Americans should rethink overthrowing other peoples’ governments

In his second opinion piece appearing in Informed Comment in recent days, Furman University’s Akan Malici, a politics and international affairs professor, says Americans – Democrats and Republicans alike – have received an awakening of sorts when it comes insurrection and coup attempts following the storming of the U.S. Capitol on January 6 by Trump supporters.

Malici recounts how the U.S. has for decades imposed its will on foreign governments to protect its interests. He cites the overthrowing of Iran’s democratically-elected Muhammed Mosaddegh in 1953, “clandestine operations” to take out Cuban dictator Fidel Castro, and the failed Bay of Pigs invasion, all having consequences the U.S. is still dealing with. “If we hate something for ourselves, we shouldn’t like it for others,” Malici writes. “If we don’t like what unfolded in our capital, we should not produce these scenes in foreign capitals.”