And that really showed the true character of the US as a country. Just how much bloodlust they had after 9/11.
I would add that it wasn’t just the immediate aftermath of 9/11 that showed Americans’ character. After it was widely known and accepted that there were no WMDs and so many people had already died, Americans’ response was basically “whoopsie daisy”. Americans accepted, likely just as cope, that Bush and Cheney didn’t lie, the CIA didn’t lie, etc. No one did anything maliciously. Everyone was just doing their gosh darn best and they just got it wrong; like ordering some bad soup at a deli. So there has been zero accountability at all. Hell, I can’t imagine the President of the US just writing a letter of apology to the Iraqi people without most Americans losing their shit over it.
Bad countries refuse to acknowledge their faults and certainly don’t do anything about it. For as incomplete as de-Naziification was at least in West Germany, I do believe German society - even in the West - did try and come to grips with the horrors of the Nazi regime and do something about it. You’ll know about this much better than I, so please correct me if I’m wrong, but in the 90s it seemed at least to an outsider that there was at least some attempt for South African society to understand the scope of evil of apartheid, come to grips with it, and move forward in healthier ways. This is the sort of baseline requirement to being a good country and the Americans can’t even come close to this low standard.
I would add that it wasn’t just the immediate aftermath of 9/11 that showed Americans’ character. After it was widely known and accepted that there were no WMDs and so many people had already died, Americans’ response was basically “whoopsie daisy”. Americans accepted, likely just as cope, that Bush and Cheney didn’t lie, the CIA didn’t lie, etc. No one did anything maliciously. Everyone was just doing their gosh darn best and they just got it wrong; like ordering some bad soup at a deli. So there has been zero accountability at all. Hell, I can’t imagine the President of the US just writing a letter of apology to the Iraqi people without most Americans losing their shit over it.
Bad countries refuse to acknowledge their faults and certainly don’t do anything about it. For as incomplete as de-Naziification was at least in West Germany, I do believe German society - even in the West - did try and come to grips with the horrors of the Nazi regime and do something about it. You’ll know about this much better than I, so please correct me if I’m wrong, but in the 90s it seemed at least to an outsider that there was at least some attempt for South African society to understand the scope of evil of apartheid, come to grips with it, and move forward in healthier ways. This is the sort of baseline requirement to being a good country and the Americans can’t even come close to this low standard.