DEAR MR BANERJEE

Submitted by Jeff (United States), Jan 21, 2022 at 15:53

Hi Debanjan,

Always a pleasure to hear from a man who chooses to live in the world's largest democracy.

Friends and allies, like the U.S., Japan and South Korea often act in concert and coordinate their policy. It's not unusual.

The US keeps almost 30,000 troops in South Korea to help its army protect that country from its belligerent neighbor to the north that keeps up a stream of invective and bombastic threats to incinerate South Korea.

Japan had a longstanding fear of the Soviet Union, which grabbed and ethnically cleansed the Sakhalin and the Kurile Islands in 1945 (no refugee camps though and no right of return). The U.S. is still an ally of Japan, who still has dangerous neighbors.

No actual empire would allow its colonies to cause a negative balance of trade, or to compete with and beat its core industries.

People, be they military or civilians, getting a virus during a worldwide pandemic has no relevance whatsoever to what is or is not an empire.

White Americans comprise over 63%% of covid deaths in the USA. Black Americans, 14.2 percent of the population, comprise 14.5 percent of covid deaths. Hispanics, 18.7 percent of the population, comprise 17% of covid deaths.

India has almost 500,000 reported COVID deaths, though researchers suspect the reported number is low by a few million. Who has more covid deaths, Brahmins or Dalits?

Over a million immigrants, from all over the world, immigrate legally and are welcomed into the USA every year. They don't cost us a thing and become members of society. How does that million+ per year compare with annual immigration into your country?

No complaints about the Chinese empire, right (speaking of covid)? Tibetans murdered, forcibly sent to live thousands of miles away, Han Chinese moved in to take their place. Uyghurs forced into slave labor camps. East Turkistan wiped off the map (and conveniently China's largest source of oil and natural gas). No problem, right?

Heartfelt thanks for keeping primarily in mind the interest of common American citizens.

P.S. Good news, Debanjan. Your heroine of the century, Chelsea Manning, has a forthcoming book. Not only that, her publisher, MacMillan, has a web page where you can sign up for news about tours and events as well as new releases or exciting news related to Chelsea Manning. Given that you feel Chelsea Manning "should be compared with the likes of Martin Luther, John Calvin, Abraham Lincoln, Winston Churchill and George Washington," this is truly a dream come true and I'm sure you'll be thrilled to take advantage of this opportunity. You can even pre-order Chelsea Manning's book right on the same web page. Maybe your order will push her book sales into double digits.

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