Exterminating civilians is exterminating civilians...
Who knows. Maybe so. Regardless, I never lose any sleep at night worrying about those two particular decisions.
I've noticed (and you're just one example) that, over the last decade or two, there's been a strong cynicism, most of it often woefully uninformed about historical conditions and realities, over the US and its actions, specifically relating to its foreign policy. Somewhere along the way the US somehow became the "bad guy." I've noticed this in particular with the recent ceremonies regarding the atomic bombings. Much of this is justified, but much of it isn't. When you compare the US's actions to the only feasible alternatives, the US looks like a saint. And people forget, because they only ever look at raw statistics and then want simple culprits and narratives to explain them, but the majority of wars the US has been in (outside of WWII), the majority of civilian casualties were the people killing each other (not the US). Even regarding the indigenous populations here (which is often considered a genocide), the overwhelming majority of native peoples died from exposure to diseases they had no immunity to, not necessarily from coordinated genocide efforts.
Now, if you want to blame the US primarily for these things, that's understandable, but let's not pretend like these societies and peoples are saints that didn't have some real serious underlying issues with one another. (You don't get half a million Iraqis to murder one another unless they have some serious, deep-rooted historical issues with one another that need to be resolved at some point.) Perhaps the US was the spark, but I don't think it was the actual problem. In today's 24/7 news/media cycle, which has never existed until now, we tend to overlook the fact that people have always been killing one another and that the parts of the world that are currently "unstable" have just about always been "unstable" simply due to geography and historical migrational/cultural interaction patterns. But, historically speaking, the past 70 years (and I include the Soviet Union in this as well as "relative" keepers of the peace, but mostly the US) have most likely been the most peaceful in history. We just don't think they are, because we have things like Twitter and CNN and RT to remind us constantly how someone got killed by a drone today. And so we think the world's on fire, when it really isn't.
Regarding our past indiscretions as a nation, I think that in order to earn back the goodwill of the rest of the world we need to follow the Russian model. What is the Russian model, you might ask. I'll break it down in simple, comprehensible steps:
1. Claim successor state status to the USSR (and, by extension, to the Russian Empire).
2. Look at everything good and desirable about claiming such a successor status (UN Security Counsel permanent member, vast nuclear arsenal, etc.), and claim it. Sell it to the world for all it's worth, as the natural inheritor of these good, desirable things and deeds. Along with Comrade Stalin, we saved the entire world from fascist aggression and tyranny! Heyyyy!!!
3. Look at everything bad and undesirable about claiming such a successor status, and don't claim it. Let the world know that, whatever those other guys (Soviets and Imperialists) did in the past, well, those were entirely different nations. Not the Russian Federation. Stalin murdering 40 million Russians? Not us! That was a completely different nation, the Soviets. Comrade Stalin? Who the hell is he?
4. The world completely absolves you, at least in your mind, and you move on. Move on to just blame someone else constantly for the past or for your current problems.
This way you get to dissociate yourself with the bad while only keeping the good. Kind of like having your cake and eating it at the same time.
So maybe if the US renames itself to the United States of North America and sets up a de facto three-party system instead of a de facto two-party one, we can dissociate ourselves with all the bad in our past and only claim the good. And the world will absolve us of any wrongdoing the United States of America may have done. You know, those bad other guys. Not us.
Logic.
