As in 1938, today's democracies are militarily weak
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Posted by David Murrell on 07:06:36 2008/09/29
In Reply to:
Appeasement can never work - Sun Media posted by Salim Mansur
I of course agree with Professor Mansur, and I am glad he highlighted the 70th aniversary of Chamberlain's appeasement doctrine. I suspect few media will do this. I think the vast majority of our chattering elites support Chamberlain's appeasement polcies -- although they would never admit it. Indeed, we live in an appeasement culture.
I am a student of World War II, and one point not brought out by Mansur was how militarily weak the West was in 1938. The Nazi German war machine was being built up, and the Soviet Union under Stalin had a vast army. And at the time, Japan was militarily strong, and fighting then a winning war in China. The West had only a small army in Great Britan, a vastly overrated army in France --and the United States was isolationist and boasted a small military force.
I oppose the Neville Chamberlain appeasment policy, but I make the point that appeasment and military weakness are mutually reinforcing.
Timothy Gordon Ash has an interesting piece in the Globe and Mail two or three weeks ago. I did not post it on this CCD site, since Ash is a left-liberal who opposes intervention in Iraq, etc. But his essay is interesting, since he writes that China and Russia are rising militarily and economically, and the United States is in decline.
But unlike the vast majority of left-writers, Timothy Gordon Ash actually opposes authoritarianism and totalitarianism. He wonders in his op-ed essay that the ascendancy of Western democracy, begun in the 1500's, may be in jeopardy, given the rise of Russia and China. (He reviews the history of Western-based democracy in lucid detail, much better than I can here in this brief post). He speculates that liberal democracy -- born during the Enightenment -- may be in peril. He speculates that the Enlightenment may be in peril, this despite the huge information revolution under way.
I share his pessismism, but as a neo-conservative and not as a left-liberal. Back in 1938, the prevailing view in universities and much of the media (especially in North America) was supportive of Chamberlin-syled appeasement. Today the vast majority of media and academia support what one can call neo-appeasement.
But the media today is far more pervasive than it was back then. And "junk culture" is left-politicized (look at Opray Winfrey and ABC's "The View" for example). Back then, stupid culture was limited in the margins to comic books and pulp magazines. Today's stupid culture strongly supports Western appeasement, and reinforces the pro-appeasement policies articulated by media elites (New York Times, Globe and Mail, etc).
Twenty years ago, Great Britain defeated Argentina during the Falklands conflict, and a pro-West coalition defeated Iraq over Kuwait. The victors had (1) strong leaders, (2) superior military force, and (3) public support from voters. (Recall that the left-elites back then opposed both wars). Today, albeit we have some strong leaders like George W. Bush (who at least had a strong heart, if lttle else), we are militarily weaker and have no public support to defend democracy.
I suspect the next threat to democracy will come during the early days of Barak Obama's presidency, when Putin's Russia will invade one or more miltarily weak Eastern European states. Mr. Obama is a Chamberlin-styled appeaser, will allow that to happen. (And certainly the pro-appeasement European Union will go along with it). He will also receive support from the vast array of today's media and NGO elites.
The same holds true with Amhadinejad's Iran. I expect an Iran-Israel conflict will take place later, and will involve an exchange of nuclear weapons.
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