Re: <nettime> World War III Diary: NATO Expansion is a Tripwire for War

[Stan Norton <stan@stannorton.com>]

"T.V. Weber & Alida Weber" <jatich@mcs.com> writes:

> During the breakup of the former Soviet Union, Russia willingly
> dissolved the Warsaw Pact, with the understanding that the West would
> reciprocate by dissolving NATO. To reciprocate would have made good
> sense, from the standpoint of both practicality and morality.



The Warsaw pact was an Imperialist construct that simply no longer
obtained with the demise of the Soviet Union's (and local
government's) strangle hold over former client states.

The Russians didn't "willingly dissolve" anything. The Pact dissolved
itself. This is like saying that American slave owners "willingly dissolved"
their "pact" with their slaves when slavery was abolished.

The Russians also had no external rationale for "understanding" that
the collapse of their empire would result in the dissolution of NATO,
which was, to a large degree, a consortium born primarily of
fear of Soviet ambition.

Why should the opponents of a failed empire feel compelled to dissolve
a successful union - with current activities well beyond defense from
the Pact - for reasons of "morality" on the demise of the initial, but
no longer compelling,  catalyst for their consortium?  

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