Relay-Version: version B 2.10 5/3/83; site utzoo.UUCP Path: utzoo!linus!philabs!seismo!harpo!floyd!clyde!ihnp4!inuxc!pur-ee!uiucdcs!uiuccsb!eich From: eich@uiuccsb.UUCP Newsgroups: net.politics Subject: Re: PWhat if They Threw a War... - (nf) Message-ID: <3993@uiucdcs.UUCP> Date: Sun, 20-Nov-83 15:47:28 EST Article-I.D.: uiucdcs.3993 Posted: Sun Nov 20 15:47:28 1983 Date-Received: Wed, 23-Nov-83 02:37:42 EST Lines: 96 #R:uiucuxc:21200024:uiuccsb:11000060:000:5333 uiuccsb!eich Nov 17 10:40:00 1983 History shows that the weak cannot count on the kindness of the strong. Ukrainians, Poles, and Afghans know this quite well. The Russians also know this, hence their different interpretation of the word `Freeze'. When Lenin swept to power on the wave of the Great Russian Peace Movement of 1917, a policy of unilateral pacifism was put into effect (quite bloodily). Soldiers and sailors, encouraged by the Bolsheviks, mutinied by the thousands. The Admiral of the navy was dragged into the street and shot. Everywhere, people tortured by war and famine cried out "Peace!" Lenin's addresses to the newly formed Bolshevik government left grown men sobbing that "peace had come at last." It availed Russia nothing: Trotsky went to the German Army's East Command at Brest-Litovsk and made a *Unilateral Declaration of Peace*; the Germans, bemused, paused for two days and then started the invasion. They met almost total surrender. Mutinies and desertions had rendered Russia defenseless. For instance, A railroad flat-car with a machine-gun mounted on it was sufficient to capture all towns along the line. In the end, the revolution that shook the world was saved from the tender mercies of the Germans (and even given the Ukraine), by the actions of a Protestant American moralist named Woodrew Wilson -- such are the ironies of the dialectic. The Great Russian Peace Movement was the closest any nation has come to unilateral disarmament in this Century, and the results were calamatous. Of course, Lenin's subsequent liquidation of all opposition, starting with the students, wasn't so nice either. But I'm glad you said the magic words `unilateral disarmament', because up till now most members of the latest peace movement have included deadwood like `mutual' and `verifiable' in their proposals (although lately these tags have been disappearing). Lest you think I imagine Russians wading ashore at Cape Cod on the day after unilateral disarmament, I'll tell you what would likely happen. Soviet adventurism would step up to the degree that the Russian economy could bear. That degree, needless to say, would be raised by an invasion of the Persian Gulf, or by at least the overthrow of the Saudi royal family and the installation (from South Yemen) of a `progressive' regime (remember the cigarette butts in the 1979 Mosque raid). Africa, coveted for its minerals, would be there for the taking; Asia would be unmolested, except perhaps for Japan, and South Korea if the North got the go-ahead. Europe is problematic: although the Soviets, mustering an opportunistic, deep-penetration armored attack, could easily overcome current European conventional defenses, the (relatively old and few) French and British nuclear weapons would have to considered. Who knows? The French would probably try to cut a deal. The eventual situation, however, would be a Finlandized continent. Of course almost all of the above military action on the part of the USSR is unnecessary; the simple fact of supreme Soviet military might would suffice in most cases to secure political surrender. Finlandization is less of an administrative bother, too. Deterrence by American conventional weapons does not promise to be very effective, except against a direct North American invasion (which, again, would not be worth mustering). But appeasement would be the order of the day. No more Reagans, or anyone else to the right of, say, Alan Cranston. In short order the Soviets could work their political will anywhere they pleased. The author/film critic Richard Grenier tells of an acquaintance of his, a person employed in the movie industry, who espoused the current pacifism without the bilateral disingenuousness. What, asked Grenier, would she do if the Soviets did eventually take control of America? Oh, she replied, she would go about her business. But suppose, perchance, Grenier continued, they happened to look disfavorably upon her business, indeed upon her whole lifestyle, and flung her into a Gulag? "Oh", she replied bravely, "then I'd fight!" "Yes, indeed", said Grenier, "I'm sure it would be one of the nobler battles." So if you consider the condition of captive peoples in the East, along with quite a bit of blood shed from those of us who would oppose such conditions, to be one of `peace' (and further, if you think that you could *honestly* live with this), AND if you believe that the possession of nuclear weapons is unjustifiable, then support for unilateral disarmament is the logical course, far preferable to a freeze. Oh, yes, Thatcher and Mitterand would be quite upset. I don't understand your question about `world opinion' or that obscure den of iniquity called the `United Nations'. Since most of the member nations routinely condone totalist imperialism and human rights violations by Leninists (who go by tweedsy, academic-sounding misnomers like `Marxist' and `Socialist', but don't let that fool you), while heroically and hypocritically kicking Israel and South Africa, there is no doubt that nary a peep of concern from that quarter would accompany Soviet domination. The Chinese would, barring rapprochement, be hysterical. And we would probably still pay for most of the U.N. Why in the world would they "just launch their missiles"? Brendan Eich uiucdcs!uiuccsb!eich