“”I definitely think that the allowing of the financing of the bolshevik revolution and alliance with Stalin were both wrong policies. I merely point out the instincts that made these mistakes possible.””
Dear Brother, these bad decisions the US made were well thought out IMHO.
Too many Americans have been brainwashed(not claiming you are) into thinking anyone who speaks out against the bad decisions of america is un patriotic, but it is the farthest thing from the truth.
From the words of Joe Sobran...
The patriot differs from the nationalist in this respect too: he can laugh at his country, the way members of a family can laugh at each other’s foibles. Affection takes for granted the imperfection of those it loves; the patriotic Irishman thinks Ireland is hilarious, whereas the Irish nationalist sees nothing to laugh about.
The nationalist has to prove his country is always right. He reduces his country to an idea, a perfect abstraction, rather than a mere home. He may even find the patriot’s irreverent humor annoying.
Patriotism is relaxed. Nationalism is rigid. The patriot may loyally defend his country even when he knows it’s wrong; the nationalist has to insist that he defends his country not because it’s his, but because it’s right. As if he would have defended it even if he hadn’t been born to it! The nationalist talks as if he just “happens,” by sheer accident, to have been a native of the greatest country on earth — in contrast to, say, the pitiful Belgian or Brazilian.
Because the patriot and the nationalist often use the same words, they may not realize that they use those words in very different senses. The American patriot assumes that the nationalist loves this country with an affection like his own, failing to perceive that what the nationalist really loves is an abstraction — “national greatness,” or something like that. The American nationalist, on the other hand, is apt to be suspicious of the patriot, accusing him of insufficient zeal, or even “anti-Americanism.”
When it comes to war, the patriot realizes that the rest of the world can’t be turned into America, because his America is something specific and particular — the memories and traditions that can no more be transplanted than the mountains and the prairies. He seeks only contentment at home, and he is quick to compromise with an enemy. He wants his country to be just strong enough to defend itself.
But the nationalist, who identifies America with abstractions like freedom and democracy, may think it’s precisely America’s mission to spread those abstractions around the world — to impose them by force, if necessary. In his mind, those abstractions are universal ideals, and they can never be truly “safe” until they exist, unchallenged, everywhere; the world must be made “safe for democracy” by “a war to end all wars.” We still hear versions of these Wilsonian themes. Any country that refuses to Americanize is “anti-American” — or a “rogue nation.” For the nationalist, war is a welcome opportunity to change the world. This is a recipe for endless war.
In a time of war hysteria, the outraged patriot, feeling his country under attack, may succumb to the seductions of nationalism. This is the danger we face now.
In this we discern the difference between faith (not necessarily Christian faith but faith as a cognitive tool in general) -- and ideology. My faith is what I experience through my life; it is good for the faith to be catholic, -- held in common with the Church Eternal, but even a faith outside of religion, for example, faith in a certain ideal such as freedom, or the love for the Anglo-Saxons or for the Belgians from your post, or the Russians, -- is always a living and therefore self-correcting thing. Now, it does not mean I figure out my faith as I go along in the fashion of some religious sects, but I verify, for example, my prayer life and my confessional life by the results my life gives me. The metaphor would be a journey along a road that winds along the landscape instead of cutting through, defying all practicality, in a straight line.
Ideology cannot likewise adapt. People whose patriotism becomes an ideology have lost the ability to develop as the history progresses. An ideological system, periodically, faces a cognitive disconnect. Then it is best that it is destroyed, but unless faith replaces it, the next ideology will in due course likewise perish.
These are not my thoughts, I am retelling something I read earlier today on, what else, a Moscow Church of the Martyrs and the Confessors of Russia (non-MP) site by one Andrushkevich, and he says he got it from Ortega y Gasset.
On this a distinction can be build between a monarch and a constitution. Both are somewhat similar governing principles, except it is in the living person of the king that the nation can find its historical existence in a way constitutional legalisms cannot provide.
WALL STREET AND THE BOLSHEVIK REVOLUTION
PREFACE
Since the early 1920s, numerous pamphlets and articles, even a few books, have sought to forge a link between "international bankers" and "Bolshevik revolutionaries." Rarely have these attempts been supported by hard evidence, and never have such attempts been argued within the framework of a scientific methodology. Indeed, some of the "evidence" used in these efforts has been fraudulent, some has been irrelevant, much cannot be checked. Examination of the topic by academic writers has been studiously avoided; probably because the hypothesis offends the neat dichotomy of capitalists versus Communists (and everyone knows, of course, that these are bitter enemies). Moreover, because a great deal that has been written borders on the absurd, a sound academic reputation could easily be wrecked on the shoals of ridicule. Reason enough to avoid the topic.
Fortunately, the State Department Decimal File, particularly the 861.00 section, contains extensive documentation on the hypothesized link. When the evidence in these official papers is merged with nonofficial evidence from biographies, personal papers, and conventional histories, a truly fascinating story emerges.
We find there was a link between some New York international bankers and many revolutionaries, including Bolsheviks. These banking gentlemen — who are here identified — had a financial stake in, and were rooting for, the success of the Bolshevik Revolution.
Who, why — and for how much — is the story in this book.
Antony C. Sutton
March 1974