From: MaxPlumm@aol.com
Date: Thu Apr 03 2003 - 03:30:08 MST
Lee Corbin initially wrote:
Ø The point needs to be made over and over that the pre-1989
> world was a LOT DIFFERENT than now. The West was fighting
> for its life against the Soviet play for world domination.
To which Damien Sullivan responded:
"No, the West thought it was fighting for its life. After 1991 it became
clear
the Soviet Union was a paper tiger. Okay, a paper tiger with nukes, but its
economic power had been vastly overestimated."
To dismiss the Soviet Union as "a paper tiger" is beyond insulting. I am
astonished that someone that I must view as being quite intelligent (given
your presence on this list) would so cavalierly dismiss the deaths of
millions of people due to the direct and indirect actions of the Soviet
Union. They or their proxy's actions within the borders of the USSR, East
Germany, Czechoslovakia, Hungary, Afghanistan, Vietnam, Korea, Ethiopia and
many other countries brought untold misery to hundreds of millions of people.
It is not responsible to label the Cold War as a "misunderstanding" or any
other such nonsense. The Soviet Union sought a world dominated by Communism,
and did its best to inflict its brutal system upon as many people as
possible.
"And there wasn't that much fighting, more jockeying for status and
influence."
Given the conflicts which occurred in Afghanistan, Vietnam, Korea, Ethiopia,
Greece, Angola et al, how much war and loss of life is required for there to
be "much fighting" in your view?
> The choice, as Max Plumm has eloquently explained, was never
> between "democracy" and "tyranny" in a developing country,
> but between "pro-U.S. authoritarianism" and "pro-Soviet
> totalitarianism" in those places. It's still an open
"I consider that unproven. Greece wandered between democracy and
authoritarianism."
As I illustrated in my last post to you, it is highly dubious to suggest that
Greece would've been capable of "wandering between democracy and
authoritarianism" had the United States allowed the Soviet proxies in that
country to emerge victorious in their civil war.
"Costa Rica has been democratic for a long long time."The rest of Latin
America was having trouble with democracy since long before Communism; it's
not clear what the latter had to do with anything."
I must strongly disagree, if there is one thing that is crystal clear it is
that a Communist system eliminates any chance at democracy. In regard to the
struggles of Latin America with democracy, the same can be said of Africa,
which is precisely why I have attempted to illustrate that the United States
cannot be criticized for dealing with authoritarians during the Cold War. The
vast majority of democratic experiments during this era failed. However, it
should be noted that many that succeeded were allowed to prosper in large
part because of actions by the United States.
"Apart from us helping to overthrow democratically elected left-leaning
governments such as Allende."
Despite our past decisions in Chile, which I explained in more depth in my
last post, the people of Chile today do enjoy democracy, and have since 1988.
As I've mentioned, the United States is the reason there is democracy today
in South Korea and Taiwan. Please provide ONE example of where the Soviet
Union brought or fostered democracy in its many proxies. Again, to simply
dismiss that it is easy for us to have a better record abroad than the Soviet
Union ignores the entire point of why the Cold War was waged.
"Oh, India's another counterexample. Definitely still developing, but
democratic since independence, and leading the Nonaligned Bloc."
Or Iran, which after 1979 was neither pro-US authoritarian nor pro-Soviet
totalitarian.
Maybe getting some aid from the USSR, but mostly going its own theocratic
way."
How do these examples invalidate the Cold War? Neither the USSR, nor the
United States, had infinite resources with which to wage their ideological
conflict in every country of the globe. The Nazis did not conquer Zimbabwe
before or during World War II, does that mean they were not seeking world
domination? The goal of the United States in the Cold War was not to spread
democracy in every nation (which would have been impossible), it was to
prevent the spread of Communism. That being said, we still fostered and made
possible the spread of democracy in places where it otherwise would not have
occurred. That cannot be said for the Soviets, who willingly suppressed the
spread of democracy in every instance.
"Lebanon was roughly democratic until the Syrians moved in, and possibly
Israel's interference didn't help either."
You only aid my position with this example. The United States sent troops
into Lebanon to "prop up" the democratically elected Chamoun government in
1958. It was not until the 1970s when the Soviet proxies, the Syrians,
entered that country that democracy was undone. But this gets to the heart of
the matter. Do you suggest that the goals and aims of the democratic United
States and Israel during the Cold War were of the same merit and validity of
the totalitarian Soviet Union and Syria?
"I now consider the dichtomy not just unproven but rather dubious."
In what sense? You have acknowledged that you agree with the assertion that
democracies were the exception and not the rule of the Cold War world. And,
to my knowledge, you have as of yet not illustrated where the Soviet camp
spread democracy, nor proven that they did not willingly suppress it
throughout the globe. I somehow doubt that the peoples of West Germany, South
Korea, or Greece, among others, would share in your conclusion.
Regards,
Max Plumm
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