Kum Ba Yah, Neville
At the end of September, 1938, British Prime Minister Neville Chamberlain, got off his airplane from Munich waiving a piece of paper in his hand and said the following:
“My good friends, for the second time in our history, a British Prime Minister has returned from Germany bringing peace with honor. I believe it is peace for our time…”
Hitler had threatened to march into all of Czechoslovakia unless Britain and France agreed to allow Germany to annex the Sudentenland, an area of Czechoslovakia which had large numbers of ethnic Germans, but strategically important to the Czechs. Two agreements were signed by the Germans, Italians, French and the British. (Note that Czechoslovakia wasn't invited to the party). The first caved to the German demands. The second agreement stated that war would not be used to resolve any future disagreements between Britain, the United States, and Germany, only “peaceful” means. As Chamberlain was waiving this agreement at the press, Hitler was back in Berlin…literally laughing at “that useless piece of paper”. The rest, of course, is history.
I saw on the news this past week that United Nations Secretary General Kofi Annan visited Iran and Syria, and joyfully announced that both had agreed to cease providing military aid to Hezbollah, and would work to find a peaceful solution to Iran’s desire for nuclear capability. Of course, Iran could keep its uranium enrichment program fully active during the negotiations. I am sure glad to hear that. I know I will sleep better tonight. Couple that with the Dean of the Georgetown University School of Foreign Service's statements on Fox News that the United States must engage North Korea directly. After all, we “succeeded” with them before, and we can “succeed” again. Let me see, was the “before” first time Bill Clinton’s rapprochement with North Korea where we gave them hundreds of millions of dollars, and they secretly increased their nuclear activity and built bombs and missiles using our money? Is the ghost of Neville Chamberlain lurking in the background at the United Nations and Georgetown University?
I continually ask the question why is it so hard for us to understand how evil the people are with which we are currently dealing. If either North Korea or Iran builds several nuclear bombs, those bombs will be used. What city in the United States are you ready to sacrifice? Washington? New York? Las Vegas? Chicago?
It would never happen, you say, because these bad guys would be afraid of being nuked themselves. Here is a news flash. They don’t care!!!!!! It was incomprehensible to us that the Kamikaze pilots would kill themselves for the Emperor; or that a Palestinian would be willing to strap a bomb onto him/herself in order to blow up an Israeli bus; or that 20 individuals would put themselves into airplanes killing themselves along with thousands of others on September 11; or that the Branch Davidians would sacrifice themselves and their children for David Koresh; or that hundreds upon hundreds of people would drink laced Kool Aid for Jim Jones. Why is it such a leap to believe that a country like Iran would be willing to sacrifice itself in order to bring about the Islamic revolution? Scarier yet, miscalculate, believing that we would not respond in a meaningful way, or that they could survive it. What if there is a second terrorist cell ready to explode a second bomb if there is a response to the first?
This is scary stuff. There are no good choices here. So as the midterm elections approach, the current administration needs to be honest with the American people as to the seriousness of the threat, and the loyal opposition needs to put away the peace signs, quit worrying about how the President pronounces "nuclear", and offer some workable alternatives other than lets just sit down and talk. Kum Ba Yah just won't cut it here.
“My good friends, for the second time in our history, a British Prime Minister has returned from Germany bringing peace with honor. I believe it is peace for our time…”
Hitler had threatened to march into all of Czechoslovakia unless Britain and France agreed to allow Germany to annex the Sudentenland, an area of Czechoslovakia which had large numbers of ethnic Germans, but strategically important to the Czechs. Two agreements were signed by the Germans, Italians, French and the British. (Note that Czechoslovakia wasn't invited to the party). The first caved to the German demands. The second agreement stated that war would not be used to resolve any future disagreements between Britain, the United States, and Germany, only “peaceful” means. As Chamberlain was waiving this agreement at the press, Hitler was back in Berlin…literally laughing at “that useless piece of paper”. The rest, of course, is history.
I saw on the news this past week that United Nations Secretary General Kofi Annan visited Iran and Syria, and joyfully announced that both had agreed to cease providing military aid to Hezbollah, and would work to find a peaceful solution to Iran’s desire for nuclear capability. Of course, Iran could keep its uranium enrichment program fully active during the negotiations. I am sure glad to hear that. I know I will sleep better tonight. Couple that with the Dean of the Georgetown University School of Foreign Service's statements on Fox News that the United States must engage North Korea directly. After all, we “succeeded” with them before, and we can “succeed” again. Let me see, was the “before” first time Bill Clinton’s rapprochement with North Korea where we gave them hundreds of millions of dollars, and they secretly increased their nuclear activity and built bombs and missiles using our money? Is the ghost of Neville Chamberlain lurking in the background at the United Nations and Georgetown University?
I continually ask the question why is it so hard for us to understand how evil the people are with which we are currently dealing. If either North Korea or Iran builds several nuclear bombs, those bombs will be used. What city in the United States are you ready to sacrifice? Washington? New York? Las Vegas? Chicago?
It would never happen, you say, because these bad guys would be afraid of being nuked themselves. Here is a news flash. They don’t care!!!!!! It was incomprehensible to us that the Kamikaze pilots would kill themselves for the Emperor; or that a Palestinian would be willing to strap a bomb onto him/herself in order to blow up an Israeli bus; or that 20 individuals would put themselves into airplanes killing themselves along with thousands of others on September 11; or that the Branch Davidians would sacrifice themselves and their children for David Koresh; or that hundreds upon hundreds of people would drink laced Kool Aid for Jim Jones. Why is it such a leap to believe that a country like Iran would be willing to sacrifice itself in order to bring about the Islamic revolution? Scarier yet, miscalculate, believing that we would not respond in a meaningful way, or that they could survive it. What if there is a second terrorist cell ready to explode a second bomb if there is a response to the first?
This is scary stuff. There are no good choices here. So as the midterm elections approach, the current administration needs to be honest with the American people as to the seriousness of the threat, and the loyal opposition needs to put away the peace signs, quit worrying about how the President pronounces "nuclear", and offer some workable alternatives other than lets just sit down and talk. Kum Ba Yah just won't cut it here.
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