Sept. 2, 2022–Mikhail Gorbachev, who presided over the needless demise of the Soviet Union, was praised on his own demise by U.S. President Joe Biden. “(A) man of remarkable vision,” Biden’s statement claimed, noting Gorbachev’s role in bringing about the end to the Soviet Union, the United States’ foremost enemy.
Now we all know that Biden is prone to gaffes. But this is no gaffe. The Soviet President bringing down the Soviet Union is truly the reason, the only reason, why Washington adores Gorbachev.
Gorbachev’s “reforms” of the Soviet Union’s economic and political structures at the same time not only brought about the dismantling of the Soviet Union, but also resulted in the ruin of the Soviet economy, inflicting economic woes, misery, and poverty on most Russians. Which accounts for why Gorbachev is still despised and hated by most Russians.
For Washington, “Gorby,” as he was fondly nicknamed in American media, was a godsend and a genius.
After all, in a few short years, Gorby had managed to destroy the U.S.S.R., a feat Washington had dreamed of but failed to achieve for almost half a century. Despite its dogged policy of “containment,” despite its NATO military alliance, and despite all the might and cost of its conventional and nuclear forces aimed at the Soviet state
So what’s not to like?
How could Washington possibly ask more of any Soviet leader? It was Washington’s wet dream come true. And for the head of state of the Soviet Union himself to do the deed, to make Washington’s wet dream come true, well, glory, hallelujah, praise the Lord!
Washington and its Pentagon didn’t have to fire a shot. They didn’t have to lift a finger. Their Gorby did all the heavy lifting for them.
So the least Washington (echoed as always by Brussels, Berlin, and Tokyo) could do is to use a lot of cheap hyperventilating words to send off its Gorby into the dustbin of history.
© 2022. All rights reserved.