From One Axis to Another – Folha de S. Paulo, September 24, 1972

by Plinio Corrêa de Oliveira

At the time of writing—Thursday evening—the daily press has published no significant news regarding Mr. Kissinger’s economic and diplomatic efforts. This scarcity of information contrasts sharply with last week’s multiple and important reports on the same subject.

This raises the question: could a factor have stalled the Washington-Moscow agreements?

Indeed, while the horizon on which Mr. Kissinger was operating was clear blue, a careful newspaper reader last week could see dark clouds gathering. For example, Gen. Goodpaster, NATO commander, warned that Soviet military power already exceeds that of the US in some areas. The US is studying the construction of an invisible satellite—unreachable by Soviet weapons—to compensate for Russia’s progress in missile technology. The US Congress is currently approving the largest military budget ever voted on in the country. As can be seen, all this indicates a lack of trust. Some people in the US do not trust the red allies that Kissinger and toadish American capitalists confidently imagine they are buying with money, prestige, and power.

Has the current of distrust toward the Soviets finally put a stop to the maneuvers of the current that trusts them?

More precisely, has the patriotic vigilance of some Yankee circles managed to curb the thoughtless optimism of modern American “Chamberlains”?

Chamberlain… This name takes us back to 1939.

It is certain that the old man with the umbrella was personally responsible for the outbreak of World War II. How great was his responsibility compared with Hitler’s? I am also certain it was not significantly less.

The British prime minister’s naiveté, prevarications, and concessions cast Hitler in a favorable light among the German “revanchist” movement. This gave the dictator the internal political base he needed to launch a war. By signing the Munich Agreement, Chamberlain handed over all of Czechoslovakia’s economic and military potential to Nazi Germany, thereby greatly facilitating the invasion of Poland. On the eve of the conflict, when an elite group of politicians and military leaders sought to overthrow Nazism, Chamberlain thwarted the coup by refusing to support it. In a way, Chamberlain made Hitler and then prevented him from being overthrown.

Now, Kissinger’s policy honors, enriches, and saves the communist regime just as Chamberlain did with the Nazi regime. The tons of dollars that Kissinger is channeling to Russia may prolong the existence of state capitalism, which is undermined by bureaucracy, stagnation, and misery. US support may discourage the internal opposition that is becoming more threatening in Russia every day. And it gives Russia the resources it needs to reunite its satellites, which are falling apart.

Kissinger is “remaking” the Soviet regime and, ipso facto, preventing its destruction.

There is more. Chamberlain was a weak opponent of Nazism; Kissinger is an ally of communism because his policy is establishing a Washington-Moscow axis to regulate how the two superpowers share the benefits of a peace only now coming into its own.

Once this treaty is signed, the United States-Russia axis will clearly emerge as the model for relations that will succeed the superpower tension.

And the world will be astonished to see that, after fighting a terrible war to escape the domination of one axis, it has fallen under the empire of another!

* * *

If the Rome-Berlin axis had won, who would have had hegemony in the postwar world? Rome or Berlin?

The answer is not difficult. Even in Mussolini’s heyday, the Fascist Party did not devote to him the fanatical, aggressive, and fierce enthusiasm that the Nazi Party never ceased to pay to Hitler. Everything suggests that the lion’s share of the victory would go to the fiercest party, that is, Nazism.

At a time when the Washington-Moscow axis seems poised to establish itself openly and is already in a position to dominate the world, it is impossible not to ask who will reap the greatest benefits of victory.

Once again, the answer is not difficult. It will go to the most ferocious. We know very well who that is.

* * *

According to Bismarck, the relationship between allies in a political alliance is always that of a knight and a steed. Although the axiom is too general, there is no doubt that Bismarck’s principle applies to inexorable partners such as the Soviets. In other words, with the two superpowers dominating the world, the fiercer partner will do everything possible to dominate the less fierce one. This is all the more so because Kissinger’s concessions give the fiercer partner a capacity for aggression it did not previously possess.

All of this will lead to a tragic outcome. In time, the US will have to choose between ultimate collapse and war, a war with much lower chances of victory than at present.

Nothing could be more obvious.

* * *

Some readers may ask, “But what do you want: a world war?”

In my view, the only way to preserve peace is for the US to keep Russia in a position of unchallenged military inferiority and deny it any economic support. The communist regime, weakened by bureaucratic inertia and hunger, will thus be left to the beasts of discontent, howling ever louder behind the Iron Curtain.

Under these conditions, the communist leaders will have to make themselves small, prudent, and manageable. They will eventually dwindle so much that the communist problem may be solved behind the Iron Curtain through an unstoppable popular uprising or through the complete dismantling of the aging, Parkinsonian machine of state capitalism.

* * *

What if the Soviets, desperate in the face of such an emergency, decided to drop their nuclear bombs on America, dragging the whole world into their own ruin?

To this objection, I reply that it would indeed be atrocious. But I ask: what can be done to escape such danger? Give in?

That is what Chamberlain tried to do. The path of concessions did not lead to peace. On the contrary, it hastened the outbreak of war.

If there is one thing that cannot be said in favor of Kissinger’s policy, it is that he is leading the world toward peace.

1939-1972. From one axis to another, how many things happened!

Did we learn nothing from Chamberlain’s terrible lesson in futile concessions?