‘Are you going to the American side?’

This was a fascinating, highly illuminating little anecdote in the WSJ today. I recommend reading the whole piece, but at least this part:

    Lia’s husband had remained behind and arrived in Tbilisi shortly before I did. "He was trying to keep the house and the fields," she explained. "Afterward, he wanted to leave, but he was circled by soldiers. It was impossible. He was in the orchards hiding from the Russians in case they lit the house. He was walking and met the Russian soldiers and he made up his mind that he couldn’t stay any more. The Russian soldiers called him and asked where he was going, if he was going to the American side."
    "The Russians said this to him?" I said.
    "My husband said he was going to see his family," she said. "And the Russians said again, ‘Are you going to the American side?’"
    "So the Russians view you as the American side, even though there are no Americans here."
    "Yes," she said. "Because our way is for democracy."

Sort of clarifies things, doesn’t it?

6 thoughts on “‘Are you going to the American side?’”

  1. bud

    So how many American lives are you willing to lose in order to keep the Russians from over running Georgia?

  2. bud

    Here’s another side to this issue, our flaunting of the Russians with missiles at their border. This is a great article by Greg Monbiot writing for the Guardian. This is a topic that is frankly ignored by both parties, i.e. wasteful military spending. This whole missile defense system is such a waste and the damn thing doesn’t even work. Why does this not get more attention? I guess Paris Hilton and Jeremiah Wright are more important.
    http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/2008/aug/19/usforeignpolicy.russia
    Here’s an excerpt:
    The American government insists that the interceptors, which will be stationed on the Baltic coast, have nothing to do with Russia: their purpose is to defend Europe and the US against the intercontinental ballistic missiles Iran and North Korea don’t possess. This is why they are being placed in Poland, which, as every geography student in Texas knows, shares a border with both rogue states.
    They permit us to look forward to a glowing future, in which missile defense, according to the Pentagon, will “protect our homeland … and our friends and allies from ballistic missile attack”; as long as the Russians wait until it’s working before they nuke us. The good news is that, at the present rate of progress, reliable missile defense is only 50 years away. The bad news is that it has been 50 years away for the past six decades.

  3. Brad Warthen

    I thought Friedman put all that very well into perspective earlier this week. Did you read that piece? When I first read it, I thought two things: First, "bud would like this," especially with the headline, "What did we expect?" Second, "This explains very well the big difference between OUR mistakes, and what Putin has done."

    And bud, what do you mean, "American lives?" Are we suddenly risking lives if we boot Russia out of G8, don’t let them into the WTO and boycott the next Olympics? Those are the kinds of things we’ve been talking about here. What are YOU talking about?

  4. Mike Cakora

    bud –
    One of my fellow right-wing extremists derived the pejorative political epithet “Moonbat” from George Monbiot’s last name.
    While Monbiot to date has advocated democratic means to effect change, his goal is to elect a government that will radically de-industrialize the UK to serve as the model for responsibly saving the planet on a national level. I suspect that voters would get a little upset before his plan progressed too far, but he doesn’t see it that way.
    As for the point that missile defense does not work, take a look here, watch the slide show and read the comments. This one sums it up:

    Ironically, MAD only applies to rational enemies like the Soviets and assuring them that they could not attack us without destroying our ability to counterstrike massively.
    With the North Koreans and various Islamist terrorist groups including Iran we can’t count on our enemies being rational or caring for their own lives, let alone the lives of their people.
    When SDI was first discussed I remember scientific experts saying it wasn’t possible, because it would be like hitting a bullet with a bullet. But they weren’t taking Moore’s law into account.
    The funny thing is that a lot of the same people are now assuring us that computer models can predict the behavior of the climate over the next century.

    Moore’s law states that the number of transistors that can be inexpensively placed on an integrated circuit is increasing exponentially, doubling approximately every two years. So hitting a bullet with a bullet becomes practical with enough fast, powerful computer-based sensors to do the job of detecting an incoming threat and directing fast, powerful computer-controlled interceptors to the threat. The systems being deployed are admittedly test-beds, but they are functional and used to demonstrate concepts and capabilities while next-generation components are being readied for deployment. Missile defense system components will probably always be under development as changes in technology allow greater precision and speed.
    We who are reality-based don’t see that we have a choice because sooner or later some bad guy out there is going to acquire nukes, put them on missiles, and send them our way. Sure, the bad guys could also try to sneak them in, fire them from a ship or sub just off the coast, or try the old Candygram-for-Mongo gambit, so we have to keep our guard up in many ways.
    But I don’t think we should give up, do you?

  5. bud

    The Iranians have nothing close to a system that can strike Europe AND that could be countered by a missile defense system based in Poland. If you’re a radical in Iran and see American ABMs going up in Poland are you really going to devote money to a system that will be defeated by such a system? Come on Mike; at least acknowledge that part of this defense scheme is designed to send a statement of some sort to the Russians.
    Cynically speaking I believe it has more to do with providing more big buck contracts to the companies developing the missiles than anything else. At least don’t dismiss that at as a possibility out of hand. There are many useless weapons out there that have made billions for the companies that developed them, the B-1 bomber is a good example. Worthless weapon but a big money maker.

  6. Lee Muller

    And, as usual, bud had nothing on which to base his personal beliefs about the evil motives behind America’s missile defense system.

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