PING – Hugo is at it again!
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HugoPing Archive
Posted on 05/31/2006 4:02:28 PM PDT by sergey1973
Russia is holding talks with Venezuela to license the manufacture of Kalashnikov rifles there, Russia's state arms exporter has confirmed. On Tuesday, Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez said Russia planned to build two munitions plants in the country.
Moscow has already signed a deal to supply Venezuela with 100,000 Kalashnikov assault rifles.
The move is likely to worry the US, which regards Mr Chavez as a destabilising influence in the region.
In May, the US State Department banned arms sales to Venezuela because of concern over its contacts with Iran and Cuba and what it called Venezuela's lack of support for counter-terrorism efforts.
(Excerpt) Read more at news.bbc.co.uk ...
Remember the Monroe Doctrine? Perhaps it is time to remind the rest of the world about it.
Putin's not interested in peace and world stability, he's only interested in whatever he can conquer and his country is still out to conquer the US.
..it was just a matter of time
What are banana farmers going to do with crappy guns?
"Putin will do whatever he can to help keep the region destabilized. He has never been our friend and far as I, and many others I'm sure, are concerned the old Russia never died, they just took on newer clothing."
To be exact, by "Old Russia" you probably mean "Old USSR". "Old Russia" is referred to Russian Empire which had mostly a good relations with the US until Bolsheviks took the empire over in 1917 and turned it into the USSR after winning the Russian Civil War.
I guess the Iranians have maxed out their credit card, so they're hitting up the regional wierdo.
Thanks comrade russia, always so predictable.
It's not a perverted obsession, it is his true nature. And the nature always trumps everything else. A man is known by the company he keeps, and there are similar sayings in every language on the planet. Birds of feather flock together.
lose their next military conflict
Doogle
Communism as an ideal is alive and well in Russia; it just goes by a different name now, with a slightly different face.
Putin's "friendship" was another major miscalculation by President Bush. When Bush met him in 2001 he was enamored of Putin's smile. The President came home and said: "I LOOKED the man in the eye. I was able to get a sense of his soul."
Now the President is looking in the eyes of 20 million illegal immigrants and he apparently can see their souls too. It's been a very long time since a man with both brains and the ability to reason has sat in the White House. Right now I don't think either virtue exists in the WH.
I can't stand jerks that can't stop looking for every excuse to cry and complain about immegration in every thread.
Let's remind folks, shall we? From usinfo.state.gov ......
---------------------------------
THE MONROE DOCTRINE (1823)
The end of the Napoleonic Wars in 1815 marked the breakup of the Spanish empire in the New World. Between 1815 and 1822 Jose de San Martin led Argentina to independence, while Bernardo O'Higgins in Chile and Simon Bolivar in Venezuela guided their countries out of colonialism. The new republics sought -- and expected -- recognition by the United States, and many Americans endorsed that idea.
But President James Monroe and his secretary of state, John Quincy Adams, were not willing to risk war for nations they did not know would survive. From their point of view, as long as the other European powers did not intervene, the government of the United States could just let Spain and her rebellious colonies fight it out.
Great Britain was torn between monarchical principle and a desire for new markets; South America as a whole constituted, at the time, a much larger market for English goods than the United States. When Russia and France proposed that England join in helping Spain regain her New World colonies, Great Britain vetoed the idea.
The United States was also negotiating with Spain to purchase the Floridas, and once that treaty was ratified, the Monroe administration began to extend recognition to the new Latin American republics -- Argentina, Chile, Peru, Colombia and Mexico were all recognized in 1822.
In 1823, France invited Spain to restore the Bourbon power, and there was talk of France and Spain warring upon the new republics with the backing of the Holy Alliance (Russia, Prussia and Austria). This news appalled the British government -- all the work of Wolfe, Chatham and other eighteenth-century British statesmen to get France out of the New World would be undone, and France would again be a power in the Americas.
George Canning, the British foreign minister, proposed that the United States and Great Britain join to warn off France and Spain from intervention. Both Jefferson and Madison urged Monroe to accept the offer, but John Quincy Adams was more suspicious. Adams also was quite concerned about Russia's efforts to extend its influence down the Pacific coast from Alaska south to California, then owned by Mexico.
At the Cabinet meeting of November 7, 1823, Adams argued against Canning's offer, and declared, "It would be more candid, as well as more dignified, to avow our principles explicitly to Russia and France, than to come in as a cockboat in the wake of the British man-of-war."
He argued and finally won over the Cabinet to an independent policy. In Monroe's message to Congress on December 2, 1823, he delivered what we have always called the Monroe Doctrine, although in truth it should have been called the Adams Doctrine. Essentially, the United States was informing the powers of the Old World that the American continents were no longer open to European colonization, and that any effort to extend European political influence into the New World would be considered by the United States "as dangerous to our peace and safety." The United States would not interfere in European wars or internal affairs, and expected Europe to stay out of American affairs.
Although it would take decades to coalesce into an identifiable policy, John Quincy Adams did raise a standard of an independent American foreign policy so strongly that future administrations could not ignore it. One should note, however, that the policy succeeded because it met British interests as well as American, and for the next 100 years was secured by the backing of the British fleet.
For further reading: Dexter Perkins, The Monroe Doctrine, 1823-1826 (1927); Samuel Flagg Bemis, John Quincy Adams and the Foundations of American Foreign Policy (1949); Ernest R. May, The Making of the Monroe Doctrine (1975)
_____________
THE MONROE DOCTRINE
... At the proposal of the Russian Imperial Government, made through the minister of the Emperor residing here, a full power and instructions have been transmitted to the minister of the United States at St. Petersburg to arrange by amicable negotiation the respective rights and interests of the two nations on the northwest coast of this continent. A similar proposal had been made by His Imperial Majesty to the Government of Great Britain, which has likewise been acceded to. The Government of the United States has been desirous by this friendly proceeding of manifesting the great value which they have invariably attached to the friendship of the Emperor and their solicitude to cultivate the best understanding with his Government. In the discussions to which this interest has given rise and in the arrangements by which they may terminate the occasion has been judged proper for asserting, as a principle in which the rights and interests of the United States are involved, that the American continents, by the free and independent condition which they have assumed and maintain, are henceforth not to be considered as subjects for future colonization by any European powers....
It was stated at the commencement of the last session that a great effort was then making in Spain and Portugal to improve the condition of the people of those countries, and that it appeared to be conducted with extraordinary moderation. It need scarcely be remarked that the result has been so far very different from what was then anticipated. Of events in that quarter of the globe, with which we have so much intercourse and from which we derive our origin, we have always been anxious and interested spectators. The citizens of the United States cherish sentiments the most friendly in favor of the liberty and happiness of their fellowmen on that side of the Atlantic. In the wars of the European powers in matters relating to themselves we have never taken any part, nor does it comport with our policy so to do. It is only when our rights are invaded or seriously menaced that we resent injuries or make preparation for our defense. With the movements in this hemisphere we are of necessity more immediately connected, and by causes which must be obvious to all enlightened and impartial observers. The political system of the allied powers is essentially different in this respect from that of America. This difference proceeds from that which exists in their respective Governments; and to the defense of our own, which has been achieved by the loss of so much blood and treasure, and matured by the wisdom of their most enlightened citizens, and under which we have enjoyed unexampled felicity, this whole nation is devoted. We owe it, therefore, to candor and to the amicable relations existing between the United States and those powers to declare that we should consider any attempt on their part to extend their system to any portion of this hemisphere as dangerous to our peace and safety. With the existing colonies or dependencies of any European power we have not interfered and shall not interfere. But with the Governments who have declared their independence and maintained it, and whose independence we have, on great consideration and on just principles, acknowledged, we could not view any interposition for the purpose of oppressing them, or controlling in any other manner their destiny, by any European power in any other light than as the manifestation of an unfriendly disposition toward the United States. In the war between those new Governments and Spain we declared our neutrality at the time of their recognition, and to this we have adhered, and shall continue to adhere, provided no change shall occur which, in the judgment of the competent authorities of this Government, shall make a corresponding change on the part of the United States indispensable to their security.
The late events in Spain and Portugal show that Europe is still unsettled. Of this important fact no stronger proof can be adduced than that the allied powers should have thought it proper, on any principle satisfactory to themselves, to have interposed by force in the internal concerns of Spain. To what extent such interposition may be carried, on the same principle, is a question in which all independent powers whose governments differ from theirs are interested, even those most remote, and surely none more so than the United States. Our policy in regard to Europe, which was adopted at an early stage of the wars which have so long agitated that quarter of the globe, nevertheless remains the same, which is, not to interfere in the internal concerns of any of its powers; to consider the government de facto as the legitimate government for us; to cultivate friendly relations with it, and to preserve those relations by a frank, firm, and manly policy, meeting in all instances the just claims of every power, submitting to injuries from none. But in regard to those continents circumstances are eminently and conspicuously different. It is impossible that the allied powers should extend their political system to any portion of either continent without endangering our peace and happiness; nor can anyone believe that our southern brethren, if left to themselves, would adopt it of their own accord. It is equally impossible, therefore, that we should behold such interposition in any form with indifference. If we look to the comparative strength and resources of Spain and those new Governments, and their distance from each other, it must be obvious that she can never subdue them. It is still the true policy of the United States to leave the parties to themselves, in the hope that other powers will pursue the same course....
Source: J.D. Richardson, ed., Compilation of the Messages and Papers of the Presidents, vol. 2 (1907), 287.
oh geez, ok, I stand corrected. "Old USSR."
I'm inclined to agree with you. The government has underestimated our old adversary and it could come back to bite us in the butt if our elected officials don't wake up.
Not since 1981-1989.
Monroe Doctrine time, folks.
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