so much for draining the swamp

[Dill]

(11-21-2016, 01:58 PM)Mike M (the other one) Wrote: Just an FYI.
We did give Panama over 1Billion in aid after we left to help them rebuild.
Bosnia was different, but they still received money from SEED afterwards to help rebuild.
The EU took the lead on rebuilding Kosovo, but we did send over 500 mil to help with that.

Aid does not equal nation building.

This discussion got me thinking of historical examples.

In 37 BCE, the Roman senate declared Herod the Great king of Judea and lent him aid in overthrowing Antigonus II. Judea was already a client state, but I still call that regime change since it was also the end of the Hasemonean Dynasty and founding of the Herodian. But far from offering "aid" or otherwise interfering in Judean government, the Romans just continued to exact tribute and taxes. This seems an example of regime change without nation building. I could multiply examples here from throughout the ancient world. A major power dethrones a minor king and replaces him with someone who understands he is to pay tribute and trade on favorable terms. Everything else remains the same in the regime-changed country.

WWI certainly effected regime change in Germany and Austria-Hungary, though the Allies themselves did not directly depose/kill the leaders of the Central Powers. What followed was not exactly nation-building or aid--quite the opposite as the Central Powers were saddled with reparations.

If you change a country's "regime" and then force it to pay you money, exhausting its economy, are you automatically nation building? You would have to be if regime change and nation building are the same thing.

Most historians would agree that the decision to nation build in Germany and Japan after WWII was connected to the refusal to national build after WWI, which in great part fueled German desire for a revenge war.