It’s been a standard right wing line (for I don’t remember how long) that diplomacy is for sissies. Real men (and a few women like Margaret Thatcher) talk tough and act tougher on the international stage. It’s why John McCain gets applause lines from the faithful when he says he knows how to win wars, and he’s willing to start more of them at the drop of the hat. It’s why he acted like a school yard punk when Russia invaded Georgia even though he knew there was nothing we could do to stop Putin short of a nuclear war.
The trouble is that ignoring diplomacy isn’t just petty or stupid in today’s world, it’s downright dangerous, especially when it comes to protecting our national security. You want proof, my little Christian Warriors? Well, here is all the proof you need. Our failure to keep good relations with Russia is threatening the destruction of nuclear weapons which could fall into the hands of –say the word now — terrorists.
WASHINGTON (AP) — The authors of a U.S. program designed to secure weapons of mass destruction in the former Soviet Union say they worry that deteriorating relations between the United States and Russia could undermine efforts to keep the weapons out of the hands of terrorists.
Sen. Richard Lugar and former Sen. Sam Nunn say the two countries have continued working together to secure nuclear, chemical and biological weapons despite growing hostility after Russia’s invasion of Georgia last month.
They said in separate interviews with The Associated Press, however, that the spike in tensions heightens the risks of a breakdown in the arrangement under which the United States pays for the program.
“The Nunn-Lugar program has survived the very bad feelings between the U.S. and Russia before,” Nunn said. “History is full of examples where pride and dignity basically overruled self-interest.”
Sam Nunn is a conservative former Democratic Senator, and Richard Lugar, is well, he’s a Republican Senator, so it’s not like we’re talking barking liberal commie sypathizers here. These men worked together to put in place a mechanism to eliminate Russia’s loose nukes. After all, it certainly wasn’t in our best interest to allow a collapsing Soviet Union to become a black market for nuclear arms dealers. Both are highly respected for their expertise in national security and foreign policy issues. So when they say we are in danger because of a “failure to communicate” with Putin’s Russia, I take what they say seriously.
And what they are saying is this: the Bush administration in general, and the State Department under Condoleezza Rice and all of Cheney’s cowboys, has done our country a deep disservice, by allowing our relations with Russia to deteriorate to the extent they have. Nunn is correct. The pride of the Bush/Cheney Neocons and their policies of unilateralism and aggression have weakened our security.
It is in our self interest to keep talking to Russia, even if we don’t like what they have to say, and even if Bush’s desire to put a defensive missile shield in Eastern Europe and expand NATO membership might have to go by the wayside for now. Getting rid of theses excess nukes, and securing the ones that still exist is a far more important matter than George Bush’s legacy as a “War President.” Diplomacy and its “jaw-jaw” still matters in this 21st Century world, more than ever, in fact. It’s time we had a President who realized that.
Otherwise we might wake up one morning to find one of our cities has just been incinerated by an ex-Soviet nuke.