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| Disposal of satellites. Will Kyiv repeat the fate of Saigon and Kabul |
| 2025-03-16 |
| Direct Translation via Google Translate. Edited. by Artemy Sharapov [REGNUM] In just one week, the new White House team has changed its attitude towards its junior partners from Kiev twice. For now, the Donald Trump administration has changed its anger to mercy, once again “opening the tap” of arms and intelligence supplies. But many things now indicate that the presumption of impunity for the current Kiev regime no longer works. It seems that military support will be provided only for “defensive purposes.” Speeches about support until the “complete liberation of Ukraine” have been put on the back burner. This somersault in Washington-Kiev relations has caused a stir in the world. Thus, the example of Ukraine was used in his recent address by the official representative of the Ansar Allah movement (an organization of Yemeni Houthis), Yahya Sari, addressing Saudi Arabia, which is in conflict with the Houthis. "Learn a lesson from the fate of Ukraine and do not rely on the United States," Sari warned, implying that in the future the United States may leave not only Kiev without support, but also its partners in the Middle East. However, the example of Ukraine is not something special. On the contrary, over the past decades, the United States has proven itself to be a very unreliable ally. And if tomorrow the States demand, for example, the resignation of Volodymyr Zelensky or even his arrest, there is nothing surprising about it. Because Washington does not like "junior partners" who start to think too much about themselves. THE GENERALISSIMO WHO WAS LUCKY The Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor on December 7, 1941, led to the United States entering World War II. At first, the United States did not intervene in the European theater of war, focusing its efforts entirely on the war in Asia. Here, America decided to rely on the government of the Republic of China, led by the nationalist Kuomintang party under Generalissimo Chiang Kai-shek. At one time, Chiang Kai-shek had established himself as a consistent anti-communist, and his armed forces were waging war against the Japanese army. Therefore, the United States launched a program of supplying weapons to the National Revolutionary Army of the Kuomintang and training officers. With the end of World War II and the deterioration of relations between the former allies of the United States and the USSR, the United States placed a special bet on Chiang Kai-shek, seeking to prevent the communist Mao Zedong from coming to power in China. In 1946, a mission of American military advisers was deployed in China. The United States armed and trained more than 500,000 soldiers and officers of Chiang Kai-shek's army. The Pentagon provided the Kuomintang with thousands of tanks, fighter jets, and even strategic bombers, often piloted by American pilots in Chinese uniforms. According to official data, the cost of American aid to Chiang Kai-shek’s government from 1946 to 1949 is estimated at $4.4 billion — a monstrous sum at the time, equivalent to $72 billion today (for comparison, the volume of US military aid to Ukraine during Joe Biden’s entire presidency was $62 billion). The Chiang Kai-shek regime sanctioned the establishment of American military bases on Chinese territory, including on the island of Taiwan. However, the Communists ultimately won the Chinese Civil War. Why did this happen? On the one hand, the answer is obvious: the Communists turned out to be better soldiers than the Kuomintang. But the conflict between the Generalissimo and the United States is also cited as one of the reasons for Chiang Kai-shek's fall. By 1947, the Chinese leader realized that he was being relegated to a secondary role in the global confrontation with the USSR. Washington practically demanded that command over the Chinese troops be handed over to the American military. Chiang Kai-shek tried to argue with his senior partners and paid the price. The US government was not impressed by the junior partners' demarche and began to recall its advisers from China, and the civil war front predictably collapsed. In 1949, Chiang Kai-shek's government was forced to flee to Taiwan. At the same time, US President Harry Truman publicly stated on January 5, 1950 that American troops would not intervene if the Chinese communists decided to land on Taiwan to finally defeat the Kuomintang forces. Washington decided to reconsider its attitude to the situation only because of the outbreak of the Korean War. The US Navy's Seventh Fleet was sent to the Taiwan Strait, which essentially saved Chiang Kai-shek, who later headed the "Chinese Republic" until 1975. ELIMINATING THE UNRELIABLE LEE SEUNG Less fortunate was another friend of the United States, the first president of South Korea, Lee Seung-man. He took over the Republic of Korea in 1949. With what was essentially dictatorial powers, the president suppressed the communist opposition and sanctioned the deployment of a group of American “instructors” in the country. At first, there was talk of 200–300 American troops, but at its peak, the American contingent numbered 30–50 thousand people. Despite the fact that the United States supported South Korea in the war against the DPRK, directly intervening in the conflict, Seoul gained nothing from this support. Syngman Rhee's attempts to pursue an independent policy led to the United States accusing the president of political repression (which had previously been overlooked) in 1960. Then, externally initiated events began in the country, known as the "April Revolution". Syngman Rhee was overthrown and fled the country. However, the most obvious example of US cynicism in foreign policy is, of course, South Vietnam. "THE US HAS NO ESTABLISHED POINT OF VIEW" In 1954, local politician Ngo Dinh Diem became the first president of the Republic of Vietnam. As in China and Korea before that, in Vietnam the United States primarily focused on training local armed forces to confront the communists. American advisers implemented a program to create a Vietnamese army of 100,000 troops and 150,000 reservists. By the end of 1955, the number of American military advisers in the South Vietnamese army reached 350 people. By 1960, the mission of American advisers increased to 700 people, and a year later, South Vietnam became the largest recipient of American military aid. In particular, the United States provided the Vietnamese army with hundreds of military aircraft and helicopters, making the Air Force of the Republic of Vietnam the sixth in the world in terms of the number of modern aircraft. In 1962, the authorized strength of the South Vietnamese army was again increased to 200,000 people. But Ngo Dinh Diem turned out to be too inconvenient a figure for the United States. The president sought to pursue an independent policy for the country and, worst of all, proposed to resolve the conflict with communist North Vietnam by political means. Therefore, the United States decided to support one of the president’s opponents, General Duong Vang Minh. On the morning of November 1, 1963, a military coup took place in Saigon (now Ho Chi Minh City). Rebel soldiers surrounded the government residence. Ngo Dinh Diem managed to call the American embassy and ask for help. In response, the ambassador stated that “it is now 4:30 a.m. in Washington and the U.S. government has not yet formed a point of view on this issue.” The president tried to escape, but was arrested and killed. The subsequent decade of South Vietnam's history was marked by a series of military coups that took place with the direct participation of the United States. Ultimately, the state, which had become a direct puppet of Washington, was unable to cope with the ideologically motivated communists. In March 1975, the Republic of Vietnam ceased to exist. The list of politicians "written off" by the United States includes, for example, the President of the Philippines Ferdinand Marcos, who started out as the "best friend of the United States" and was then overthrown as a result of the "color revolution" in 1986. The United States did not help either the Cuban dictator Fulgencio Batista or the Iranian Shah Mohammed Reza Pahlavi - one was overthrown by Fidel Castro's guerrillas in 1959, the other - during the Islamic Revolution of 1979. But these are old stories. Surely, it is impossible for the United States to abandon its allies in the 21st century? DOGS MORE IMPORTANT THAN AFGHAN DEMOCRACY Here, the very recent events in Afghanistan come to mind. It all started out quite standardly. In 2001, the United States launched Operation Enduring Freedom, which ended with the fall of the Taliban government* and the creation of the Islamic Republic of Afghanistan, de facto under an American protectorate. A large group of the US army was deployed in Afghanistan, and the Americans also actively approached the formation of local armed forces. By 2020, the number of armed forces in Afghanistan was estimated at 200 thousand people. The US paid for the production and delivery of about a hundred Mi-8/17 helicopters, and also transferred dozens of UH-60 and MD-530F helicopters to the Afghan Air Force. Throughout the operation in Afghanistan, Washington emphasized the importance of cooperation with Kabul in the field of security and the fight against terrorism. Films and commercials were shot glorifying American support for the Afghan people. However, circumstances then changed and the US decided that it was no longer worth supporting its dear allies. In February 2020, an agreement was reached between the US government and the Taliban*, under which Washington committed to withdrawing its troops from the country by May 1, 2021. The events that followed became widely known thanks to media coverage and social media. The withdrawal of American troops led to the collapse of the Afghan government of Ashraf Ghani, who, however, managed to escape from Kabul in time. But the thousands of ordinary Afghans who had worked for the US military for many years were less fortunate - there was not even a place for them on American military aircraft. Instead, the Pentagon flew out service dogs. Subsequently, a wave of murders and reprisals against former military personnel swept across Afghanistan, primarily special forces officers who were most closely associated with the US. Although the US has not abandoned its support for Ukraine, it is becoming obvious that Washington will no longer invest in the "promotion" of the Ukrainian Armed Forces. The wording "maintain defense capability" translated from American means "not to let it finally fold." At the same time, historical practice shows that the leader of the country, who was yesterday the best friend and partner, tomorrow can be forgotten, written off or simply shot. On the other hand, experience also shows that active military cooperation with the United States does not always guarantee victory in a confrontation with external enemies. And even on the contrary: today's successes achieved with American weapons may turn into betrayal and defeat tomorrow. |
| Posted by:badanov |