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Stuxnet Authors Made Key Errors
Trailrunner7 writes "There is a growing sentiment among security researchers that the programmers behind the Stuxnet attack may not have been the super-elite cadre of developers that they've been mythologized to be in the media. In fact, some experts say that Stuxnet could well have been far more effective and difficult to detect had the attackers not made a few elementary mistakes."
If I had to take a good guess and speak for the consensus opinion it would probably be to keep a lid on the various hotspots so as to avoid having to save the world a third time. And yea there is a strong undercurrent of seeing it as a duty to continue carrying on the 'White Man's Burden' after the Brits stumbled and became unable to do it any more while at the same time worrying that trying to civilize/police the world is what undone them.
Most Americans would really rather to be able to ignore the rest of the world but if we don't step up who will? When all was lost and a dark age of despair was descending on the world Team America would be expected to come in again to save the motherfucking day so we figure it is easier to just keep the next World War from getting going. Yea a bunch of smelly hippies don't like that reality and call us 'imperialists' and such but until they can offer a better plan to keep the world from descending into madness they can just suck on our balls.
The above is why I said I (and believe most Americans) really wouldn't mind seeing a few of the more sane emerging powers step up their participation. It is the countries with conquest, empire and general mayhem on their minds that pose a problem for global stability, not any rising power to challenge the unipolar post cold war world.
Democrat delenda est
Not at all. Of course we have done a lot of underhanded stuff. Welcome to International Relations in the real world as opposed to your textbook. There are no pure good or pure evil actors or actions. Just nations with conflicting goals, resources and all doing whatever they think is in their long term self interest.
Iran Contra was more an internal squabble in the US. Congress was shorting out the Executive's ability to conduct foreign policy so certain elements resorted to less than lilly white means to fund needed operations. As for the Shah, can you look back with the benefit of hindsight and say the Shah wasn't the right choice for us to have backed? Hello!
And Hell yes it was right, in the context of the Cold War, to back the Afgan rebels against the Russians. It was a major turning point in the Cold War. Do most solutions carry the seeds of another new problem? Yup. But nothing UBL could possibly do compares to the wholesale slaughter that the Cold War going Hot would have caused and giving the Afgans a helping hand helped bring the Cold War to a peaceful resolution.
As for Saddam, no I won't relitigate the depraved fantasies of the Bush Deranged. Hell, you probably still believe Saddam didn't have WMD and Cheney was involved in outting Plame.
Democrat delenda est