FSO: Global Analysis with J. R. "When Big Enemies Encounter Small Nothings" 06/01/2007

Weekly Column - 06.01.2007

WHEN BIG ENEMIES ENCOUNTER SMALL NOTHINGS
by J. R. Nyquist

America's real enemy is big, whether you measure him at 6.6 million square miles (Russia) or number him at 1.3 billion people (China). A few thousand Muslim fanatics hiding in caves cannot match the power of governments that control the largest and most populous countries respectively. As it stands, most Americans are unaware of Moscow and Beijing’s enmity. They have been fooled, just as the U.S. Government has been fooled. This is due to a sophisticated deception campaign operating on many levels. For example, there is an ongoing campaign to hoodwink American academics through university exchanges. There has been extensive false advertising about free market reforms in Russia and China. There is also deception through handshakes and hugs at high-level summits where leaders supposedly look into one another's souls. False defectors and double agents have also fooled the FBI and CIA.

The enemy has been successful on every level. This does not mean, however, that the enemy is "ten feet tall." If he seems so, it is because Americans have downsized themselves; ignoring facts, turning away from witnesses, changing the channel to something light and entertaining. Americans today believe what they want to believe. President Bush also believes what he wants to believe. Consequently, he has engaged the wrong enemy at the wrong time (in Iraq). The American public has no sense of history and very little factual knowledge. This is because they are largely taken up with entertainment.

A serious man sees no danger in being clueless about sports, celebrities or fashion. At the same time, to be clueless about enemies, about those who are out to destroy you, is very dangerous indeed. Such ignorance, in fact, is shameful and no excuses will be excepted once cities have been bombed and whole regions devastated. If you think this is an exaggeration, then you haven’t read much history and have no idea of the precipice upon which civilization stands today. It is more convenient for the average fool to say that America – not Russia – threatens world peace. It is the lazy man's geopolitics to repeat the latest anti-American conspiracy theory; to say that America is the Big Bad Wolf and Bush is Hitler. How creative, how original today’s anti-Americanism has become. It reverberates from every side as bedrock truth. The indecent crowd passes this ideological poison as they pass germs. And so, in public discourse, we find ourselves face-to-face with the intellectual equivalent of the bubonic plague.

Last week the Pentagon warned that China is building up a surprise attack capability. Why they are doing this, few care to speculate. How foolish America has been to trade with this fatal regime. Cheap goods appear in American stores, the U.S. economy is hollowed out, the American consumer is confirmed in his market hedonism, and the Chinese are able to build long-range missiles and high-tech submarines. A clever strategist might conclude that China’s threat to Taiwan is diversionary. China is preparing to fight America.
Russia’s position is no different, and recent events help to illuminate the Kremlin’s strategy. At a recent press conference with Portuguese Prime Minister Jose Socrates, President Vladimir Putin of Russia stated: “We consider it harmful and dangerous to turn Europe into a powder keg and to fill it with new kinds of weapons.” He is talking, of course, about NATO’s plan to build an anti-ballistic missile defense against Iranian missiles. With astonishing hypocrisy, Russian leaders insist that proposed anti-missile defenses in Europe are aimed at Russia. Meanwhile, First Deputy Prime Minister Sergei Ivanov recently announced Russia’s successful test of a new intercontinental ballistic missile (designated RS-24) capable of carrying ten warheads. “As of today,” boasted Ivanov, “Russia has new tactical and strategic facilities that can overcome any existing or future missile defense systems.”

Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice says this is well and good. The West, she explains, isn’t worried about war with Russia. The West sees no reason for hostilities, no occasion for a new arms race, no reason for mutual suspicions. But the Russians are determined to pick a fight. They seek to justify their own arms buildup by talking about a threat from the West that doesn’t exist. Whenever Russian leaders do something wicked, or plan something wicked, they always blame their enemy for doing the exact same thing. For example, “former” KGB official Andrei Lugovoi, the Russian “businessman” accused by British authorities of assassinating KGB defector Alexander Litvinenko with polonium-210, has now stated that Litvinenko was murdered by the British special services. It is not enough for a Russian to protest his innocence. The Russians must immediately accuse their enemy of the crimes they have committed, or are presently contemplating.
It is therefore more than ominous that almost three years ago President Putin issued a declaration of war, calling for his country’s mobilization against a hidden enemy. Grim before the television cameras in the wake of the Beslan massacre, Putin blamed an unnamed foreign power that was “still afraid” of Russia’s nuclear missiles. “Despite all the difficulties,” said Putin, “we have managed to preserve the core of the colossus that was the Soviet Union.” And “someone” wants to destroy what remains of the core.

Are the Americans really plotting to destroy Russia?

The Americans can hardly deal with their own domestic malcontents and Communists, let alone deal with the numberless KGB officers and Communists who continue to govern Russia. In fact, while Russia is building up its strategic arsenal with new ICBMs, the American Congress is cutting back on strategic programs. According to a May 24 story by Washington Post Staff Writer Walter Pincus, a House committee has eliminated all funding for America's Reliable Replacement [Nuclear] Warhead program. As it happens, nuclear weapons get old. They wear out and become unreliable. New warheads are required to maintain the credibility of America’s nuclear deterrent. The Democrats in Congress have stopped this vital program, which would only cost $88 million – a paltry sum in terms of Pentagon spending. You will find no similar funding slash on the Chinese or the Russian side. The dictatorship in North Korea starved over a million citizens to death to develop its nuclear weapons. But the supposedly malevolent American militarists are busy canceling new weapons programs.
Curious as it seems, the “imperialist” Americans are not ruthlessly amassing an arsenal capable of tearing through Moscow’s anti-missile defense system, which is far more sophisticated than anything possessed by the United States. Instead of massing tank divisions on Russia’s border, the Americans have been cleverly diverted into the Middle East. And now, after the Iraq adventure has proven fruitless, the American people elected Democrats, who are generally opposed to Pentagon spending. This tendency to self-sabotage is the extent of the vaunted American “threat.” This threat is nothing more than a joke and a misunderstanding. But on their side, the Russians will not desist in perpetuating it in all seriousness. President Putin spoke as follows during a press conference in Greece: “Our American partners have quit the ABM Treaty. We warned them then that we would come out with a response to maintain the strategic balance in the world…. It wasn’t us who initiated a new round of arms race.” (Of course, the Russians were violating the ABM Treaty all along. But who bothered to notice something so fundamental?)

And what an arms race it is, with America canceling weapons systems as Russia introduces one new weapon after another. Meanwhile Russia is supporting terrorist states like North Korea and Iran, building arms plants for dictators like Hugo Chavez and the butchers of Tiananmen Square. Putin is pointing his finger at America, crying “imperialism” and using words like “aggression” when the Americans have no desire to govern or colonize anybody. If the U.S. were genuinely imperialistic the Iraq people would fear American soldiers more than they fear the terrorists. But they don’t.

And now President Bush wants to meet with Vladimir Putin in what is being billed as “a show of intimacy.” The American side thinks there has been a misunderstanding. But there hasn’t been a misunderstanding. Russia’s leaders and strategists understand what they are doing, and Russia’s talking points do not suggest a misunderstanding. They point, instead, to a series of excuses and justifications for doing what Russia long ago planned to do. American officials are supposedly “shocked” at Moscow’s rhetoric. They are stunned that Russia’s leader would compare America to the Third Reich. How stupid it is to be shocked at such an outcome. Go back and read over speeches Putin gave as far back as 2001. He has been saying the same thing from the start. And now he is declaring war against capitalism, against American imperialism, and against the idea that there was anything wrong with Communism or the Soviet Union. “Let’s not talk about having immaculate, white fluffy partners on one side, and on the other a monster who has just come out of a forest with claws and horns,” said Putin.

That’s right. The monster on the other side didn’t just emerge from the forest with claws and horns. He has been on the opposite side of the conference table all along. We have slapped him on the back, declared our friendship for him, and now we want to say that he is suddenly changed – from a friend into an enemy. But he was always an enemy, from first to last, and that is the point we cannot fully digest. That is the lesson we don’t want to learn. The big enemy was always there. The vacancy was entirely on our side.

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