Soviet Invade Afghanistan

We're doing things in Central Asia that would have been unthinkable five or ten years ago, certainly, when the Soviet Union was there. But now, we're working together on common threats: terrorism, illegal immigration, drugs that come out of South Asia, Central Asia and into the Russian Federation and then all the way across and into Western Europe. ...

But at the same time, I think it's an overstatement to think that Russia is going back to the days of the Soviet Union. They're not going back there. I think they have discovered what democracy is about, they like it, and they want to be able to vote for their leaders. ... [Read More]

Remarks at Sophia University

In our Pacific community, we can assure basic security, we can reach out to achieve our other goals, of greater opportunity and greater freedom.We can do this because we know what works: economic openness, political openness, and our commitment to global standards that reinforce that openness work. Economic openness supports the aspirations of our people, and their prosperity and redoubles their devotion to political openness and to freedom. Ultimately, a society’s material well-being cannot be separated from its political virtue. Our Pacific prosperity relies on trust and a growing understanding of economic best practices. From time to time, however, trade disputes do arise among us. The latest, of course, is about Japanese imports of American beef products. The time has come to solve this problem. I want to assure you: American beef is safe, and we care deeply about the safety of food for the people of the world, for the American people, ... [Read More]

Practical Idealism: Present Policy in Historical Perspective

After World War II, however, the hope of great power collaboration in actively solving international problems quickly faded. The division of the world between democratic and totalitarian ideals remained after the war ended. But the Soviet Union, soon joined by revolutionary China, led a rival bloc of states and revolutionary movements. The idealistic objectives of the 1940s seemed increasingly remote. ...

And then, in 1989 and 1990, many of the Cold War’s assumptions about stability, peace, and the role of ideals were overthrown, along with so much else. Some American and European leaders rediscovered the power of practical idealism. In 1991 the Soviet Union passed into history. ... [Read More]

Bush Pledges U.S. Support for Young Democracies - US Department of State

To build free institutions, all free nations have responsibilities. We know that democracies do not foment terror or invade their neighbors. Democratic societies are peaceful societies -- which is why, for the sake of peace, the world's established democracies must help the world's newest democracies succeed. ...

Citing "revolutions of Rose, Orange, Purple, Tulip and Cedar" in the past 18 months in former Soviet republics and across the Middle East, Bush said:  "We are seeing the rise of a new generation whose hearts burn for freedom -- and they will have it." ... [Read More]

Department of State Washington File: Text: Rumsfeld Assures 9/11 Commission of Future Terrorist Attack

-- Wouldn't we open ourselves to the risk that other rogue regimes might take advantage of the fact that the U.S. is tied up in Afghanistan to invade neighbors or cause other mischief? ...

"[I]magine for a moment that we were back before September 11, 2001," Rumsfeld said. "Imagine that a U.S. president had looked at the information then available, and gone before the Congress and the world, and said: ‘We need to invade Afghanistan, overthrow the Taliban, and destroy the al-Qaeda terrorist network,' based on what little was known before September 11th. ... [Read More]

Department of State Washington File: Text: Rumsfeld Seeks Congressional Support for Iraq Resolution

Finally, while containment worked in the long run, the Soviet Union's nuclear arsenal prevented the West from responding when they invaded their neighbor, Afghanistan. Does anyone really want Saddam to have that same deterrent, so he can invade his neighbors with impunity? ...

Some have asked: why not just contain him? The West lived for 40 years with the Soviet threat, and never felt the need to take pre-emptive action. If containment worked on the Soviet Union, why not Iraq? ... [Read More]

Powell Highlights Comprehensive U.S. Strategy in Iraq - US Department of State

I vividly remember addressing your National Convention in Baltimore in 1990 when I was Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff. There was still a Cold War, but things were changing. Just the year before, 1989, democratic revolutions had swept across Central and Eastern Europe. The Berlin Wall was torn down by people going to that wall on a cool November evening and banging it apart with axes and hammers and their bare hands. And when they did that, it was the beginning of a new era. The Soviet Union itself, this "Evil Empire" that we worried about, had not yet collapsed, but the end was in sight. Soviet President Gorbachev realized what was happening and he acquiesced in the rebirth of a Europe that was going to be whole, free and at peace. Remarkably, the leader of the Evil Empire that I and so many of you had trained our whole lives to fight, was now working with us to bring peace to troubled regions of the globe. ... [Read More]

North Korea (08/04)

Throughout the Cold War, North Korea balanced its relations with China and the Soviet Union to extract the maximum benefit from the relationships at minimum political cost. In the 1970s and early 1980s, the establishment of diplomatic relations between the United States and China, the Soviet-backed Vietnamese occupation of Cambodia, and the Soviet occupation of Afghanistan created strains between China and the Soviet Union and, in turn, in North Korea's relations with its two major communist allies. North Korea tried to avoid becoming embroiled in the Sino-Soviet split, obtaining aid from both the Soviet Union and China and trying to avoid dependence on either. Following Kim Il Sung's 1984 visit to Moscow, there was an improvement in Soviet-D.P.R.K. relations, resulting in renewed deliveries of Soviet weaponry to North Korea and increases in economic aid. ... [Read More]

Remarks to the Press en Route to Shannon, Ireland

SECRETARY RICE: Well, I don't think that you could be completely a realist and be a Soviet specialist because one had to recognize that it was the character of the Soviet state that was a lot at fault for the threat that the Soviet Union posed to the international system. And if you didn't believe that values mattered in the balance of power, just imagine what the world would have been like if the Soviet Union had won the Cold War. We would not be talking about the spread of freedom and liberty. ... [Read More]

Interview With Lee Jin Sook of MBC TV

QUESTION: You called North Korea one of the outposts of tyranny. Do you still believe that North Korea is a threat to world peace?SECRETARY RICE: Well, I have to say that I think everybody understands the nature of the North Korean regime. Everybody understands the plight of the North Korean people. And, unfortunately, North Korea has taken what is an opportunity, which is to be a part of the Six Party Talks, to give up their nuclear weapons programs, and to therefore get the respect that they are seeking and the assistance that they need. Instead, they have refused to come back to the talks, they talked about being a nuclear weapons state. So I think the nature of this regime is very clear. QUESTION: Then does that mean that -- well, it is a matter of interpretation, but does that mean that you still -- or your administration still regards North Korea as another dictatorial regime that shoul ... [Read More]