There's now talk of replacing Hamid Karzai (president of Afghanistan) with a pro-Western chief executive. Do you know what gives us the right to replace elected governments?

This is a great question, I hope someone can factually answer it.

I was interested so I found this more legible and factual article which goes into the situation better at The Economist. Unfortunately I don’t have time to delve into the issue, and since I’m Canadian, I appreciate that our government is not as knee deep as yours is (although our boots are far from clean) with regards to meddling in the Middle East.

It just goes to show how messed up our foreign policy is. The government feels obligated to mold the Middle East to our likings, but when genocide in Africa is brought up, National Sovereignty is their excuse to stay out of it.

American hegemony; it can be a terrible, terrible thing.

@EnzoX24 Just makes you wonder what it is we’re getting out of it in Afghanistan and Pakistan. I certainly don’t think that we’re there for the reasons we say we’re there for. But what could our ulterior motive possibly be? As far as I know they’re both pretty poor in resources.

@Jiminez Strategic positioning, I would assume. You can’t fight a war without your foot planted firmly in the soil. The rest of the Middle East is an oil goldmine and “acquiring” a few governments in the area only makes it easy to progress toward other goals.

Americans will not replace Karzai. He is unlikely to be able to retain power without American support, however.

This article gives a pretty complete picture. Excerpt:

“But four key figures believed to be challenging Mr Karzai have arrived in Washington for meetings with Obama administration officials this week. There is now talk of a “dream ticket” that would see the main challengers run together to unite the country’s various ethnic groups and wrest control away from Mr Karzai.

“The Americans aren’t going to determine the outcome of the election, but they could suggest to people they put their differences aside and form a dream ticket,” said a senior US analyst in Kabul. ”

Isn’t Karzai pretty much a puppet for America anyway?

@SuperMouse Yeah, but he’s doing a “Pinnochio” and starting to play to anti-western sentiments. We want him to turn back to wood.

There has been a serious problem with corruption under his leadership, as well as a laissez-faire policy towards drug trafficking, but that’s certainly never been sufficient grounds for getting “unfriended” by the US in the past.

arrogance, basically. Might makes right? I hope not.

What gives us the right? We’re Amurrica, we can do anything we want. Jesus told me so.

@Mamradpivo lol – good point thar!

@Harp I’m guessing that was facetiousness? Not sure what you mean by turning me back into wood. Is that some sort of in-house meme? What’s wrong with being anti-Western? The West just happens to be imperialistic and overthrowing foreign governments. I know their government is corrupt, but do governments have a right to be corrupt? I’m asking you. Plus, I would say our government is 20 times more corrupt.

@Jiminez

No, No :)

I’m saying that Karzai may have been a puppet to the US at the beginning of his term, but that, like Pinnochio, he took on a life of his own. Now, the US would like to see him fall back into line.

The terms “right” and “corrupt” are mutually exclusive, no?

DOH!