Can the USA ever end its wars?

Image via Newsweek

We US Americans need to end our wars.  War drains our strength as a nation, and we can’t deal with our other urgent problems – dysfunctional government, financial oligarchy, growing inequality and poverty, drug addiction – until we do.  War keeps the world divided, and unable to unite to deal with global problems – catastrophic climate change, pandemics, the migration crisis.

The United States is currently at war with at least six countries – North Korea, Cuba, Iran, Venezuela, Syria and Russia – and is getting ready add a seventh, China.  All of these are wars of choice.  There is no good reason to be at war with any of these countries.

Technically, of course, we are not at war.  Congress has not declared war on any of these countries.  No uniformed American troops are fighting troops of any of those countries, at least not directly and not in large numbers.

But this is not how wars are fought today.  War is not declared.  It is just waged.  There is no clear boundary between being at war and being “adversarial.” 

War is not limited to fighting by troops.  It includes economic warfare, covert warfare, cyber warfare and proxy warfare, all of which can be just as deadly as armed conflict by troops in uniform.   

Recently two African governments, Chad and Niger, asked the U.S. government to remove its military bases from their soil.  The U.S. Defense Department replied that this is something that will have to be negotiated.  Meanwhile U.S. troops are occupying countries against the will of their governments.  Is this war?

President Biden has criticized Israel for the mass killing of civilians in Gaza, while continuing to provide Israel with money, weapons and military advisers to use those weapons.  Is this war?

When U.S. forces exited Afghanistan in 2021, the U.S. government, along with European allies, blocked the Afghan government from access to its funds in foreign banks, while also cutting off foreign economic aid and grants.  The excuse was that the money could be used to help terrorist.  The result was a collapse of the Afghan economy and a food crisis.  Was this war?

Secretary of State Madeline Albright was famously asked if the blockage of Iraq in the 1990s was worth the deaths of up to 1 million Iraqi children.  Her reply was, yes, it was worth it.  Was this war?  It’s not peace.

My definition of war is that a policy becomes an act of war when it is intended to bring about regime change or when it results in deaths of the innocent.    Or if it is something that a government would only do if it were at war.

This includes attempted assassinations of heads of state (Cuba), support of terrorist groups (Cuba, Iran, Syria), economic blockades (North Korea, Cuba, Iran,  Venezuela, Syria, Russia), confiscation of financial assets (Iran, Venezuela, Syria, Russia), arming of enemies and rebels (Cuba, Iran, Syria, Russia) and cyber warfare (Iran).  

Of course the full extent of cyber warfare and covert warfare is not known.  And this  is not an exhaustive list of U.S. military operations, not all of which are known to the public.

U.S. decline and rise of Eurasia

For a transcript, click on:

The Duran: Economic Decline and the Rise of Greater Eurasia – Michael Hudson, Alexander Mercouris and Glenn Diesen.

US defeat in Ukraine and the coming world order

THE UKRAINE WAR AND THE EURASIAN WORLD ORDER by Glenn Diesen (2024)

I’ve long felt that I’m living at a turning point in history, comparable to the eve of the French Revolution or the First World War.  There are so many things that can’t go on as they are, although what will or should replace them is not clear.

Glenn Diesen is a Norwegian political scientist whom I watch frequently on podcasts on The Duran web site, such as the one above.  His new book is a history of relations among nations, the reasons for the imminent end of the U.S.-backed “rules-based international order,” and how the Ukraine conflict fits into this.

The first printing of the book seems to be sold out.  Rather than wait for a second printing, I ordered a PDF version of the book, which is something I rarely do.

Diesen says there are two basic frameworks for relations among states.  One is hegemony, when the most powerful state imposes order on all the rest.  The other is a balance of power, with no one state allowed to dominate all the rest.

After the fall of the Roman Empire in the West, the aspirational goal of Western European Christians was unity under the rule of the Pope and a reconstituted Holy Roman Empire.  The Pope crowned Charlemagne as successor to the Caesars in the year 800 CE.  His empire broke apart after his death, but was reconstituted in 962 CE by Otto I and continued as Europe’s dominant power for centuries.

In theory, all the other kings and nobles were vassals of the Emperor and subject to the rule of the Pope.  Conflicts between Pope and Emperor lessened the prestige and power of both, and the goal of European unity faded and was sometimes resisted in practice, but did not entirely disappear.

A turning point came with the Thirty Years War in 1618-1648.  It began as a religious war in which Catholic Austria sought to suppress rebel Protestant German princes.  Catholic France and Protestant Sweden joined the conflict, and it became the bloodiest conflict in European history prior to the 20th century.

The war ended with the Treaty of Westphalia, in which it was agreed that the rulers of each principality has the right to determine their subjects’ religion without outside interference.  This was the origin of what is called the Westphalian system.  In this system, each ruler agrees to respect the others’ sovereignty and right to exist.

Israel is not an indispensable U.S. ally

Israel is sometimes referred to as a U.S. aircraft carrier in the Middle East. President Joe Biden has said that if Israel did not exist, it would be necessary for the United States to invent it.

But does the United States really need Israel? Does it benefit from supporting Israel?

Jean Bricmont and Diana Johnstone, in a good article in Consortium News, say the answer is “no.”

The government of Israel, like all governments, acts in its perceived national interest, not necessarily in the interest of the USA.

All through the 1950s and early 1960s, the U.S. government was wary of aligning with Israel for fear of antagonizing the oil-rich Arab nations.

Afterwards the U.S. excluded Israel from any of its military interventions in the Middle East, including the broad coalition that supported the 1991 liberation of Kuwait and attack on Iraq.

In 1967, the Israeli Air Force attacked a U.S. intelligence-gathering ship, the USS Liberty, which was monitoring the Six-Day War. The Israelis killed 35 American sailors and wounded 174. The intent was to sink the ship and blame it on the Egyptians.

A friend of mine, now deceased, was a member of the intelligence-gathering unit, although not on board the ship. He told me how every member of the unit, and every surviving member of the crew, was threatened with court-martial if they disclosed what happened.  My  friend was understandably very bitter.

When Israel invaded Lebanon in 2006, that government was perfectly pro-Western.  The current slaughter in Gaza in no way benefits U.S. interests.  It threatens U.S. relationships with Egypt, Saudi Arabia, the Gulf states and other friendly states.

Why does the U.S. government act against its own interests.  Bricmont and Johnstone say it is because of the power of the pro-Israel lobby, especially the American Israel Public Affairs Committee (AIPAC).

I don’t deny the power of AIPAC, but in fact it is not the only factor.  As a wise e-mail pen pal of mine pointed out, there are a number of ways in which Israel does serve U.S. interests, as least as perceived by American neoconservatives

The big one is that Israel’s survival and U.S. power in the Middle East are threatened by Arab or Muslim unity and by governments such as Egypt historically and Iran and Syria currently.  

Radical movements that threaten the conservative governments in the Middle East also sympathize with Palestinian Arabs (Hamas is an offshoot of Eygpt’s Muslim Brotherhood).  The U.S. and Israeli governments have a common interest in keeping those movements down.

There is a pipeline that runs from American taxpayers through the Israeli military to the U.S. military-industrial complex – only a few billion dollars a year, but every penny counts.

Israel helps the U.S. government manufacture enemies.  You can’t consistently criticize U.S.-NATO forever wars and carve out an exception for Israel, but if you don’t, you are open to charges of antisemitism.

Most people think the USA has gone wrong

A majority of citizens of nations allied to the United States think the USA has gone wrong. A majority of American citizens agree.

What happened?  Why don’t U.S. and allied governments seem to care?  If people have the wrong idea, where did they get it? 

Half of Americans age 18-24 favor Hamas

A strong majority of Americans support Israel in its war against Hamas.  But a new poll indicates that 51 percent of Americans age 18-24 think Israel should be ended and given to Hamas and the Palestinians.

That could be long-range bad news for a future Israel, which depends for its survival on continuing economic and military aid from the United States.

I myself condemn the government of Israel for its murderous tactics in the Gaza war and for its oppression of the Palestinians.  

But that does not mean I wish for the tables to be turned, and Hamas to do to the Israelis what the government of Israel is now doing to the Palestinians.  I hope for a peace agreement between the two nations, impossible as that seems at the moment.

NATO fought ‘to the last Ukrainian’ – now what?

Back in early 2022, cynics quipped that the USA was willing to fight Russia “to the last Ukrainian.”  Now it appears that point has been reached.  

Ukraine no longer has the military manpower to keep on fighting.  Certain commanders in the field are refusing orders to attack because they don’t have the troops to carry out the orders.

The establishment press is admitting the war is not winnable.  It now urges Volodymyr Zelensky to negotiate.  But the Russian leaders see no need to negotiate anything but surrender. 

Alex Christoforou and Alexander Mercouris, in the video above, discussed terms Russia is likely to impose.  

It goes without saying that Russia will keep Crimea and the four Donbas provinces that already have been annexed.  Russia probably will take the rest of the Russian-speaking areas of Ukraine.  The question is whether the Ukrainian-speaking part of Ukraine will be allowed to continue as a sovereign nation, and on what terms.

Since the Vietnam era, the United States has suffered many military defeats.  They have not ended in peace treaties. Instead our political leaders walk away from the wreckage as if nothing had happened.  

I think this time will be different.

Ukraine will have been ruined.  The European Union economy will have been badly damaged by the sanctions war.  NATO will have been discredited as a defensive alliance.  Russia will be the dominant military power in Europe.

Of course the USA will still be a great power – just not the world’s dominant power.  But can our leaders accept this?  And what if they can’t?

Vladimir Putin’s vision of a new world order

Vladimir Putin is the most consequential of today’s world leaders, except maybe for Xi Jinping.  Like him or not, he has goals which he is in the process of achieving, and not merely reacting to events.

I think that to understand his intentions, you have to look at what he himself has to say for himself, and then measure his actions against his words.  I don’t take everything he says at face value, but I take it seriously.  He is far from being the Hitler of the 21st century.

He outlined his vision last Thursday to the Valdai Discussion Club‘s annual forum on world affairs.  His vision is of a world of sovereign governments, each with their own cultural and religious values and none of them meddling in the internal affairs of any other.

The leadership in Putin’s world order would be the “civilizational states” – nations such as Russia, China and India, that embody a whole civilization.  Smaller nations such as Hungary would be able to legislate their own values without outside interference.

Civilizational states would not be multi-cultural.  Minority groups would have their cultural rights, but the values of the nation would be defined by the leading ethnic group in each nation – the Han Chinese or the Great Russians.

I’m not sure who they would be in India.  According to Narendra Modi, they would be the Hindus, Sikhs, Buddhists and others whose holy places are in India, but not the native-born Muslims, Christians or Jews.

Putin does not explicitly reject democracy or human rights, but he says that national sovereignty is a more important value.  I notice that he has no problems allying with North Korea.

The United Nations would set international law and be the forum for resolving international disputes.  As I see it, its structure does reflect Putin’s vision – a General Assembly of sovereign nations and a Security Council of great powers.  Russia, China and the USA, UK and France are permanent members, representing the civilizations of Russia, China and the West.

He said India should be made a permanent member of the Security Council.  Possibly leading nations of other civilizations, such as Brazil or South Africa, also could be permanent members.

What Putin does reject is the U.S.-led “rules-based order.”  He said:

The United States and its satellites have taken a steady course towards hegemony in military affairs, politics, the economy, culture and even morals and values. [snip]

To attain these goals, they try to replace international law with a “rules-based order,” whatever that means. It is not clear what rules these are and who invented them. It is just rubbish, but they are trying to plant this idea in the minds of millions of people. “You must live according to the rules.” What rules?

And actually, if I may, our Western “colleagues,” especially those from the United States, don’t just arbitrarily set these rules, they teach others how to follow them, and how others should behave overall. All of this is done and expressed in a blatantly ill-mannered and pushy way. This is another manifestation of colonial mentality. All the time we hear, “you must,” “you are obligated,” “we are seriously warning you.”

Who are you to do that?

The history and lessons of the Ukraine war

Retired  Ambassador Charles W. Freeman Jr. recently gave an excellent, impartial presentation on the Ukraine situation. Here are some highlights and a link to his full presentation.

Every government that is a party to the Ukraine War — Kiev, Moscow, Washington and other NATO capitals — has been guilty of various degrees of self-deception and blundering misfeasance.  The consequences for all have been dire.  For Ukraine, they have been catastrophic.  A radical rethinking of policy by all concerned is long overdue. 

[snip]

Ukrainian troops 2016

At no point has the United States government or NATO declared that the protection of Ukraine or Ukrainians, as opposed to exploiting their bravery to take down Russia, is the central American objective.  

In April 2022, Secretary of Defense Lloyd Austin reiterated that U.S. aid to Ukraine was intended to weaken and isolate Russia and thereby deprive it of any credible capacity to make war in future.  

Quite a few American politicians and pundits have extolled the benefits to having Ukrainians rather than Americans sacrifice their lives for this purpose.  Some have gone further and advocated the breakup of the Russian Federation as a war aim.  

If you are Russian, you don’t have to be paranoid to see such threats as existential.  Putin assesses U.S. war aims as directed at humbling the Russian Federation strategically and, if possible, overthrowing its government, and dismembering it.  The United States has not disputed this assessment.

[snip]

In mid-March 2022, the government of Turkey and Israeli Prime Minister Naftali Bennett mediated between Russian and Ukrainian negotiators, who tentatively agreed on the outlines of a negotiated interim settlement.  The agreement provided that Russia would withdraw to its position on Feb.23, when it controlled part of the Donbass region and all of Crimea, and in exchange, Ukraine would promise not to seek NATO membership and instead receive security guarantees from a number of countries.  

A meeting between Putin and Ukrainian President Voldodymyr Zelensky was in the process of being arranged to finalize this agreement, which the negotiators had initialed ad referendum — meaning subject to the approval of their superiors.

Johnson & Zelensky 2022

On March 28, 2022. President Zelensky publicly affirmed that Ukraine was ready for neutrality combined with security guarantees as part of a peace agreement with Russia.  But on April 9 British Prime Minister Boris Johnson made a surprise visit to Kiev.  During this visit, he reportedly urged Zelensky not to meet Putin because (1) Putin was a war criminal and weaker than he seemed.  He should and could be crushed rather than accommodated; and (2) even if Ukraine was ready to end the war, NATO was not.

Zelensky’s proposed meeting with Putin was then called off.  Putin declared that talks with Ukraine had come to a dead end.  

BRICS expansion challenges U.S. dominance

BRICS is an alliance of countries whose goal is to find ways to engage in international trade without using the U.S. dollar or being vulnerable to U.S. economic sanctions.

It recently added six new members, augmenting its power and hastening the day when the U.S. can no longer claim to be the world’s dominant economic power.

Russia, China and now Iran, the most important targets of U.S. sanctions, are now members of BRICS.  Venezuela, Cuba, Bolivia, Nicaragua and Vietnam, also targets of U.S. sanctions, are on the waiting list to join.

The weapon of economic sanctions is one of the pillars of U.S. world power.  The aim of BRICS is to neutralize that weapon.

World trade is conducted in U.S. dollars, goes through banks based in the United States and U.S. allies and is subject to regulations by U.S.-influenced economic institutions such as the International Monetary Fund, World Bank and SWIFT system for conducting international banking transactions.

Because of this, the U.S. government can freeze accounts of foreign individuals, businesses and whole nations, and cut them off from international trade, with the goal of creating economic chaos and regime change.

The aim of BRICS is to create an alternative system.  But that doesn’t necessarily mean that BRICS members will cease to use U.S. dollars or to trade with the United States.

Having a universally accepted currency, such as the dollar, is a convenience that is hard to do without.

For example, India recently bought a lot of Russian oil (some of which was resold to Europe) and paid for it in rupees.

Now Russia has a lot of rupees, which it can use only to buy things from India and countries that want to buy things from Russia.  I’m told that, as a result, Russia is teeming with Indian guest workers and contractors, because they accept payment in rupees.

Eventually the BRICS countries will come up with a non-dollar payments system.

It probably wouldn’t be used by individuals for their everyday business, as the dollar and euro are.  Rather it would be used only to balance international payments, maybe like the bancor proposed by John Maynard Keynes in 1944.

It could be based on a weighted average value of BRICS members’ currencies, or on the average price of one or more commodities.

Shifting to such a system would ordinarily be a slow, complicated process, but expansion is being speeded up because of the Biden administration’s sanctions war against Russia, and its demand that the rest of the world join in.

In a way, President Biden deserves credit for bringing Saudi Arabia and Iran closer together, not to mention India and China.  Maybe he should get a Nobel Peace Prize.

A new ‘great game’ in Africa?

China and Russia are expanding their influence in Africa at the expense of the USA and France.  

China, as a trading partner.  Russia, as a supplier of military aid.

Below are graphics that are counterpoints to graphic information I presented in A new scramble for Africa?, which show African natural resources, history of coups and military bases.

The first is a chart showing African countries’ imports (in red) and exports (in grey).

The second is a map showing African countries that have military agreements with Russia.  I presume this is mainly with the Wagner Group.

Even though Russia’s overall trade with African countries is small, it is the leading supplier of armaments.

However, many of the countries in red also have U.S., French or other foreign military bases.

I don’t understand the ins and outs of the recent coup in Niger, but the key fact about Niger is that France’s electric power grid is based on nuclear energy, and Niger is its main source of uranium.  [Added 8/11/2023]  

LINK

From periphery to priority: Africa as a key arena for Russia’s ambitions by Mohamad Hasan Sweidan for The Cradle.

All Eyes to Niger by Lobotero for In Saner Thought.

Blowback in Africa: U.S.-Trained Officer Overthrows Pro-U.S. Leader in Niger, Site of U.S. Drone Base on Democracy Now!  [Added 8/8/2023]  Hat tip to Bill Harvey.

A new scramble for Africa?

Leading exports by country

 

The DD Geopolitics on Twitter thread says the belt stretching across Africa just south of the Sahara is the “coup belt” of Africa.

Observations by DD Geopolitics on the “coup belt”….

–  There is a vast abundance of resources including labor, oil, and mineral deposits.

–  It’s got the highest concentration of western bases on the continent with tiny Djibouti hosting an astounding SEVEN foreign nations.

–  It cuts clear across the continent dividing the Northern Africans from the Sub-Saharan Africans, a divide easily and often exploited.

I don’t understand the ins and outs of the recent coup in Niger, but the key fact about Niger is that France’s electric power grid is based on nuclear energy, and Niger is its main source of uranium.  [Added 8/11/2023]

Just what is neoconservatism anyway?

Crew members of US aircraft carrier USS Harry S Truman work on fighter jets on the flight deck of the ship in the eastern Mediterranean Sea on May 8, 2018.  (Photo credit ARIS MESSINIS/AFP/Getty Images)

A lot is being written about neoconservatives and how they are to blame for America’s forever wars.  But who are they?

‘Neoconservative’ is not just a fancy word for “warmonger” or “war hawk.”  Neoconservatism is a coherent set of ideas that people sincerely believe and are working hard to promote.  

That’s why the neocons have such influence.  Both elites and millions of Americans are sold on their ideas, or, rather, they just take them for granted.

The essence of neoconservatism is as follows: 

1. The United States of America is the embodiment of democracy and freedom.
2. U.S. American power is a force for good and supreme U.S. American power is a supreme good.
3. The USA, after its victory over Soviet Russia, found itself in a position of supreme power.
4. Anything or anyone that threatens this power is bad, and deserves to be suppressed by whatever means necessary.
5. The USA has the power to accomplish anything its leaders have the will to see through.
6. If the USA is ever defeated, it is because of weakness of will, lack of unity or treason, not the lack of the means to win.
7. Anyone who undermines American morale, whatever their motive, is, objectively speaking, an enemy.

You may think all this seems extreme, but there are individuals in the U.S. government and foreign policy establishment who literally believe all these things, many who believe in a weak form of these principles and few if any who would contradict them altogether.

They constitute a network journalists, academics, foreign policy and national security officials and a few politicians, all working together to promote their views and help each other advance. 

Outright opponents of their views are few.  Dissenters include the so-called “paleo-conservatives” and economic nationalists such as Pat Buchanan, who opposed intervention in Iraq and now think the United States should tend to its own problems rather than trying to reorder the world.

They also include the “realists” such as Henry Kissinger, who was ruthless in playing the Great Power game, but recognized that there were limits as to what American power can accomplish.  

I think the insiders who leak information to Seymour Hersh are in this category.  They don’t necessarily object to American foreign policy overall.  They just object to stupid and unproductive things, such as blowing up the Nord Stream pipelines. 

But nobody in a position of influence advocates peace as a goal.  Even Elizabeth Warren, Bernie Sanders, Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez and other self-described progressive Democrats are silent.

The result is never-ending war.  This cannot go on forever and is bound to end in a bad way.

Russia says there’s no legal Ukrainian state

The Russian Foreign Ministry recently stated that Russia does not recognize the legal existence of the Ukrainian state.  That’s an extreme statement.  

During World War Two, the USA and UK recognized the German, Italian and Japanese governments and accepted terms of surrender from them.

But maybe I exaggerate the statement’s significance.  Russia already had announced it is no longer open to negotiation with Ukraine, as it was at the outset of the war.  It does not ask Ukraine to accept terms of surrender, but rather intends to “demilitarize” and “denazify” Ukraine by force.  

Here’s what independent journalist John Helmer had to say.

In brief statements issued late last week in Moscow – their significance missed in the western press — President Vladimir Putin ordered a reality check of Russia’s war strategy. He then  answered himself by declaring the war will be over when no Ukrainian army will be left on the battlefield, nor NATO weapons.  

The Foreign Ministry answered by pointing out that Russia does not recognize there is a legal Ukrainian state because the reality is that the mutual recognition treaty between Russia and the Ukraine was cancelled by Presidents Petro Poroshenko and Vladimir Zelensky in 2018 and 2019.  

“We can conclude,” Putin said at the Security Council meeting on Thursday morning, “that they can certainly send in additional equipment, but the mobilisation reserve is not unlimited. And Ukraine’s Western allies really seem determined to fight with Russia to the last Ukrainian. At the same time, we must proceed from the fact that the enemy’s offensive potential has not been exhausted; they may have strategic reserves yet unused, and I ask you to keep this in mind when making fighting strategies.  You need to proceed from reality.”

Putin was following by a few hours the statement by the Foreign Ministry that Russia does not recognize the legal sovereignty of the regime in Kiev, and that following the cancellation of the treaty between the Ukraine and Russia in 2019, there will be no Ukrainian state left to sign an end-of-war agreement.

At her weekly briefing of reporters, the ministry spokesman Maria Zakharova, was asked “when will Russia initiate a legal procedure to terminate the bilateral treaty with Ukraine on its sovereignty?”  Zakharova answered:  “The procedure for terminating the bilateral treaty with Ukraine on its sovereignty is hampered by the absence of such a treaty.  In Article 1 of the Treaty on the Principles of Relations between the RSFSR and the Ukrainian SSR of November 19, 1990, the two republics recognised each other as ‘sovereign states.’ The 1990 treaty was then replaced by the Treaty on Friendship, Cooperation, and Partnership between the Russian Federation and Ukraine of May 31, 1997 (Article 39),  which was denounced by Ukraine and terminated on April 1, 2019.” 

No army, no state.  But the war will continue because it is the one between the US and the NATO powers and Russia. That too will have an ending, but longer.

Why does Biden keep insulting Xi Jinping?

The Chinese, like the Russians, are not on speaking terms with the United States.  There are a lot of reasons for this, but the breaking point was the silly balloon incident.

A Chinese balloon went out of control and floated over the United States.  The Chinese said it was a weather balloon, but the Biden administration said it was a spy balloon.

This doesn’t make any sense.  If it was a lighter-than-air equivalent of a U-2 spy plane, the U.S. government wouldn’t have allowed it to float over the entire USA before shooting it down.  And the U.S. government would have shown the supposed spy equipment to the world, but it didn’t.

But the Biden administration used this bogus incident as an excuse to cancel a scheduled visit to China by Secretary of State Antony Blinken to China.

The U.S. government has got into the habit of making foreign policy an extension of domestic politics.  President Biden likes to posture as a tough guy.  He did this by insulting Xi Jinping.   President Xi and the Chinese leaders were understandably furious about this.

The difficulty is, as Alexander Mercouris pointed out in the video above, that Xi Jinping, like Vladimir Putin, no longer sees any point in negotiating with the United States.  They do not trust the U.S. government to keep its promises, and they now think they so powerful that they don’t have to negotiate with the United States.

So the Chinese stopped answering the telephone when the Americans called.  The U.S. government asked to resume Blinken’s visit, and the Chinese didn’t respond.

Finally, after a good deal of begging, the Biden administration were able to persuade the Chinese to allow a Blinken visit.  The visit consisted mostly of Blinken being browbeaten for American misbehavior by Chinese leaders.  It was humiliating, both for Blinken and the USA.

Blinken made an important concession.  He said the U.S. accepts the fact that Taiwan is part of China which, so far as I recall, no Secretary of State or President has ever explicitly said.  In return, the Chinese agreed to set up a working group to plan for another summit meeting between Biden and Xi.

But President Biden immediately torpedoed his Secretary of State.  He called Xi a dictator.  He ridiculed him for not being able to control his “spy” balloon.  

The comment was not just another Biden slip of the tongue.  It was put on the White House web page. 

Nobody likes insults.  The Chinese culture is one in which keeping and losing “face” are especially important.  So why did Biden go out of his way to insult Xi?  Did he do it deliberately or unthinkingly?  What was his motive?

There was a time when U.S. American presidents and secretaries of state could get away with this kind of behavior.  The USA was so powerful – militarily, industrially and financially – that other nations had to put up with it.

But American leaders have allowed our power to be eroded.  We as a nation can no longer disregard the interests of other nations or insult their leaders, and not suffer consequences.  Actually, this was always true, but it is becoming more obvious now.

As a nation, we Americans should be strong but reasonable.  Instead we are weak and belligerent.  This cannot go on.

The rise of the East and decline of the West

The most important things going on in the world today is the rise of China to world leadership.  The second most important thing is the decline of U.S. power.

China historically has been one of the world’s most advanced and powerful civilizations.  Now it is resuming its historic place.

Its Belt and Roads Initiative (aka New Silk Road) is bringing about the economic integration of the interior of Eurasia through construction of oil and gas pipelines, railroads and roads.

China is slowly drawing the rest of the world into its economic and diplomatic orbit by offering benefits and treating other nations with respect.

We US Americans could have kept our leading position longer if our leaders had simply made a good-faith effort to be what we claimed to be – friends of democracy, upholders of international law, impartial trustees of the world’s financial system.

The USA is alienating the rest of the world by threats and brute force. There was a long period when Russia and Iran would have welcomed good relations with the USA.  Instead we have driven them into the arms of China.  Now it is too late to change.

Long-time allies such as Turkey and Saudi Arabia are turning to the China-led bloc, as are neutrals such as India. No nation in Latin America or Africa and only a couple in Asia have been willing to join in the U.S.-led crusade against Russia.

It is not just that the Global South nations are shifting from the perceived losing side to the perceived winning side.  It is that Chinese and Russian leaders treat them with respect and offer them benefits, while US American leaders no longer do.

That’s not to say China, Russia and their allies are examples of democracy and human rights.  They aren’t.  I still would rather live in the dilapidated, dysfunctional U.S. democracy, under what’s left of our Constitution, than in those countries.  But that’s my personal preference.  Not everybody in the world shares it.

The Russian-Chinese alliance does have vulnerabilities.  The integration of Eurasia depends on the ability of China and Russia to pacify the subject and restive Muslim peoples in Xinjiang and the former Soviet republics in Central Asia.  

Also, the whole struggle for power is based on control of oil and gas resources.  Someday the supply of affordable fossil fuels will run out, unless catastrophic climate change wrecks industrial civilization first.  But that is an issue for a later day.

With all their problems and defects, China, Russia and Iran are on the way up.  With all our US American residual strengths, the USA is on the way down.  Our economic system, political system and social system are decaying.  

If we don’t change, we’re going to learn a very painful lesson, and we will find that much of the world thinks it is payback time.

LINKS

In Moscow, Xi and Putin bury Pax Americana by Pepe Escobar for The Cradle.

How the USSR’s Fall Unleashed a Neocon Goldrush to the Heartland by Simplicius the Thinker.

Eurasia.net and Association for Human Rights in Central Asia.  Reports on tensions within the Eurasian heartland.

Is there any possibility that Ukraine could win?

I’m not an expert on military matters. I don’t speak Russian or Ukrainian. I’m not in touch with anybody in Russia or Ukraine or the higher circles in Washington, D.C.

I’m a retiree with time on his hands, an Internet connection and a willingness to go outside official sources and consensus opinion in order to figure out what’s going on.

I’ve explained why I think Russia is winning its proxy war against the U.S.-led Western alliance.  I haven’t changed my mind, but that’s not to deny that Russia has weaknesses.

A Russian dissident pointed out that Vladimir Putin’s announced objectives in launching the war are not being achieved.

Putin wanted to push back NATO from its borders, but Sweden and Finland are de facto members of NATO.  He wanted to demilitarize Ukraine, but Ukraine is a heavily-armed military dictatorship.  He wanted to denazify Ukraine, but the neo-Nazi Banderite nationalists, previously a fringe group, are more powerful and popular than they have ever been.

Public opinion polls say Putin is more popular in Russia than Joe Biden is in the USA. But a strong minority opposes the war despite the risk of 15-year prison sentences.

The actual fighting in Ukraine is being done disproportionately by Russian-speaking militias raised in Ukraine itself, the Wagner Group private mercenary company and Chechens recruited by Putin’s warlord friend Ramzan Kadyrov.  The Russian government has tried to keep Russian draftees out of the fighting.

Russians as a group don’t seem to have anything against Ukrainians or any desire to go fight in Ukraine.  Large number of what you could call the professional-managerial class have left Russia to avoid the draft.

Also, while the cutoff of Russian oil and gas supplies has hurt the Western alliance, Europeans and we Americans have got through the winter better than I thought they would.

But taking all these things into account, I don’t think any of these things change the big picture.  Ukrainians, according to the military analysts I trust, are suffering much greater casualty rates than the Russian forces, and they are a smaller country to begin with.  Germans, French, Britons and Americans have even less desire to join. the fighting themselves than Russians do.

Although there doesn’t seem to be any great anti-war sentiment in the USA or Europe, there do seem to be rising protests against the economic hardships that are a byproduct of the sanctions war.  Cutting ourselves off from cheap Russian oil, gas and other raw materials has hurt us much more than it has hurt them.

Victory in a war of attrition is a product of two things – the degree of hardship suffered and the degree of will to endure the hardship.  If it is to be a war of attrition, Russia is in a better position to endure than the Western allies.  The Russians have more at stake, more of the resources needed to survive and the backing of China, the world’s leading industrial power.

Russia and the USA on the brink on nuclear war

Russian nuclear missile launcher on display. Via RUSI.

There are two foreseeable ways the conflict with Russia and the USA could end.

One is a Russian victory, which would make it the dominant military power in Europe. The other is nuclear war.

Ukraine cannot defeat Russia on Ukraine’s own soil.  It is outnumbered and outgunned.

Russia is on a war footing.  It can produce enough munitions to keep the war going indefinitely.

The USA and its NATO allies are not on a war footing.  They are depleting their own arsenals.  

If things go on as they are, the European Union nations will have disarmed themselves by the time the war ends.  Russia will be the only power left standing.

The only way they could win is by taking the war to Russia itself.  This already is happening.

The Ukrainian forces have fired missiles at airfields where Russian bombers and their nuclear weapons are stored.  They murdered Darya Dugina, a Russian nationalist TV commentator.   Three of Russia’s Nord Stream pipelines have been blown up.  All these actions are acts of war.

President Joe Biden and other American leaders have called for Russia to be crushed.  Some talk of dismembering Russia and putting Vladimir Putin on trial for his alleged war crimes.

Knowing the fates of Slobodan Milosevic, Manuel Noriega, Saddam Hussein and Muammar Qaddafi, I don’t think Russian leaders think Biden and the rest are just kidding.

President Vladimir Putin has stated that Russia will use nuclear weapons “in response to the use of nuclear and other types of weapons of mass destruction against it or its allies, and also in case of aggression against Russia with the use of conventional weapons when the very existence of the state is threatened.”

If that happened, Russia would go full Doomsday Day Machine.  There wouldn’t be any tit for tat escalation, or use of limited nuclear weapons.  Russia would unleash its full nuclear arsenal upon its enemies. 

President Putin in his speech Tuesday to the Russian Duma said that the USA and its allies “plan to finish us once and for all. In other words, they plan to grow a local conflict into a global confrontation. This is how we understand it and we will respond accordingly, because this represents an existential threat to our country.” 

He announced that Russia is suspending participation in the Strategic Arms Limitation Treaty (START), which is the last of the treaties that were intended to reduce the chances of nuclear war.

It is important that he suspended participation in the treaty rather than renounced the treaty altogether.  This leaves open the possibility that the treaty could be restarted.

But in the rest of the speech, he said the Russian government regards nuclear war as a real possibility, and is preparing to wage it if necessary.  He also announced Russia is prepared to resume nuclear testing, but won’t do so until the USA does.  

Crises everywhere, all at once

I firmly believe the world is at a historical turning point, equivalent to the French Revolution or the outbreak of World War One.

I expect more changes in the next few years than there have been in many decades.  

This is not good news.  Times of revolutionary change are not times any normal person would want to live through, even those whose results we now think are good, like the era of the French Revolution.

The world faces multiple crises, which feed upon each other, and which are not being dealt with.

Humanity is failing to deal with the growing civilization-threatening threat of global warming.  We are neither about to stop the ongoing increase of global warming nor deal with the increasing number of catastrophic storms, droughts and floods.  

Neither are we able to deal with the growing threat of pandemic disease.  Nor has the world has really recovered from the 2008 financial crash.   And now the world faces the spillover from the proxy war in Ukraine.

Adam Tooze, a famous financial historian, calls what we’re facing a “polycrisis.”  All the different crises affect each other and make the others worse.  

Tooze is an intelligent establishmentarian.  He wants the world’s leaders to change some things in order that the essential things will stay the same.  I think the things are past the point where this is possible, although I would be happy to be proved wrong.

If I made my own polycrisis chart, I would put some additional boxes on it—the continuing “war on terror,” for one; peak oil, for another.  But his basic point is right.  The world’s leaders face multiple crises, and, with few exceptions, they are not dealing with them. 

Instead of joining forces to face the existential threats to civilization, the world’s great powers—China, Russia, the USA and the European Union—are lining up for a struggle for power that will test their strength to the breaking point and damage the world as a whole, not just themselves.

Ukraine already is devastated.  The UK and EU are in economic recession and face dangerous fuel shortages.  Many nations of the Global South are unable to import food and fuel.  

I have written about why I think my own country is likely to crack before Russia does, but Russia and even China have serious problems, and if they go down first, our future still looks grim.

It is not just the great power conflict’s cost in resources and human lives.  It is the opportunity cost of neglect of turning away from the real threats that face us.

LINKS

Apocalypse Nowish: The sense of an ending by Michael Robbins for Harper’s magazine.

Defining polycrisis – from crisis pictures to the crisis matrix by Adam Tooze for Chartbook #130.

Covid, Climate and the New Denialism by Edward Snowden for Continuing Ed.

Fighting a War on the Wrong Planet by Rajan Menon for TomDispatch.

Why Is China So Obsessed With Food Security? by N.S. Lyons for The Upheaval.

Saudi Arabia may cease to be a U.S. ally

President Xi Jinping plans to visit Saudi Arabia soon.  In the video above, Alex Christoforou and Alexander Mercouris of  The Duran speculate that Prince Mohammad bin Salman may be planning to join the BRICS alliance.

If so, this could be a big threat to U.S. power—a much bigger threat than the Russian invasion of Ukraine.

The BRICS alliance consists of Brazil, Russia, India, China and South Africa.  Its ultimate purpose is to create a new reserve currency that would be a substitute for the U.S. dollar.

The fact that most world trade is conducted in dollars, which the U.S. government has the power to print, gives the United States enormous leverage over the world economy, including the power to impose economic sanctions.

If this changed, the United States would lose its financial power as well as much of its ability to finance the world’s largest military budget.

Saudi Arabia back in 1973 agreed, in return for U.S. military protection, to price its oil in dollars, to deposit its dollars in U.S. and allied countries’ banks, and to buy U.S. military equipment.  As the leading oil exporter, Saudi Arabia has a lot of power in the Organization of Petroleum Exporting Countries (OPEC), whose purpose is to control the price and production of the world’s oil

The Biden Administration earlier this year supported the Group of Seven’s plan to cap the price of Russian oil imports.  This must have miffed the Saudis and other OPEC members, because, if successful, the plan would have infringed on the Saudis’ and OPEC’s power to set would oil prices. 

Later President Biden asked Prince Mohammad bin Salman to increase oil production to help keep the price down and offset the loss of Russian oil due to economic sanctions.  Bin Salman turned Biden down.

Christoforou and Mercouris think Bin Salman is taking a big risk.  They expect the U.S. to try to destabilize and overthrow the Saudi regime.  The U.S. is already trying to stir up trouble between Saudi Arabia and Iran.  

Even a direct attack or invasion are not impossible, and Mercouris said Bin Salman needs to be sure of his personal security.

Algeria also has applied to join BRICS.  Other countries are expressing interest.  

In 2023, Saudi Arabia may push Ukraine off the front pages.

Or maybe not.  I don’t have the power to read minds or predict the future.  

But I don’t think President Xi would be planning to visit Saudi Arabia unless he had something in mind.  And I notice that Saudi Arabia is not the only country who leaders are losing both respect for. and fear of, the United States.

LINKS

China’s Xi Jinping to Visit Saudi Arabia Amid Global Reshuffling by Stephen Kalin, Keith Zhai and Summer Said for the Wall Street Journal.

Chinese President Xi To Visit Saudi Arabia By Year End by Tsvetana Paraskova for OilPrice.

Everybody wants to hop on the BRICS Express by Pepe Escobar for The Cradle.  [Added Later]

All Eyes on the Gulf: The Present and Future of Europe’s Energy Supply by Der Spiegel.  [Added 11/12/2022]

Xi of Arabia and  the petroyuan drive by Pepe Escobar for The Cradle [Added 12/17/2022] 

Diana Johnstone on the breakup of Yugoslavia

FOOL’S CRUSADE: Yugoslavia, NATO and Western Delusions by Diana Johnstone (2002)

Diana Johnstone is an American journalist, slightly older than me, who has spent most of her adult life in Europe.

Fool’s Crusade is about the lies that justified NATO intervention in Yugoslavia in the late 1990s.  I mostly accepted these lies at the time.

If I had read Johnstone’s book when it was published, I would have understood then a lot of things I have slowly came to understand over a period of years. 

I did realize that Germany precipitated the crisis by prematurely recognizing Croatia and Slovenia as independent countries, and that Croatia’s Franjo Tudgman was as much of an authoritarian nationalist strongman as Serbia’s Slobodan Milosevic was accused of being.

But I still accepted the propaganda line that Milosevic was engaging in ethnic cleansing in order to create a Greater Serbia.  What he was actually trying to do was to hold together what was left of Yugoslavia and to protect Serbs stranded in other parts of the former Yugoslavoa.

Johnstone wrote that Milosovec could be criticized for his failures as a statesman, and that the Serbs were not guiltless.  But neither he nor they were not carrying out a systematic program of “ethnic cleansing.”  It was the Serbs, more than others, who were driven out of their ancestral homes.

She foresaw how U.S. intervention in Yugoslavia was to set a pattern for future interventions.

• NATO was formed as a defensive alliance against the Soviet Union.  But this set the precedent for NATO interventions against nations that were outside the NATO region and did not threaten NATO members.
• The United States led the intervention without any strong commitment of “boots on the ground.”  Instead the intervention consisted of indiscriminate bombings, use of proxy warriors and crippling economic sanctions.
• The intervention was conducted without authorization of the United Nations.  The bombings of civilian neighborhoods and infrastructure were in violation of international law.
• The justification for the intervention was to defend human rights against an imagined Hitler-like foe, who was supposedly so evil that anything was justified to bring him down.
• The intervention was led by self-identified liberals and supported nearly unanimously by the liberal press.  The propaganda included false accusations of rape.  Critics were accused of sympathizing with the supposedly fascist enemy.
• No good came of it.

Johnstone’s book is a model of what journalism should be.  She based her reporting on what she saw and on on-the-record interviews with named sources, plus her extensive background knowledge of the history and politics of the region.  None of it was due to inside information that the reader has to take on trust. 

Who sabotaged the Nord Stream pipelines?

Stopping the Nord Stream pipelines has been a central goal of U.S. policy for a decade. The Russians spent billions of dollars and years of work bringing the pipelines into existence. Potentially they are a source of both wealth and political leverage to Russia.

So who would be most likely to sabotage the pipelines? We the American people are being told that Russia is the most likely suspect.  This video by Matt Orfalea illustrates the great “mystery.”

‘Why are we in Ukraine?’

The conservative writer Christopher Caldwell wrote an article in the latest Claremont Review of Books saying that even if the USA and its Ukrainian proxy win their ground war against Russia, the USA may well lose on the economic war front and the culture war front.

On March 24, a month after Russian tanks rolled across Ukraine’s borders, the Biden White House summoned America’s partners (as its allies are now called) to a civilizational crusade.  The administration proclaimed its commitment to those affected by Russia’s recent invasion—“especially vulnerable populations such as women, children, lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender and intersex (LGBTQI+) persons, and persons with disabilities.”

At noon that same day, Secretary of State Antony Blinken tweeted about the “massive, unprecedented consequences” American sanctions were wreaking on Russia, and claimed Russia’s economic “collapse” was imminent.

Never has an official non-belligerent been more implicated in a war.  Russia and its sympathizers assert that the U.S. attempt to turn Ukraine into an armed anti-Russian camp is what the war is about in the first place.  Even those who dismiss this view will agree that the United States has made itself a central player in the conflict.  

It is pursuing a three-pronged strategy to defeat Russia through every means short of entering the war—which, of course, raises the risk that the United States will enter the war.  

One prong is the state-of-the-art weaponry it is supplying to Ukraine. Since June, thousands of computer-guided artillery rockets have been wreaking havoc behind Russian lines.  

A second prong is sanctions.  With western European help, Washington has used its control of the choke points of the global marketplace to impoverish Russians, in hopes of punishing Russia.

Finally, the U.S. seeks to rally the world’s peoples to a culture war against an enemy whose traditionalism, even if it does not constitute the whole of his evil, is at least a symbol of it.

It would be foolish to bet against the United States, a mighty global hegemon with a military budget 12 times Russia’s. Yet something is going badly off track.  Russia’s military tenacity was to be expected—bloodying and defeating more technologically advanced armies has been a hallmark of Russian civilization for 600 years.  

But the economic sanctions, far from bringing about the collapse Blinken gloated over, have driven up the price of the energy Russia sells, strengthened the ruble, and threatened America’s western European allies with frostbite, shortages, and recession.  

The culture war has found few proponents outside of the West’s richest latte neighborhoods. Indeed, cultural self-defense may be part of the reason India, China, and other rising countries have conspicuously declined to cut economic ties with the Russians.

Suppose Russia wins – what happens next?

Ukraine in 2021

We still cannot break the advantage of the Russian army in artillery and in manpower, and this is very felt in the battles, especially in the Donbass – Peski, Avdiivka, and other directions. It’s just hell. It can’t even be described in words.   ==Volodymyr Zelensky.

If a problem cannot be solved, it may not be a problem, but a fact.  ==Donald Rumsfeld.

I think the Russians have a good chance of winning their war in Ukraine, for reasons I’ve stated in previous posts.  You may disagree.  But suppose, for the sake of argument, I’m right.  What would happen next?

The first thing to understand is that, at this point, Russians are not interested in negotiation, only in terms of surrender.  And the terms offered at the outset of the war may not be enough.

Historical map of Ukraine

Before invading, the Russian leaders demanded that Ukraine recognize Russian sovereignty over Crimea and the independence of the secessionist Donbas republics, and renounce future membership in NATO.  But that is no longer enough to satisfy.

Russia is extending its operations to absorb the pink and blue areas on the map at the right, which are the areas with the heaviest concentrations of Russian speakers.  It is issuing passports to those who desire Russian citizenship.

This indicates a plan to carve out a “new Russia” from Ukrainian territory which would extend from Russia to Transnistria on the Moldovan border.

Russia’s demands go beyond Ukraine.  Russia’s goal is to push back all NATO bases and installations from which NATO forces could strike at Russia.  This includes missile sites in Poland and Rumania.  Presumably it would include Sweden, Finland or any other U.S. ally that becomes a site for NATO strike weapons.

The ultimate goal, which Russia shares with China, is to crack global U.S. military and financial domination and replace it with a balance of power that includes Russia, China, the USA and maybe other countries, such as India.

A vain hope

Compromise is no longer possible.  Vladimir Putin and Sergei Lavrov say that US American leaders are “not agreement-capable.”  They say the USA and NATO allies have ignored their red lines for years, and the time for talk is past.  A recent speech by General of the Army Sergei Shoigu, the Russian minister of defense, gives a good idea of the Russian point of view.

The main advantage Russia has in Ukraine is superior firepower.  The USA and its allies are drawing down their arsenals to supply Ukraine and will not be able to quickly replenish them.

Russia claims to be producing as much ammunition and armaments as it is expending.  If Russia wins, this claim will have been proved right.

Where does this leave Poland, Rumania and other NATO allies?  Their governments joined NATO because they believed the USA could protect them from Russia.  This belief will have been proved wrong.  The choices for Poland and Rumania will be to submit to Russia’s demands or to fight at a worse disadvantage than Ukraine had (except for being less corrupt than Ukraine).

The European nations would have to face the fact that they must either be willing to make peace with Russia or be prepared to depend on themselves for defense.  Ideally, they would do both, as Finland, Sweden and Switzerland did during the Cold War era.

At the same time, economic warfare against Russia is failing.  Economic sanctions have backfired.  The USA’s NATO allies are hurting much more than Russia is.

These may be the last days of NATO

We still cannot break the advantage of the Russian army in artillery and in manpower, and this is very felt in the battles, especially in the Donbass – Peski, Avdiivka, and other directions. It’s just hell. It can’t even be described in words.   ==Volodymyr Zelensky.

∞∞∞

Back in December, Russia issued an ultimatum to the United States and NATO that consisted of the following demands:

• No more NATO expansion towards Russia’s borders. Retraction of the 2008 NATO invitation to Ukraine and Georgia.
• Legally binding guarantee that no strike systems which could target Moscow will be deployed in countries next to Russia.
• No NATO or equivalent (UK, U.S., Pl.) ‘exercises’ near Russian borders.
• NATO ships, planes to keep certain distances from Russian borders.
• Regular military-to-military talks.
• No intermediate-range nukes in Europe

At the time these were understood to be fighting words.  John Helmer has helpfully provided maps of NATO installations that are covered by the ultimatum.

NATO bases in Poland

NATO base near Kaliningrad

NATO installation in Rumania

The U.S. government can’t say it wasn’t warned.  Vladimir Putin had been complaining about the eastward expansion of NATO for decades, and his complaints were ignored.  

The result is that the Russian government is no longer interested in negotiating with the USA.   Putin is done complaining.  He has decided to impose his demands by force.

So far he is succeeding.  Ukraine is in retreat.  Its U.S.-trained and U.S.-equipped army is faring no better than U.S.-trained and U.S.-equipped armies in Syria, Iraq, Afghanistan and South Vietnam.

The Russian strategy is based on use of artillery.  Ukrainian forces, brave as they might be, are being annihilated by  constant bombardments.

The Russian army reportedly has fired more artillery shells than U.S. forces fired during the whole invasion and occupation of Iraq.  But Russians claim to be manufacturing them faster than they are being used up.

Russia is only using a fraction of its military manpower.  A rule of thumb is that an invading force suffers heavier casualties than a defending force, and needs a three to one advantage.  But the Russian force is only one-third the size of the Ukrainian force.  

The Russians are fighting and winning with, figuratively speaking, one hand tied behind their back.

This means Russia has forces in reserve to enforce the other parts of its ultimatum.  It also has the power to escalate if the U.S. steps up its support for Ukraine.

In the early stages of the conflict, President Biden expressed the hope that Russia’s might could be destroyed by sanctions.  But the sanctions war has backfired.  European nations now realize they need Russia’s oil and gas to get through the winter.  Even we in the USA see rising prices and empty store shelves (not all due to sanctions, to be sure).

We Americans face the possibility of a great national humiliation in Ukraine.  The longer the war goes on, the greater the humiliation will likely be.  The more the conflict expands, the greater the humiliation will be.

There is no honorable way out.  It is dishonorable to encourage Ukrainians, Poles and other allies to fight and then refuse to fight by their sides.  Abandonment is shameful.  Using allies as cannon fodder is shameful.  Directly fighting Russians in a ground war, aside from the danger of nuclear war, is something we Americans are not prepared to do.

Ukraine could have had peace up to the end of last year by agreeing to withdraw from NATO, accept Russian control of Crimea and recognize the autonomy of Luhansk and Donetsk.  Now the only agreement on offer is terms of surrender.

What comes after a Ukraine defeat?  Poland and Rumania may accept the ultimatum, or they may resist.  If they resist, there is no reason to think that the United States can do for them what it could not do for Ukraine.

Either way NATO will be shattered.  It may continue to exist, but its guarantees will have been shown to be meaningless.  

The whole point of joining NATO was to gain U.S. protection and deter invasion from Russia.  If NATO bases instead bring on an invasion, and the United States is helpless to protect you, what is the point?

I fear how my fellow Americans will react.  We’ve retreated before – from Vietnam and Afghanistan – but that was on a timetable of U.S. choosing after Americans had tired of carrying on these wars.  That’s different from being defeated on the battlefield.  In history, such defeats have been preludes to revolutions and coups.  I fear our morale and our political system are too weak to absorb  such a defeat.