When will the US elect a President who will have the courage to not want to rule the world ?

[UK populist]

As a Brit I was brought up being taught that there is this special relationship between our countries that is to do good in the world. I was taught that the US jumped into WWII to save us and Europe from the fascist regime of Hitler. I was taught that the UK government was an influencing partner (be it a smaller partner) of the US. I was taught that the US military was stationed all across to protect the peaceful democracies of western Europe from the expansionist agenda of the Soviet Union.As I have grown up and learned about the history of the world through many different views I have unfortunately discovered that most of what I have learned in my youth (above) can generously be described as political spin.

The US government was quite happy to sit on the sidelines and watch while US corporations made made money in Nazi Germany. One of the most notorious cases is the fact IBM was supplying the Nazi's with the technological ability to track the effectiveness of the Holocaust. The US did supply Britain with the weapons and day to day supplies Britain needed to survive, but at an exorbitant price. After WWII the US government was happy to loan Britain the money to rebuild our country, but by the time that the loan was approved the Republicans had powerful and they basically acted like the worst of the predatory lenders your country has seen recently. As a result of this we had to change our economic model to suit the US and end up paying back that loan until as recently as the last 10 years.Today in the UK there are still 6 main US military bases and god knows how many satellite bases. All together around the world there are in excess of 800 acknowledged US Military bases and again god knows how many secret ones. Then there is a question of how many NSA,CIA or even DIA bases there could and probably is scattered all over the world.

Now the fact that we have all of these bases and pressure from the US over the decades has resulted in Many nations not spending big on their budgets because we are part of NATO. However that has also been a point of contention because European governments have been persuaded to purchase US military hardware. A notable exception to this has been France where they have primarily relied on there own arms industry. Without looking to deeply into the history of that situation I would surmise that has something to do with the fact that they had been ruled by a dictator for a period since the end of WWII. No-one can tell whether European countries would have spent more on military budgets if the arrangement of NATO and US bases, but I imagine it would have been. So in that case you can attribute the factor of the US presence the demilitarization of European governments and less arms industry competition.

I suppose thats enough of my historical perspective so I will get back to my initial question.
I have no doubt that Obama will be a much better US President fort the rest of the world than Mccain, But and it is a big but that he is still an interventionist (Full Spectrum Dominance) Thinker and it shows when he has the likes of Brzezinski in his team of foreign policy advisers. The reason the rest of the world hates America is not just about the wars you start for profit in most cases and for strategic dominance in other, but it is also just because of your presence in our countries when there appears to be no other need than you strategic agenda. There is an increasing backlash around the world about you military presence and the way you personnel act with impunity in most nations. I know that most Americans do not see this on their news shows but it has to get to the US people that you are not liked around the world and unfortunately the hatred is not going to differentiate between those of you who have an open mind and those of you who are just ignorant to this fact.Before 9/11 I used to work on US military bases here in the UK and I have to admit that although most of the civilians were nice polite people I did not find many actual military personnel who I would consider friendly even to us Brits. I don't know whether this was just about the way they have been trained or whether it was their own personalities. Either way it does not always go down well with the locals. I can't imagine what it has been like since 9/11 but I'd guess it definitely didn't get any better.

What will it take for a US President to realise that they do not need 800+ bases around the world just to protect America. When will America realise that it is them 800+ bases that make you unsafe in the first place.

[ThomWV]

1. This may brand me a heritic but Eisenhower was probably the last one

[Captain Hilts]

2. Carter and Clinton, actually. Very cooperative and inclusive with other countries. nt