Russia's invasion of Ukraine has held the world spellbound. Not since the Yugoslav wars has Europe seen such a conflict on its doorstep. The massive land-driven invasion brings to mind images of WWII.
As always in the fog of war, propaganda is flying on all sides. The first European conflict of the social media age has whipped up the western world into a frenzy of virtue-signaling.
Steve Sailer reports:
The Metropolitan Opera said it would cut ties with Russian artists or institutions “allied” (to use state-funded NPR’s word) with President Vladimir Putin. … In Wales, an orchestra removed Tchaikovsky. … The University of Milano-Bicocca postponed a series of lectures on Fyodor Dostoevsky “to avoid any controversy.”
Governor Chris Sununu of New Hampshire signed an executive order directing state-run liquor stores to stop selling Russian products. Ohio, Pennsylvania, and Utah have done the same. … FIFA has banned Russia indefinitely, meaning the country won’t be able to compete for the World Cup. The International Paralympic Committee has also banned Russian athletes.
What prides itself as the “United Nations of cat federations” (FIFe) has banned Russian-owned and Russian-bred cats from all competitions because it “cannot just witness these atrocities and do nothing.”
Russia's 'imperial' ambitions have shocked the West. Images of bombs falling on homes, tanks rolling through cities, dead children on stretchers—it is appalling.
So appalling, in fact, that it is easy to forget the murder and mayhem perpetrated by that other great imperial power these last 80 years. As 'Physicist Dave' puts it,
'Try to name all the countries that have been attacked, invaded, bombed, conquered, or had their governments overthrown by the US just during your lifetime.
Really — get a piece of paper and try to write them all down.
There are so many that I bet that you cannot even remember them all.'
We will take up the challenge.
America's imperial adventurism has become so omnipresent on planet Earth these last three-quarters of a century that we hardly seem to notice it.
In
condemning the suffering caused by Mr. Putin's war, most Americans seem
oblivious to the fact that their own tax dollars support a world-spanning
empire that has its claws sunk into every inch of the globe, spying, prying,
arming, meddling, funding, bombing, and starving. The 80-year 'Pax Americana' has
come at an unimaginably heavy cost.
We
thus propose to scrub off the blue and yellow greasepaint, just for a moment,
and to remember that other long, long imperial war.
I.
The Cold War
As
the two big teams jockeyed for position on the planetary chessboard for half a century following WWII, the U.S. developed a mortal fear of anything even
remotely redolent of socialism, be it near or far.
This
led to regular covert and overt U.S. action against democratically-elected
governments and in favor of dictators pledging allegiance to free-market
capitalism.
A stroll down memory lane…
