Well, how about on the sixtieth anniversary of invasion and occupation?
Posted on 05/07/2005 12:26:06 AM PDT by cweese
WASHINGTON (CBS) President George W. Bush, ignoring Moscow's objections about his trip to former Soviet republics, said that Russia should treat its neighbors with respect and not fear the rise of new democracies along its borders.
Bush on Friday opened a fast-paced four-country, five-day journey to mark the 60th anniversary of the defeat of Nazi Germany. The president will meet on Saturday with the leaders of Estonia, Lithuania and Latvia. For these Baltic countries, the end of World War II did not bring liberation. Instead, they traded Nazi oppression for nearly five decades of Soviet domination.
"This is a bittersweet moment for a lot of people in America who are from the Baltics," Mr. Bush said.
CBS News Correspondent Bob Schieffer reports that the president said he'll bring it up with Putin when they meet, which is sure to irritate the Russian leader who has called the collapse of the Soviet Union a catastrophe. Tensions are on the rise between the leaders, which was made clear by the president's visit to Latvia despite Putin's protesting.
Mr. Bush said he has reminded Russian President Vladimir Putin about that history, ahead of the victory celebrations. "Frankly, it's the beginning of a difficult period, and I can understand why some leaders of countries aren't going and some others are," the president said. He spoke in a series of pretrip interviews with television outlets in countries he will visit.
Lithuania's President Valdas Adamkus and Estonia's President Arnold Ruutel say they will stay home when dozens of world leaders — Bush included — go to Moscow for a parade Monday in Red Square to honor Russia's enormous sacrifices to defeat the Nazis.
Bush's trip has been clouded by Moscow's unhappiness about his stops in two former Soviet republics, Latvia and Georgia, which the Russians see as interference in its neighborhood. The president also will visit the Netherlands as well as Russia. Bush said he would tell Putin he should welcome peaceful democracies on Russia's borders.
"And so I will remind him that this is not a plot by anybody or any nation," Bush said. "This is just the inevitable course of humankind because all humans want to be free."
Mr. Bush said the three Baltic countries, as new members of NATO, have a security guarantee from the United States and its allies. Bush said he speaks with Putin frequently about the Baltics.
"And my job at times is to send a message that says, look, treat your neighbors with respect," Mr. Bush said. "Free nations, democracies on your border, are good for you — whether that be, by the way, in the Baltics or in Ukraine, I've sent that same message — or Georgia. In other words, countries that are free countries are countries that will be good neighbors."
And that message can apply to anywhere in the world. Putin believes the Iraq war has spawned more terrorists and that the war was perhaps Mr. Bush's biggest blunder.
In an exclusive interview to be broadcast on 60 Minutes on Sunday, Putin tells Correspondent Mike Wallace that the U.S. should question its own democratic ways before looking for problems with Russia's.
"In the United States, you first elect the electors and then they vote for the presidential candidates. In Russia, the president is elected through the direct vote of the whole population. That might be even more democratic," Putin said.
At the same time, Bush said he would tell Baltic leaders that democracy must include respect for minority rights, a nod to Moscow's unease about the treatment of Russian-speakers in the ex-Soviet republics.
Mr. Bush, in an interview on Russian television, acknowledged that the United States and Britain played a major role in reshaping Europe at the 1943 Yalta conference of Franklin Roosevelt, Winston Churchill and Josef Stalin. "I think that the main complaint would be that the form of government that the Baltics had to live under was not of their choosing," Bush said. "But, no, there's no question three leaders made the decision."
CBS News Correspondent Bill Plante was with Mr. Bush in Latvia, and said the president's message seemed clear: These Baltic states are fledgling democracies at a time when Russia is wandering off the path of Democracy and the rule of law.
Dan Fried, assistant secretary of state for European affairs, said on Air Force One that there are competing narratives about how World War II was won and the aftermath. "We have our dark spots too, just like the Russians, but we admit it," Fried said. He said the Russians do not.
Russia refuses to apologize for absorbing the Baltics, insisting that the Baltic governments of the time had willingly invited Soviet troops into their countries and agreed to join the Soviet Union. Baltic leaders say that if Russia wants glory for defeating the Nazis, it also should take responsibility for the occupation.
Putin said Moscow already has condemned the secret Soviet-Nazi pact that led to the occupation. In an interview published Friday, he said the Soviet-era legislature, the Supreme Soviet, had issued a resolution in 1989 that criticized the 1939 Molotov-Ribbentrop Pact as "a personal decision by (Soviet leader Josef) Stalin that contradicted the interests of the Soviet people."
"I want to repeat: We already did it," Putin said. "What, we have to do this every day, every year?"
Despite any cloudy forecast for the Bush-Putin relationship, the leaders will likely choose to keep any conflicting opinions hushed. As Plante reports, privately the leaders might admit there is a problem, but the U.S. leaders still need Putin and Russia to deal with the conflict in the Middle East and with nuclear proliferation. And Putin needs Mr. Bush, likewise.
President Bush will lay a wreath Saturday at Latvia's towering Freedom Monument, which served as a symbol of resistance in the difficult struggle for independence.
Mr. Bush's trip to Latvia, the Netherlands, Russia and the former Soviet republic of Georgia was designed to meet a variety of diplomatic needs.
Oh..Putin is mad at President Bush? That means he is doing the right thing. Russia is not to be trusted...nor the Chicoms or France for that matter..:) Welcome to the new world.
CBS didn't like it when President Reagan had the US Navy cross Ghadaffi's "line of death" in the Gulf of Sidra either.
I sometimes imagine the swearing and throwing of objects in their "news"room whenever Republicans don't heed their advice.
Russia is not to be trusted...nor the Chicoms or France for that matter
You got that right.
I'm sure they really freaked out when Reagan called the Soviet Union the "Evil Empire," or asked Mr. Gorbechev to "tear down this wall."
And President Reagan failed to finish the job in 1987 when he had the chance. He could have taken out that terrorist loving phony. Remember Lockerbie!
At the time the Lockerbie terrorist attack, noone knew what organization had planted the bomb on Pan Am flight 103. It was much later that the Libyans were implicated.
Well, how about on the sixtieth anniversary of invasion and occupation?
Well, how about on the sixtieth anniversary of invasion and occupation?
AM We have us a Troll, Call in the Viking Kitties
| Liberal headline writers at work
Bush Trip Brews Russian Tension |
Still, it's interesting to compare the The Munich Pact (wikipedia.org background). to the Molotov-Ribbentrop Pact (wikipedia.org background). Assessing them as equivalent in their depravity is altogether another matter.
In the first case, we had the west's appeasers wringing their hands, hoping to avoid WWII. In the second case, we had Soviet and Nazi chicanery at their zenith: both sides scheming to see if they could buy more time to prepare for their preparation for global domination.
What lessons can we take from this?
Thank you good America friend"risk"
"President George W. Bush, ignoring Moscow's objections about his trip to former Soviet republics, said that Russia should treat its neighbors with respect and not fear the rise of new democracies along its borders."
Thank you America strong President. Europe information news ping Thank you all
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