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Least Peaceful Countries
Name the least peaceful countries according to the Global Peace Index, a conglomeration of statistics regarding conflicts, crime, military spending, and human rights.
It is easy to throw stones: When UK was the worlds leading power they were constantly having to join in or stop or control wars / uprisings/ rebellions etc. and the other countries involved were jealous of the UK's ability to do so. Slowly over the years since the WW1 (when UK was drained of it's manpower and finance), the USA has taken that place as the controlling world body. This brings with it the jealousy and hate that even on this jetpunk site is so easily noticed. What all these knockers don't realise is that without the UK and now the USA, the world would be in one hell of a mess, no democracy, no freedom of rights, no judiciary rights, no freedom of press etc. etc. ........ and the countries that still don't have those freedoms are the countries that are still calling the UK and USA names. Instead of throwing stones at the USA how about those places spending their energies and finances cleaning up their own countries for the good of their own people.
It is true that every dominant power in modern history has tried to impose its will on other countries...the sun never set on the British Empire. The USSR meddled alongside the US in Vietnam and Korea. Germany tried to conquer the damn world during the Third Reich. France established an empire under Napoleon. They speak Spanish in (most of) Central and South America, Portuguese in Brazil, and French in much of Africa because of the imperialism of Spain, Portugal, and France at the height of their respective power. There's Dutch East India, the Belgian Congo...what am I forgetting? The most powerful countries always get involved where they don't really belong. The difference, like it or not, is that the US and UK have generally tried to broker peace and liberate oppressed groups where they go. I'm not so silly as to think their motives are purely altruistic, or that they don't cause collateral damage...but compared to what their predecessors in power did...it's not bad.
I tend to agree. The ethnic cleansing/forced assimilation of natives, slavery, and constant involvement in foreign wars are not unique to the United States. These things have been happening in every corner of the Earth, not just involving the West, for as long as history has been recorded. It's pretty hypocritical when those pointing the finger at the US have done the exact same things, sometimes on a larger scale for a longer time. Of course, that doesn't make it right and America should be called out on it. It would just be nice if everyone got off their high horse and looked in the mirror before doing so.
I've never stated the US is perfect and though I was born there I'm not even patriotic. I don't believe in nationalism. I have no more love for America than any other country. There are good and bad things. I object to bigotry. And there is a whole hell of a lot of that aimed at the US today. And I agree with jmellor, from a historical perspective, the US is doing a hell of lot better than any power that came before including the British (or their contemporaries: the Nazis, the Soviets, Imperial France, etc); but the British were somewhat less evil than the Mongols, or the Arabs, or the Romans.
We can hope that this is an upward trend. Some day we can all complain about China being the great Móguǐ, and Americans can start criticizing everyone for things that they were more guilty of in the recent past, once their country has become obsolete (Trump hard at work on this now). But I'm curious to see if the Chinese will do any better. If I live that long.
Jack: yeah I wouldn't bother with this guy. He can barely read. None of his responses to me ever make sense. He recently became the 2nd person on my block list and I've decided I'm just going to ignore him.
I don't remember anymore, but I think the person that I was responding to was trying to call kalbahamut out for defending the US, and was bringing up some of its past atrocities, but the way it was worded made him sound bigoted and disrespectful.
The interventions by the UK were effected to quell rebellion amongst those who sought relief from its colonialism. I have yet to read or hear of the UK ever intervening in any imbroglio that wasn't in their self interest.
Almost every other major world power has done this. Sure, the atrocities that the British empire committed were awful, but they weren't unique to Britain.
The difference is that British Empire was the biggest colonial empire covering over 25% of all land area. All other european powers were pretty small in comparison to the brits.
@ Debossishere You're not supposed to question it. Just join in with the unfounded xenophobia against Russia like the mainstream media wants you to do. They've been spending millions to air their propaganda; the least you can do is parrot their talking points.
Five years on and if anything the Burmese government gets worse. Another military coup. Major conflict with the Rohingya. High military spending. Massive numbers of refugees. Bombing of civilians. One of the worst Huan Rights records on the planet and still not on the list? I've checked the criteria and Burma should clearly be in the top ten, IMO.
In 2023 update (not on the quiz yet) it is no. 20 already. But how it is not top 10-15 at least is also beyond my understanding. Turkey, Iran or Burkina Faso cannot be worse despite all their flaws.
I'm not surprised. Iceland is at the top in the relevant categories, but the one thing giving them an advantage for example over the other nordic nations is that they don't have a military.
Well the report states for the 5 less peaceful countries in the "Militarision domain": 1. Israel, 2. Russia, 3. USA, 4. North Korea, 5. France. So you are actually right. It is those "third-world issues" like ongoing civil wars which stole the crown...
Conflicts, crime, military spending, human rights, and there's not a single Central American country on the list? Been to Honduras or El Salvador lately?
How many wars, overseas coups, outright invasions, have been encouraged, instigated, caused and exacerbated by the USA? The USA is the most warlike country on the planet.
Right. And if being “warlike” was such a huge factor then the UK would make more sense to be on here given its large list of wars. But of course it gets a pass because it’s not the US.
This is just another example of people bashing the USA based on bias and media overexposure. Have you read up on Somalia at all? Have you ever tried to countenance the violence in these countries? The US is nowhere close. And as for the US fomenting violence: even if its motives are sometimes selfish, it intervenes in countries that are themselves beset by violent conflict. You mean to tell me Syria, Yemen, Iraq, and Afghanistan would be beacons of peace if the US weren't there? Please. The US is the most interventionist of the world's major powers, but on a list of all the world's countries, it's not at the top, nor is it anywhere close. There are certain countries in which you're advised not to go anywhere without a local escort. The US is nothing like that. The antidote to Americans' ignorance of their role in the world is not to respond with similar ignorance to the contrary. Temper yourselves.
Not under Trump's term. Which is funny. Because he has all these childish blustering temper tantrum tweets but the actual reality is less war, troop drawdowns, and minimal meddling in foreign affairs. Throw in the Middle East peace work and , as I said in a comment above, it's been the best foreign policy since Bill Clinton, in my opinion. And I certainly didn't vote for him.
I class myself as a liberal, but I can't for the life of me figure out why my fellow liberals are so keen to allow unfettered immigration from countries such as the above.
...because people aren't inherently evil if they come from those countries, and more often than not just want to escape the conflict and live their lives?
Honduras and El Salvador have some of the highest per capita murder rates in the world and fail to make the list. Not sure I agree with a ranking system that fails to include very dangerous countries for being too poor to spend on military. Lebanon made the list. Is Hezbollah more dangerous than the drug cartels and gangs that hold central America? Israel? Honestly, would you feel safer in Israel, or haiti? This ranking system to me smells of political bias.
for the umpteenth time the criteria for this ranking can be found linked above. Starting wars isn't part of it. Having an active ongoing conflict inside your country is, though. So if anything Ukraine would have shot to near the top of the rankings this year. Not Russia.
Russia spends around 40% of its government budget on the war, and faces the risk of breaking apart with PMC owners becoming warlords (imagine 1930s China but in a nuclear country). Even the orthodox church has its PMC now...
Despite not having a conflict on their soil (minus some ukrainian strikes and counting their internationally recognised borders), the situation looks terrifying.
Yep, checked the index, and Myanmar is ranked 25. The next 4 out of this quiz, in order, are: Cameroon, Iran, Niger, Myanmar. Then it's Lebanon, Mexico, Chad, India, Israel, Palestine, Eritrea, Burundi, Brazil, and the USA (ranked 35 if you count Palestine as a country)!
Aye, right. I mean, Israel has been peaceful for decades, and Myanmar doesn't routinely imprison and torture dissidents. Statistics leading to lies and damned lies.
How about updating your Most Peaceful Countries quiz as well? I'll nominate that for a star as well - peace deserves at least as much attention as war, even if it's more boring in the eyes of the media.
The 2023 statistics are now available, with Iran, Myanmar and Israel coming into this list since this 2022 quiz, with Colombia, Libya and Venezuela dropping off it.
Israel appears at #21 on the 2023 list, a year after the stats given here. They may well rise in 2024 but presumably the calculations aren't made so early on.
We can hope that this is an upward trend. Some day we can all complain about China being the great Móguǐ, and Americans can start criticizing everyone for things that they were more guilty of in the recent past, once their country has become obsolete (Trump hard at work on this now). But I'm curious to see if the Chinese will do any better. If I live that long.
Also the UK: Why do you hate us?
I know there's Caucasus and its terrorism, but still the countries I mention have more security problems than Russia.
Russia has also been involved in less wars than US in the last years.
- United States
- Myanmar
- Mali
- Iran
+ Haiti
+ Mexico
+ Lebanon
Also, we could update this thing. The data has been updated twice since 2017's numbers.
Despite not having a conflict on their soil (minus some ukrainian strikes and counting their internationally recognised borders), the situation looks terrifying.
I was just about to say that!