Category: Diplomacy and foreign affairs

Real Diplomacy

The one president in my lifetime to show any real diplomacy was Nixon. Nixon faced a terrifying coalition in the Soviet Union and communist China. There was tremendous anti-communist sentiment in the country, but, despite this, Nixon came up with a strategy to weaken this dangerous coalition vis-a-vis the US.

To everyone’s surprise, he made a personal trip to China to assuage the communist Chinese leadership. This was real diplomacy because it was eminently in US interest to weaken that dangerous coalition, even to the point of making peace with your ideological enemy — here the Chinese communist party.

Fast forward to the situation today: surprisingly, Trump faces the exact same dangerous coalition. The proxy war in Ukraine, waged by the US/Nato, has driven the Russians into the arms of the Chinese, even though Russia is no longer a communist country, but in fact one that holds elections and is predominantly Christian.

Trump should take a page from Nixon’s playbook in order to weaken this same dangerous coalition. That would be real diplomacy a second time by a president in my lifetime. But instead of rapprochement with China, it should be with Russia.

There are many reasons why such a rapprochement with Russia makes total sense in terms of real US interest. For one, Russia is chock full of nuclear missiles aimed at us. Such a rapprochement would vastly reduce this risk. Secondly, Russia is a country rich in natural resources, so there would be enormous opportunities for US companies to mutually benefit from economic development in this country. Finally, as mentioned, Russia does hold elections and is predominantly Christian, so this country is ideologically compatible with our political regime.

Will Trump have the stones to do what Nixon did and do some real diplomacy here? It obvious what he should do. Cut off all military and political support for Ukraine, forcing a settlement of the proxy war on Russian terms. Dropping all sanctions, particularly with regard to Russian oil. Perhaps a minerals deal with Russia, like the one with Ukraine, and discussion concerning American assistance in developing Russia’s oil and natural gas resources. A personal trip to Moscow, just like Nixon did with China.

Trump’s Tariffs

Who Destroyed Ukraine?

US and Nato destroyed Ukraine with their anti-Russia policy. US promotes war everywhere because it is good for its defense industries.

Living in the US, with its pension for war, one feels a bit like a citizen of Nazi Germany who realizes that the country is being led by a madman, only here the madman is the entire government.

Reagan called the Soviet Union the “evil empire.” Today, we are the evil empire, with a sanctimonious press that endorses everything the war-mongering government does.

Proud to be American? No, embarrassed and disappointed.

Totalitarians

Finger on the Button

Remember before Trump was elected that the anti-Trump people put out the scare meme, Just think Trump having his finger on the nuclear button? But then when he was elected, he steered very clear of war, despite building up the military.

Now we have Biden actually playing nuclear chicken with the Russians by using Ukraine as the tool.

We were much safer with Trump, in my opinion.

Afraid

Outbreak of War

What the events that led to the outbreak of World War 1 in 1914 tell us is that diplomats can lose control of situations, which can escalate quickly and snowball out of anyone’s control.

World War 1 was a war that no one wanted, with the possible exception of Kaiser William II who had off-the-wall fantasies of glory in combat. Because of entangling alliances, once the dominoes started to fall, it was inevitable that the world was faced with not a local war but a world war.

It is a lesson that perhaps has been lost on today’s generation of diplomats that seem to be acting as if the nuclear threat were merely an innocuous abstraction that could never happen. But it can happen, and if certain events are set in motion mindlessly, it will happen of its own accord.

And so we will have another world war that no one wanted, but this time it will be the war that does end all war — and civilization as we know it.

Finland

Zero Diplomacy

The United States has suffered from its lack of a true diplomat. The last real diplomacy to be pursued by the US happened under Nixon/Kissinger with their initiative with communist China. They realized that the US faced a menacing communist coalition between the Soviet Union and communist China, so Nixon, despite his anti-communism, did something about it. In an unprecedented and unanticipated move, he went to China and extended the olive branch to the Chinese — with the obvious intention of creating a fissure between the Soviet Union and communist China in their relations with the US.

That is called DIPLOMACY. It is a mixture of both vision and practicality — the vision to see what is indeed a better outcome than the current set of circumstances and the practicality to see how to make it happen. To be an effective diplomat — not a partisan ideologue pushing a questionable agenda — but a true diplomat, you need both. Missing either and you are spinning your wheels.

So how has diplomacy in the last 60 years or so been such an absolute failure? You merely have to look at all the current serious situations that have continued to fester without any clear resolution in sight to realize this. What are they? Not hard to identity. China/Taiwan; North Korea/South Korea; North Korea/Japan; Europe-NATO-US/Russia; Pakistan/India over Kashmir; Israel/Iran. The China/Taiwan situation has the possibility of bringing the US into a nuclear confrontation with China. North Korea/South Korea ditto. North Korea/Japan ditto. Europe-NATO-US/Russia a nuclear confrontation between the two sides. Pakistan/India colossal loss of life and economic devastation for the two countries and ultimately the world. Israel/Iran can bring the US and Russia into direct and inescapable conflict.

Very serious consequences for all of these situations. Yet there has been no diplomat worth his salt to come up with a vision and the practicality to resolve any of them, and these situations are all very long in the tooth — decades — and festering…perhaps “smoldering” is the right word here. Many of these situations, like the entangling alliances that led to World War 1, could lead to a world war that none of us could even imagine.

So where is our Metternich of the 21st century to lead the world out of its darkness and away from the abyss, away from a second Middle Ages and the destruction of our very civilization? Nowhere to be found. And the clock keeps ticking on all of these situations, like a bomb, a very big bomb.

Absence of Diplomacy

Absence of Diplomacy

NATO’s reckless expansion east to the doorstep of Russia is what has caused this war in Ukraine. Russia has been pleading with NATO since the questionable coup in 2014 for Ukraine to remain unaligned, but their pleading fell on deaf ears. So now we have war. A war that should have been avoided, had we had a single worthwhile diplomat in NATO/US. But there are none. They have ideologues, not diplomats.

A true diplomatic would have seen the far greater value in establishing congenial relations between Europe and Russia compared to further expansion of NATO — because to any reasonable person the former is much more important than the latter. Therefore, you do what needs to be done in diplomacy to ensure the better outcome. But that isn’t what our “diplomats” did.

And now the West makes the incredibly hypocritical claim that this war is Russia’s fault. Duh.

Likely Future Terrorist Targets

War What Ifs

What if, simultaneously, NK invades SK and China invades Taiwan. What would the US do, led by a Biden administration soft on — and I would say naive about — China?

A NK invasion of SK would require the use of tactical nuclear weapons by the US to deter it (no way the US would send a large army into SK nor would there be enough time to mobilize and do that). But I don’t see the Biden administration willing to use tactical nuclear weapons. Same situation (need for the use of tactical nuclear weapons) with an invasion of Taiwan, which might actually be triggered by a successful first invasion by NK of SK because it would then embolden China — China would conclude that the US was actually a paper tiger and so not to be feared in their takeover of Taiwan. So the first invasion would lead to the second.

The lesson taught by history at Munich that led to the outbreak of a world war is simply that if one side is perceived to not be willing to protect it sphere of influence, that condition invites aggression by the other side.

Consider this: two such successful invasions would mean that the American sphere of influence in Asia would collapse. Japan, Philippines, Australia, New Zealand, and all of southeastern Asia would all become dominated by China because none of these nations would any longer trust the American defense. China would become the uncontested power throughout all of Asia. Therefore, what is obvious is that China would have a tremendous amount to be gained from a successful takeover of Taiwan — a much greater gain than just that takeover, i.e., a sphere of influence extending throughout all of Asia. Therefore, one should not dismiss a Taiwan invasion as unlikely — it is much more likely than not, imo.

These two situations — the status of both SK and Taiwan — have been simmering, tittering on the edge, and unresolved now for decades.

America Coming Apart?