Past & Present

A U.S. court has ruled that punishment is owed to a former official in the El Salvador government. The court said that during the dirty war against the FMLN insurgency of the late 1970s and 1980s, the ex-deputy defense minister Nicolas Carranza directed acts of torture against suspects. We’ll see where it goes on the inevitable appeals. I wonder what stand the U.S. government is or will take on this case.

http://http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/americas/4451966.stm

One of the ya-hoos who tried to deny the Nazi Final Solution ever happened has been arrested in Austria.

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2005/11/17/AR2005111700583_pf.html

It is common when news of Israel-Arab conflicts hit the streets to hear people who happily embrace their ignorance say “Well, those people over there have been fighting since the time of Christ, blah, blah, blah . . .” The fact of the matter is that most of the forces driving both this conflict and the attempts to fix it arose since Israel was founded in 1948. U.S. Secretary of State Condoleeza Rice, to her credit, stated yesterday the enduring importance of the Six-Day War of 1967. Here’s what she said:

By midmorning Tuesday, Rice was able to announce a comprehensive agreement between Israel and the Palestinian Authority to ease Gaza’s isolation and provide reliable access for its goods and people to Israel and the outside world. She called the deal “a major step forward” that would allow the Palestinians to “live ordinary lives” and would establish a new “pattern of cooperation” between the two sides. “For the first time since 1967, Palestinians will gain control over entry and exit from their territory,” she said, referring to the Middle East war, when Israel occupied Gaza and the West Bank

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2005/11/15/AR2005111500144.html

A student asked me a good question today. In class yesterday I mentioned in passing that China became a communist country in 1949 when Mao tse-Tung prevailed in a civil war. The student asked if China was still communist, or maybe kind of communist? And, if so, why is the U.S. so friendly, in trade relations especially, with China?

I put here how I responded, and not because I think I am knowledgeable about China. As I told him, it’s important to think about.

Hi Matt:

Good for you for thinking hard about China, because the country deserves the attention from us. You know what? I and others in the history department agree that China is on the road to becoming so powerful that this present century will be known to history as “The Chinese Century” just as the 20th Century is called “The American Century.”

I think you said it yourself when you say China is kind of communist. China is still a communist country in the sense that they call themselves communist, it is the communist party in control of government, and the government presents itself as descendents of Mao tse-Tung’s leadership. And it is true that the U.S. is friendlier to this government than it is to Cuba or North Korea. (The U.S. is also friendly with Vietnam, I think, even though this country is also
communist.) But the country seems to act less and less communist all the time. They are encouraging private businesses to flourish, they encourage trade with the U.S. and anybody else with cash to spend and they embrace the shop-till-you-drop mentality that is making the growing number of well-off city residents look a lot like yuppies in Minneapolis or Chicago. (Factory workers and rural residents continue to wallow in impoverished misery). But the government is still repressive and authoritarian — not as brutal and bloodthirsty or Mao or Stalin but truer to their style of government than to democracies such as the U.S. that allow a free press, demonstrations and elections.

The quick answer to your overall question is that we have decided that it would bring more harms than benefits to us if we were simply hostile to China and isolated ourselves from them. Being linked with China in our economy and in our diplomacy is too necessary. So you see that governments like ours and most others are not consistent, they are not faithful to a doctrine like “shun all Communist regimes” if there is more harm than good in following that doctrine. Plus, I think our political leaders are secretly smug about the fact that although China still calls itself communist, that they are acting more and more capitalist all the time.

I think a better question (although I know the answer already) is why are we so hostile to Cuba, not why are we so friendly with China.

Thanks again for writing Matt. I hope I didn’t blab on too long here.

Bert Kreitlow