So, you're claiming that those are scare quotes?
That's an interesting claim.

More to the point, my initial question: If there is no right to the self-determination of nations (which Rand stated was limited to nations in which free citizens have voluntarily delegated their right to self defense, but regardless...) then why should anyone care who invades whom? There are no countries, correct? They are just artificial entities with no rights, not even the ones delegated to them by a free citizenry, correct? So, why the agitation?

Is the response, "because war is bad"?
Ok, war is bad.

But not all United States interventionist policy is war.

Some are nation building, some are leadership toppling, some are influencing elections, some are embargoes.

Why then, are any of these immoral?

Because the United States has no right to impose its will on other people?

But they are not, they are imposing their will on a Government which you claim has no rights, including the one which Rand states of their free citizens delegating to them their individual rights to self defense?

So why get all outraged?
It's just a non-entity with no rights applying force to another non-entity with no rights.

Reread that quote Eud. Ayn Rand even put "the self-determination of nations" in quotes. She was stating limits on acceptable behavior for nations. She even stated that a free society has the right to invade a dictatorship.

She was not giving a nation a free ride on self determination.

"The right of 'the self-determination of nations' applies only to free societies or to societies seeking to establish freedom; it does not apply to dictatorships." - Ayn Rand

“Collectivized ‘Rights,’”
The Virtue of Selfishness, 104

http://aynrandlexicon.com/lexicon/sel...

"A nation, like any other group, is only a number of individuals and can have no rights other than the rights of its individual citizens. A free nation—a nation that recognizes, respects and protects the individual rights of its citizens—has a right to its territorial integrity, its social system and its form of government. The government of such a nation is not the ruler, but the servant or agent of its citizens and has no rights other than the rights delegated to it by the citizens for a specific, delimited task (the task of protecting them from physical force, derived from their right of self-defense) . . . .

Such a nation has a right to its sovereignty (derived from the rights of its citizens) and a right to demand that its sovereignty be respected by all other nations." - Ayn Rand

“Collectivized ‘Rights,’”
The Virtue of Selfishness, 103

Ayn Rand Lexicon
http://aynrandlexicon.com/lexicon/nat...

A right of self determination is only applicable to an entity. A nation is not an entity, it is a group of independent entities.

A nation's policies are technically driven by its citizens, if it is a "free" nation, a dictatorship on the other hand is driven by the dictator. In neither case is self-determination for the nation possible.

Is the outrage against interventionism a moral one or are there other reasons?

If it is a moral issue, what is the moral?


Which is the controlling moral imperative?

To intervene in a situation of great loss of life?
or
To not intervene and allow the nation its own path?

An interesting corollary, J, which I pose as a question.

If there is no such thing as a right of a nation to self-determination, then what is the basis of the moral outrage held by so many Gulchers (including myself) to United States interventionist foreign policy?