Dear
Mr. Putin: Time to Give Up on Better Relations
with America
By Joseph
Mussomeli
Dear President Putin: It is no use
trying any further to accommodate the
United States or cooperate with it. We
cannot afford any more concessions. It
is clear that the United States only
respects force and firmness...
Dear Mr.
President: The below memorandum regarding
Russian-American bilateral relations was drafted
by my Ministry’s Department of North America. I
do not share completely all the views espoused
by my Foreign Ministry colleagues—sometimes they
seem too harsh, even shrill, in their analysis
of the United States—but I suspect their
assessment closely reflects the views of the
average Russian, so I believe it would be useful
for you to read their analysis unadulterated by
my edits. Because of the sensitivity of the
conclusion reached, I have classified this
assessment as top secret/eyes only. Sincerely
yours, Sergei.
July 19,
2017 "Information
Clearing House"
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The July
7th meeting between Presidents Trump and Putin
could have been the beginning of that
long-awaited breakthrough in our worsening
relations with the United States. Instead, that
meeting served only to confirm that there is no
longer any chance that we can forestall a new
Cold War. Of course, for many American
policymakers the Cold War is already here or,
perhaps more precisely, for many in the West the
Cold War never really ended. They never knew how
to handle a more cooperative and friendly
relationship with Russia, and are now oddly
reassured and comforted that tensions are
rising. You will recall how many high-level
American officials during the Nineties
nostalgically lamented the collapse of the
Soviet Union because the world became less
predictable and more muddled.
But this
new Cold War—or more accurately, phase two of
the original Cold War—will be worse than its
predecessor from 1948-1990. This is because all
the American elites are now united in their
distrust and disdain for Russia as never before
in our bilateral history. Although we pose no
existential threat to America, embrace no
ideology anathema to their way of life, and have
dramatically reduced our territory while at the
same time dramatically increasing our
cooperation with America on a full range of
issues over the last two decades, they remain
dissatisfied. Indeed, one could argue that the
more we give in, the more unreasonable they have
become in their demands. When the National
Review, the New Republic, the
Nation, and the Washington Post
are all bleating like good sheep the same
uninformed half-truths about Russia, you know
that building better relations is now
impossible.
The
American Psyche
Americans
are perhaps unique in the world in their view of
the world—they are truly a conflicted people:
they know less about history and the rest of the
world than any other developed country, yet they
deem themselves experts on all things. More
intriguingly, they feel a messianic impulse to
save the world, while at the same harboring deep
resentment when the world intrudes on them. They
are, paradoxically, irredeemably isolationist
and compulsively interventionist.
But what
is most important to understand about America is
that it is not evil. The American people and
their leaders are good-hearted and always mean
well. Such silly leftwing notions of America the
Evil need to be cast aside, onto the trash heap
of history so to speak, with so many other
myths. They want only to do good—and that is
what makes America so dangerous. They do not
have a lust for power, nor truly a craving for
wealth. But they do lust for glory and they do
crave admiration. A white knight on a noble
steed, erratically trampling the rest of the
world into submission with benign intent.
What is
most infuriating about America’s self-image,
however, is the ease with which it deflects its
own foibles and inclinations onto the rest of
the world. For example, the long-held belief
among Americans of every political stripe that
Russia only understands force and toughness. But
hasn’t the history of the last several decades
shown just the opposite? It is the United States
that never sees a concession as an effort at
compromise, but instead views every concession
as a victory for themselves. One glaring example
that puts this into stark relief are the two
pivotal events of 1989: the Tiananmen slaughter
of peaceful demonstrators and the peaceful
tearing down of the Berlin Wall a few months
later. The Chinese cracked down on the
demonstrators ruthlessly and with considerable
violence, and now that massacre is a fading
memory and does not at all impede relations with
the West nor China’s ascent to regional
hegemony. But our decision not to crackdown on
those demonstrators in Berlin, as we had done in
years past in Hungary and Czechoslovakia, has
caused us endless trouble with the West. Yes, it
would have caused a great international crisis
and yes Russia would have been severely
lambasted by global leaders, but all that fury
would have died down by now and all the blood we
would have had to spill would have long dried.
Our reluctance to kill—to use force and be
tough—and to keep what was ours at all cost has
cost us dearly.
A Century
of Interference
Next year
will mark the 100th anniversary of American
involvement—interference—in our domestic
affairs. It was in 1918 that then President
Wilson sent 13,000 American soldiers as part of
the multinational invasion force to topple our
government. This is a small footnote in history
that shamefully few Americans even know about,
but even those who know about it justify it
because their intentions were good. That is
after all the eternal American defense: we meant
well. It is a universally applied principle, so
for example it doesn’t matter that tens of
thousands of Iraqis are dead and hundreds of
thousands more are homeless and broken because
the Americans meant well! It is of little
importance that the United States militarily
interfered in over a dozen Latin American
countries because it also meant well in those
places, too. The same for the dozen or more
interventions and invasions in the Middle East
and Asia. The intent is always good so the
results don’t matter.
It would
be unfair not to admit we too have fallen prey
to this self-delusion in our past. Like the
average American today who is blissfully
oblivious to the harm done because the intent
was good, we once felt equally vindicated in all
our actions since Marx and Lenin had taught us
we had history on our side. But we’ve grown up;
America never will. It always believes it’s
actions are sanctioned by God and its mistakes
forgiven by that same God. That is enough to
salve any conscience.
The other
mental technique employed with great effect by
the Americans is having a dual timeline to
history; this technique impressively reinforces
its “good intentions” defense. Whenever one
raises a past transgression—e.g., their
interference in various democratic
elections—Mosaddegh in Iran, Allende in Chile,
etc.—these offenses are all characterized as
ancient history. Whereas when they assess the
actions of Russia or any other “enemy” state,
past transgressions are never ancient history;
instead, our past aggressions are always seen as
an “immutable pattern” of bad behavior that will
never cease unless confronted. Thus, Czar
Peter’s desire for a warm water port three
centuries ago is still believed a Russian
obsession, while the United States obsession
with maintaining absolute hegemony over all of
Latin America is a harmless relic of a distant
past. Yet, American interference in domestic
elections continues unabated. Certainly not as
heavy-handed as in the past, but still
inexcusable and inappropriate. We need only
recall former Secretary of State Clinton
publicly criticizing our own 2012 elections:
“The Russian people, like people everywhere,
deserve the right to have their voices heard and
their votes counted. And that means they deserve
free, fair, transparent elections and leaders
who are accountable to them.” A remarkable
statement, without a hint of irony, from a woman
who had no hesitation to rig the party rules to
ensure her own nomination as the Democratic
party candidate in 2016.
But this
cognitive historical dissonance is best
exemplified in the United States outrage over
our annexation of Crimea, which has always been
overwhelmingly populated by Russians. For nearly
two hundred years Crimea was part of Russia,
when in 1954 for purely domestic political
reasons it was internally transferred from
Russia to Ukraine, both of which were parts of
the Soviet Union! Never was it envisioned at
that time that Ukraine would ever become an
independent state and even when it became one
never was it envisioned that the Russian Black
Sea fleet at Sevastopol would be threatened. How
does this compare to America’s continued
occupation of the Cuban port of Guantanamo? Is
that naval port intrinsic to the security of the
United States? Is it populated by an
overwhelming number of Americans? Was it
historically ever a part of the United States?
Of course, the answer is no to all these
questions. Yet, the United States sees no
hypocrisy and inconsistency in its retention of
Guantanamo despite Cuba’s legitimate demand to
have it returned. It is amusing that the world
focuses on the detention center for alleged
terrorists at Guantanamo and no one—other than
the Cuban government—sees the far greater
outrage in the refusal of the United States to
give back to Cuba what was taken at the point of
a gun in 1903. Gunboat diplomacy may be
condemned by the United States now, but it
refuses to give up the fruits of its own past
employment of military extortion.
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The
Tragedy of the Last Thirty Years
Since
Mikhail Gorbachev’s 1986 Vladivostok speech, we
have tried to reach a true accommodation with
America. In that speech, largely ignored in the
United States at the time, we announced that we
would substantially draw down our troops in
Afghanistan with an expectation of finding a
political solution that would allow our complete
withdrawal. The American analysis should have
been instructive and served as a warning:
American policymakers dismissed any possibility
that we would withdraw our troops and insisted
that the promise of a troop withdrawal was a
ruse not to be taken seriously. At the same
time, they explained that if we did withdraw
troops it would only be because we had been
defeated! We should have taken this early
warning more seriously about the American
penchant for holding two opposing views
simultaneously. This same American assessment
occurred in the months leading up to the fall of
the Berlin Wall: that we would never allow it to
happen, and then that we could not stop it from
happening because—again!—we had been defeated.
The path
from those early “defeats” to our present dire
predicament was easy to see, but we were yearned
for better relations. When Germany united, we
allowed it—even agreeing to keep a united
Germany within NATO. But we made clear that
would be the extent of NATO’s expansion
eastward. Gorbachev in his memoirs underscores
that NATO provided assurances that it would not
expand further toward our border. Indeed, in
1990 it is hard to believe that anyone even
considered the prospect of our former allies
joining NATO! But soon they did, and again we
remained silent. First former President Clinton
allowed various former Warsaw Pact countries to
join, then former President Bush added insult to
that injury by even allowing former Soviet
republics to join. At the same time, Gorbachev’s
suggestion that we be allowed to have a pathway
to NATO membership was dismissed out of hand! We
were being hemmed in on all sides and all we
sought was better relations and to become fully
integrated into the Western community.
But to
America and NATO we had already amply signaled
our weakness and unwillingness to stand up to
them, so the threats to our security kept
multiplying. One of our few remaining allies,
Serbia, had a portion of its territory annexed
that became the separate state of Kosovo. This
abrogated the crucial understanding among all
European states to keep all national borders
intact. The sanctity of borders had kept the
peace for five decades, but now it was to be
tossed aside at the whim of the Americans!
(Amazingly, when we did the same thing with
Crimea—taking Kosovo as precedent—we were
roundly attacked.) Yet we accepted the partition
of Serbia in order to maintain good relations
and we again we kept our mouths shut.
Then in
2002, in light of the horrific 9/11 attacks,
former President Bush unexpectedly and
mystifyingly withdrew the United States from the
Anti-Ballistic Missile (ABM) Treaty. Had the
Americans forgotten that we had originally
opposed such a treaty back in 1967? Had they
forgotten that it took them five long years of
negotiations to convince us to embrace the ABM
Treaty, but once it was signed in 1972 we
adhered to it completely and came to accept that
it was a cornerstone of our relationship with
America. But when Bush abrogated the treaty we
said very little: that it was a “mistake” but
that withdrawing from the treaty would not have
any serious impact on our warm relations.
Showing his formidable intellectual prowess,
Bush explained that the ABM treaty needed to be
abrogated because four hijacked planes had
caused widespread destruction on American soil.
Of course, an ABM system would have been
completely ineffective against such an attack
anyway, but that somehow was beside the point.
Feeling sympathy for the American tragedy we did
nothing to oppose this decision.
Yet even
this was not enough obeisance. In 2007, again
using the pretext of defending itself and its
allies from a different threat, the United
States proposed placing a missile defense shield
in Poland and the Czech Republic, countries once
our allies. In 2009 former President Obama
declared that the United States would abandon
this proposal, but now a site is already
operational in Romania and another will be
operational in Poland in another year. At the
same time, NATO continues its inexorable march
eastward. The understanding that no NATO troops
would be stationed on the territory of the new
NATO members, such as the Baltic states and
Poland, is no longer viable. Using so-called
Russian aggression as a pretext, NATO is
deploying more and more troops closer and closer
to our border. It was not until the United
States and NATO pushed to undermine Ukraine,
orchestrating the removal of a democratically
elected president, that we finally started to
find our voice and our courage to stand up and
say enough.
What Once
Was and What Is to Be
Apart from
a very brief period of genuine cooperation
during the great global struggle against fascism
and Nazism, the United States has worked
tirelessly to weaken us and bring us to our
knees. And how it characterizes that global
conflict indicates just how distorted and flawed
a view of history the United States embraces.
Read any American high school history textbook
or watch any Hollywood movie about World War II
and you would think that America almost
singlehandedly saved the world. Yes, their
production capabilities were prodigious and
their logistics unrivaled, and their soldiers
did fight bravely, but they could never have won
without Russia. They mourn the loss of 400,000
Americans, yet think our loss of 20 million
Russians just an incidental matter. It was
Russian blood more than American production that
defeated Germany, but that indisputable fact is
found nowhere in the books or hearts of
Americans. The Americans faced a German army of
only 1,500,000, while we were fighting nearly
five times that many Germans. Do the Americans
really believe they ever would have gotten off
the Normandy beaches had the Germans been able
to deploy even a few more troops to the Western
front? But they all like to bask in the glow of
what they unthinkingly describe as that
“greatest generation” of Americans, while we
must shoulder the burden of having endured the
“greatest loss of a generation” of Russians.
A rapidly
expanding and aggressive China and a
determinedly nihilistic and ruthless Islamic
fundamentalism are America’s true threats, but
if they cannot see that themselves, we will
never succeed in showing it to them. They should
be eager to form closer ties with Russia, both
to counter China in the East and to safeguard
NATO in the west. Are we not part of that same
broad Western civilization that they all ought
to want to preserve? But only President Trump
appears to understand the value of better
relations. However, in a sad, strange twist, we
would probably be better off if Trump denounced
us. Given how the American elites both on the
right and the left view Trump, it has become a
liability to have him defend us and try to
foster better relations for one simple reason:
any policy or idea he espouses is automatically
assumed to be tainted and twisted.
Given this
reality, it is no use trying any further to
accommodate the United States or cooperate with
it. Our unprecedented and crucial logistical
support to the United States in its Afghanistan
campaign is already forgotten, and our
willingness to cooperate in Syria and elsewhere
is always presumed as diabolical attempts to
resurrect a long-faded glory and long-lost
empire. Perhaps someday the United States will
come to its senses, but until then we must
safeguard our own interests and ensure our own
security. We cannot afford any more concessions.
It is clear that the United States only respects
force and firmness. If the psychological term
that best fits the United States is cognitive
historical dissonance, then the psychological
term that best fits our foreign policy toward
the United States for the last 30 years is
“battered spouse syndrome.” We need to stop
making excuses for the United States, we need to
stop blaming our own past behavior for their
current actions, and we certainly need to say
enough is enough and just admit this
relationship is broken.
Joseph Mussomeli served for almost thirty-five
years as an American diplomat, including tours
in Egypt, Afghanistan, Morocco, and the
Philippines. He was the U.S. ambassador to the
Republic of Slovenia and the Kingdom of
Cambodia. Before entering the U.S. Foreign
Service in 1980, he worked as a Deputy Attorney
General in New Jersey.
This article was first published by
The Imaginative Conservative
-
© The
Imaginative Conservative
The
views expressed in this article are solely those
of the author and do not necessarily reflect the
opinions of Information Clearing House.
