Meet Joe Cool

One of the most revealing photographs of the 20th Century -- "the" definitive photo of the century, I might say -- is that of the "big three" conferees at the 1945 Yalta Conference, deep in the heart of Russia, where the still-warm -- but in its death throes -- body of the Third Reich, which had recently been renamed the Great German Reich, was being carved up for the delectation of the victors. But some victors, to paraphrase George Orwell, are more equal than others. There sits FDR, looking like death warmed over... Churchill, looking like a fat, pink baby clutching a cigar, like a character out of a W.C. Fields comedy... and "Uncle Joe" Stalin, resplendent in his immaculate marshall's uniform. Churchill, as Pat Buchanan points out, was about to lose an empire, and it was never to be regained. The U.S. had asserted its rightful inheritance as The Power of the West, and Uncle Joe was lying in wait, like an evil toad, for the smoke to clear so he could take over half of Europe, which he subsequently did, with amazing efficiency and ruthlessness, considering Russia's staggering losses in the recent unpleasantness. One can only speculate as to what was going through his mind at that point. He knew that England was already "history". America was something to be reckoned with, but guess what, Stalin had his agents larded all through the Roosevelt administration -- the most prominent (in retrospect) being Alger Hiss -- and had established a firm footing among the liberals, socialists, collectivists, and various hangers-on in the U.S. -- starting with the academics, of course, but extending to many of the unions, populists, entertainment media, news media, and even portions of the American military. So he really had nothing to fear from the U.S., and in the back of his mind might have been humming the tune, "Today Eastern Europe, tomorrow... the United States?" Hey, it could have happened, and it would have if it hadn't been for some awkward incidents down the line, like the Berlin Blockade and the Korean War. Stalin had come to power on a platform -- if you will -- of "socialism in one country" -- or at least one country at a time. It was a war of attrition, rather than a frontal attack. The fork that he stuck into Eastern Europe had many prongs, and they included not only brute force but political subversion, old-fashioned spying, intimidation, and what we now call ethnic cleansing -- with the Gulag already well in place to absorb the results. By comparison, Britain had a vanishing empire, and the U.S. had -- what? An administration that had toyed with socialism and collectivism on a enormous scale for, at that point, twelve years, and which was bursting at the seams with "friends" of Russia and of communism, who were also enemies of "isolationism", "America first-ism", and any return to the old values and old ways that had characterized this country from its founding up through at least the 1920s. So he was cool... he waited... and sure enough, Eastern Europe fell into his lap like an overripe fruit, with nary a peep of protest on the part of his erstwhile "allies", at least until it was too late.

Now, of course, we know what happened next -- we call it the "Cold War", although it could get pretty darned hot at times, like in Korea and Vietnam... and I don't know what the Russians called it, probably "progress". At any rate, the new Russian empire, pronounced (at long last) "evil" by Ronald Reagan, eventually collapsed of its own weight, with probably not a little help from Reagan, Thatcher (England redux!), and Pope John Paul II, along with many minor players like Lech Walesa. So the "peace" that _should_ have been established in 1945 finally came about during the Bush I administration -- leading directly to the "vacation from history" that was the Clinton administration. This vacation was, as we know, rudely interrupted by the events of Sep. 11, 2001, and the rest is... well, it's not history yet, but it will be some day. In any case, Stalin managed to work out a 45-year delay in what should have been the collapse of the Soviet system right after World War II, the way the Czarist system collapsed in the midst of World War I. And thus, freedom was reborn circa 1990... or was it? Russia took her own vacation from history for a while in order to lick the wounds of her contraction from an empire back to a single country with a few vaguely allied former Soviet states, but then along came all that gas and oil money, and those former states were not all turned, overnight, into gleaming "democracies" on the American model. And what we have now is an even newer Russian empire -- the Russian Third Reich, if you will -- and the guy in charge (no matter what his official title is) is Joe the Second, AKA Joe Cool, namely Vladimir Putin.

And why do I call him Joe Cool? (You'll recall that "Joe Cool" was one of Snoopy's fantasy personas -- you know, the guy you see on every college campus sporting the shades and leaning back with one foot planted against the wall. Say what you want about his academic achievements, he is large and in charge.) Well, because he knows exactly which buttons to push, and which strings to pull, and when. He's playing us, and our hapless president and his minions, like a violin, talking tough (and backing it up militarily, in the case of Georgia) one minute, and being the complete gentleman the next. On the heels of the recent five-day war in Georgia (Was it five days or five minutes? Does it matter?) he is now sitting back and calmly saying that "he expects the next U.S. administration to improve the two countries' strained relations", citing -- guess what! -- our alliance against the Nazis in World War II as an example of our "mutual interests". No mention, you'll notice, of the Cold War, or espionage, or the army of agents Russia had planted in Washington from the 1930s until at least the early 1950s, and no mention of Afghanistan ("Russia's Vietnam"), since, I guess, that place has turned out to be a wash. (Afghanistan kicked Russia's butt with our help, and is now in the process of kicking our butt with... well, with our help too, I guess.) Putin has already fired the first volley in the next round -- namely the squaring away of Georgia (and do you think that put a damper on Georgia's NATO fantasies? For their sake, I hope so.) -- he has made his move on the chessboard and is now waiting for our response, all the while assuring us that, hey guys, it's only a game, after all. Is he thereby expressing some kind of regret that Russia took things a bit too far with the Georgia foray? Not at all! It was a significant move, both for what it told Georgia, and the other former Soviet republics, and possibly also the former Warsaw Pact nations, about the way things are, but also for what it told us about what we can do something about and what we can't. Is he quaking in his boots every time Sarah Palin starts waving her moose-hunting rifle around and talking about defending Georgia next time around? Sorry, but no. He is, rather, painting a... well, actually pretty rosy picture of a new world order, Russian-style, in which we're free to preach the gospel of democracy pretty much anywhere we want, but kindly stay off his turf and out of his face on this point because if we don't, this is what's going to happen. So do we "blink", the way the Russians supposedly did over Cuba (although they got a fair trade out of it from JFK, as we all now know)? Or do we start mumbling, like some sort of drugged-up Rambo, about "not cutting and running" and "staying the course"? Is he, in other words, overestimating the sanity of the American regime? (You'll notice he said "the next U.S. administration" -- he didn't say "Democrat" or "Republican" because he knows what most Americans don't know, namely that, foreign policy-wise, they're one and the same and are going to stay that way.) Is there any country, or nation, or state in the world that Russia is determined to "defend" (i.e., keep in its own camp) at all costs, the way we are with Israel? I doubt it. Everything is negotiable. But the position he is taking, namely that the old Soviet empire still belongs to them, and that the Warsaw Pact could, at least in theory, be reclaimed at any time, is crystal clear.

Now, of course, George W. Bush has said he trusts Putin. He "looked into his eyes", etc. Well, OK -- but Bush trusts Dick Cheney too, so how much does that say about his judgment? Putin is not talking to Bush anyway, or to Cheney -- he's talking to whoever might take over American foreign policy next, and saying -- not unlike Rodney King -- can't we all just get along? But, unlike Rodney, he has the wherewithal to back up the "or else" part that is not stated explicitly. And, he rightfully sees NATO as an obsolete organization (according to its original charter) which has become, basically, a surrogate for the U.S. and its foreign policy. Don't try to disguise American empire building as a "coalition of the willing" -- it just won't fly. We know better.

So, as I've said, the next move is up to us, no matter who wins in November. And the former Soviet republics have been put on notice not to be so eager to join the American empire. And this, I submit, is not unreasonable. It's realpolitik, and in a sense it's an ideal way to contain the ambitions of both China and militant Islam. (Why should we do all the heavy lifting?) And yeah, each side will continue to plot, and intrigue, and engage in empire building in some way, shape, or form. But it doesn't have to turn into a hot war, which McCain and Palin so desperately seem to want, nor does it even have to turn into another cold war. All it has to be is a deal. (Call it a "Cool War" if you like.) But where are the absolutists, fanatics, and utopian idealists who are determined to squelch anything so "relativistic" and "unprincipled"? Where are the people who are all for "self-determination" as long as the selves that are determined are on our side? Clue -- they ain't in Moscow.