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Zonie63 -> RE: Chavez dead... (3/8/2013 8:52:22 AM)
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quote:
ORIGINAL: Owner59
Funny, in an ugly kinda way....that there`s no narrative of political repression coming out of Cuba but that our cons know the Chinese communists do in fact repress and punish their people......but embrace them anyway with open hearts and open wallets(Mittens)in spite of that.
Why is that?
Why the double standard?
Probably several reasons. One is, the U.S. leadership chose the path of Triangular Diplomacy since the relationship between the Soviet Union and China had deteriorated and there was an opportunity to split the Communist World. The Soviets grew to be more afraid of China than of the U.S., so by developing a friendlier relationship with Communist China, our leadership thought they could effectively counter Soviet expansionism. That may be where the double standard originated, although why it continued even after the fall of the Berlin Wall and the end of the Soviet Union - that seems a bit mystifying.
China is clearly bigger than Cuba, so maybe that has something to do with the double-standard.
I also think that, historically, the U.S. has had a different perception of nations within our own hemisphere versus nations in the other hemisphere. Our hegemony over the Western Hemisphere had been firmly established before we started to make inroads in spreading our hegemony into the Eastern Hemisphere. We had the Monroe Doctrine in our own region, yet we favored the Open China policy over in that country. It was just after the Spanish-American War, in which Cuba figured prominently, as we "liberated" that country from Spanish rule, recognized their independence, while keeping Puerto Rico, Guam, and the Philippines. Why we needed those territories is also a bit mystifying, although considering the annexations we made as a result of that war, it's rather curious that we didn't choose to keep Cuba, too.
Another possible reason for the double-standard is that with Cuba, there seems to be something personal about it. While this is just idle speculation on my part, with heavy Mob influence in Cuba being kicked out so suddenly, it could be that some very highly-placed individuals in the U.S. might have a very strong grudge against Castro. The idea that the Mob never forgets and never forgives might be in play here. The fact that Cuban cigars are still banned - even when we were selling wheat to the Soviets - that sounds like something personal to me, as if the powers that be are really, really pissed off at Cuba for reasons that go beyond geopolitical rivalries.
I don't think we had that kind of relationship with China. When the Chinese Communist Revolution was taking place, we considered both factions to be "allies," as it was just after World War II, when the Chinese Communists and Chinese Nationalists were both fighting the Japanese. I think that General Marshall tried to mediate between the two sides, but ended up disgusted with both. (We had already knocked heads with the Chinese Nationalists previously, so they were not really "puppets" of the US - not like Cuba's pre-revolutionary government was.) Truman was more focused on Europe at the time and didn't seem to be able to formulate much of a coherent policy in East Asia (or in the Middle East for that matter).
In contrast, in our region, our policy had already been (more or less) set in the previous century. While our expansionist foray into Canada fell flat, we saw the collapsing Spanish Empire to our south as an opportunity for expansion. We grabbed Florida, and then a huge chunk of Mexico and firmly established a hegemonic relationship throughout the rest of Latin America after Spain was booted out completely from the Americas. Because of this, countries like Cuba and Venezuela have had more long-term experience in dealing with "Yankee imperialism" than the Chinese ever did.
We may be able to deal with China on a more reasonable level, since there's not as much bad blood as there has been with our neighbors to the south.
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