The Lies We Believe
(Excerpt)
By J. R. Nyquist, Apr. 23, 2020
The Collapse of Communism
Conservatives have congratulated themselves, over and over, for defeating communism. But they have done no such thing. It is a classic case of conceit. To show how deluded this conceit is, recall the cancellation of the Rose Parade in Portland Oregon during 2017. It was cancelled because communists threatened violence against Republicans slated to participate.
Communists have always been a small group. But they have always exercised power and influence beyond what their actual numbers would suggest. Why? Because they possess a missionary zeal. Because they are ruthless. Because they are better organized, better at strategy, better at infiltrating, sabotaging, and taking control.
Stopping a rose parade in Oregon, the communists flexed their muscles in an important city. But elsewhere in North America, the communists have become masters of an entire country. Consider Evan McGuire’s 2018 piece in the American Spectator: “A Cold War Communist is Still Killing People in Nicaragua.” Oh yes. Reagan won the Cold War, but the Sandinistas are ruling Nicaragua as before.
Consider what happened in Venezuela. According to Luis Henrique Ball, writing in the Pan American Post of 17 December 2017, the oil-rich prize of Latin America was converted into a communist stronghold through a strategy of socialist incrementalism. What made this possible? Our conservatives made it possible, because they were no longer concerned with the spread of Marxism-Leninism. Why? Because they were swindled to believe that communism collapsed.
It is a disastrous situation. The “domino theory” has been overtaken by “domino history,” where one country after another succumbs to communism. Sadly, the so-called “fall of the Soviet Union” did not herald the end of communist expansion, but opened a new phase — in which communism advanced from victory to victory, unrecognized and unhindered.
South Africa was the first great prize to be taken by the “defunct” communists after 1991. While the West celebrated an unearned victory over Leninism, the Leninists had a great laugh. The progress of communism in South Africa is a long story. In the 1950s the South African Communist Party ordered its members to join the African National Congress (ANC). As Richard Monroe pointed out in his Lessons of the 1950s, “Whatever the Communists did was done through the Congress movement…. Apart from one or two minor instances, nothing was done by the CP [Communist Party] which was in conflict with Congress policy.”
As history records, the National Party surrendered its monopoly of power to the African National Congress (ANC) in 1994. For the past 26 years South Africa has been a one-party state ruled by ANC communists who have followed the same gradualist strategy used by Hugo Chavez in Venezuela. Once again, a strategic country was conquered.
How strategic?
South Africa sits astride the Cape sea route used by Europe’s oil tankers returning from the Persian Gulf. South Africa is also the “mineral storehouse” of Africa. Control of this country by the communist bloc, during the Cold War, would have frightened Western strategists. In military/economic terms, the bloc now enjoys a metals monopoly — with crippling implications for American aerospace. But no alarm has been raised. The conservatives do not care who governs South Africa — as long as the flow of precious metals continues. The West will soon discover its error when the communist bloc’s economic offensive accelerates. Essentially, South Africa is now a communist bloc country ruled by the African Nation Congress — a false front behind which lurks the Russians and Chinese.
Like Zimbabwe and Namibia, Angola and Congo, South Africa has gone communist. In each country we are deceived about the rulers, who pretend to be democrats. But they are not Democrats. Once again, our own conceit gets the better of us. These countries are on China’s side. They are on Russia’s side. And this is no minor matter.
The myth of “the collapse of communism” could be turned into a very fat book. But who would buy such a book? The preference of the market is clear. People crave lies. They want myths. The communists have fostered these myths. As Lenin said at the advent of his New Economic Policy in 1921, “Tell the capitalists what they want to hear.”
America is invincible
A flattering myth is always believed — to the ruin of the believer. Life is full of hard lessons, hard knocks, and hard heads. Many people born after World War II act as though America were indestructible. This goes a long way to explaining their readiness for destructive policies, destructive behaviors, and destructive thinking.
When the survival of a society or country is taken for granted, and every kind of social experimentation is indulged on the back of this conceit, you can be sure that a massive pile of rubble is going to be the legacy.
Look at the “baby boomer” generation: they grew up in a country that beat the Nazis and Imperial Japan. It was so rich, so powerful, that nothing could harm it. So a great deal of harm was done. The fabric of the society was not treated with gentleness or respect. Everything was subjected to ruthless criticism. Motherhood, patriotism, spanking, honesty, sobriety, chastity, common sense, anti-communism. It became fashionable to mock or discount these items. The more they were associated with the past, the more they were mocked.
In the 1980s Ronald Reagan’s “morning in America” came to the fore, as if the Republic was not already staggering from internal wounds. The true situation was papered over, and insincerity was given wider latitude. This was the context in which we embraced Gorbachev and built China into a colossus. We did it with a Reagan Happy Face.
Invincible? No. Stupid and self-deceiving? Yes. Nothing here is intrinsic to invincibility. Everything conspires to strip the whole, preparing the way for a destructive nihilism. What we have, in America, is a series of illnesses — and COVID-19 is the least of them.
Aside from these points, there are no invincible countries — especially in an age like ours. Biological and nuclear weapons can destroy any country at any time. Especially, they can destroy a country that refuses to deal realistically with them; a country that wants to live as if such weapons do not require more from us.
J.R. Nyquist has written for Newsmax, WorldNetDaily, SierraTimes, Financial Sense and Epoch Times. He is author of the book Origins of the Fourth World War and The New Tactics of Global War (among other books).
Source:
The Lies We Believe
