by Pieter J. Friedrich
9/10/03
I recently heard a short clip from a cassette recording by Rev. Steve Wilkins, who was speaking about the First Gulf War. He said, and I paraphrase, "If there were any chance Saddam could have lit up the skies over Washingon in the same way we lit up the skies over Baghdad, [George H. W.] Bush would not be taunting him and calling him a 'Hitler.' Rather, he would be posing with him for photo-ops and calling him our 'partner.'"
The Reverend Wilkins hit the nail on the head.
No, I'm not saying Bush Sr. is a coward. To be frank, I don't know if he is a coward. Certainly, he has never displayed particular courage, but lack of display of courage is not enough to warrant calling the man a coward. However, Bush's cowardice or lack thereof is irrelevant. The Reverend Wilkins was not implying that Bush is or was a coward.
Rather he was making reference to the past 70 years of hypocritical precedent set by U.S. foreign policy-makers.
This nation has a sad record of playing buddy-buddy with every passing dictator who has the ability to threaten (or aid) the U.S. in some tangible way. All too often the U.S. can be found supporting and even funding one evil ruler while simultaneously condemning another.
A handful of examples of this hypocrisy are provided below:
The first example that comes immediately to mind is the U.S.'s interaction with Soviet Russia. Joseph Stalin, surpassing even Hitler's Holocaust, exterminated some 10 million Jews. He also used "food as a weapon" and so starved some 7 million Ukrainians through artificially induced famine in the 1930's. In the Congressional report "Investigation of the Ukrainian Famine 1932-1933," Rep. Daniel Mica said, "Despite ample and timely knowledge about the man-made Famine of 1932-1933 in Ukraine, the US government did not publicly acknowledge what it knew or respond in any meaningful way." And, of course, the Soviets sent millions to the infamous Gulags.
Soviet Russia was perhaps one of the most evil empires in recorded history. Yet in WWII, President Roosevelt allied our nation with that empire. After the war, President Truman (against the wishes of General Patton, who wanted to drive the Soviets back into Russia) withdrew from Eastern Europe, leaving it to the Soviets. Throughout the 70's and 80's, the U.S. sold government-owned grain reserves to the Soviets for slashed prices. And in the 70's and 80's the U.S. loaned huge sums to the Soviets...sums which have never been repaid.
We overthrow Saddam and support and fund the Soviets. Soviet Russia, our opponent in the nuclear arms race, was a threat to the U.S.
In my article, "The Illegitimacy of the Second Gulf War," I noted several other examples. I wrote, "The US does not have a history of responding to the brutalities of other governments. The US ignored the 1994 cold-blooded slaughter of nearly a million Tutsis by members of the Hutu tribe in Rwanda. In 1989, over a million Chinese students gathered to protest in Tiananmen Square in Beijing, China, and Red Chinese troops fired on the demonstrators and ran them over with tanks, killing an estimated 2,000 students, and the US did nothing. In the 1970's, the US actively backed the communst ruler of Cambodia, Pol Pot, who was responsible for the deaths of 1 in 4 Cambodians, an estimated three million people in a 4-year period."
In Red China, the "One-Child Policy" is responsible for the deaths of some 5 to 10 million. Mao's "Great Leap Forward" was responsible for the deaths of an estimated 44 million. As noted above, some 2,000 Chinese students were killed in Tiananmen Square in 1989. And it was China that, only two years ago, forced a U.S. surveillance plane down (of course, one wonders why the U.S. has the right to spy on the Chinese) and held the crew in captivity for nearly two weeks.
Yet China is awarded "Most Favored Nation" trading status.
We overthrow Saddam and support the Red Chinese. The Red Chinese are a threat to the U.S.
The North Koreans have set up their own Gulags, and thousands of people have starved in an ongoing famine. In February of this year the North Koreans threatened the U.S. with a preemptive nuclear strike.
Yet the U.S., since 1994, has sent $6 billion to North Korea to use for nuclear reactors.
We overthrow Saddam and fund the North Koreans. Need I point out that North Korea, the nation that threatens this country with preemptive nuclear strikes, is a threat to the U.S.?
I could go on. I could spend time talking about Pol Pot, or I could mention Uzbekistan or Sudan. But I think you get the idea.
U.S. foreign policy is schizophrenic and hypocritical.
Foreign policy ought to be governed by morality. More specifically, it ought to be governed by God's Law. Foreign policy is not a morally subjective area. This nation's foreign policy is governed by pragmatism...but that does not justify the immoral hypocrisy of U.S. foreign policy.
Some might argue that the fact that the presidential administration changes every four to eight years accounts for the evident hypocrisy in foreign policy. Yet such an argument doesn't hold water. The hypocrisy and moral subjectivism of U.S. foreign policy has been baldly displayed in the majority of the presidential administrations of the past 50 or more years. Presidents as diverse as F. Roosevelt, Nixon, Carter, Reagan, Clinton, and G.W. Bush are guilty of displaying moral subjectivism by supporting and funding one evil ruler while condemning another.
One cannot chalk U.S. foreign policy hypocrisy up to changes of administration.
It was strong U.S. precedent which led Reverend Wilkins to say that, were Saddam Hussein a real threat to the United States, Bush Sr. would be posing with him for photo-ops and allying with him.
