The Left’s Pathological Fear of Reality
Filed under: Cold War, Communism, Leftist Thought, Military, Russia, United States — marc moore on May 20, 2008 @ 6:05 am CEST
Lately some on the left have been working hard at revising downward Ronald Reagan’s legacy of ending the Cold War and creating the opportunity, since lost, for the first period of extended peace since WW II. The Soviet Union, Kathy says, was never a threat at all. In fact, the U.S. was the antagonist all the while.
Ronald Reagan did not “win” the Cold War. If any one person can be credited with bringing the Cold War to an end, that person was Mikhail Gorbachev.
It’s true that the Soviet Union fell in large part because it was bankrupted by 40 years of the most unprecedented arms buildup in human history, but that’s nothing the United States should take pride in…
During the lead-in to Myth Busters, my kids’ favorite TV show, Adam Savage jokes that he rejects our reality and substitutes his own. This would be a nice bit of juxtaposition, were it possible for mere mortals. Yet it’s both possible and fashionable, in certain circles, to reject the reality of the past and substitute one’s own neo-liberal anti-Americanism in its place.
More from Kathy:
The entire Cold War was premised on two false beliefs: one, that the Soviet Union had a military arsenal equal or superior to our own, so that we always had to “catch up”; and two, that the Soviet government had global expansionist ambitions, and was willing to launch a first strike on the United States to achieve those ambitions. In fact, the Soviets were convinced that the U.S. government was planning to launch a first strike on them.
Referring to my admittedly shaky memory of history lessons long since learned, it seems to me that the Soviet Union overran, occupied, and ruled all of Eastern Europe for 4 decades after WW II. The Soviets also agitated for and funded communist takeovers around the world, notably in Southeast Asia, the site of two wars against communist expansion. The Soviets also helped fund and supply the Chinese communists in their fight against that country’s Nationalist government and worked closely with Mao for number of years after his victory.
It’s possible that the Soviet Union believed that the United States might preemptively strike out with it’s nuclear arsenal. Possible, barely, but not rational. Then again, Stalin, a man directly responsible for the murder and torture of hundreds of thousands of his own people, was hardly sane. His megalomaniacal paranoia probably fueled the Cold War more than any other single factor. The Soviet Union was formed in his image, according to his 5-year-plans, to be a democracy killing machine.
Even so it’s quite likely that most Soviet leaders understood that their country was in no danger of being attacked by the United States. This had to become painfully obvious during the Vietnam era in which the U.S. was unable to pacify a tiny, poverty-stricken nation despite massive troop and equipment expenditures. Invading the Soviet Union was impossible, nuclear war unthinkable save in response. And the Soviets surely knew that. Claiming otherwise is an attempt to subvert reality.
Yet minimizing Reagan’s accomplishment is essential if the left is to discredit current efforts to confront Islamic terrorism. It’s therefore both a blessing and a curse when Barack Obama says things like this:
…the Soviet Union had thousands of nuclear weapons, and Iran doesn’t have a single one. But when the world was on the brink of nuclear holocaust, Kennedy talked to Khrushchev and he got those missiles out of Cuba. Why shouldn’t we have the same courage and the confidence to talk to our enemies?
The Soviet Union was a grave threat to the freedom of this nation as well as many others. Those countries like Great Britain often had an even greater understanding and fear of the Soviets’ intentions. Reagan’s push to break the Soviets’ economy was the right approach at the right time, as the results demonstrate. Revisionist history should not try to alter that fact.
Neither should the lesson be lost on the left, as unpleasant as it may be to accept. When dealing with enemies whose ideology demands the conquest of free people it is vitally important that we understand that they cannot be reasoned with on our terms. Individual rights, economic opportunity, and social freedom mean nothing to Islamic terrorists, just as they meant nothing to the Soviet leadership who had already acquired those things for themselves. From what position are we then to negotiate with the likes of Iran? The only chip in our hands is to absent ourselves from their region of the world, something that would be a disaster for Israel and the world energy market.
Very few Americans are interested in pursuing war for war’s sake, whether conservative or liberal. If an opportunity exists to establish a kind of peace with Iran we should investigate it. But if the cost of such an agreement is the surrender of Israel, the one fully functioning nation in the Middle East, to the mullahs in Tehran then it’s an unacceptable trade.
Every U.S. president from Truman to Bush 43, with the possible exception of Jimmy Carter, understood that America’s military strength helped to keep the peace more than it encouraged war. Fantasies about disarming so that terrorists and the nations, like Iran, that sponsor them will feel secure enough to lay down their arms are just that - fantasies.
1 Michael Merritt
May 20, 2008 @ 7:28 am CESTAny attempt to lay the success of winning the cold war at the feet of any one man is folly in my opinion. The closer reality is that many events were responsible for its fall.
On the social side of things, anyway, Chernobyl was a huge catalyst toward the end of the Soviet Union.
2 Interested
May 20, 2008 @ 8:35 am CESTI think it is laughable to remove Reagan’s role in it, but equally Thatcher and Pope John Paul II as well as Gorby should be given their due.
But in anycase, did you really expect any different? Further along in that article is placing the blame at the feet of the US. It’s the left - who could expect anything better.
3 C Stanley
May 20, 2008 @ 2:34 pm CESTThe entire Cold War was premised on two false beliefs: one, that the Soviet Union had a military arsenal equal or superior to our own, so that we always had to “catch up”; and two, that the Soviet government had global expansionist ambitions, and was willing to launch a first strike on the United States to achieve those ambitions. In fact, the Soviets were convinced that the U.S. government was planning to launch a first strike on them.
In addition to the facts that you mentioned, Marc, the Cuban missile crisis also seems to have fallen down Kathy’s memory hole.
She also completely misstates the premise we were working under; it wasn’t that we believed that the Soviet arsenal was greater than ours and we had to catch up, it was that we knew that if we kept expanding our arsenal, that THEY couldn’t catch up. We knew that capitalism was a superior economic system and that eventually the pressure of cost of military investments would lead to their collapse.
What’s really preposterous is that all of this rewriting of history is obviously being done in the context of discussions regarding current rogue nations and terrorist groups and how to deal with them, yet there’s not even any comparison to today’s threats and how we dealt with the Soviet Union (it’s apples to oranges.) The USSR was a superpower which HAD nuclear arms, and we had to deal with them on those terms and find leverage and methods of mutual assurance. Central to our current policy is the concept that we must prevent Iran from getting nuclear weapons; the threat that that would pose to our ally Israel and to the stability of the region (there’d undoubtedly be an arms race with the Sunni nations in the region) would threaten the entire global balance of power and our energy supply.
Now that nuclear weapons can be in the hands of small nations, it makes no difference that Obama pointed out the relative size and military strengths of the countries involved; as some blogger or pundit pointed out, Afghanistan wasn’t a country that we would have expected to have to deal with a threat from, either, but it certainly became a threat once its government agreed to give safe haven to OBL and al Qaeda.
There’s also no way to acheive stability and security based on the idea of mutually assured destruction, because a country like Iran can sponsor a terrorist act, even a nuclear one, with plausible deniability. During the Cold War, if either the US or USSR had launched a nuclear device, the other side would clearly know where it had come from and a return strike was guaranteed. Today, Iran or another nation with ambitions to control a region could support a terrorist group’s use of weapons to gain that kind of control, and the country that is attacked and its allies would not necessarily have that clear ability to counterattack. It’s like the terrorist tactic of hiding among the civilian population, but on an even bigger and more sinister scale. And without MAD, the idea of allowing nations that clearly have no regard for human rights to gain nuclear power is just completely unthinkable- and I can’t see how anyone could formulate a US foreign policy that didn’t accept that as an axiom.
4 Alex
May 20, 2008 @ 4:44 pm CESTCuban missile crisis? You mean the Soviet Union’s response to the US placing missiles in Turkey 90 miles from Moscow? Yeah, that definitely was one helluva offensive maneuver by Moscow. I guess the fact that Khruschev’s willingness to negotiate it down, ie remove your missiles from Turkey and we remove ours was neglected by Kennedy in favor of a confrontational course until some wiser people from his administration told him to work with Khruschev is just another testament to USSR’s offense first, defense 2nd mentality.
When the USSR was formed the goal was to spread communism to the world, true. After WWII, however the goal was preservation and building the country. Hence the changing of the Soviet Anthem, hence the Khruschev thaw, hence all the new dogma.
The USSR was defensive first, only an idiot would claim otherwise. Eastern Europe was occupied because, um, they did not particularly want to fight another war that would cost them 20 million people while its "allies" watch on until its safe and then make a glory run in its waining days, like in WWII. It’s called stability, it’s exactly the same thing the US is doing in Iraq except the motivation for it was the death of over 20 million people, not 3,000 and some extra oil.
MAD still stands. Big nation or small, neither wants to be nuked into oblivion. It’s pretty hilarious hearing the only country actually use nuclear weapons, on civilians mind you, lecture others on how to behave with nukes they don’t even have.
The US right now is FAR more paranoid then the USSR ever was because it feels like its losing its grip on the world. ABM missile systems are designed to give NATO nuclear primacy, something it seems to desperately want even despite Russia essentially doing everything that was ever asked of it in return for nothing but humiliation and scorn. Prompt Global Strike project, is that a defensive thing too?
I can only imagine what the world would be like if the USSR didn’t get nuclear arms so quickly after the US. Lemme guess, half of America’s high school curriculum would be devoted to patiently explaining why nuking 150 million Russian civilians was justifiable.
At least even Americans know are beginning to get tired of their leadership’s democracy-mongering for justification of imperialistic ambitions. No other country is so obsessed about everyone in the world that does not toe the line set forth by them.
5 C Stanley
May 20, 2008 @ 4:51 pm CESTAlex- you demonstrate the liberal fallacies so nicely, thanks.
Yes, Kruschev, being just a misunderstood Communist with a changed heart (having abandoned all of that expansionism stuff, of course) was just willing to negotiate. It had nothing to do, of course, with the fact that Kennedy DID stare him down first.
And like Obama says, Kennedy engaged in open diplomacy with Kruschev, right, and there was no problem of propaganda victory for the USSR? Oh, wait- I almost forgot, part of the deal they reached was that the removal of the US missiles in Turkey was to be done in secret, and the deal would have been moot if USSR had publicly announced it (oops, so it wasn’t actually open diplomacy then, was it?)
6 Jason
May 20, 2008 @ 4:57 pm CESTSuggest you invest in a map.
7 Alex
May 20, 2008 @ 5:06 pm CESTNo, you’re right, the whole crisis had nothing to do with Russia wanting the US to remove the missiles from turkey. When the US puts its nukes near Russia’s borders, that’s wishing for a better world, when Russia does the same, later, as a counterbalance, it’s imperialistic expansion. Forgive me for forgetting that obvious unbiased fact.
8 C Stanley
May 20, 2008 @ 5:33 pm CESTAlex, you are right to criticize the simplistic notion that the USSR had ONLY offensive, imperialistic goals in mind to guide it’s maneuvers. I can see why my earlier statement about the Cuban missile crisis came across that way, but I assure you I’m not that simple minded and the implication is only due to the constraints of writing a short blog comment. But what I’m trying to point out is the fallacies on both sides of that spectrum of thinking- USSR wasn’t ONLY maneuvering for expansionist goals, but it wasn’t ONLY reacting to perceived US imperialism either.
And forgive me for my American exceptionalism, but yeah, it is a net preference of mine for a nation that holds the ideals that America does to have more power than one that espouses Marxism. Obviously both the US and the USSR were mainly guided by self preservation and by the need to control adequate resources for their own prosperity- but I have no problem in saying that I support the preservation of the American nation over the USSR if the two were not to be able to peacefully coexist.
9 C Stanley
May 20, 2008 @ 5:36 pm CESTBTW, I think one of the important lessons of the Cold War came from examination of USSR archives- which showed that internally, while it’s true that the USSR was often acting out of fear, there’s absolutely no evidence that we could have done anything differently to have caused them to react differently either.
That’s something that flies in the face of the logic that some on the left use today. Those that think that our enemies would behave less aggressively if we would project less power, have no evidence that that’s the case (and as I just pointed out, there’s evidence to the contrary.)
10 Kevin H
May 20, 2008 @ 8:00 pm CESTCS,
"The USSR was a superpower which HAD nuclear arms, and we had to deal with them on those terms and find leverage and methods of mutual assurance. Central to our current policy is the concept that we must prevent Iran from getting nuclear weapons; the threat that that would pose to our ally Israel and to the stability of the region"
So, if they get nuclear weapons we’ll talk to them, but otherwise put them out in the cold? That seems like a pretty strong encouragement to get nukes! I think you’re proving the far left’s point for them: that our current stance encourages rather than discourages nuclear proliferation in Iran.
Note, I don’t necessarily agree with that, I think the sanctions are pretty effective at curtailing Iran’s economy, which has a direct impact on the size of any nuclear program they can afford. However because of their vast oil reserves, this strategy can only go so far, and there seems to be two longer term plans. The first, hold back their economy long enough for the oil reserves to run out and hope they can’t get nukes in that time frame. Or second, negotiate and hope to change the desire to get nukes, or increase the safeguards placed on nuclear material. Like the USSR (probably even more so) there is zero incentive for Iran to actually make a direct nuclear strike, the fear of a Nuclear Iran is really just a fear of rouge fissile material.
To all: I think the Kennedy example is a very good one. It doesn’t have to be open diplomacy, and there can be secret aspects of any negotiations. You just need to keep some lines of communication open so that you have a hope of influencing the other sides actions. And, contrary to Marc’s assertions, we CAN reason with non-western regimens on our terms.
We have lots of small carrots to give to Iran that fall well short of the ridiculous hyperbole of abandoning the region/Israel. If we can get something substantial for something small, then I’m all for it, and I can’t see why anyone wouldn’t be.
11 C Stanley
May 20, 2008 @ 8:23 pm CESTSo, if they get nuclear weapons we’ll talk to them, but otherwise put them out in the cold? That seems like a pretty strong encouragement to get nukes! I think you’re proving the far left’s point for them: that our current stance encourages rather than discourages nuclear proliferation in Iran.
You partly rebutted this yourself, Kevin, in the paragraph that followed that one. As you mentioned, there are other ways to prevent them from getting nuclear weapons so that even if they are ‘encouraged’ by our unwillingness to negotiate on the point of whether or not we’ll accept their attainment of a nuclear arsenal, it doesn’t matter. So the question is, do they want to attain nuclear weapons so that we will talk to them, or do they want them for other reasons? Are we to believe that this is the whole crux of it, that if Ahmenidajad can’t have tea at the White House than they’re going to be hell bent on creating a nuke so that we’ll be forced to invite him?
You just need to keep some lines of communication open so that you have a hope of influencing the other sides actions.
Which is exactly what we’re doing now!
And speaking of the Kennedy example, it occurred to me that (if I’m not mistaken) the Vienna summit was largely considered a failure on Kennedy’s part because he didn’t have any leverage to negotiate on the Berlin question. He ended up having to answer Kruschev’s ultimatum with the response that we would go to war if we had to. So, the exit question is- is this the kind of diplomacy that Obama admires and wants to duplicate, or is it the kind that Kennedy learned after he had a bit of experience? If Obama were to go to Tehran and if he were told that Iran intended to continue its nuclear program, continue to advocate for the destruction of Israel, and continue to support Hezbollah, and the US would have to go to war if it doesn’t accept those things, then how would Obama respond?
12 kennedy curse
May 20, 2008 @ 10:02 pm CEST[…] says things like this: ??the Soviet Union had thousands of nuclear weapons, and Iran doesn??t …http://poligazette.com/2008/05/20/the-lefts-pathological-fear-of-reality/Orwell??s Nose If you??re going to be a good, well-informed citizen ?? they say our democracy […]
13 Kevin H
May 21, 2008 @ 12:04 am CESTObviously, the safest of all world is for them to not want to make nuclear weapons, and be incapable of doing it even if they wanted. I’d say our current attitude is certainly better than doing nothing, but far from the best course of action.
While there are some very indirect lines of communication open between the US and Iran (and possibly less indirect ones the public isn’t fully aware of), I can’t see how more direct lines of communication are likely to hurt, especially not more likely to hurt than the attitude of "we’ll ignore them when they don’t have nuclear weapons, but if they get nukes we’ll be forced to talk to them". I don’t even really buy the argument that talking to Iran ‘legitimizes’ the regiem, but even so I’d rather a ‘legitimate’ Iran that doesn’t feel a need for nukes than an ‘illegitimate’ Iran that is seeking international stature through nuclear proliferation.
14 Interested
May 21, 2008 @ 2:44 am CESTAll those cursed idiotic history lessons.
Wait wait - History rewritten - of course, the Soviets were just doing all they could to survive. Now if they continued and took over the entire world - that would prevent countless possible future wars!
suggest you spend oh - 5 minutes in examining the leaps the US had in terms of Submarine & Airborn methods of delivering Nukes in comparison with the Soviet’s capabilities (and when) and then realize why they felt Cuba was necessary - and that is just one of the reasons. Turkey was an excuse - however plausable of one.