alt Hacker NewsYour enemy is not the people of the country you hate, it’s the government. If you believe it’s the people then you are a victim to propaganda, or some other source of highly biased information.
Think about what war really is, it’s almost always a bunch of powerful people who have a disagreement with a bunch of other powerful people, who then have to trick a bunch of less powerful people to fight on their behalf. If you feel like fighting you’ve been tricked. When the rich wage war it’s the poor who die.
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No, it can be both the government, and the people.
The government for all of the reasons you say.
The people because they have fallen for and accepted propaganda. Thereby leading them to support the government and its toxic narratives.
I base this opinion mostly on seeing how Russian propaganda has poisoned my mother-in-law's mind. Many media reports and various other sources have verified that she is not an isolated example, most Russians accept the same propaganda narratives.
As a German, I must insist that your statement is absolutely wrong. The people of a country can be your enemy. A Government like Nazi-Germany or current day Russia cannot exist without plenty of support by its people in the first place.
Russia has behaved the same way under 4 radically different forms of government.
It's a combination. Here in the US, a large chunk of the population supported Trump, knowing full well what kind of things he would do. And another large chunk of the population are trying to stop him.
You can't blame the population as a whole. But I suspect it's uncommon for the government to be completely disconnected from (some portion of) the population's sentiments.
To add to this, culture can be changed significantly in a short period. See how the USA has changed in the past 20 years, the culture has changed 2 or 3 times now with vastly different values & attitudes between each. What does each period have in common? Thick gobs of propaganda being push in every nook & cranny. And lack of critical thinking on the individual level. If country X wants to change, it is very possible, its just a matter of time, persistence & brain washing. Brain washing the youth is the easiest path, especially if in the opposite direction than what their parents/elderly want.