While there is no clear evidence that Joe Biden knows how to read, his performance at the teleprompter makes that a 50/50 proposition. We needn't worry though... He is married to the very well-educated "Dr." Jill Biden.
Since Joe either can't or won't read it on his own, I'm recommending that Dr. Jill speed read, “The Guns of August” by Barbara Tuchman, to Joey beginning at 5 pm each night until Joe hits Never Neverland through to completion.
Published in 1962, and remaining on the bestseller list for 42 consecutive weeks, Tuchman’s masterpiece provides the ultimate telling of the WWI story, from its origins until the guns went silent, leaving roughly 40 million casualties, including 22 million dead. Tuchman’s manifest objective in writing “The Guns of August” was to show how disastrous the consequences of inept leadership lead to oblivion.
On June 28, 1914, Garrilo Princincip, a Serbian Nationalist, assassinated Austria's Archduke Franz Ferdinand, heir apparent to the throne of Austria Hungary, and his wife Sophie, Duchess of Hohenberg. At the time, there were two basic European Alliances facing off in Europe: “The Triple Entente”, whose members were the Russian Empire, the French Third Republic, and the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland, and the "Triple Alliance" consisting of Austria/Hungary, Germany, and Italy. Eventually, Italy joined The Triple Entente and the Ottoman Empire became a part of the Triple Alliance.
In 1914, most or all of these countries had reciprocal treaty obligations, which meant if one were attacked, the others were Treaty bound to defend her. Each of the nations on both sides of this divide were ruled by related hereditary monarchs. Most had organic brain damage resulting from their incestuous childbearing traditions and were almost as dumb as Joe.
Throughout the month of July 1914, members of the conflicting alliances were mobilizing for war, and on some level, negotiating for peace.
Oh, to be a fly on the wall during that hot summer month…Can you imagine the German, Kaiser Wilhelm, grandson of Queen Victoria, and first cousin of British King George V’s conversation?
... “Ok cousin, I don't care about protecting Austria, we're going to War because Granny Victoria loved you more. I'll show her!”…
In any event, diplomacy failed, and on August 4th, England declared war on Germany based upon the German invasion of Belgium. The first shots were fired and WWI, the greatest slaughter-fest to that point, was off to the races.
How important was “The Guns of August”?
JFK claimed the “The Guns of August” to have been his guiding light during his three-dimensional diplomatic chess match with Khrushchev during the Cuban Missile Crisis.
The result?
A brilliant U.S. victory, accomplishing the goal of our enemies not getting to nuke us from Cuba while allowing Kruschrev to leave the field of battle with face-saving honor.
Joe and his very untalented team have been hyping the crisis between Ukraine and Russia for weeks. None of us know what, when, or if Russia has any intention of invading Ukraine. To me, it looks like Joe’s Wag the Dog initiative so far. That said, the Russian / Ukraine border is a potential flashpoint for conflict and should be taken seriously.
The American Pravda, including fake conservative Fifth Columnist David Brooks, is giving Joey high marks for "rallying NATO against Putin, etc.”
NATO is now a weak Alliance. Without the will or the boots on the ground to seriously confront Putin, Vlad knows he can play us like a fiddle.
Even assuming a Russian Invasion to be imminent, can Joe identify what America's tragic national interest is in Ukraine? Joe has claimed that we must defend Ukraine because it is a democracy!
Sorry, Joe… Ukraine is not a democracy, but a Dictatorship, in Russia's backyard.
Joe, we all know that you need a victory, but Dr. Jill needs to read you “The Guns of August” as your bedtime story. You should know by now that there is more to bedtime than milk and cookies… We know that you will do something stupid, but don't do anything really stupid, that's all we ask.
Like your old boss said, “Don’t underestimate how much Joe can fuck things up...”
Joe, you're not Obama's gal Friday anymore… During your first year, we have seen how much you can F things up!
BE CAREFUL.
-Emes
another great essay. Our friends and relatives in Eastern Europe seem to think this is all a big CIA psy-op, ostensibly to prop up Biden's administration as some sort of foreign policy geniuses. They believe that Putin never intended to truly invade Ukraine, beyond the Donetsk and Luhansk-and that the Biden admin has been hyping this "invasion" to make Joey look like he is a master of diplomacy. Keep in mind, our relatives have a lot more to lose should a full fledged invasion pan out, since they are literal neighbors of the battle front. Time will tell...but one thing is certain, Joe Biden and his State Department are dunces.
Thank you for the thought provoking piece, and I am thrilled that CC now has a section devoted to comments. That promises to make this noble effort of yours even more robust a vehicle for influencing and informing.
I do have to say, however, that I disagree with it in a number of fundamental respects.
First of all, the ad hominem attack on Biden is unfair and uncalled for. Whatever his personal shortcomings are, this is a mean spirited assault on his intellectual and cognitive abilities. I understand your statements about his literacy to be hyperbolic, of course, but I wonder whether the nature of your attack somehow diminishes your substantive comments.
Moving onto those, I disagree with the characterization of Biden’s policy as ineffectual. I think you and I will agree that the geopolitical threat faced by Russian expansionism is, if not an existential threat, a serious one to the global order, and one which should not come as a surprise to students of history, of which you are included. The David Brooks article from the New York Times, link attached Opinion | The Dark Century: Why Is Liberalism in Decline? - The New York Times (nytimes.com), I thought was very timely and lucid, although you seem to disagree with the qualifications of the author.
Regardless, the President has forged an alliance with Western Europe which, at least for the time being, is taking a unified and assertive approach to dealing with the fears over Russian hegemony. While I suspect that you may think that a stronger message from Biden is in order, there is a virtue to a gradualist approach, namely, leaving Putin and his minions with room to deviate from what appears to be a single minded goal. I think the term now in vogue is “off ramp” , and the US/European goal should be (and I think is) giving Putin the ability to decide, for the good of his people and perhaps more relevantly his legacy, whether there might be some reason to refrain from bolder action. Yes, it’s a chess game with global implications, but at the end of the day that is exactly what statesmanship entails. Ironically, the former president congratulated himself in his actions with North Korea that he would not reveal his plans, i.e. show his hand, as a tactically superior means for dealing with an adversary. Why is that strategy when employed by Biden not valid?
Unless you are considering a more confrontational approach, which I think could thrust this cold war problem into a hot war scenario, I think this is the right tactic, at least for now. Ukraine is not a member of NATO, and therein lies a distinction from other Western powers. Putin’s global aspirations appear to be regional, at least for now. And it’s easier to escalate than to de-escalate tensions, ergo the virtues of a policy of gradualism.
I did not say appeasement, for the record! If you were comparing Biden to Neville Chamberlain, I might understand the criticism, but that is not at all what’s happening. Freezing Russian assets, suspending credentials of oligarchs and kleptocrats, coordinating with other Western leaders (whose suspension of trade and other arrangements are tough if not crippling actions.), etc are exactly what is required, at this juncture.
Beyond this, the current president has difficult domestic challenges which complicate the enactment of policy. When his predecessor praises Putin’s power grab as “brilliant” and when Tucker Carlson commends Russia’s actions, as recent notable examples, it creates a miasma of pressures and cross pressures. Imagine had Herbert Hoover applauded Hitler’s invasion of Sudetenland or Poland in the 1930’s. Wouldn’t it be terrific if, for once, “politics stopped at the shoreline” and U.S. commentators, politicians, statesmen, etc. could agree that Putin’s actions are part of a calculated scheme to assert Russian expansionisism in the 21st Century and deserves a concerted and united opposition?
Finally, I will conclude with words from Charlie Bright, whose importance as a thinker and a historian is something as to which you and I share a common belief. In his 1995 article “World History in a Global Age” (co-written with Michael Geyer) he asserted the following:
“But, while the world as it has been orphaned by the collapse of historical narratives, this is not a loss that can be remedied by a more encyclopedic approach, as if equal time for all the world’s histories will make history whole.”