It is starting to look like while we were all paying attention to the thing I am refusing to talk about, the hawks and wolves in our midst have mired us in another Cold War that could last decades. In the course of just the last few weeks, NATO (ie. The U.S.) has begun to shut down communication and cooperation with Moscow, which in turn has led Moscow to engage in proportional freezing. The right-wing's loud demands to admit Georgia (and many other former Soviet satellites) into NATO have resulted in a geographically different but strategically similar expansion of the Warsaw Pact.
Finally, the U.S. insistence on a ballistic missile shield with launch sites in Poland has led the Russians to threaten all-out war, leading us to threaten all-out retaliation. Two weeks ago we were talking about Paris Hilton's response to McCain's T.V. spot, and now it almost seems as if we should start dusting off the Strategic Air Command and stocking fallout shelters with food.
What's stupid about all this is that it was completely avoidable. Tom Friedman makes exactly this point in a New York Times piece this morning, explaining how our neglect and antagonism of the budding Russian democracy circa 1993 led to the rise of Putin and the hardliners. When given the opportunity to become a friend to our vanquished arch-enemy, we chose instead to strengthen our alliance against them, cornering, humiliating, and enraging them. What a shock that they eventually bit back.
For all the talk about the "pre-9/11" mindset that Democrats and liberals are supposed to be stuck in, the right-wing has never moved out of the "pre-Cold War" mindset. They continue to insist that the world follow American dictates and remain beholden to American interests. When there is rebellion against this regime, the response must be instant and violent. Anything short is appeasement.
While this might have worked as the sole foreign policy of a super-power in an age before globalization, interdependency, and Mutually Assured Destruction, it is utterly preposterous in this day and age. As the list of events I opened this post with demonstrates, every action that Republicans demand will result in a reaction from Russia. Nuance, realism, detente: these are the tools of modern diplomacy, which lives in a world that has become both too small and too dangerous for hotheaded bluster.
I'm not crying that the sky is falling. I don't believe we are in for a nuclear war. But the foolish exchange of grunts across the sea has already resulted in a chain-reaction that is going to take many years and billions of dollars to inch back from. This brief exchange will undoubtedly birth new fighter jets, satellite surveillance systems, and tactical nuclear weapons that won't debut for decades, funded with tax dollars that could have gone to schools and health care. What a tremendous waste.
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3 comments:
First of all, allow me to overstate the obvious... we are talking about communists.Now that that is out of the way, down to business. The problem is not our missle defense program in Poland, the problem is that the Ruskies ran all up in Georgia with tanks and hum-vees,property of the U.S. of A might i add, and, as recent as a few days ago, occupied a third of the country. The Russians have agreed to a cease-fire not once, but twice and there are Russian soliders in Georgia as I type this. Bush had to send the Sec. of State over in an attempt to diffuse the situation. I noticed you conveniently left these developments out. As for the "budding" Russian democracy of the 90's; if I am correct, this would fall under the legacy of the "famed" Clinton administration. "Strengthen our alliance"...? We have god knows how many billions of dollars invested in a space station/program, open air survallience agreements, and time, effort and energy invested in that entire region of the world, just to name a few. Let's be honest, Putin is a mean little guy, who circumvented Russia's constitution and made himself prime minister for life, also he's bent on power and control by any means. I agree, if anybody on the right has a "pre-Cold War" mind set they are sadly mistaken, because this is definitely not a "pre-Cold War" Russia we are dealing with. Niether militarily nor econimically. If you want to talk about realism, the reality is that every civilization that has preceded us has used violence as a very effective tool, on both sides of the table. As long as there is man on earth,there will be evil, and as long as there is land on earth there will be evil men who will attempt to take as much land as they can by violent means. But fortunately for us and those who follow, there are good men prepared to defend the land, even if it means using violence, or in the words of a famed communist; "By any means necessary".
You'll have to bring yourself up to speed, BC, if you intend to remain useful to your rulers. The Cold War mythology wore itself out and disappeared some years ago. We are currently engaged in a new mythology known as The Clash of Civilizations. Same story, new vocabulary. On stage, it's us, it's them. They're evil, we're good. They want to destroy us, we only seek to defend our wimmen, our chillun, our humble way of life. Behind the curtain, the players laugh and take your money and know that their only enemy is the man who stands up and walks out of the theater.
BC - Communists? I have some news for you - China and Russia are about as communist as Bank of America. They are the largest and third largest, respectively, capitalist oligarchies in the world (the U.S.A. being number two). The big story here is that the Great Bear is rising again because American power and influence in the world has been so diminished by neo-con policies that they were emboldened to make this move and perhaps more. Our Sec. of State had zero credibility and the "deal" was brokered by France. Our idiotic response of placing middles in Poland does nothing, absolutely nothing, more than escalate the situation.
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