I don’t often quote the words of anyone in the United Nations except to illustrate the desultory and destitute nature of that organization, but UN Secretary General Antonio Guterres said something Monday that is worthy of noting, and noting well as he warned "humanity is just one misunderstanding, one miscalculation away from nuclear annihilation.".We are inching towards the nuclear abyss largely because international diplomacy right now is in the hands of enfeebled old men like U.S. President Joe Biden and intellectual lightweights like Prime Minister Justin Trudeau..What's truly frightening, is that neither of these two “leaders” seems vaguely attuned to the chasm the world is moving towards or how to divert our path from it..Under Biden, the U.S. has effectively declared war against Russia by allying itself so closely with Ukraine and by continuing to fund the war between these two countries. The likelihood of a direct confrontation between U.S. and Russian forces is growing by the day and that incident could so easily lead to a nuclear exchange..As if Biden waltzing with war in Europe wasn't enough, the U.S. administration is sending bizarre signals to China this week as House Speaker Nancy Pelosi made an enigmatic visit to Taiwan that only enunciated the Keystone Cops are formulating American foreign policy..There is no question Pelosi has every right to demonstrate America’s continued solidarity with Taiwan and that the United States cannot be cowed by Chinese threats to stop or interfere with the visit..But what the hell is she going to Taiwan for and does the United States really want to exacerbate current tensions with China by executing such a meaningless visit? She didn't even discuss the visit with Biden, who has only looked sillier than ever in the aftermath of the visit. .Pelosi, who shepherded Biden’s disastrous spending through the House, has done absolutely nothing to articulate or reflect the real concerns of Americans: inflation, an open southern border and crime — to name just three. She has rejected a bipartisan approach to policy and yet by visiting Taiwan, she has suddenly found friends among Republicans who are now itching for a war with China, with some actually suggesting the U.S. can win World War III. .This is madness..For the entire Cold War, the United States and all NATO countries understood the concept of Mutually Assured Destruction (MAD) and how the obvious and catastrophic consequences of a nuclear war helped make that altercation virtually impossible. We cling to our nuclear weapons because their strategic deterrence meant another war was unwinnable for either side. Smart American presidents from Harry Truman to Ronald Reagan understood that war with the Soviet Union was insanity, but the west could continue to block communist expansionism through conventional means and proxy wars. .It was the peace activists who advocated a “nuclear freeze” or unilateral disarmament who destabilized the international equation and brought us closer to war by weakening the west..Today, the nuclear hawks who think we can have a limited nuclear war with Russia or China and somehow win are the ones bringing us closer to a nuclear holocaust..How plainly can we phrase this? The nuclear weapons that could have obliterated humanity at the time of Cuban Missile Crisis remain the same today. They will end human life as we know it. President John Kennedy understood this and that's why he put some thought into removing the Russian missiles from Cuba instead of rolling the dice and hoping for a pair of sixes. .If we think we can teach Russian President Vladimir Putin a lesson or show the Chinese who’s boss by risking a nuclear war, we are mad..The late President Richard Nixon was a lifelong anti-communist who would never have surrendered a square kilometer of U.S. soil or compromised American democracy by demonstrating weakness to the communists. Yet he visited Red China when no other U.S. president had dared to do so and he ushered in a era of détente with the Soviet Union because he understood realpolitik and the need to recognize the strength of your adversaries and try to forge a diplomatic understanding that acknowledges ideological differences while refusing to start a war over them..This was a mature foreign policy and we need some semblance of it in this world today. Funding an endless war in Ukraine and risking one with China is not mature diplomacy, it only reflects a desperation by the Biden administration — and the Trudeau government for that matter — to look tough..If Biden wanted to be tough, he would allow the United States to be energy independent and to start producing vital products in America. He would start sending illegals back to Mexico..The U.S. is completely dependent upon China for much of the material its citizens take for granted: from iPhones to 90% of pharmaceuticals. It was former President Donald Trump who understood the U.S. could not talk tough without getting tough with China in a way that didn’t provoke a nuclear conflagration. That’s why he pursued a made in America policy and used tariffs to force the Chinese to play fair on trade..Like the great powers in August of 1914 who insouciantly walked into the First World War, we are inching towards disaster in this atmosphere of diplomatic chaos. The difference is that in 1914, there were no nuclear weapons and the world was capable of bringing economic, social and political ruin on itself, but not utter devastation. We have that power today and it scares the hell out of me.
