I was watching a show of Eddie Izzard (British, Cross dressing comedian). Absolute crack up but he raised an interesting point i would like to discuss here.

Stalin killed 20 million russian civilians, the world did practically nothing.
Pol Pot killed 2 million Cambodians, the world did very little.
Hitler killed people next door... stupid man... a world war starts.

Now i know there are alot of variables here, and i also know that invading a country is different to murdering your own people (still just as bad but different). But is it possible.. at all.. that the reason we didn't declare war on the Soviets, or the Khmer Rouge (to name a few), is because they were killing their own people? and we're sort of fine with all that?

Don't get me wrong, my opinion is not the stated question however i would like people to discuss this issue, the lack of action by countries in the above examples (and please provide more), and why this was so.

The World trade tower came down killing a few hundreds and a war started. Apparently destroying a building these days warrants a war. About 2,700 people died in the world trade center and about 3000 U.S soldiers have died in Iraq- stupid. If the reason for the war in Iraq was stupid the reason for world war 1 was even more stupid as it was caused by the assassination of some arch bishop. Anyway genocides don't necessarily cause wars, maybe civil wars, but only international incidence causes full fledged war.

Stalin killed 20 million russian civilians, the world did practically nothing. Pol Pot killed 2 million Cambodians, the world did very little. Hitler killed people next door... stupid man... a world war starts. But is it possible.. at all.. that the reason we didn't declare war on the Soviets, or the Khmer Rouge (to name a few), is because they were killing their own people? and we're sort of fine with all that?International politics is just not that simple. England didn't make war on Hitler because he was killing Czechs and Poles--or even German Jews. They did it because they believed that he intended to conquer all of Europe, including England, and as far as we can tell they were right. America joined in not because we cared about the Czechs and Poles--and honestly at the time almost nobody actually knew about the Jews--but because we cared about England. Americans have an irrational love of England, even those of us whose ancestors came from elsewhere. I understand, I feel that way myself.

We didn't make war on Stalin, even though many of us believed that he was just as intent on conquering all of Europe, including England, as Hitler--because he was a more formidable foe, not because thus far he'd only killed Russian citizens. We couldn't have done it immediately after WWII, especially with the Korean War in there, because we were worn out and needed to recharge. By the time we could have done it both sides had hydrogen bombs. "Nuclear deterrence" really worked, apparently. Either that or our generals weren't sure that we could defeat Russia in any kind of war, nuclear or conventional. It was a damn big country with a damned big army and a lot of satellites to use as sacrificial shields. After rescuing the Czechs and Poles from Hitler, who wanted to annihilate them to get at Stalin?

Would China have sided with the USSR? That's enough to make any general shudder. The North Koreans fought us to a draw with their help.

Cambodia? Oh please! No American soldier is going back into southeast Asia after what happened last time! Both China and Vietnam will come to their aid this time.

But yes, your original question still has merit. I do believe that the Western nations are less outraged by despots killing their own subjects than by invading their neighbors. For starters, we don't have any pesky mutual defense treaties to honor. Iraq was killing off its Kurds like they were cockroaches, but as soon as they turned their attention to Kuwait, we dropped the hammer on them.

Chatha, what did they teach you in your world history class, it wasn't a Arch Bishop, it was Austrian Archduke Francis Ferdinand, Heir to the imperial throne of the Austro-Hungarian empire. His assassination on June 28, 1914, ...

“Truthful Comedy?” - No, more like: “Comedic Lies.”

Hidden in spaceman Steve’s question is the assumption, or at least hope /expectation, that nations go to war to resist evil, etc. Wish that were so, but it never has been the case.

I can understand why he might tacitly be assuming this. Nations always proclaim some “worthy cause” when they go to war, even internal wars*. For example, in US civil war “to free the slaves” had much more appeal to farm boys living in the North than the real reasons. (The main one being that South was selling its cotton to England and buying English textiles, instead of conducting this trade with the Yankee owners of textile factories.) “Join in the effort to make our factory owners even richer.” does not have the same power to make farm boys willing to die, even if it is more truthful.

Fraggle Rocker’s comments are correct, but I also want to note a more extreme case (than US vs Stalin) where an outrage was done to a people by a government, but the people were powerless to redress the wrong done them. (At least 30,000 of their citizens died as direct result of the CIA‘s setting up a new military dictatorship government to replace the one they had elected.)** Interestingly the CIA’s agents or “contractors” killed the elected president on 9/11. Can any one guess the country? I will give one more hint: The current president of that country has good reason to hate the US, as her father was among the 30 thousand the new regime tortured to death.

Even though an order of magnitude less died in the more recent 9/11 than in the CIA's 9/11, the enraged and powerful US has gone half way round the world and already produced at least another 30,000 deaths, but oil is also mixed in as motive for this. (Best recent independent estimate is 42,000, but only 3000 of them are "important" :rolleyes: I.e. US citizens.)
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*External wars are much easier to justify; usually the first step is to notice that the enemy is not quite "fully human" and then go on from there with some specific evil these "beasts" have done.

**This has happened several times, for example in Nicaragua and in Iran when the Shaw was pulled out of Paris and placed on the throne, but I am asking for the one that started on 9/11 with the killing of the elected president, because he was openly a communist.

Interesting comments so far, I enjoy it when intelligent people make opinions and judgements based on fact.

Just to clarify a few things though with the original question and place my opinion out there:

War happens for many reasons, in the case of WWI and II however, countries like the US and UK were thrown into it against an "evil" enemy. Excluding pre war politics which played a major part in it, ultimately the Allies responded against hostile nations.
When it comes to Vietnam and Korea, it was because of Ideological differences. Mind you though the Vietnam war (as we know it) could of been avoided if the French had given up its colonies along with most of the rest of Europe after WWII. Or alternatively fought better in the first Indo China war (i think it was Indo China, correct me if i'm wrong)

I acknowledge that going to war against the former Soviet Union would not have been an easy task, Seeing as, with all respect, soviet military technology was somewhat superior at the time. Ultimately the Nuclear deterrant was a good thing, despite civilians living in fear, it avoided a confrontation between the US and USSR.

Cambodia is in interesting case, i don't think that the argument, US needed to rest its troops is justified, however, the Regional situation had detoriorated and the US had lost alot of prestige over Vietnam. If the US had gone into Cambodia, alot of assumptions could be made over that e.g. US needed a punching bag after Vietnam to release "anger" over losing.

I don't profess that i know alot about International Politics, and every time the world has stayed out of someone elses affairs like the ones we are talking about, their seems to be some sort of justification. But sometimes you just wonder, what could have been achieved if we had done the opposite.

Chatha, what did they teach you in your world history class, it wasn't a Arch Bishop, it was Austrian Archduke Francis Ferdinand, Heir to the imperial throne of the Austro-Hungarian empire. His assassination on June 28, 1914, ...
I don't care if he was an arc angel, that should not have sparked a fight frenzy :D

Chatha, the situation was alot more volatile than that. I suggest you read this (Causes of the war) (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/World_War_1#Causes), It might shed some light for you... There were alot of contributing factors between all the nations involved, Except ofcourse US who only joined at the end to do the whole American Cavalry charge :p

I took a WW1 class, I am aware of the other factors, the fact is that the war broke initially between Austria-Hungary and Serbia due to the assasination. Every war just doesn't break from nothing, instead the tension brews up to a point where any little thing could spark the first blow.