly have Russia set up to take a hard fall for it's behavior. This one peters out over time
US "Border Crisis" / Mexican Stability - > Not a real issue


Chinese Expansionism is a direct threat to the Western World Order. It is the only one that implies lasting change to the international community. That is why it is the only one that truly has significance. Afghanistan, ISIS, Iran... they can all go poorly or frustratingly for the Western World, but to really no ill long term effects. China on the other hand? It cannot be allowed to try and rewrite the rules to which it is subject. It must be confronted and it must be stopped.

The world only has room for one superpower. One. We must make sure that continues to be the United States and not China.

[Ratboy]

When it comes to things like this I ask myself 2 questions:
1 - Is there anything I can do about it?
2 - Will it have a direct impact on my life?
If 1 or both of them are "no", I just don't care.

[THE Bigzoman]

Chinese/Japanese tensions.
http://www.crisisgroup.org/en/region...-tensions.aspx

Seems like a ticking time bomb decades in the making. If there's any conflict where world stability is threatend, it lies in the nations that have deep unresolved beefs with one another.

[Deleted]

That's even more irrelevant.

Its the most important issue we have ever faced.

[Kellhound]

China. They are the long term global destabilization catalyst threat.

[Cybran]

http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2014-1...h-reports.html

European stocks fell the most in almost three years, taking their decline from a June high to 11 percent, as Shire Plc led health-care companies lower, while investors weighed earnings and worse-than-forecast U.S. retail-sales and manufacturing data.

The biggest concern is that Europe is heading towards a second financial crash, due to Germany's miss handling of the ECB.

[Tekkommo]

Scotland gaining independence from sheer persistence.

[Deleted]

ISIS, more specificaly ISIS supporters in the western world. Holy fuck, they might not be so vocal, but I could not belive home many people actually approve their deeds here in my hometown, fucking traitors