Dakota Beacon

“Of all the enemies to public liberty war is, perhaps, the most to be dreaded because it comprises and develops the germ of every other. War is the parent of armies; from these proceed debts and taxes… known instruments for bringing the many under the domination of the few.… No nation could preserve its freedom in the midst of continual warfare.” — James Madison

The polling results are in. Vladimir Putin’s approval rating is the highest it’s been since he moved to annex Crimea.  Surprise, surprise.  Once again, western meddling has yielded a motherload for our perceived enemies.  Why do we keep doing this?  

When I was in my teens I recall the two opposing camps during the VietNam war - the “hawks” and the “doves”.  It sounds  so quaint now.  Just like the idea of open debate.  Back in those days we were free to disagree with our government or even with popular opinion, or with our peers or our families.  Back then, a lot of us believed in the “domino theory” - that if the communists were allowed to prevail in VietNam, next would be Taiwan, all of Southeast Asia, perhaps even the Philippines.  The whole Eastern Hemisphere would be red.  And in those days “red” did not mean “Republican”.  

This is the problem - a lot of Americans thought it was incumbent upon us to make the world over in our image, as though we were some kind of “super race”.  Looking back, it seems very presumptuous.  I’m not sure we’d appreciate another country deciding to “fix” our problems.  Even though we have some pretty serious ones, like election fraud.  Our solutions still need to come from ourselves.  And VietNam didn’t turn out all that well in the end.  We lost that one,  and in the process made America much the worse for it.

But old neocons never give up.  The next years were fraught with mini wars - guerilla conflicts which often did not even directly involve us - or maybe they did but it stayed sort of under wraps.  America went off the rails after World War II.  We thought, like some teenage kid, that we were invincible.  We could never lose.  We lost our way.

Over the years the CIA has been behind numerous coups d’état around the world, instigating flare-ups which we fueled with supplies of arms, "training" and more.  We pulled off lots of covert operations in which the CIA would install, or attempt to install, puppet governments to do our will.  We meddled in Iran - reinstated the Shah, only to see his government shaken like a dog’s toy and toppled.  That cost us.  Many of these adventures were aimed at outfoxing Russia.  And to be fair, Russia was a powerful and aggressive foe.  Some of us remember the film of Nikita Kruschev pounding his shoe on the desk at the UN and telling America he would “bury” us.  We believed he would try.  His successors were no friendlier than he.  So it seemed to a lot of us like there was this big chess board with Russia on one side and the US on the other and it was just a matter of “making the right move” to “win”.  The little countries we fought over really didn’t matter that much to us.  

Even as we proclaimed our championing of “freedom” for the unfortunate people of these lands we have been concurrently destroying freedom in America.    Now we are at the point where we are no longer at liberty to disagree, even with the most insupportable fiction - like the 2020 election was “fair”, or that Ivermectin is a dangerous horse dewormer, or that the covid vaccines are “safe and effective” . . . or that Jeffrey Epstein killed himself.    We really shouldn’t be claiming that we are defending the American way of life when we are no longer allowed to live that life in America.  

Nevertheless, we kept racking up the regional wars.  We have been at war in one place or another for nearly my own entire lifetime.  There was a precious ten-year gap between the Korean “Police Action '' and the VietNam war.  But where we have not actually had wars we have frequently tried to ignite them - Hungary was one example.  We left those trusting “freedom fighters' ' out to dry in Budapest - after ginning things up via Radio Free Europe we just let them twist in the wind.  We were at pains to eliminate Muammar Gaddafi in Libya.  That was an unqualified disaster.  We did the same in Cuba - or our CIA did.  The CIA (and undoubtedly other secret spy agencies allied with us  - or perhaps with Russia) kept playing “Spy Versus Spy” while people’s lives, homes and economies were up-ended in our silly games. 

After World War II we became conscious of the potential devastation of nuclear weapons and we should have done everything in our power not to allow war to start or escalate.  Somehow we never learn.  Even as our war in Afghanistan was hitting the rocks, leaving our allies, collaborators and Americans - civilian and military - in the lurch, some still there as we made a humiliating retreat, the neocons were burning the midnight oil planning the next swashbuckling performance.  

Nigel Farage’s words back in 2014, have been recalled today in several people’s analyses of the Ukraine war.  He warned that the west was just being stupid by goading Putin, prodding him - making it almost necessary for him to act so as not to appear cowed by the bullying.  His words made sterling good sense back then, and now, eight years later, make even better sense as we see his prophecy unfold.  As it does so, we have President* Joe Biden slurring that this man (Putin) "cannot remain in power"!

The North Atlantic Treaty Organization was formed in 1949, by 12 western nations to balance the power of the Soviet Union, which, following WWII, had overtaken a number of Eastern European countries and seemed to be threatening the rest.  Over time other nations have joined.  It would have been best to have dissolved NATO when the Soviet Union disintegrated in 1991.  At that point, however, when it would have made sense to defuse the rivalry and bring Russia into the family of free nations, NATO ramped up instead, adding the formerly occupied nations to its roster.  There are, today, with no Soviet Union, some 30 member nations.  This is a military organization, supposedly a defensive one, but military all the same.  We once promised that we would stop the growth of NATOs membership.  That turned out to be a lie.  Now the existence and growth of NATO, like the treaties which resulted in WWI, are threatening, not protecting peace and safety.

One of the things that leads to war is the failure to understand the perceived enemy.  Instead of persisting in the team sport idea it might have been constructive to consider for just a moment the viewpoint of Russia.   Instead of enjoying the freedom and acceptance of other countries freed of the old Soviet yoke, like, say, Poland or Latvia or the Czech Republic, the Russian Federation, now no longer the “Soviet Union” under the communist dictatorship - at least technically - continued to be treated like the “enemy”.  It was obviously getting old for the Russians.

We might point to Putin, once a KGB man, and say “nothing has changed”.  But we look at Ukraine, arguably the most thoroughly corrupt regime in Europe today, and call their leader a “fighter for democracy”.  Zelenskyy is no more a freedom fighter than Putin is.  Perhaps even less so.  But the difference is that he is a U.S. puppet dictator.  

It has been noted by some that the arming of Ukraine and openly urging its application to become a NATO member is not unlike the Soviet Union under Krushchev shipping missiles over to Castro in 1962.   This encroachment so close to the United States created such consternation that we threatened to go to war with Russia over it.  Kruschchev removed his missiles.  Had he not, what would the United States government have done?  Well, probably at least invade Cuba.  For his part, like Zelenskyy, Castro was quite willing to sacrifice his own people, calling on Krushchev to use the missiles and “bring it on”, basically.  This is exactly what Zelenskyy is doing.

We have filled Ukraine with military materiel and, as we now know, weapons of mass destruction - bioweapons labs.  We did this on the border of Russia.  Not 90 miles from their shore but on their border.  We have used Ukraine and its government as a staging area for possible aggression against Russia.  It might not ever have been the intention, but we need to think for a moment what it looked like to Russia.  The United States government and other western governments and regimes have also used Ukraine as a clearing house for drug and human trafficking and money laundering.  Had Lucky Luciano been our puppet dictator in Ukraine there would have been little difference.  What’s not to dislike about Ukraine’s government?  Especially if you are Russia and it stands right there, armed and hostile, between you and your only only outlet to the Mediterranean?  

It was said that the “bi-polar” nature of international relations ended in 1991.  We could have taken that dynamic and made the most of it.  We could have made it an advantage for Russia to have let go of its European and Asian empire.  Instead, our leaders clung desperately to the old adversarial relationship.  It is in the nature of the neocon to do this, to try to control other nations from the United States. Both major parties have done this.  Even Reagan, who was largely credited with ending the old Soviet power structure through the strength of his leadership, also fell afoul of good diplomacy when he got involved, egged on by the CIA, no doubt, and the neocons in positions of influence in his era, to actively support the Contras in Nicaragua.  

What good did the Nicaraguan adventure do?  Who runs Nicaragua today?  Daniel Ortega.  The remnants of the Sandinistas.  U.S.-sponsored “freedom” lasted exactly one office term before it was replaced by the Sandinistas.  The Shah of Iran is long gone.  Iran is dominated by the survivors of our meddling there - people who scream “Death to America!”  Vietnam?  That didn’t turn out well, after a 20-year war.  Afghanistan?  No?  Where have our grafted-on puppet leaders gotten us?  Well, I suppose we could say that since we control them we can get away with a lot of war crimes and other kinds of crimes, trafficking in drugs and human beings, kidnappings of children, establishment of illegal labs in which we create weapons of biological warfare.  The neocon model of diplomacy has cost us massive amounts of money and terrible loss of life, whether in Iraq, Afghanistan, Viet Nam or anywhere else.  It has cost us even more - our reputation.  It has created a very negative impression of America.  It’s ok, we think, to develop WMDs but not for China or Russia to do the same.  Well, it’s not ok.  

Where freedom has prospered is where the people themselves have demanded it.  In Poland, in the Czech Republic and many other Balkan nations, in Taiwan, the people themselves have wrested freedom from totalitarian regimes or, in the case of Taiwan, staked out their territory and established a free society.  We can’t superimpose freedom by installing puppets.  

It was a long time coming for me - like many Americans I came of age at a time when we all felt threatened by the Soviet Union.  Today our greatest threat is not Russia but China.  Our greatest danger is getting involved in yet another foreign war.  If we don’t want to live in a dictatorship ourselves we need to avoid these wars.  Madison recognized that war is the excuse used to restrict our own freedom at home.  We have seen this demonstrated dramatically in recent times.  As with most matters, Madison was insightful as to mankind and very wise.  

World War I came about as a direct result of entangling treaties.  An insurrectionist assassinated the heir to the throne of the Austro-Hungarian Empire.  Instead of leaving this matter to the Austrians and the Serbians, every nation of Europe involved itself.  Had they not, there would have been no WWI and thus no WWII, which was the inevitable outcome of unwise leadership in the Paris peace treaty crafted in 1918.  Had we avoided WWI it is entirely possible that the communist revolution might not have taken place in Russia.  Or in China.  These mutual defense treaties ultimately were the undoing of peace for over a century.  It has been over 100 years since the peace treaty signed in Paris to end WWI.  That was the “Great War”, the “War to End All Wars”, remember?  Only it seems to have been the war to start 100 years of warfare, nearly uninterrupted.  In 1796, George Washington, having decided not to seek re-election to the presidency, urged America, going forward, to avoid foreign entanglements. 

We really should end our membership in NATO now.  It was intended to protect Europe from invasion.  The modern-era leadership of Europe, however, has elected to invite invasion from North  Africa, the Middle East and Turkey - an invasion which has had a far greater impact on these nations, displacing their own culture, than the Soviet Union ever threatened.  Muslim culture and their languages have almost obliterated and supplanted European culture and languages.  Why defend Europe when European leaders refuse to?  The Soviet Union, whose objectives were the reason for the NATO alliance, ceased to be a real threat to Europe in 1991.  We should have allowed the demise of the Soviet system of aggression and attempt to dominate, to inaugurate a new era of peace and prosperity, cooperation with the people of Russia, recently freed.  Instead, we doubled down, using it as an opportunity to be aggressors ourselves.  

Every bullet that a Tom Emmer or any other congressman or senator, manages to get shipped into Ukraine for their “defense” will as like as not, end up in the body of an American soldier in the next outbreak in which we send troops to fight.  That is what usually happens.  My daughter loves airplanes and airplane technology.  She likes to watch documentaries on what causes them to crash.  Last night I watched one with her.  In this one, a cargo plane was flying over  Iraq.  It was there on a peaceful mission, to deliver mail to U.S. servicemen.  Unfortunately for the crew of three Belgian pilots, militant Iraqis managed to get hold of some surface-to-air missiles and weaponry we had left behind, unguarded.  They used this to attempt to shoot down the cargo plane.  The plane, of course, was unarmed, civilian.  Spoiler alert:  the crew survived a terrifying experience and landed the badly damaged plane.  But, when they evacuated the aircraft, they had another problem.  They were ordered not to take a step forward.  With the plane in flames behind them, they were warned that the ground was planted with explosives - also a remnant of our wartime engagement there.  They had to carefully tread in the tracks of a large fire truck so as not to detonate any of these land mines.  We have all seen the pitiful videos and pictures of children and others who have unwittingly blown themselves up on this debris of war.  This is the dividend of injudicious waging of war.  

We should go to war only to defend our own nation.  Ron Paul was right.  We are sadly not defending our own nation - our border with Mexico has ceased to exist.  We are under invasion and not even resisting it.  Meanwhile we rage and shake our collective fist at Putin for crossing Ukraine’s border.  Our leaders do not care about the sovereignty of Ukraine.  We have been violating that ever since they separated from Russia.  We have just been using Ukraine for our own nefarious and aggressive purposes.  Sure, we make excuses.  We claim we fear Russian aggression so we have become aggressors ourselves.  The media and our leaders and celebrities are urging hatred of Russians - even to the preposterous banning of Russian breeds of cats from cat shows and persecuting Russian children in schools.  We are actually called upon by some to do harm to Russian people.  This is absurd and it is against the nature of decent people.   In his humble, yet masterful Farewell Address, Washington observed: “The nation which indulges towards another a habitual hatred or a habitual fondness is in some degree a slave. It is a slave to its animosity or to its affection, either of which is sufficient to lead it astray from its duty and its interest.”    Instead of ignoring or ridiculing our Founders, we should listen to them.  We might be surprised how much of what we are living through today was explicitly warned against in the early years of our Republic.  Mark Twain once said, “When I was seventeen I was convinced my father was a damn fool. When I was twenty-one I was astounded by how much the old man had learned in four years.”  We might benefit from the same humility.

We have seen a tendency to ridicule our Founding Fathers and the heroes of our own Revolution.  They are “passé”, unsophisticated.  It is not unlike the disrespect a wayward teen might feel toward a parent who seeks to advise caution and morality.  “Don’t play in the traffic” or “Don’t  try cocaine” or "Don't steal" might as well be “Don’t become entangled in foreign intrigues”.  There was a time when children learned the wisdom of our forebears in school.  We used to study the words and deeds of Washington and other heroes.  There was a reason he was offered a crown.  He proved that the people’s faith in him was well-placed - in an era of kings and despots, he refused it.  One of the casualties of our sophisticated internationalism has been the study of the sterling character of our Founders’ wisdom.  

Most of us love our country.  We are proud of our country and what our countrymen have done, but we should not be proud of our activities as configured by the CIA, our intrigues in other countries to attempt to create a proxy empire of our own.  It has definitely been bad for America and American values of freedom. It's time for "tough love".   As with so much else today, we would do very well to go back and read what James Madison had to say.  He is recognized as the “Father of our Constitution”.  He realized how dangerous wartime mentality is to freedom.  Look at us today - we are no longer free to say anything which even remotely challenges the official line.  We have abandoned “innocent until proven guilty” and we have dozens of people rotting in prison without even being charged.  How is this “freedom”?  Why would any people elsewhere in the world think this is an improvement over the dictatorship they have?  The best way to encourage people to demand their own freedom is to be a model of freedom ourselves, not run around trying to create surrogate dictatorships of our own.  We must understand that this is a self-serving program.  The same people rise to the top of the economic/power ladder in every war.  The same old neocons.  This is not the role of America and it does nothing to protect our country.  It is a rinse and repeat of VietNam, of Nicaraugua, of Iran, of Iraq, of Afghanistan, of Libya.  An endless cycle of no-win wars that have impoverished not only other emerging nations but especially our own - not only financially but morally.  If we consult Washington in his Farewell Address again, we’ll see that this was foreseen as a danger even then:   “Of all the dispositions and habits which lead to political prosperity, religion and morality are indispensable supports. In vain would that man claim the tribute of patriotism, who should labor to subvert these great pillars of human happiness, these firmest props of the duties of men and citizens.”  What we have been doing in Ukraine for years is immoral.  It seems a good time to put away the Ukrainian flags now and fold this scheme of attempted world domination by the US.  Let’s make America great again.  Let the Ukrainians and the Russians make their own countries great again.

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