How the Left tries to forget the 1980s
~~"and just as a matter of fact the US did not precipitate the fall of the USSR and its allies"~~
---zergimmi
“Unless you want to count the massive military and cruise missile buildup Reagan pulled off in Europe in the 80s that bankrupted the USSR. That caused it and the rest of its subsidiary nations to fall just like the dominoes we were so afraid of for so long in Asia, and allowed the people to overthrow their governments.”
The above quote and reply pairing were taken from couchman’s thread “Why the Left Loves Osama”. The reply was mine.
It never ceases to completely amaze me just how far those on the Left will sometimes go to downplay the role of the US, and Ronald Reagan in particular, as pertaining to the collapse of the Soviet Union. For a well-written and (somewhat) concise history of those events and the events that preceded and gave rise to them, see the link.
For the Left in America, and not to mention in Europe, to say that Reagan and the US had nothing do with the fall of Soviet communism is simply another blatant example of revisionist history.
To the liberal Left, Reagan has always been little more than a vacuously grinning, somewhat dim, yet affable old geezer who very nearly brought the world to nuclear destruction with his wild schemes for SDI and a missile buildup in Europe. Remember the demonstrators in Germany, waving their placards saying “Better Red than Dead”?
They just don’t, or perhaps won’t, get it; Reagan had a perception and clarity of vision that was lacking in every American president from FDR on up….those who had to deal with the Soviet government as an equal power. He had enough wisdom to see and understand that the Soviet Union was slowly crumbling. Their economy was not strong enough to support their enormous military budget, and still support those of their satellite states, as well. Morale there was low among the people and in the military, as was confidence in their government.
He wasn’t afraid to challenge them because knew that, with Gorbachev in power, we could deal peaceably with him and come out on top. The fact that he was proven absolutely correct in his vision and its execution cuts no ice on the Left. They continue to be baffled even today by his longstanding popularity with the American people.
In every major confrontation with the West, Reagan saw, the Soviets were the first to blink. From Berlin in 1948 to Cuba in 1962 to Grenada in 1983, they came out on the losing side. He wasn’t afraid, then, to stand firm in the face of Soviet posturing and belligerence because he understood that it was all a front.
The vaunted, state-of-the-art Soviet Red Army had spent a decade floundering in its efforts against the partisan Afghan tribes, some of whom were fighting with muzzleloaders and Molotov cocktails; the USSR quickly withdrew their support when American Marines landed in Grenada.
There was no heart, no fight, left in them to back up their words. Perhaps there never had been, really. A system built on a lie, that murders its own people by the millions in its own name, cannot really be said to have a heart, in my opinion.
I firmly believe that, in the next 50-100 years, after history makes its verdict, Ronald Wilson Reagan will be looked upon as one of our best presidents, and as the man who, by finally vanquishing Soviet Communism, saved Western democracy, perhaps from itself. Our false perception of the fierce Soviet Bear had, after all, been a serious handicap in all previous rounds of negotiations and confrontations.
Reagan revitalized those on the Right, their political representation, and made Americans proud, and their nation strong, again. They hadn’t had much to be proud of in the ten years prior to January 1981.
Reagan’s presidency and its legacy, after 16 years, still resound through world politics, while Carter and Clinton, for example, each still search for a legacy to which to lay claim.
Let the revisionists do their worst. We all know how it really happened.