I'm not going to overly saturate the board with posts, I promise.

That said, my Japan WW2 thread got me thinking. Has there ever before been as drastic a change in relations between countries like we've seen with the U.S.A. and Japan post WW2?

They went from bitter enemies to top allies in a very short time span.

Has something on par with this ever occured before?

Italy switched sides in WW1-2.

Cuba, 1959. Vietnam, a couple times. Cambodia, Iran. All of those (but for Italy) had significant CIA involvement of course.

OTOH, I've read that the Vietnamese and the Chinese have pretty much had bad blood between them for a very very long time … same for the Sioux and the Pawnee.

Sapper Redux said:

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BrazosBendHorn said:

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OTOH, I've read that the Vietnamese and the Chinese have pretty much had bad blood between them for a very very long time … same for the Sioux and the Pawnee.

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They have hated each other for centuries. Their work together during the Vietnam War was the definition of a marriage of convenience.

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Yeah, just like we were willing to accept some help from France during the Revolutionary War (no hard feelings over the French & Indian War, LOL). Of course, it's not that King Louis XVI was in favor of our experiment in government by the people, he just wanted to stick it to the British.
IIRC, N. Vietnam got most its support from the Soviet Union, with only a relatively small amount from the PROC.

BrazosBendHorn said:

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I recall a history professor repeating the old adage that nations don't have permanent friends/enemies, only permanent interests. (Or words to that effect.)

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The real life world is a big game of Risk.

MGS said:

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We saved the Chinese in WWII only for them to stab us in the back in Korea.

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In October 1943, the governments of the United States, United Kingdom, Soviet Union, and Republic of China issued the Moscow Declaration. In this statement, the four major Allied powers pledged jointly to fight the Axis powers until their unconditional surrender and work toward the establishment of a permanent international organization for peace: the United Nations. In the ensuing months, U.S. President Franklin Roosevelt and British Prime Minister Winston Churchill successively convened with China's Nationalist leader Chiang Kai-shek at Cairo and Soviet leader Joseph Stalin at Tehran to discuss strategies for defeating the Axis powers and the foundations of a post-war order.

CoachtobeNamed$$$ said:

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BrazosBendHorn said:

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I recall a history professor repeating the old adage that nations don't have permanent friends/enemies, only permanent interests. (Or words to that effect.)

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The real life world is a big game of Risk.

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This is why everyone attempts to invade and hold Australia at all costs.

Sapper Redux said:

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CoachtobeNamed$$$ said:

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BrazosBendHorn said:

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I recall a history professor repeating the old adage that nations don't have permanent friends/enemies, only permanent interests. (Or words to that effect.)

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The real life world is a big game of Risk.

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This is why everyone attempts to invade and hold Australia at all costs.

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The Brits did and still do!

CoachtobeNamed$$$ said:

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BrazosBendHorn said:

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I recall a history professor repeating the old adage that nations don't have permanent friends/enemies, only permanent interests. (Or words to that effect.)

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The real life world is a big game of Risk.

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Not to mention Diplomacy. You really don't want to play this game if your feelings are easily hurt or you take the (almost inevitable) back-stabbing personally ... one time when I was playing this with dorm friends a fistfight nearly broke out between two of them after a double-cross.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Diplomacy_(game)

U.S. and Canada right now.

Illegal Aliens

The Sioux and the Crow as well.

El Cid?