Ending the Evil Empire

NATO:1. Soldiers do agree to fight in Afghanistan, but only because that is what the Commander in Chief is currently telling them to do. They’d also agree to come home to their families, if that’s what the government decided. A life is a life, and ending the war means fewer soldiers dying.2. Oh, so the US government cares about helping people when it’s convenient for them, when they aren’t in the way of our interests? That doesn’t seem to really count as caring about other people. In addition, this argument is about spending the Afghanistan war money on ending all extreme poverty instead. If we were arguing about why we aren’t ending all extreme poverty now, and spending that money in Afghanistan instead, Con’s argument would be correct. But this argument is about what the government would do with that money GIVEN that we’re ending the war in Afghanistan. Accepting Con’s theory of US humanitarianism, surely in that scenario the government would spend the money on ending all extreme poverty. This would save millions of lives, and reduces terrorism because richer people are less likely to become terrorists—advancing our interests and helping others. Death Toll:1+2. Again, it does not matter who does the killing. If NATO occupation increases conflict, which increases the amount of people killed by the Taliban, then those deaths are caused by NATO occupation. And there’s good reasons to believe this is true—total civilian deaths have increased yearly in the past several years, exactly what would happen if I’m right and NATO does increase total conflict, and the opposite of what would happen if Con’s theory of NATO stabilizing the region was correct. And me dropping Con’s criticism of the study doesn’t prove that “a lot” of deaths are actually Taliban deaths, it just means that some indeterminate amount is. Con provided no evidence showing that this is a large amount, or even a significant one—just reasoning suggesting that it’s SOME amount. In addition, this is countered by an earlier note about the death estimate being a vast understatement (see Death Toll R1). There’s no reason to think that Con’s indeterminate amount is larger than mine.3. The evidence of the past 10 years suggests that NATO occupation makes Afghanistan bloodier, which Con does not contest, merely saying that it’s going to be bloody either way.Then, Con tries to sneak in the idea that NATO occupation will bring long-term stability to Afghanistan. There’s no reason to accept his claim at face value—Con provides no reasoning or evidence to back this up. I don’t have room to rebut all of Con’s 1 line assertions with full arguments, so I’ll leave my rebuttal at “nuh-uh.” He uses N. Afghanistan as an example, but that part of the country was already against the Taliban—there’s no reason to think the US can stabilize S. Afghanistan when they haven’t gotten close in 10 years.He also just asserts that Taliban support will increase if NATO withdraws, again with no evidence. He has reasoning this time—that people will be pressured to join without NATO protecting him, but there’s no reason to think that this is more likely than support decreasing because NATO is no longer bombing people and turning people against the U.S. and toward our enemies. Con provides no evidence backing up his assertion, and it should be discounted.Drugs/HIV:1. Again, I said that even if drug use doesn’t decrease, it will stop increasing, which Con drops. Since he drops this, he concedes that this will happen—extend arguments about heroin addiction and HIV infections.2. Oh, Obama plans for NATO to take control of South Afghanistan and stabilize it? Oh, well then in that case, my plan is for withdrawal to bring peace and stability to the region. What’s that—my plan doesn’t have any arguments or evidence backing it up? What a coincidence! Con’s doesn’t either. Maybe there is evidence suggesting that Obama’s plan will work—but we’ll never know.HDI: 1. Con states that the region will become too unstable after NATO leaves, and so the Chinese will withdraw their investments. But he offers no evidence or analysis showing that this is the case. I could just as easily say, ‘When NATO leaves, the region will become more stable due to there not being a war, and so Chinese investment will increase’—and I’ve matched Con’s level of analysis. Again, China has invested all over the world, in unstable countries, even those without NATO military occupation—see my R2 source. 2. The HDI does include the things Con mentions it not including, national income statistics, life expectancy, and education (including expected future education based on how many people are now in school). [1]] It is a far more comprehensive measure of well-being than Con’s indicators, because it includes those indicators, as well as others.Karzai:1. Con argues that the Taliban was worse, but fails to show that the Taliban would actually take over—choosing to merely assert it instead.Terrorism:1+2. It really doesn’t matter if Pape’s study doesn’t make a distinction between terrorism on U.S. soil and “insurgency” in the Middle East. Both kill people, and all lives are of equal moral worth. And I did not ignore the Rubin analysis, I showed that the assumption he makes, “the US had little to no involvement in the Middle East before 9/11”, is clearly wrong, making his conclusion that US intervention has nothing to do with terrorism flawed.1) is simply false—any group of people anywhere in the world can call themselves ‘Al-Qaeda’ and be in Al-Qaeda, for example. There’s no membership cards or uniforms—it’s just what a bunch of completely disconnected groups with similar ideologies call themselves. Besides, anyone can just pick up a gun/bomb and be a terrorist by themselves. 2) There’s no reason to think that the war creates any sort of “deterrent effect” for terrorists—how could one deter people who are willing to die for their cause anyway?—nor does Con provide any evidence of such an effect. WOT:1. Afghanistan is certainly not the only country that provides safe havens to terrorists. See: any government to weak/corrupt to stop terrorists in their country, like Pakistan and much of Africa. Nor does Con provide any sort of analysis or evidence about the benefits of removing Afghanistan as a safe haven for Al-Qaeda to weigh against the costs.2. See earlier response on Taliban support.Hegemony:1. Con misunderstands—we can consider global impacts, but just the impacts of withdrawing from ONLY Afghanistan.2a. Con argues that even though Iran has never attacked anyone before, “the threat is there.” Why? Who would they attack, and for what reason? Con merely asserts that some vague threat is there. This is just empty lip service.2b. The US military is still much stronger than Iran’s. This is off-topic—there’s no reason leaving Afghanistan would stop the US from pressuring Iran.3. See my above response on terrorism. And again, Con merely asserts something without backing it up. I could just as easily say many terrorists will stop after “beating” the U.S., because we aren’t there for them to fight any more, which makes Pakistan’s government more stable.Conclusion: I have shown that NATO occupation increases the total death toll, helps terrorist recruiting, and stagnated living standards.Many of my other arguments are simply some variant of “nuh-uh,” or bare assertions about what would happen without any supporting evidence. This is because many of Con’s arguments are nothing but bare assertions without evidence—as Christopher Hitchens famously said, “That which can be asserted without evidence, can be dismissed without evidence.” He is just spamming arguments, trying to get me to drop one. There’s no room to respond to all of his assertions with full arguments and evidence, so I’ll dismiss them with the amount of evidence Con used. Voters should also ignore Con’s points if he tries to substantiate his claims in his R3.