Wednesday, March 25, 2009

With Friends Like These...

I feel sorry for Poland. How many times does one nation have to be betrayed by it's allies?

Remember when Stalin and Hitler signed the Molotov-Ribbentrop Pact and invaded Poland in September 1939? Well, it turns out that Poland had an alliance with France and Britain. The French and British declared war but sat around and watched while the Poles fought the German Panzers on horseback. By the time the Soviets invaded mid-month, the Poles were in full retreat with no allies in site.

Now, it's deja vu all over again. This time it's the United States. Poland took a huge risk allowing us to put missile defense systems within their borders.

Now President Obama is backpedaling on the deal by using it as a bargaining chip with Russia over the Iranian nuclear program.

Polish Foreign Minister Radoslaw Sikorski noted that Poland had taken "something of a political risk" in agreeing to the deployment of 10 ground-based interceptors on its territory. "When we started discussing this with the United States," he said, "the U.S. assured us they would persuade the Russians that it was purely defensive and it would be a noncontroversial decision."

Did I mention that the Czechs are involved also? Yes, they are in the same boat as Poland on the missile defense issue. And, like Poland, they were also betrayed by Britain and France during the 1930's. In 1938, at the Munich Conference, Britain and France forced Czechoslovakia to give up the Sudetenland to Germany which led to their full invasion and capitulation. Remember the whole "Peace in Our Time" episode? The Czechs also had a treaty with France: the Little Entente. They had such a fondness for the French that, in 1891, they built a smaller version of the Eiffel Tower in Prague. So much for that gesture...

Let's hope that the Obama Administration appreciates our true allies in Europe. The Eastern Europeans know the importance of fighting for freedom, which is unfortunately something that we've grown soft over.

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