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Andau, South Ossetia, And Taiwan

August 12, 2008 by John H. Taylor | Filed Under Bush Administration, International Affairs, Nixon Center, Nixon Library, Richard Nixon, Russia 

“Nixon At Andau” by Ferenc Daday

The analysis of Nixon Center President Dimitri Simes is the linchpin of Reuters’ assessment of limited U.S. options in South Ossetia:

“Let me say at this point that there are no good solutions. Either we have to try to remove them (the Russians) by force or accept a humiliating defeat,” said Dimitri Simes, founding president of the Nixon Center in Washington.

“It is not a happy situation, and we did not have to have this situation, and I think the (Bush) administration has considerable responsibility for that.”

Georgian forces entered separatist South Ossetia last week, trying to retake the pro-Russian enclave that broke away in the 1990s. Moscow, which supports South Ossetia’s independence, responded by sending its troops into Georgia proper.

Georgia has appealed for international intervention and pulled its battered forces back to defend the capital, Tbilisi, as Russian troops pushed deeper into its territory, ignoring Western pleas to halt.

Simes said U.S. encouragement of Georgian President Mikheil Saakashvili, one of Washington’s staunchest allies, may have led him to believe he could get away with military action to take back control of South Ossetia.

The Bush administration has pushed hard for Georgia to join NATO, against European misgivings and Russian fury at the idea.

“Saakashvili was discouraged from attacking Russian troops in South Ossetia but he clearly never was told point blank ‘If you do it, you are on your own,’” said Moscow-born Simes, who was an informal adviser to President Richard Nixon.

The all-too-familiar images of violence and suffering from Georgia bring to mind an analogous crisis in U.S.-Russian relations a half-century ago. The nature of the regime in Moscow was different, the geostrategic dynamics almost identical. Through the Voice of America, the United States had urged Hungarian freedom fighters to rise up against their communist government. When they did so in October 1956, and Soviet forces cruelly crushed them, President Eisenhower realized that despite U.S. encouragement of the uprising, if he deployed U.S. forces he would be risking a nuclear World War III. Instead, virtually all he could do was send Vice President Nixon to meet with Hungarian refugees who had flooded over the border into Austria. The moment was captured in an heroic-style painting by Hungarian-American artist Ferenc Daday, “Bridge At Andau,” which until recently was on display at the Nixon Library, where Hungarian-Americans would sometimes come considerable distances to see it. It was taken down in January by the Library’s federal custodians.

As for President Nixon, he learned from the Hungarian tragedy, and especially from the anguished faces of refugees who pleaded to know why the U.S. had let them down — their expressions so memorably captured by Mr. Daday — that it’s dangerous for the United States to encourage provocations of smaller allies’ powerful neighbors when we’re not in a position to help when the shooting starts. This seeming bit of common sense underpins the “enlightened realism” view of foreign policy enunciated by The Nixon Center and its journal, “The National Interest.” The U.S. prides itself on being on the side of truth and righteousness, freedom and justice. But if our encouragement of Georgia emboldened it to challenge Moscow, and Moscow called the bluff (knowing as well as Mr. Bush does that the U.S. could realistically do almost nothing), of what value to the suffering people of South Ossetia is our commitment to truth and justice?

The question also applies to the other focus of the world’s attention this week — China. Since 1972 and the Nixon-Kissinger-Zhou-Mao Shanghai Communique, successive Presidents, President Bush most militantly of all, have extended a security guarantee to Taiwan in the event of an attack from the mainland. In the heady days before Iraq, neoconservatives sometimes sounded as though they wanted to provoke the mother of all pro-democracy confrontations in the Taiwan Strait. Pro-independence politicians in Taiwan began to act out their part, certain that the U.S. would keep its promises. How many hundreds of thousands would die in such a war? How many American families wanted to lose their sons and daughters? Thankfully, wise heads have prevailed in Taipei and Washington as well as in Beijing. No one wants the rights of people to be free and thrive to be trampled, whether in Hungary, South Ossetia, or Taiwan. On the other hand, talk — even the noblest expressions of American ideals — is often cheap, while the cost of war, especially for those who suffer, is always incalculable.



Comments

9 Responses to “Andau, South Ossetia, And Taiwan”

  1. russ on August 12th, 2008 7:29 pm

    Mr. Taylor,

    I have searched for a poster of the Daday painting for some time, without success. Do you have any suggestions?

    Thanks,
    Russ

  2. John H. Taylor on August 12th, 2008 9:31 pm

    Hiya, Russ. Sorry — I’ve never seen a poster of the painting.

  3. Maarja Krusten on August 13th, 2008 5:32 pm

    Where in the Nixon Library was the “Nixon at Andau” painting on display? Do you know why NARA took it down? Was it due to construction or renovation of the facility? Are there plans to put it back up on display?

  4. John H. Taylor on August 13th, 2008 6:42 pm

    Greetings, Maarja. To answer your questions: The painting was on a wall at the end of the permanent gallery, around the corner from Presidential Forum. Tim Naftali took it down in January, saying that he planned to install an exhibit about RN’s post-Presidential years in its place. The new exhibit has not yet been installed.

  5. Paul Matulic on August 14th, 2008 11:31 am

    Very thoughtful post, John. I would love to see this painting made into a print — or perhaps post cards — not only for deltiological purposes, but as means by which conservatives can exchange their thoughts on the central point of your post.

    Best, PM

  6. Maarja Krusten on August 14th, 2008 2:17 pm

    Thanks for the explanation, John. Since NARA plans to use the space where the painting once hung for an exhibit on RN’s post-Presidential activities, I hope it finds another spot to hang the painting. (I gather it is quite large.) As a former National Archives’ employee, I can’t think of any reason why the painting should be not on display at the Library in an exhibit area dealing with his activities as Vice President. However, although I worked early in my career, briefly, with the domestic and foreign gifts that Nixon received, exhibits was not my area of speciality.

    John, since this touches on curatorial issues, I’ll ask did you ever work with my friend and former colleague, Wally Owen? Wally was the curator at the Nixon Project and I remember during my tenure that he helped out with a number of issues when the library opened in Yorba Linda. BTW, Wally Owen was a member of the 1971 T. C. Williams High School Titans football team depicted in the Denzel Washington film, Remember the Titans. You can find a nice write up about Wally, including a description of his curatorial work at the Nixon Project, if you Google the words Wally Owen Original Titans 57

    Maarja

  7. John H. Taylor on August 14th, 2008 2:20 pm

    Thanks for that, Maarja. I do remember Wally from my visits to the Nixon Project as well as from his work helping us get the Library started. I’ll Google away.

  8. Michael Turton on August 14th, 2008 8:30 pm

    +++++
    Pro-independence politicians in Taiwan began to act out their part, certain that the U.S. would keep its promises.
    +++++

    This is just an anti-Taiwan canard. Chen pushed hard for Taiwan’s status in the world because it was part of his domestic political strategy (and because they all support independence for Taiwan), but he was following the path blazed by Lee Teng-hui who long predates Bush. Nothing that Taiwan did was very bold, but Beijing’s strategy of painting longtime corporate lawyer and center-rightist Chen as a “radical” was highly successful, and you see many instances of it duping analysts and media commentators.

    Bush’s promises soon turned to vapor, and as we all know, weapons sales to Taiwan have been frozen since at least 2006 and probably earlier.

    What actually happened is even more interesting. By claiming to be “provoked” by Chen’s pro-Taiwan policies, China gained moral ascendancy over Bush Administration China policy — an ascendancy so complete that when Chen held referendums in the recent election, the US described it in the same terms as it did China’s anti-secession law. While hacking on Taiwan’s pro-democracy moves, the Bush Administration only weakly objected to China’s military buildup and its fundamental alteration of the situation in the Straits. As longtime journalist Jonathan Manthorpe bluntly put it: Bush’s Taiwan policy was “outsourced to Beijing.”

    =====
    Thankfully, wise heads have prevailed in Taipei and Washington as well as in Beijing. No one wants the rights of people to be free and thrive to be trampled, whether in Hungary, South Ossetia, or Taiwan
    =====

    The idea that Ma and the KMT are “wiser heads” then Chen or Lee is frankly, absurd. This is exactly backwards. By handing Taiwan off to China and permitting Beijing to bully its way into annexing an island no Chinese emperor has ever owned, the Bush administration has simply ensured that war will come — over the Senkakus, the Spratlys, the Natunas, or some other claim that China has yet to dream up. Or alternatively, that the democracies will lose their position in East Asia. Great work that.

    BTW, South Ossetia will likely be swallowed by Russia, while Taiwan appears to be on its way to being annexed by China. The policy of “wiser heads” appears likely to result in “free peoples” being swallowed by authoritarian states, as well as further wars.

    Michael

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