What even is Europe? by Kraut
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- čas přidán 12. 09. 2024
- What even is Europe? by Kraut
Original: • What even is Europe?
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Ancient China saw Rome as their western counterpart, "Daqin".
India is not the oldest civilization. Ancient Sumeria was. It predates the Indus Valley civilization by a very significant margin. Heck, Ancient Egypt is the second oldest civilization, and it is beat by the Ancient Sumerians by over 500 years, so the Indus Valley civilization is not even in the running really.
China being a unified monolithic civilization or state throughout history is a myth, created by ancient (and contemporary) chinese historians who wanted to legitimize their respective states. China has been a fractured patchwork of ethnicities, languages and political entities for large parts of its history. Its history is a history of cyclical unification, decline, fracturization and reunification. And the most productive times in terms of culture and science have often been the times of fracturization, not of unification. Diversity and rivalry always spark developments in science, art, literature, etc. I think that's one of the reasons for why the Europeans were the ones who first explored snd colonized the world and not the Chinese for example. Unification and centralization almost always lead to stagnation. Yet, most chinese (and even western) historians still perpetuate the image of the unchanging, monolithical China that has always been the same since the Han Dynasty. Nothing could be farther from the truth.
If you want to learn more about attaturk you should react to krauts video on turkey. Its awesome!!!!!
They are easily his best videos but I think that 3 part series too too time consuming since each episode is 1 hour long.
If he has the time he 100% should watch it because it’s brilliant and just perfectly made. I learned so much about the Turkish Republic from that series.
Atatürk is someone everyone should learn about, no matter where they are from.
The problem for us Europeans in the EU is how we are too weak military and energy related. We aren’t strong enough to handle big crisis on our own as much anymore.
What I hope is that we will learn from the disastrous foreign policy we had with Russia and that we will start trying to work to get more military and energy independence from the US so that Europe can become its own self sustaining power block. I don’t think we should say F off to the US but we should work to become independent on our own so that we don’t need them as much. Being stuck to the US long term can bring very bad consequences for us I think later on.
Europe imo as it stands today is too weak and I think we went from crazy militaristic powers that were out of control to having become way too pacifistsic. I think we need to find a middle balance between our pacifism and our extreme militarism that we had before.
And economically the EU is quite strong but the more independent the EU can become in every aspect especially economically the better imo.
I would say most Americans agree with this.. We can still be close allies and work together, but there are plenty of wealthy European countries that can spend much more on the military, and it just makes the alliance that much stronger
Many of us Americans have been saying this for a while. Europe has become very complacent and unhealthily dependent militarily.
When Trump told the leaders of NATO countries that they should at least be putting up their 2% obligations, they literally laughed. That was very frustrating to see. Because you are right. It will bite Europe in the ass if they do not take this more serious.
You are right that religious wars are mostly not about religion like the crusades for example weren't even about religion but about land and resources and religion was an excuse to achieve that.
You can have a union among democracies (EU). You can have an autocratic union (the old USSR). How could, e.g., India and China form a union? They can't with their current governments.
Exactly they are enemies on more than one aspect. Their states are rivals and that is why a union between them is impossible.
India is more neutral than anything else but leans to the west only because China is a direct threat to their interests and the only ones that would help India would be the west. So if a war between China and India happened I definitely think India would choose to align itself to the west.
@@melkor3496 - It still has this odd, old friendship with Russia. But, India is slowly waking up to the fact that Russia is busy and crumbling.
@@SilvanaDil Just like China is as well. Russia is a dying country in world politics in the fact that it will have less and less impact in world geopolitics over time.
Enlisted is great, definitely worth checking out man. I have played it a fair bit
German unification.
French Republics.
The literal creation of Belgium.
All happened in the 1800s. So I disagree that the Turks invented nationhood, they are an example of it, but to say that none of the above examples are examples of nationalism or nation creation in some form is wrong.
Enlisted looks like a cool game, Russianbadger did a video on it.
The problem with the EU is that it was never designed to be a comprehensive political entity. It started as a loose economical cooperation and transformed over the decades, adding more layers of complexity. Now we Europeans are kind of stuck, we can't (and shouldn't) go back but we also can't go forward with the integration because some countries want to increase it and some do not. But we urgently need to reform the EU to make it more social, more democratic and more coherent. Only then can the EU become an influential entity in international politics. It is a difficult situation.
Another aspect is that NATO is blocking military cooperation within the EU. It always has. Before 2022, it seemed that NATO had almost become superfluous and a true european military alliance seemed to be in reach, but Putin's invasion of Ukraine has revived NATO and it again blocks european military cooperation. Europe needs the USA for the moment, but it also needs to emancipate itself from the US military hegemony in the long run.
As someone from the US I think there are a good amount of people here that agree that Europe has been relying on our military too much and it’d be better for both parties if the EU was able to replace NATO as Europe’s main defensive alliance. I don’t see the US and Europe becoming enemies anytime soon and Russia is a dying animal lashing out with the last bits of energy it has left…
That the EU, or it's predicessors, weren't designed to be a comprehensive political entity is 100% false. It's litterally in the opening paragraph of the Treaty of Rome "to further an ever increasing politcial integration". That was the goal from the begining.
Should the EU become one country, in order to have more influence across the world?
I would say that Kraut presents a very German point of view, especially talking about France. He is saying about France buying cheap resources for their atomic power plants from Africa, while at the same time Germany was built (in recent years) on cheap gas and oil from Russia - but Kraut is not saying a word about that. Why?.. ;) So yeah, as you said, everybody is biased :)
He’s Austrian not German. And he did in fact mention the horrible German foreign policy with Russia in earlier times.
@@melkor3496 OK thank you for that information, I didn't know that he is Austrian.
@@XEternity Did you notice that Kraut did comment on the gas from Russia?
I see it as an attempt at political solidarity across borders where there is an existing cultural and historical solidarity (existing, if not prominent) - even if that has come through conflict. The *people* were tired of war and willing to support ideals that worked on the 'never again' concept. Political solidarity, as with all - doesn't always show as a plus on the balance sheets and those recently independent are still trying to ensure they're building on solid foundations. Solidarity through integration of ideas and people - give and take, as opposed to the Empire creation of old and forcing people together by means of oppression or subjugation, like the Imperial model deferred to through the ages. And still celebrated in some places. In a similar vein that Genghis Khan is a heroic leader to some, with giant statues and a murderous warmonger to others. Those on the winning end of the stick when China unified and re-unified, those who came out on top of the pile will see it as a wonderous thing. Those who lost their homes, their independence or voice, perhaps less so. Though the idea that there was political and religious freedom and peace throughout Asia or anywhere else for that matter, before the Europeans arrived, is somewhat comical. Mansa Musa was having tens of thousands of slaves marched from Mali to Mecca long before Columbus. Legendary tales of battles amongst hundreds of thousands litter the Chinese annals. Philosopher Kings were rare, though perhaps a few Princes.. Pretty much everywhere had rulers who had conquered power or were conquering someone else, if they weren't consolidating what their ancestors had won by the sword. They're intricate and proud histories but none of them bloodless nor peaceful. And we are after all, all here because our ancestors survived whatever genocide or atrocities befell our soil in the past. Not all victors but survivors at least.
29:43 Ah yes not-empire
7:00 I think that needs more elaboration. Premodern times most things were likely invented by civilizations independently with some exceptions like democracy, gunpowder, the zero, negatives, calculus, paper money, interest rates.
Like India, people tend to forget that the gun had already been integrated into Chinese armies long before major conflicts with European empires.
A big problem with China late 1600’s onwards was a general disinterest in things foreign as nomads took control as the new dynasty and only started loosening restrictions after the opium wars in a last effort bid to survive.
Imo, Isolation is what made them fall behind, not the part of having a massive state or being right next to a rival. If you look at the US then there’s an example of a massive state far away from empires which innovated immensely from the 1900s onwards as it accepted new people and influences relatively easily.
Nice more Kraut. Kraut’s videos are great and perfect for reaction.
I myself also like how at the very least he isn’t conservative or a socialist which at least gives his explanations and arguments a fresh point of view. Or if he is then he’s an expert at hiding it because I’ve watched the majority of his videos and he seems very center imo.
Agreed. He uses multiple lenses to view societal issues and does not adhere to a single ideology.
He self called him a Social Democrat (Source: A Discord conversation on his second channel). Factoring in he lives in Austria this makes him quite center-left as the Austrian school of social democracy is not based on Marxism.
The big doubt I have about the EU is that it's built on cooperation and an ideal that everyone can cooperate and get along and no longer need conflict. I don't see that ever happening. A lot of people call this time of peace the Pax Americana, but I've always seen it as the Pax Atomica. The threat of nuclear weapons has made warfare not an option between powerful nations. When technology comes that negates or stops nuclear weapons from being effective... when tech becomes so plentiful that the risk of a country firing all it's nukes and even one hitting is 1%... warfare becomes an option that goes back on the table for everyone. Once that comes... cooperation doesn't become the best or only option in all cases. The borders of the world have always changed, empires always rise, and fall, and new ones rise and fall.
I have a better question: Why is Europe?
25:41 Total bullshit.
The European Union was created in 1992 with the treaty of Maastricht. It isn't what kept Western Europe at peace since the end of WW2...It's a false and anachronic narrative. What really happened was the creation of two blocks : the Western block and the Eastern bock, Europe was divided by these two blocks. Warsaw pact vs NATO with the threat of nuclear annihilation is what kept Europe (mostly) peaceful, not the coal and steel cooperation in the 50s between western European countries.
For the nation-state, it isn't the Turks who invented it but it is at least attributed to the French Revolution/Napoleon, and it is probably even older. The 20s 30s constant wars in the Balkans was not the result of nationalism in itself but of, as you yourself said, of political void that created instability, these nations emerged from the ashes of the Austrian-Hungarian Empire and the Ottoman Empire. You need time to stabilize new borders. And I agree with you on the fact that the fragmentation of Europe is what led this continent to be the most advanced and culturally rich. Competition between political entities and experimentations through tries and failure is great for development of ideas, cultures and innovations. But we must recognize that it can lead to wars too. It isn't all bad or all good. If Europe doesn't want to die and remain an important continent, we need to concile unity and diversity. I'm afraid that the EU in its current state goes too far toward homogeneity.
His discourse about Empires is weird, I don't really understand what he puts behind "Nation-state" and "Empire". I have never heard anyone saying that Britain only became a nation-state in the 60s. I mean, I understand when he makes the distinction between it and an Empire but...Before the British Empire there was a nation-state for a very long time. The concept wasn't invented by Atatürk in the early XIXe century.
Btw, I don't know what he smokes but France doesn't have an Empire at all anymore. Saying that France still benefits from colonization because some of its uranium is bought in former colonies, doesn't make any sense. Based on his own explaination and applying the same logic, Canada is the biggest French colony since they are the ones who sell us the most uranium X)
Most Europeans tend to forget that there was a Pacific Theater in WWII.
As a European, I wouldnt really say that about my region.
Not really lol
All your videos are bias