Even then, we half-assed things. We never outlawed slavery and we supported the Nazis because they were fervently anticommunist. Fuck, we even recruited them directly after the war
IDK about the pirates but it's the US so they probably fought them because they wanted to do the piracy themselves
barbary pirates weren't cool they were involved in a slave trade on a scale to rival the Atlantic trade
the barbary pirate slave trade is less of a factor in the modern makeup of those societies however because America is uniquely bad in terms of getting over it's slavery as an institutional affect
slave trade on a scale to rival the Atlantic trade
not really. we don't have good records but it was probably less than a million people, a proportion of whom were simply ransomed through state/private intervention. europeans made a really big deal about it because it was whites being enslaved by who they saw as an inferior race, but it wasn't on a very large scale and the period of 'unrestricted' piracy, inasmuch as it ever existed was quite brief and tied to a general state of warfare between the Ottomans and the Habsburgs (controlling Spain, Italy, & the land border with the Ottomans), after which it normalized and was conducted in state-based fashion. in the 18th century most states simply paid for free passage, and the USA even signed such treaties before Thomas Jefferson decided to send gunboats instead
Confederates were American, in fact they were extra American. The most American of the Americans. The most pure distillation of the Classical Liberal Slavery ideology that America represents.
They only fought Nazis because Nazis declared war on them first and America happened to have the farthest left leaning president in its history at the time to push the nation the right way. There were significant political movements to ally with Nazis and adopt fascism ourselves, including business plot coups and major industrialist funding. Immediately after the war we absorbed Nazi command structures and reimplemented them, reinstalling fascists back into power
Remembering the times the US wasn't the worst:
The time they were fighting the Confederates
The time they were fighting the Nazis
The time they were fighting the Barbary coast pirates? Maybe? idk probably not
Even then, we half-assed things. We never outlawed slavery and we supported the Nazis because they were fervently anticommunist. Fuck, we even recruited them directly after the war
IDK about the pirates but it's the US so they probably fought them because they wanted to do the piracy themselves
The U.S. only “fought the Nazis” to prevent communist Europe, so still the bad guys
One time they got a kitten who was stuck in a tree down to safety. Source: CIA world Factbook. Org
that was them taking the opportunity to do more expansionism
also its funny how each one of these things were things the USA had to basically be forced into doing
Fighting the Confederates cancels out though, as the they were also the US. So that one doesn't count either.
That and the Union didn't finish those slavers off
pirates are cool!
barbary pirates weren't cool they were involved in a slave trade on a scale to rival the Atlantic trade
the barbary pirate slave trade is less of a factor in the modern makeup of those societies however because America is uniquely bad in terms of getting over it's slavery as an institutional affect
not really. we don't have good records but it was probably less than a million people, a proportion of whom were simply ransomed through state/private intervention. europeans made a really big deal about it because it was whites being enslaved by who they saw as an inferior race, but it wasn't on a very large scale and the period of 'unrestricted' piracy, inasmuch as it ever existed was quite brief and tied to a general state of warfare between the Ottomans and the Habsburgs (controlling Spain, Italy, & the land border with the Ottomans), after which it normalized and was conducted in state-based fashion. in the 18th century most states simply paid for free passage, and the USA even signed such treaties before Thomas Jefferson decided to send gunboats instead
And they were against the US government which has always objectively been the bad guys
Fighting the British is always kinda justifiable to be fair.
They did do it mostly so they could treat the people of the Americas worse. So any virtue there was accidntal.
Confederates were American, in fact they were extra American. The most American of the Americans. The most pure distillation of the Classical Liberal Slavery ideology that America represents.
They only fought Nazis because Nazis declared war on them first and America happened to have the farthest left leaning president in its history at the time to push the nation the right way. There were significant political movements to ally with Nazis and adopt fascism ourselves, including business plot coups and major industrialist funding. Immediately after the war we absorbed Nazi command structures and reimplemented them, reinstalling fascists back into power