Greg Rea wrote:
> Delightful. Especially your SecState Emeritus. I would quibble
> with your take on Haig however. He's a blowhard, sure, but he's
> a polysyllabic blowhard.
Sure. He was explaining a DoS White Paper on El Salvador that was
apparently more of a work of fiction and was asked if he'd be
withdrawing other DoS White Papers on the region. He allegedly said:
"Negative. There will be no interdiction of communiques which imapct on
our strategy in the Latin American sector. We're not going to abort the
whole shooting match over one rotten apple. Until we've
damaged-assessed our position, though, we'll be red-lighting current
U.S. containment of local leftist elements in Costa Rica, Guatamala and
Colombia."
A reporter then asked: "What about France?"
"That's already been cancelled. We feel the situation in Paris has
stabalised."
Of course, the source of that report was Garry Trudeau, so I've been
disinclined to believe it. But with your confirmation, I'll introduce a
more prolix Haig with collateral impact on communication,
understanding-wise.
You do realise, of course, that if Something Awful happens to Bush, my
guess is that Kemp will probably replace him. :-(
> DoS vets still speak fondly of his
> penchant to use too many syllables in place of simple sentences,
> a process known as a Haigism. He was a take charge kinda guy,
> but that One Incident notwithstanding, not a take over kinda guy.
> Believe or not, he official had the phrase "paratrooper deployment"
> changed to "nocturnal vertical insertion of personnel". Last time
> _I_ did a "nocturnal vertical insertion"... oh never mind.
_Pre-dawn_ vertical insertion IIRC.
Funny you should mention this ...
> Did you remove part 3? I can't find it. If you did, can you repost?
Nope. Here it is reposted for your reading pleasure:
WI: General Secretary Reagan? Part 3
G'day,
[Disclaimer: The following is a work of fiction, set in an
alternative universe. Any resemblance to any persons,
living or dead, is purely coincidental. Objects in the
mirror are closer than they appear. Your mileage may vary.
Have a nice day.]
The Soviet Union of 1980 was moribund with a leadership able
only to focus on one thing at a time. Waging war in
Afghanistan *and* engineering an anti-Solidarity military
coup in Poland at the same time took as much intense
concentration on the part of the politburo as Gerald Ford is
forced the expend masticating the Wrigley's Juicy Fruit on
his daily constitutional.
The Soviet Union of 1982 is a different kettle of
bouillabaisse. The Afghan tarpit does not prevent the USSR
meddling in Indo-china, Kashmir, the Persian Gulf, Africa
and Europe. Only Australasia is considered unworthy of the
Kremlin's attention. (And you can see their point-of-view.)
What is the reason for this bustle of activity? Is it the
foreign-born Reagan and his 'Californian' advisers providing
leaven to the stodge of a Politburo dominated by the
Russian-born? Or is it just that the new General Secretary
has the attention span of a six-week-old puppy? You the
reader must judge.
One example of this meddling is Grenada, in the USA's own
back-yard. A coup by extremist elements is thwarted by
airdropped Speznatz special forces with able assistance from
Cuban combat engineers who were fortuitously on hand. The
more moderate dictator Maurice Bishop is restored to power.
Margaret Thatcher claims to be concerned at this action.
Her Majesty, Queen Elizabeth the Second and President George
Bush are totally outraged.
That most under-utilised arm of the Soviet bureaucracy, the
Ministry of Justice, is called upon to give a rationale for
what is, seemingly undeniably, the invasion of a sovereign
state. The Ministry calls upon the services of some
Canadian fifth columnists. They explain that Queen
Elizabeth the Second is not, in fact, the Head of State of
Grenada. It is her appointed viceroy, Governor-General Sir
Paul Scoon. In the absence of the original ruling junta, it
is Sir Paul who is constitutionally able to make decisions
for defence and good order; such as calling for Soviet
assistance. The pre-dawn vertical insertion of the Speznatz
is no more an invasion than when the Soviet Army provided
fraternal assistance to Afghanistan at the request of
Hafizullah Amin who so unfortunately passed away the
following day.
Bush is not placated. He speaks of a violation of the
Monroe Doctrine, which places severe restrictions on the
identity of nations that can use military force in American
states. [Editor's note: Read "American states" not
"'Merican states". Colombia is an American state, Georgia
is not.]
An emergency meeting of the Central Committee is called. A
pallid-looking Andropov, obviously unwell, calls for
restrain and speaks of 'spheres of influence'.
Gorbachev, the deputy foreign minister, distances himself
from his boss. "It's all very well for the Imperialists to
speak of the sanctity of their so-called Monroe Doctrine.
Do they respect our Brezhnev Doctrine, our spheres of
influence? No. The Muslim-loving USA supplies weapons to
the Mujahadeen to use against our soldiers and the trade-
union-loving Yankees fund Solidarity in our own backyard."
A candidate member of the Politburo pipes up: "We must do
whatever we have to; to spend what we must spend; to kill
whomever we must kill. We must do anything to win what is,
in actuality, a struggle for humanity against the forces of
greed and death!"
Reagan strides beside the young Mongolian emigre and pats
him on the shoulder as the four 'Californians' present break
into a barber-shop quartet rendition of L'Internationale.
"Son, I'm not sure I'd go that far but gee! That speech.
Castro himself couldn't've said finer..."
bgadam sits down blushing as the GenSec thinks to himself
"... or shorter."
****
Anatolei Dobrinyen leaves Foggy Bottom. All in all it went
pretty well. General Haig threw a towering tantrum, as
expected but the Soviet Ambassador kept repeating his
message from the Kremlin.
Not the *precise* message from the Kremlin, which was: "Tell
Imperialists: 'Tough luck!'" Dobrinyen was, after all, a
professional diplomat. The message was expanded and
softened but its meaning was left unchanged.
The General OTOH had used the most undiplomatic language:
"gone too far" "damned Russkies" "consider our options" and
"massive retaliation".
It was the phrase "only two days' drive from Miami" that
threw the ambassador. He couldn't quite make sense of it;
putting it down to deficiencies in the teaching of geography
in US schools.
What we need to do now, Dobrinyen thought, is set up a phone
call from the General Secretary to the US President. Not
even Bush should be able to withstand the famous Reagan
charm. Within a week the President, famed for the extent
and politeness of his written correspondence, would probably
be sending Reagan a thank-you note.
****
Of course, Grenada is not that strategically important. The
GenSec has other fish to fry.
Two weeks later, Gorbachev visits Andropov in hospital.
"How did it go?" the older man asks, breathlessly.
"He's still obsessed with Israel, Yuri. He's calling it
'the homeland of our Revolution'."
"Well, Karl Marx' parents were Jewish" wheezes the Foreign
Minister. "And the great liberators of myth, Moses and
Christ, have links with Israel."
Gorbachev winces at the ease with which the names of
religious figures roll off the older man's tongue. "Anyway,
he wants to mend fences. Doesn't care at all for what it
does to our relations in the Arab world."
Andropov may be critically ill but he still has all his
mental faculties. "Do the Arabs matter?"
The Deputy Foreign Minister is stunned "Why would they not
matter?"
"My dear Mikhail, since Camp David, Egypt is firmly aligned
with the USA. Saudi Arabia has always been pro-US. Iraq is
irrelevant while they persist in their war with Iraq. That
leaves only Syria as our ally in the region."
"What of the PLO?"
"The PLO!?" Andropov would spit if the tube down his throat
did not prevent him. "We've been funding them for twenty
years now and they are no closer to forging a United Front
of working class Arabs, Palestinians and Jews than they were
when they started!"
Gorbachev isn't sure this was the founding purpose of the
Palestinian Liberation Organisation but a nurse motions to
him not to upset her patient.
The Foreign Minister continues: "We know the Israelis have
been pushing Washington for months now for a green light to
secure their borders with Lebanon. Bush is to much of a
sissy-man to grant this. If *we* were to promise Tel Aviv
there would be no Soviet backing of Syria ...". The words
are cut off by a coughing episode. Gorbachev is bustled out
and nurses draw curtains around Andropov's bed. Gorbachev
leaves as doctors rush in.
****
Operation Peace in Galilee started so well, and went so
wrong. Initially just a a border raid, Hezbollah put up
such a resistance, backed by some units of the fractured
Lebanese Army, that the IDF was forced to drive all the way
to Beirut, linking up with the detachment of Soviet Marines
that had initially secured the city.
Alas, the Marines were conscripts, raw, and untrained in
securing urban areas. There was some rock-throwing at the
Shatila and Sabra refugee camps and the Soviets lost the
plot. Hundreds of refugees were gunned down, many women and
children.
This was on top of an earlier accidental Israeli bombardment
of a refugee camp near Sidon. There is world-wide
condemnation, which is not assuage by the imprisonment in
the Soviet Union of the implicated enlisted men and the
scapegoat execution of a few junior officers.
In Washington, the Young Republicans organise a protest
march from the Soviet to the Israeli Embassies. Organisers
put numbers at around 100,000 although the police estimate
is closer to 15,000. (Typical!)
It is a peaceful march, with the crowd chanting "Rea-gan!
Beg-in! Twins in
...
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