Though “Bibi” Netanyahu won re-election last week, the
Senate Permanent Subcommittee on Investigations will still look into whether
the State Department financed a clandestine effort to defeat him. Reportedly,
State funneled $350,000 to an American NGO called OneVoice, which
has an Israeli subsidiary, Victory 15, that collaborated with U.S. operatives
to bring Bibi down.
If we are now secretly pumping cash into the free elections
of friendly countries, to dump leaders President Obama dislikes, Americans have
a right to know why we are using Cold War tactics against democracies.
After World War II, my late colleague on CNN’s “Crossfire,”
Tom Braden, delivered CIA cash to democratic parties in Europe imperiled by
communist parties financed from Moscow. But that was done to combat Stalinism
when
Western survival was at stake in a Cold War that ended in
1991.
Hopefully, after looking into OneVoice and V15, the Senate
will expand its investigation into a larger question: Is the U.S. using NGOs to
subvert regimes around the world? And, if so, who decides which regimes may be subverted?
What gives these questions urgency is the current crisis
that has Moscow moving missiles toward Europe and sending submarines and
bombers to probe NATO defenses.
America contends that Vladimir Putin’s annexation of Crimea
and backing for pro-Russian rebels in Ukraine is the cause of the gathering
storm in Russian-NATO relations.
Yet Putin’s actions in Ukraine were not taken until the
overthrow of a democratically elected pro-Russian regime in Kiev, in a coup
d’etat in which, Moscow contends, an American hand was clearly visible.
Not only was John McCain in Kiev’s Maidan Square egging on
the crowds that drove the regime from power, so, too, was U.S. Assistant
Secretary of State Victoria Nuland. In an intercepted phone call with our
ambassador in Kiev, Nuland identified the man we preferred when President
Viktor Yanukovych was ousted. “Yats,” she called him. And when Yanukovych fled
after the Maidan massacre, sure enough, Arseniy Yatsenyuk was in power. Nuland
also revealed
the U.S. had spent $5 billion since 1991 to bring about the
reorientation of Ukraine toward the West.
Now, bringing Ukraine into the EU and NATO may appear to
Nuland & Co. a great leap forward for freedom and progress. But to Russia
it looks like the subversion of a Slavic nation with which she has had intimate
ties for centuries, to bring Ukraine into an economic union and military
alliance directed against Moscow. And if NATO stumbles into a military clash
with Russia, the roots of that conflict will be traceable to the coup in Kiev that
Russians believe was the dirty work of Americans.
If the U.S. had a role in that coup, the American people
should know it and the Senate should find out whether Nuland & Co. used
NGOs to reignite a Cold War that Ronald Reagan brought to an end.
Not in our lifetimes has America been more distrusted and
disliked. And among the reasons is that we are seen as constantly carping at
governments that do not measure up to our standards of democracy, and endlessly
interfering in the affairs of nations that do not threaten us.
In 2003, we helped to overthrow the Georgian regime of
Eduard Shevardnadze in a “Rose Revolution” that brought to power Mikheil
Saakashvili. And Saakashvili nearly dragged us into a confrontation with Russia
in 2008, when he invaded South Ossetia and killed Russian peacekeepers. What
vital
interest of ours was there in that little nation in the Caucasus,
the birthplace of Stalin, to justify so great a risk?
Nor is it Moscow alone that is angered over U.S.
interference in its internal affairs and those of its neighbor nations. President
Abdel Fattah al-Sisi of Egypt has expelled members of U.S. NGOs. Beijing
believes U.S. NGOs were behind the Occupy-Wall-Street-style street blockages in
Hong Kong.
If true, these U.S. actions raise a fundamental question:
What is the preeminent goal of U.S. foreign policy? Is it to protect the vital interests
and national security of the Republic? Or do we believe with George W. Bush
that, “The survival of liberty” in America “depends on the success of liberty
in other lands.”
If the latter, then our mission is utopian — and unending.
For if we believe our liberty is insecure until the whole world is democratic,
then we cannot rest until we witness the overthrow of the regimes in Russia, China,
North Korea, Vietnam, Iran, Syria, Saudi Arabia, Egypt, Belarus, most Arab and
African nations, as well as Venezuela and Cuba. And if that is our goal, our
Republic will die trying to achieve it.
Patrick J. Buchanan is the author of the new book “The
Greatest Comeback.”
Comments
Good article by an honest journalist. All the evidence shows
the wastefulness and folly of our foreign policy. The survival of our Liberty depends on our
success in restoring our liberty in the U.S. and nowhere else. Communist countries have rotten economies and
we’re getting there fast. These NGOs are subversive everywhere and need to be
defunded.
Norb Leahy, Dunwoody GA Tea Party Leader
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