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Politics : Foreign Affairs Discussion Group -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: Neocon who wrote (87640)	3/29/2003 12:19:12 PM
From: SirRealist	Read Replies (2) \| Respond to of 281500

I'd say the spectre of Soviet bankruptcy was there before SDI was on the table. The strategy of confronting the Soviets in Afghanistan had a significant amount of influence on the Kremlins internal workings, and, if memory serves well, that arose from recommendations made within the Trilateral Commission in the Carter years (no, I can't cite sources, and admittedly, my memory is riddled with holes from the abuse of too many Twinkies). Even without Afghanistan, Russia's economy was weaker than most intelligence analysts believed, till shortly before it came unglued. I think it's oversimplistic to suggest it was all ideologically crafted when the underlying assessments were critically flawed. I think it's also oversimplifying to suggest it was all about Gandhian non-violent resistance. Historians years hence will likely indicate that it was a combination of pre-conditions, a combination of strategies, a combination of the right leaders for the right times and some plain old lucky timing. Reagan and his advisers get a share of the credit, but so does Gorbachev, so does the Gdansk movement, so does the economic rot festering beneath the Soviet system, and more. Gandhian resistance worked because of an established tradition of British civility beneath its empirical exterior. It would not work against a Stalin or Hitler, who could care less how many were slaughtered. As more of the world increases in its civil practices, the odds increase that nonviolence movements can effect change. But it's not a panacea and works least in societies that put higher value on the promise of a luxurious afterlife than a on life itself.

To: Neocon who wrote (87640)	3/29/2003 12:46:10 PM
From: Jacob Snyder	Read Replies (2) \| Respond to of 281500

Go look at the actual eye-witness accounts, the details of what was really happening in the streets of E. Europe in 1989-1991. The Communists were "paralysed" by the unwillingness of their foot-soldiers to obey orders and slaughter civilians. That was the only thing that stopped them; they tried consistently, reflexively, to clear the streets using Stalinist methods. The Reaganites, the Cold Warriors, were bystanders in the liberation of E. Europe. The real history, the opposite of Reaganite mythological self-congratulation: Message 18682682 ------------ The Hawks like to think that they are the only practical people, that they have the only methods that work in the real world, and that pacifists are Utopian arm-chair sissies, either dupes or just lazy. But we have had a real-life lesson in the power of Gandhian non-violent resistance, just a few years ago. The Communist despots who ran the Soviet Empire, they weren't any nicer people than the Islamists who we face today. Those Communists were just as opposed to the Enlightenment ideals, and just as willing to use unlimited violence. They had spend 70 years perfecting the tools of oppression, Control, and systematic terror. In Leipzig in 1989, the numbers of people who came out in the streets and said to their oppressors, "You can kill us. We have no guns. We are willing to die. But we will no longer obey.", was: September 4 -- 1,200 September 15 -- 1,500 September 25 -- 8,000 October 2 -- 20,000 October 9 -- 70,000 October 16 -- 120,000 October 23 -- 250,000 October 30 -- 300,000 November 6 -- 400,000 It takes as much discipline, as much courage, to make that statement, to stand in the streets with empty hands and face the tanks, as any soldier has. But, once any group of people achieve that self-discipline, that Will To Freedom, they are unstoppable. No Stalin, no Mao, no Bin Laden, no Khomeini, can control them. And they proved it, in the streets of Leipzig and E. Berlin and Prague and Moscow and Warsaw. Non-violence fails, not because of the degree of evil of the Stalins and Khomeinis, but because of a lack of discipline and courage in those who want freedom. Non-violence works, in the real world. All it takes is a willingness to say, "Give me Liberty, or give me death." Message 18677444 <the authorities were paralyzed against massive reprisals in the endgame> Can you find any factual evidence to back this up?