Rubin on the Illegitimacy of Russia’s Georgia Invasion…and Some Spinoff Thoughts from Me
[These are just my thoughts. Please don't think that because I'm a pastor, I think that they're imbued with the truth of God. I'm just me and I could be wrong.]
Columnist Trudy Rubin says that she’s gotten a lot of flak for her support of the US government’s condemnation of the Russian attack on neighboring Georgia. The objections have, she says, fallen into three main categories:
- Because of the US invasion of Iraq, the US has lost any moral authority in condemning Russia
- Because the Georgian president “miscalculated” by “invading” South Ossetia, a province of the Georgian nation
- Because the US allegedly put the Georgians up to the aforementioned “invasion”
Rubin opposes the Bush doctrine of preemption and acknowledges what she sees as errors in the US policy in Iraq. But, she asserts, “they don’t excuse Russia’s brutal behavior in Georgia or toward its other neighbors, behavior that began long before Bush took office. America’s ‘moral standing’ is irrelevant in judging Russia’s actions.” She also says that President “Saakashvili may have acted rashly, and he may have flaws as a leader, but he’s the elected president of a tiny nation next to a giant nuclear power.” [emphasis mine]
She goes on to write:
Russia presents itself as a champion of Ossetian self-determination. That’s absurd. Russia has brutally repressed separatist movements inside its territory, particularly in Chechnya, where Russian artillery and bombs have killed untold thousands of civilians.
This is an important point. A recent poll in the US says that a frightening percentage of Americans think that it’s okay for a portion of our country to secede any time it wants. An even higher percentage of younger Americans believe secession is fine.
This sentiment overlooks a fundamental assertion of the Founders, one that was underscored by our own Civil War: Secession or independence can only be legitimate when rooted in moral imperatives.
The Declaration of Independence legitimized the US breakaway from Great Britain on the basis of “self-evident” moral principles. When the Confederate States broke away from the US, they claimed to do so on the basis of similar moral principles. They wanted freedom. But the freedom they wanted was the freedom to enslave others unencumbered by moral considerations.*
The two troublesome provinces in Georgia may want independence. But it appears that the desire has nothing to do with moral principles. That is one more factor which, for Americans conversant with their history anyway, should further delegitimatize Russia’s invasion of Georgia.
And Russia, which has, at best, limited concern for other peoples’ “self-determination,” is acting solely on the desire of Vladimir Putin to in some way reconstitute the Soviet Union. As Rubin writes:
Putin has been clear about wanting to restore the Kremlin’s former empire, calling the Soviet breakup the “greatest geopolitical tragedy of the 20th century.”
Given what has happened to Georgia, other former Soviet Republics now have good reason to worry. Putin has threatened to target Russia’s nuclear weapons against Ukraine if that country continues efforts to join NATO (and a Russian general just warned that Poland could face attack over a missile-defense deal with Washington).
Russia has cut supplies of natural gas to Ukraine and waged cyberwar against Baltic states. Ukraine’s President Viktor Yushchenko believes Moscow was behind an assassination attempt by poison that nearly killed him…
So it doesn’t matter who “started” the crisis in Georgia. It has little to do with Ossetian rights and everything to do with Putin’s drive to restore Russian power. Had Saakashvili not sent troops into Ossetia, Russia would have found another excuse to attack.
Rubin, I think, is right to say that the next US president will have to evolve a common policy with the Europeans for dealing with the Russian government’s desire to keep its neighbors–and others–under its thumb.
Russia, as Rubin concedes, has every right to develop a sphere of influence via economic and diplomatic means. But Putin’s Neo-Stalinism must be confronted by the world. (Please don’t think I’m advocating a war with Russia. I’m not.)
There are several implications that arise from the events in Russia, the emailed reactions received by Rubin, and general US ignorance of our own history:
1. Given the enormous challenges represented by the repressive regimes in both Russia and China, the next president will have to make international cooperation a top priority. This doesn’t mean ceding US sovereignty, but ensuring its continuation.
2. The US has dithered on this point for thirty years, but it is essential that we develop our own energy sources. There appears to be an increasing consensus, even in this contentious election year, that we must develop multiple energy sources and they must be of the domestic variety. The US can ill-afford to allow itself to be raked over an energy barrel. With the rise of the BRIC nations–Brazil, Russia, India, and China, there will be increased competition for world oil and gas resources. Two of those countries can, I think, be classified as hostile competitors. (Note: I did not describe them as enemies.) In the real world of the twenty-first century, the US must engage these powers, but understand that we cannot look into the eyes of their leaders and detect benign democrats. We must ensure energy self-sufficiency.
3. Reports of the demise of the state in deference to a globalized world in which organizations and corporations that cross national lines play the supreme role are greatly exaggerated. Richard Branson’s Virgin brand may, for example, undertake space flight, taking on benign functions previously associated with governments. And the evil of terrorism may be directed by a wealthy person like Osama bin Laden. But governments, with their power (and responsibility) to tax, are the entities that have the greatest ability to help their people or project power in a way that endangers and enslaves their own nation and other peoples. US foreign policy must not forget that we still live in world in which governments wield great influence in human affairs.
4. Domestically, we must give higher priority to teaching history and other social studies. For Americans to so misread the Revolutionary War and the Declaration of Independence as to accept that secession can be undertaken just when people feel like it, thereby legitimizing not just breakaways in distant Georgia, but maybe even within this country, is frightening. The ethnic and religious fragmentations in today’s world are buttressed by such ignorance. “A knowledge of the past prepares us for the crisis of the present and the challenge of the future,” John Kennedy once wrote. We will do more to ensure America’s future with a true, honest, and appreciative understanding of our history and the principles that underlay our Revolution, Declaration of Independence, and Constitution than we will by enhancing science education, important though that is. Ignorant citizens are ill-prepared to make wise judgments when they go to the voting booth. An understanding of our own history will be a positive lens through which to view world events.
End of this far-flung rant, which was crossposted at lunchtime today on my personal blog.
*Ann Althouse, a professor of Constitutional Law, recently wrote about this here.
Author Joyce Hakim also wrote about when secession is legitimate or illegitimate in her readable history of the United States. Writing of the sentiments of the rebel Confederate States in the present tense, Hakim notes:
…the Southerners…believe in “states’ rights.” They think any state should have the right to pull out of the Union, and that it is tyranny to keep them in against their wishes. They say they are doing the same thing George Washington and the other revolutionaries did against King George: fighting for their freedom. But it is a white freedom they are fighting for, and the North won’t let them do it. Revolution is only right, says President Lincoln, “for morally justified cause.” The South has no just cause. So, said Lincoln, secession is “simply a wicked exercise of political power.”
Not all revolutions or secessionist movements should be wrapped in red, white, and blue bunting.
12 Responses to “Rubin on the Illegitimacy of Russia’s Georgia Invasion…and Some Spinoff Thoughts from Me”
Again, a reminder in case all the hoo-ha gets you feeling a little brainwashed pro-BigOil.
They were at the start of all this. Russia never would've threatened Georgia's new found independance if it didn't think the US was overstepping it's bounds (as it has been) by allowing BigOil to convince (read: lie to) Congress to expand its empire into Iraq and get Georgian troops to help.
The fact that the Georgian president smells like a puppet, given that he was schooled in the US (now how did the Russians come to THAT conclusion…lol…) was just another slap in the face with a brick-lined glove.
In other words, no matter what McCain and the GOP BigOil cronies sing to you about how bad bad Russia is so mean and nasty and wrong, they are really just preventing further US/GOP/BigOil expansion in their Hemisphere. And expansion that WE and not they, initiated by “our” invasion of Iraq for purposes of oil.
Period.
They never would be in Georgia right now if it wasn't for “us”.
Sending battleships in with “aide” to the Georgian's in what Russia now considers its terrorial protectorate (again, thanks to “our” intial actions) is yet another glove-slap with a brick inside.
And it may be our last. Prepare your boys and girls to be drafted soon. If American troops die in this clearly orchestrated setup, we will “have” to retaliate..
And you know what that means. Forget cold war, this one's going to be hot…
Radioactive maybe..
You know Congress, it's really really time for you to cut your vacation short. I really really really think you need to come back and rein this thing in before they finish us off for good.
At least the material and exerpts that started this thread don't include a contemporary nauseating idiocy I encountered when I lived in Maryland — a bunch of PC kiddies wanted to change the state's anthem because it's anti-PC or “pro-Confederate.”
The South had the right to leave the Union if it wanted. It lost to a much stronger power motivated by Manifest Destiny. We were a growing nation — no way would we tolerate the loss of _existing_ territory!
What dims the the South's secession in addition to the perpetuation of slavery was that it was not merely dispassionate self-interest, but because it was _selfish._ As Trollope (the younger) wrote, the South was happy to stay in the Union so long as it remained the more or most powerful part of it and would get its way. (It was New Englanders who first had considered secession, during the War of 1812, while Southerners like Calhoun who were Unionists of the early 1800s. Those who already know their history well enough also can recall the “Virginia Dynasty” as well as Southern influence in the location of the federal government.) In earlier years, the South had its way, and it chose to stay in the Union. Once it saw its power and influence permanently diminished and held by the “Roundheads,” they, the “Cavaliers,” chose (finally) to leave.
An earlier secession, in 1848 (merely coincidental with European strife), may well have been successful for the South. But by the 1860s, it was dwarfed by the North's power. (Had the Confederates chosen to fight guerrilla-style rather than conventionally and romantically, and been more bold — invading the Midwest and hauling away the harvest, say, in addition to conducting a larger attack on the Northeast, such as at Baltimore or at Philadelphia, cutting off the capital –they might have held out longer or even succeeded in the 1860s.)
We should stay a Union. Absolutely. I couldn't be more conservative when it comes to that. I think Texas still needs to be reminded of that from time to time. In fact IMHO, the current administration is a de facto coup attempt by Texas to take back the United States since we wouldn't let “The Lone Star State” seceed from the Union.
This may sound silly and dated, but I really believe there's a group in Texas that is wealthy, tied with oil and never really got over not being allowed to break away.
Of all the states that make noise about secession, Texas is the first one to pop into my mind. Oh, and that is HQ for most of the oil tycoons, including Bush.
Must just be a coincidence.
As it relates to the Russian invasion of Georgia? Well, Georgian independance was respected until the US became a problem over there for Russian intelligence. And they ARE intelligent people folks. I wonder how we would feel if arabs were found to have close and unnerving ties with Texan Oil tycoons? What if they were even tight with our President.
Oh, wait a minute…they are. Salem Bin Laden and Bush were old business partners from back in the day..
And so on…
“Hypocrisy” will be the word historians use to describe WWIII most often.
Life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness, yes? Then any desire to secede in order to run one's own affairs would fall under at least item two. I don't think you can hold any coherent policy that some people should be able to secede because they are morally worthy and others are not.
pacatrue:
I didn't say that secession depended on those seceding being “morally worthy.” Good grief, I'm not morally worthy. Why would I press that on anybody else?
No, what I said was that their argument was rooted in moral principles. You quote the opening lines of the Declaration. It goes on to flesh that out by enumerating a set of moral principles which the Founders believed Great Britain had violated, legitimizing the break.
Mark Daniels
There is nothing frightening about accepting the concept of a right to secede from the United States today, no more than there were many up North in 1861 whose response to the Confederate secession was “Let them go, and good riddance!”
Welcome to the real world.
In that real world, the concept of a contemporary secession introduces the set of conditions which would make a secession not only successful, but beyond that, logical. That in turn leads to consideration of just what people want states in this century to be, and possibilities (unlikely as they are) for reorganization and rationalization. (To be brief, first and foremost the seceding territory should be viable on its own, the same criterion that would change our set of states today from what were created in the days before “destruction of distance” by modern transport and communications, as well as the colonialist arbitrary creation of straight-line state boundaries in the case of much of the West. To answer Pacatrue's issue, the basis for secession would be utility and practicality as well as logic and notion of community.)
* * *
“This may sound silly and dated, but I really believe there's a group in Texas that is wealthy, tied with oil and never really got over not being allowed to break away. “
They learned to accept an ocean of Yankee money since the 1930s.
Plus some of them have located their businesses offshore so at least they can avoid taxes.
“Of all the states that make noise about secession, Texas is the first one to pop into my mind. Oh, and that is HQ for most of the oil tycoons, including Bush.”
California is first and foremost, and it's more often proposed by lefties than by righties. As popular or more so is the almost-100%-lefty “Cascadia” dream for the Pacific Northwest.
I had a friend once (not a lefty) advocate creating another Chile on our west coast by uniting California, Oregon, and Washington (I'd draw a new boundary along the Pacific Crest, though, where OR and WA should be divided into two states each, anyway) with BC and the Alaska Panhandle. We might offer to buy Baja California from Mexico while we were at it, too.
Why would Texas succeed? It is allowed to split into 5 separate states (the only state that is so allowed). Much more effective.
I want to explain that I was not confusing “secede” and “succeed,” but using each word as intended. Any state or states (or people in them) who would want to secede would hope and even expect to succeed before taking such an action.
Yes, Texas can become multiple (at one time, slave) states, which is (and was) effective (particularly in the Senate). Of course, other states like California could and even should be made into multiple states (the same is true with Oregon and Washington; their wet western and dry eastern sides are different worlds altogether).
And if the nation were sane, we'd see in some instances (on the Great Plains, for one thing) something that needs to be desperately done in places like Upstate New York, but isn't there because of bureaucratic culture and tradition — consolidation.
T E X A S
It's one place I haven't lived, but I've had the chance to visit it a number of times. Yes, many Texans consider their land to be the greatest place on earth.
“Texas would make 220 States the size of Rhode Island, 54 the size of Connecticut, six the size of New York. Texas is four times bigger than the combined New England States.”
“But as clearly as anyone else Leader Garner saw that Texas itself will object to five Texases. The bigness of Texas is the supreme boast of every Texan. To hack the State up into five Arkansases would, to most of its citizens, be dismembering an empire.”
http://www.time.com/time/magazine/article/0,917…
“IF Texas were ever to be divided into seperate states (which again, is, by gawd, OUR right! LOL), how do y'all think it should be done? Ground rules for the discussion are to stick to what is supposed to be allowable. That is, no few than three, but no more than five. When you do, make clear (at least as much as possible), boundaries and etc.”
http://www.city-data.com/forum/texas/146689-how…
Floor yielded for now.
[...] Rubin on the Illegitimacy of Russia’s Georgia Invasion…and Some …But, she asserts, “they don’t excuse Russia’s brutal behavior in Georgia or toward its other neighbors, behavior that began long before Bush took office. America’s ‘moral standing’ is irrelevant in judging Russia’s actions. … [...]