Silicon Investor (SI) -- The First Internet Community

STOCKTALK

We've detected that you're using an ad content blocking browser plug-in or feature. Ads provide a critical source of revenue to the continued operation of Silicon Investor. We ask that you disable ad blocking while on Silicon Investor in the best interests of our community. If you are not using an ad blocker but are still receiving this message, make sure your browser's tracking protection is set to the 'standard' level.

Pastimes : Kosovo -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: Yaacov who wrote (9092)	5/19/1999 5:50:00 PM
From: truedog	Read Replies (2) \| Respond to of 17770

to:Yaacov from:truedog <could not have won the cold war with liberal middle of the road> I think you are right on this but,please be aware that liberal and middle of the road are usually construed as two different things. <save us your protestant moralism> Here ,it seems that you are refering to Christian moralism. There is no way I will get involved in a debate on religeous preferences. This is a serious personal choice. But, if you truly feel that the ends justify the means,regardless of how brutal or bloody, it is my belief that you have a problem. truedog

To: Yaacov who wrote (9092)	5/19/1999 7:07:00 PM
From: Dayuhan	Read Replies (2) \| Respond to of 17770

Can you pls. tell me how did we win the cold war?' We won through people like Franco, Salazar, Shah,Somoza, Diem, Batista, Chiang Kai-Shek, Marcos, Noriega! What an extremely bizarre notion. We won the cold war because of the economic collapse of the Soviet Union, which occured because their dysfunctional economy could not meet the requirements of either their own population or their client states. Third world despots had nothing whatsoever to do with it; in the Third world arena we were actually quite close to losing the cold war. When Marcos declared "marital law" the communist insurgency consisted of under 300 poorly armed rebels operating in a few provinces of Southern Luzon. The declaration was to keep him in power and keep his hands in the till, the "communist threat" was trotted out purely to justify the move to the US. When he was driven out - with many in the State Dept. and CIA still saying we needed him to fight the communists - they had 40,000 men under arms, strong positions in every province of the country, and were close to strategic stalemate with the Philippine Army. This without appreciable outside support. Can you explain to us how this aided our cause in the cold war? Can you explain to me how our support for the doomed and staggeringly incompetent Ciang Kai-Shek aided our cause in the cold war? Or Somoza? We needed strong men to lead in countries were we were facing the danger of Communist take over! Strong men? Inept, brutal, thugs who provided communists with a hate-figure, a rallying point, and a convenient reason - the absence of peaceful alternatives - to justify armed struggle? Men who had the greed to inspire an insurgency, but who were in most cases too afraid of their own armed forces (except their personal units, far too important to risk in actual combat) to give them the wherewithal to win such a war? Have you ever actually lived in one of these countries, and observed the phenomena you preach about? These strong men happened to be corruptand cruel, but they served their purpose. What purpose was that? The insurgencies that sprang up to oppose them left countries all over the globe in ruins. We have created a reserve of anti-American feeling in the developing world that will last for generations. We have left several billion people in permanent debt, trying to pay off the bills the dictators incurred. We have economies looted and in ruins. Banks who lent to the dictators, encouraged by the IMF and the State Dept., have the choice between squeezing the money out of the poorest people on the globe and going bust. Not to mention China, Iran, Vietnam, Nicaragua, Cuba, and a few others that we made enemies out of, or made into much worse enemies than they might otherwise have been. And on, and on. Which purpose is being served here? So go easy and save us your protestant moralism. Wrong animal. A secret study made by the Israeli Intelegence Services in 1968, and passed on to CIA at that time, predicted the fall of Pahlavi dynesty Secret Study? Who are you kidding? Everybody with half of one eye open knew he was going down, it might as well have been written in letters of fire on the palace wall. Pahlavi Dynasty? Don't be ridiculous. The Iranians walked away from dynasties in '53, decided they no longer needed them. The US decided that the government they put in power would not be sufficiently responsive to American needs, and gave them back a dynasty they didn't want. With predictable results: the "king" got greedier and greedier, and demanded a respect he didn't and couldn't have, proceeded with greater and greater degrees of repression, and eventually pissed people off and got thrown out. This is what usually happens to incompetent "dynasties" imposed by outside powers.