Kruschev revisited

Dan Sernoffsky

It seems almost laughable now, but in a historic context, it was frightening.

It was October 1960, and a bald, fat, red-faced man was pounding his shoe on the table at the United Nations proclaiming, “We will bury you.”

The man was Nikita Khruschev, the premier of the Soviet Union. And at a time when the Cold War seemed dangerously close to getting hot, the fear was that he was talking about launching a military attack.

Khruschev later explained that he was merely referring to the superiority of Soviet communism and that it would eventually destroy Western capitalism.

Still, when he spoke at the United Nations, Kruschev was speaking with a knowledge unavailable to most Americans. He knew, after all, that the Soviet Union had already managed to influence American foreign policy.

Just 15 years earlier, Alger Hiss had been a close adviser to both Franklin Roosevelt and Harry Truman. Hiss’ efforts helped enable the Soviet Union to take control of much of Eastern Europe following the defeat of the Axis powers in World War II and to gain considerable control in the U.N. and its operations through the manipulation of voting and membership.

Khruschev also knew that 90 miles from Florida, the Soviet Union was well on the way to establishing a puppet state under the control of Fidel Castro.

A little more than a quarter of a century later, Khruschev’s diatribe appeared laughable. Thanks to Ronald Reagan, the Soviet Union was, in Reagan’s words, “consigned to the ash heap of history.”

Reagan may have spoken too soon. The leftist mindset, so deeply ingrained in the American Democrat Party, seems determined to make Khruschev’s threat a reality. America is at war with a malicious enemy, Islamofascism, and thanks to the insidious machinations of the American left, that enemy is coming increasingly closer to gaining the upper hand in its efforts to destroy Western civilization.

It was, after all, the Democrat Party that rushed to the defense of Hiss and attempted to destroy through a carefully orchestrated ad hominem attack the man, Whittaker Chamers, who revealed that Hiss was, indeed, a Soviet agent. It was, after all, the Democrat Party that overtly and covertly helped prop up Castro early, then totally abandoned an invasion force in 1961 that could have easily overthrown the dictator who continues to hold his island nation in a totalitarian grip.

Now that same Democrat Party, which blanched at Reagan’s bold moves to bring down a totalitarian government it had long simply tried to appease by attempting to weaken the United States, seems determined to continue to destroy what the Founding Fathers created.

It is the Democrat Party that has been damningly critical of U.S. military action ever since the first responses began to the Islamofascists following the Sept. 11 attacks. It has been leading members of the Democrat Party who have served as apologists for Osama bin Laden (Sen. Patty Murray, D-Wash.) and for Saddam Hussein (Rep. Jim McDermott, D-Wash., Rep. David Bonior, D-Mich., Rep. Michael Thompson, D-Calif.). It has been leading members of the Democrat Party who have condemned Americans while praising terrorists who have been captured and who are incarcerated (Sen. Ted Kennedy, D-Mass., Rep. John Murtha, D-Pa.).

There now rages in the Middle East a war between Israel and Hezbollah, a war that can trace its modern roots to the Carter presidency. Jimmy Carter abandoned the Shah of Iran to an Islamic revolution. He also helped elevate the profile of Yasser Arafat from thug to Palestinian spokesman, thereby insidiously helping to undermine Israel’s ability to keep its borders secure. That ability was further undermined by Bill Clinton, who made Arafat his most welcomed foreign visitor during his presidency.

Sen. John Kerry (D-Mass.), a man who conveniently forgets even the most recent history, famously said that the war between Israel and Hezbollah was the fault of the administration which has quite effectively, despite the efforts of the Democrat Party, prevented another Sept. 11.

“If I was president, this wouldn’t have happened,” Kerry said recently, ignoring the fact that Hezbollah has been waging war on the United States and Israel for 20 years.

In 1960, Kruschev declared, “We will bury you.” With the help of the American left, and the Democrat Party, his declaration may yet ring true.

###

Dan Sernoffsky is an award-winning sportswriter and political columnist for The Lebanon Daily News in Lebanon, Pa. A career journalist, he is a graduate of Ottawa University, Ottawa, Ks., and attended graduate school at Central Michigan University. The father of four grown children, he and his wife reside in Lebanon.

dsernoffsky@yahoo.com