Diplomacy worked so well with Vietnam
One of this last week’s commenters made the completely intellectually vacant point (while defending Ron Paul’s contention that we should withdraw inside our borders and depend on diplomacy instead of projecting our military power) that we’ve done so much better with our relationship with Vietnam using diplomacy than we did with the force of arms. Well, I picked up this story at Democracy Project;
The other day, Vietnam voted along with China, Russia, Libya, Burkina Faso, and Costa Rica on the UN Security Council, against the US, Britain and France for a U.N. special envoy and a voluntary arms embargo of Zimbabwe. Even UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon said it was “just unacceptable” that the election results had not been released a month after the vote. “We know who is the winner,” he added.
This was just another of Vietnam’s many international positions opposed to both the West and to human rights around the world. (I wrote about what to expect from Vietnam being allowed to sit on the UN’s Security Council here.)
They joined with China and Russia (shock!) to oppose a voluntary arms embargo of Zimbabwe. Why, other than the fact that they stand to make money shipping arms into Mugabe’s Zimbabwe would anyone vote against a voluntary arms embargo? Oh, maybe the fact that China, Russia and Vietnam are ideological allies of Mugabe who is trying to maintain control of his country using the Leninist/Stalinist/Maoist/Minhist tactic of starving the people into submission.
Category: Foreign Policy, Politics, Ron Paul
Hi John,
I had an E-Mail exchange with Cousin Scott about that “Commentator” and made the observation that Haskell Types like him all seemed to have the same old, “Cookie Cutter (Made in Viet Nam)” mentality that it is always the United State’s deployment of Military Forces, pretty much anywhere, anytime that is the true source of Evil in this world, and sure to lead to our downfall (shades of Rev, Dudley-Do).
All we have to do, at any impasse is, admit defeat and go home, and the World will once again sing in perfect harmony, and, oh yeah, thank us for seeing the light and flock to our door step for a group hug.
I’m still scratching my head as to how any supposedly intelligent individual could possibly believe that everything actually got so much better and roseier as a result of our withdrawal from that abysmal conflict that we should have, and could have, just plain won, and, at the same time, seemingly lament the fact that we didn’t win. Especially in light of known facts such as those you just pointed out.
I guess my pointy head must be a little dulled by repeated contact with reality.