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The tactics were excessive (and usually counter-productive) but the strategy was sound. The main problem was that the US couldn’t tell the difference between a nationalist uprising with a veneer of Marxist rhetoric (like Iran) and a bona fide Soviet-sponsored revolution (like Cuba).
The question is: Was the real threat Communism, per se, or Soviet domination. As Mao so clearly illustrated, even the most die-hard Communists had little time for Soviet machinations.
Ok, so we all know the tragedies of the US's overreaction to the communist/USSR threat during the cold war: push for interstate system/suburban sprawl... all in the name of defense.
The older I get, the more of an isolationist I'm becoming. Not economically. We are part of a world economy now, but I'm referring to militarily. Yes, there is some terrible stuff happening in the world. Always has ... always will. We have no business getting involved in regional disputes.
The older I get, the more of an isolationist I'm becoming. Not economically. We are part of a world economy now, but I'm referring to militarily. Yes, there is some terrible stuff happening in the world. Always has ... always will. We have no business getting involved in regional disputes.
I could understand that that but you do know perhaps in the end there's a price to be paid. If a country is militarily 'isolated' how is an adversary to understand you? Lack of engagement is arguably a prognosis for disaster in certain scenarios. It gives a 'message' in any case, doesn't it? A thought: 'Si vis pacem, para bellum'. If you want peace prepare for war'...Vegetius.
It's easy to look back and say we shouldn't have done this or that in regards to USSR. But one has to look at the historical context of the situation at the time. First, was the USSR a threat? At that time they were a viable threat to the world. One or more Scientist who worked on the atomic bomb passed secrets onto the Soviets and they became the second nuclear power. As bad as the Nazis were, Eastern Europeans were willing to welcome & support the Nazis rather than live under the USSR. Stalin had spies inside FDR's administration and at the Yalta meeting. Once Stalin took control of East Germany, people tried to flee to the west, many were shot in the back. Then came the Berlin Wall which came to be knowned as the Iron Curtain. They controlled virtually all of Eastern Europe and were looking to expand through war and invasion of other nations. Though Democrats like to insult Senator McCarthy and tie him to the House of Un-American Activities Committee, he wasn't in the House of Representatives and he wasn't in Washington when the house was doing their investigation. However, as revealed by recently declassified Soviet documents, both the HUAC and Senator McCarthy were right in that many of these people were Soviet spies. Even more scary, more recently declassified documents showed that in one year in the 1980s, the Soviets twice nearly launched their missiles at America. There was also the incident with Cuba. There was just too much going on for USA to not consider USSR a threat. Now as for Iran and the other cases, that's second guessing at this point. Perhaps things could have been better had we left the original government in Iran alone. Then again, the Islamic terrorist government of Iran could have started a get decades earlier with the support of the USSR. Personally, I'm tired of us being the world police. Close all our foreign bases and bring all our troops back to our shores. Use our military to enforce our nation's immigration laws and secure our southern border. While we're at it, revoke all UN members' diplomatic immunity and evict them from our land. Stop all payments to the UN.
Stalin likely killed more innocent victims than Hitler, and Marxism, like Naziism, is based upon a rigid ideology harnessed to the state's legitimized monopoly on the use of force. In contrast, no nation which has witnessed the peaceful transfer of power from one party to another for an uninterrupted period of one hundred years or more has since taken up the sword against another member of the group.
Although education alone, sponsored by an independent media, should be sufficient for the task, we not only should praise those who stamped out this evil, but must continue our vigilance against those who would re-introduce it.
Marxism, like Naziism, is based upon a rigid ideology harnessed to the state's legitimized monopoly on the use of force.
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In practice, that is the way that it functioned. However there was a distinction in theory between fascism and socialism. The former called for hyper nationalism with all concerns subordinate to the advancement of the state. It anticipated and endorsed the employment of force to sustain a monopoly on power.
The socialistic ideology, although never realized in practice, was not founded upon the idea of compulsion from above, it was to come from revolution from below. Power was ultimately to be transferred to the "dictatorship of the proletariat" with all class distinctions abolished and the state eventually losing utility to the point where it vanishes.
It apparently doesn't work since no dictatorship of the proletariat has ever emerged in any communist nation, but at least in theory it didn't call for the fascist style absolutism.
The tactics were excessive (and usually counter-productive) but the strategy was sound. The main problem was that the US couldn’t tell the difference between a nationalist uprising with a veneer of Marxist rhetoric (like Iran) and a bona fide Soviet-sponsored revolution (like Cuba).
The question is: Was the real threat Communism, per se, or Soviet domination. As Mao so clearly illustrated, even the most die-hard Communists had little time for Soviet machinations.
True, the threat really wans't the communist economic system, it was the Soviet political system.
Quote:
Originally Posted by travric
I could understand that that but you do know perhaps in the end there's a price to be paid. If a country is militarily 'isolated' how is an adversary to understand you? Lack of engagement is arguably a prognosis for disaster in certain scenarios. It gives a 'message' in any case, doesn't it? A thought: 'Si vis pacem, para bellum'. If you want peace prepare for war'...Vegetius.
Technically, we could reduce our military down to protecting our cyberspace, protecting our trade ships, protecting our diplomats, and our 1000's of nuclear weapons. Right? No F22's, Abrams tanks, Carriers, thousands of ground soldiers, or stealth bombers required. 1000's of nuclear weapons are as prepared for war -- specifically a defensive war, as you can get.
Quote:
Originally Posted by Grandstander
In practice, that is the way that it functioned. However there was a distinction in theory between fascism and socialism. The former called for hyper nationalism with all concerns subordinate to the advancement of the state. It anticipated and endorsed the employment of force to sustain a monopoly on power.
The socialistic ideology, although never realized in practice, was not founded upon the idea of compulsion from above, it was to come from revolution from below. Power was ultimately to be transferred to the "dictatorship of the proletariat" with all class distinctions abolished and the state eventually losing utility to the point where it vanishes.
It apparently doesn't work since no dictatorship of the proletariat has ever emerged in any communist nation, but at least in theory it didn't call for the fascist style absolutism.
Has there ever been a true communist society that wasn't tainted with fascism or totalitarianism?
The way I like explain the difference between fascism and communism is this: both of them believe collectivism is far superior to individualism -- in other words, working for the good of society is always more beneficial than working for the benefit of yourself. In fascism, society is benefited when you respect and give your work's efforts to your authority while in communism society is benefited when you respect and give your work's effort to your fellow citizen. Fascism is a vertically, or authority based collective society while communism is a horizontal or citizen (proletariat) based society.
So while the USSR and N. Korea claimed to be communist, they were really fascist societies. Soviet and N. Korean citizens did not owe their loyalty to each other, they owed their loyalty to their states authority.
All I can say is I am eternally grateful for the US's stance to crush fascism twice, the Nazi's and the Soviets.
As far as collective states failing on their own, I don't believe that that would happen. Sure they may be less prosperous, like Cuba, but they don't utterly collapse.
The way I like explain the difference between fascism and communism is this: both of them believe collectivism is far superior to individualism -- in other words, working for the good of society is always more beneficial than working for the benefit of yourself. In fascism, society is benefited when you respect and give your work's efforts to your authority while in communism society is benefited when you respect and give your work's effort to your fellow citizen. Fascism is a vertically, or authority based collective society while communism is a horizontal or citizen (proletariat) based society.
You know then with history as a guide we can see how theory and er 'execution' follow when it comes to the two 'isms'.
For example, witness the French intellectuals who got sucked into the morass and inherent contradictions of communism but nevertheless they were enamored of it. Nothing like communism to give the lie that its exisitence revolved around 'benefits to society'. Ultimately it was a dirty, dismal and criminal science of human behavior. Finally, the 'proletariat' got hip to all that.
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