SENATE BILL: Sanity in Foreign Policy Amendment (Veto Override Failed)

[Southern Senator North Carolina Yankee]

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Sponsor: Lumine

[Southern Senator North Carolina Yankee]

Talk to me Lumine!

[Lumine]

I must say I'm rather surprised the original bill passed unanimously last time. I don't have many hopes in regards to this passing the Senate, but it's certainly worth a try. As the GM pointed out in his recent foreign policy update, this Act is only making foreign policy efforts more complicated by tying up our hands with regulations that don't make sense or make things worse. Many of the Senators who voted for this were pretty sound individuals (and some of them friends of mine), but I don't feel enough time was given to actually consider the consecuences of this.

While the motivation for the prohibition of training foreign military forces is understandable, but sometimes there are forces in need of this training. If we were able to help train the Iraqi military, for example, they might be more sucessful in dealing with ISIS and the President wouldn't be forced to act in a way that has seemed to upset many. Lately we've been trying to ignore that there's a world out there and that we can be a positive force, and we avoid making any efforts at all just because we think the world can sort out its problems alone, and then these problems come to bite us back because we did nothing in the first place. I fail to see the point of avoiding the private sale of weapons to other nations as well, we're essentially ignoring we have allies who could certainly use those weapons for the sake of having a policy that "sounds nice" while having deep lasting consecuences.

If the GM has stated that this has had negative consecuences for the economy I believe in him, and not because he is the GM, it's because for me it's common sense. I plan to make a similar appeal regarding Griffin's hyperbolic comments on the Iraq issue, but I ask once again, Senators, please, let up stop ignoring foreign policy and making things harder for our government to act when necessary.

[Southern Senator North Carolina Yankee]

Why is ithis an amendment and not an act?

[🐒Gods of Prosperity🔱🐲💸]

I was surprised when I saw this had passed unanimously too. I think Lumine is right on this one. We can debate whether training other nations makes sense in any particular context, but it makes sense to have it as an option.

[Goldwater]

This has my support.

[Lumine]

Why is ithis an amendment and not an act?

Huh, another mistake I made... My apologies, Yankee, I would like this to be changed to an act. (And I formally offer if there's a need to change it via amendment.

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If we were able to help train the Iraqi military, for example, they might be more sucessful in dealing with ISIS and the President wouldn't be forced to act in a way that has seemed to upset many.

We did train and arm the Iraqi military. Yet it retreated without a fight and left many of those weapons in the hands of ISIS, including several Black Hawk helicopters.

Iraq's armed forces suffer from several problems that are more pressing than a lack of firepower or basic training, including lack of discipline among its officers, rampant corruption, and ethnic discord within its ranks. Repealing this legislation won't help to resolve any of this.

Do we really know we did? With the massive cuts in military spending and military aid in the past years and this bill acting from January 1st, I doubt we would have been able to help train then in a proper way. Even if this doesn't solve the problems in Iraq, I don't see the need to eliminate this option for every single conflict. This kind of legislation is what drives us to have the extreme choice between doing nothing and doing everything.

[H.E. VOLODYMYR ZELENKSYY]

Wait a minute, there was another "Actual End to Imperialism Act"? Goddammit, TNF, I know you introduce ten bills a day but you could at least title them differently.

[Lumine]

Name one recent situation in which this law would have prevents us from responding in the best possible way. I'm not categorically opposed to the idea, at least in theory, but it doesn't seem like one that we are likely to benefit from given our experiences. Ideally, this is only the first step in a move toward an international norm that richer countries don't send weapons to poorer ones experiencing unrest.

Ukraine, for example. We could have helped the Ukrainian government and their military to increase efficiency in the Donetsk operations, and beyond some comments and my aid package we couldn't do everything I believe we should have done (that's my opinion as Special Envoy, of course). Pushing for a norm to prevent rich countries to sell weapons to poor countries facing unrest is, perhaps, a noble goal, but one that I find very unrealistic given the challenges of the world and the fact that many countries won't stop sending military aid and weapons just because we have suddenly decided we hold the moral high ground and won't do it anymore.

[President Tyrion]

Here's the bill, btw:

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[Lumine]

Ukraine's military was so badly outmatched that they were almost certainly better off without that kind of help. Sending weapons into the country would have risked escalating the conflict without putting any real pressure on Russia, which would have easily responded with more force. If we've been spared that disaster by this law, that is all the more reason to keep it. Russia should have been kept in line with stronger sanctions and international censure, not cowboy diplomacy.

We were previously responsible for over half of global weapons sales, and much of the other half happened in direct esponse to our sales. To claim that it is not realistic to expect a significant effect on the availability of weapons worldwide is to ignore just how dominant we have been in the global arms trade. The world has been getting less violent for decades; we need to encourage this.

Actually, I believe the only effect in us not selling the weapons is that someone else is. Nations are still going to buy weapons regardless of who sells them, which means Russia is probably earning even more income thanks to that (and China, and so forth). I fail to see how supporting an ally in an internal affair such as Donetsk could legitimally be called "cowboy diplomacy", and while I do sound quite repetitive and insistent in this, I still stand for that course of action. To desire a more peaceful world is one thing, but to believe we can achieve it by simply not doing some things we did in the past sounds a little bit like wishful thinking to me.

[Adam Griffin]

The road to foreign policy hell is paved with the good intentions of the Atlasian government putting weapons and training into the hands of rogue and/or currently-aligned government and resistance groups, only to watch those groups rebel, falter or ultimately turn against us in some way. We have no reason whatsoever to repeal the legislation that encourages this short-sighted behavior. If a nation or group can't stand on its own, then it can't stand. If it ultimately becomes a real threat to our direct interests, then we act accordingly. I'm quite disappointed to see this sudden surge of chickenhawk-meddling arise in this chamber, and look forward to it blowing over hopefully in the very near future.

[Southern Senator North Carolina Yankee]

Wait a minute, there was another "Actual End to Imperialism Act"? Goddammit, TNF, I know you introduce ten bills a day but you could at least title them differently.

Apparently he came to the conclusion that his first bill was a sellout to the Militarists and hence the insertion of "actual".

[Southern Senator North Carolina Yankee]

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Sponsor Feedback: Origination
Status: Senators have 24 hours to object.

[TNF]

I object to the amendment, because this bill is bulls**t.

[🐒Gods of Prosperity🔱🐲💸]

I object to the amendment, because this bill is bulls**t.

impeccable logic.

[Simfan34]

My main concern with the Act is the ban on Foreign arms part. Foreign arms sales are not only a crucial part of foreign policy, but support around 250,000 jobs. A blanket ban would result in those jobs being lost.

I mean, are we just going to inform the F-35 partners that they won't be getting any planes after all? They will demand reimbursement for the billions they've put in.

Furthermore what is section 6 of the Act?

[Lumine]

I object to the amendment, because this bill is bulls**t.

Please stay classy, Senator. Your original bill was certainly not the best thing that has passed this Senate.

[TNF]

I object to the amendment, because this bill is bulls**t.

impeccable logic.

Better than the logic of the war-hungry lunatic who introduced this bill.

[H.E. VOLODYMYR ZELENKSYY]

I object to the amendment, because this bill is bulls**t.

The world's greatest deliberative body, folks! Come see Senators force votes on minor technicalities to spite the opposition! Watch as a bill references a section of itself that does not exist!

[Sec. of State Superique]

My concern with this Bill written by TNF is that it ignores that the Senate and the DoEA has the mechanism of Foreign Policy Reviews. Those Reviews can include Economic and Military Restrictions on specific countries and it enable us to deal in a case by case basis. The military industrial complex may be evil and it may be a creepy invention but, as Simfan told us, something around 250,000 work on those sort of activities. The outright ban of every single private sale of weapons is sort of lunatic, specially when we could be selling weapons to friendly and democratic countries like Germany, France, United Kingdom, Brazil and so on.

Maybe I could support a ban on private selling weapons to all Paramilitary Groups but prohibiting the private sale of weapons to some Governments is just weird and economically terrible. Moreover, Section 1 makes no sense to me. On countries like the new Republic of Palestine, maybe creating a provisional base to help training part of the security forces of Palestine would be good and the recent situation in Iraq shows that it's more than ever important to train other foreign military forces. I believe that TNF's law was extremely radical and I would support at least an amendment of this legislation. It would be like this: 

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[President Tyrion]

And we should also fix the numbering.

[Lumine]

I object to the amendment, because this bill is bulls**t.

impeccable logic.

Better than the logic of the war-hungry lunatic who introduced this bill.

This war-hungry lunatic deserves at least an explanation and one of those long and demented speeches against fascism in Atlasia, Senator. Last time we argued you took the trouble to write a song for me, what happened now?

[DemPGH]

There are circumstances under which I would support a modification of clause 2 to define weapons of war and foreign nations - because there is legit business that goes on (and it probably should be amended, but I don't want a war hawk to do it), but the rest of it seeks to essentially ban both gun running and state building, and no one in Atlasia should be associated with gun running. It's bound to create more problems than it ever could solutions, and these kinds of things only create more enemies. At the end of the day, we have more enemies than we had perviously. I would also question where or not it is our responsibility to train fighting forces around the world. So, I do not support repealing the Actual End to Imperialism Act. I would support a rational, conscientious amendment to clause 2, however.

[🐒Gods of Prosperity🔱🐲💸]

What is the point of clause 1?  Is the idea here that Atlasia shouldn't be involved with other countries in training (like with what historically been the case with NATO, for example)?   Or does this just functionally limit it in some way like to say it should be conducted at another country's military facilities, or those facilities should also be involved in some other activity as well so it is not the "sole mission" ( a bake sale perhaps?)