EDITORrnThomas FlemingrnMANAGING EDITORrnTheodore PappasrnSENIOR EDITOR, BOOKSrnChilton Williamson, jr.rnASSISTANT EDITORrnScott P. RichertrnART DIRECTORrnAnna Mycek-WodeckirnCONTRIBUTING EDITORSrnHarold O.J. Brown, Katherine Dalton,rnSamuel Francis, George Garrett,rnPaul Gottfried, J.O. Tate, MichaelrnWashburn, Clyde WilsonrnCORRESPONDING EDITORSrnBill Kauffman, William Mills,rnJacob Neusner, Momcilo SelicrnEDITORIAL SECRETARYrnLeann DobbsrnPUBLISHERrnAllan C. CarlsonrnPUBLICAI’ION DIRECTORrnGuy C. ReffettrnPRODUCTION SECRETARYrnAnita CandyrnCIRCULATION MANAGERrnCindy LinkrnA publication of The Rockford Institute,rnEditorial and Advertising Offices;rn934 North Main Street, Rockford, IL 61103.rnEditorial Phone: (815)964-5054.rnAdvertising Phone: (815) 964-5813.rnSubscription Department: P.O. Box 800,rnMount Morns, IL 61054. Call 1-800-877-5459.rnU.S.A. Newsstand Distribution by Eastern NewsrnDistributors, Inc., One Media Why, 12406 Rt. 250rnMilan, Ohio 44848-9705rnCopyright © 1997 b The Rockford Institute.rnAll rights reserved.rnChronicles (ISSN 0887-5731) is publishedrnmonthly for $39.00 (foreign subscriptions add $ 12rnfor surface delivery, $48 for yir Mail) per year b’rnThe Rockford Institute, 934 North Main Street,rnRockford, IL 61103-7061. Preferred periodicalrnpo.stage paid at Rockford, li. and additional mailingrnoffices. POSTMASTER: Send address changes tornChronicles, P.O. Box 800. Mount Morris. II. 61054.rnI’he views expressed in Chronicles are thernauthors’ alone and do not necessarily reflectrnthe views of The Rockford Institute or of itsrndirectors. Lhisolicited manuscripts cannot bernreturned unless accompanied by a self-addressedrnstamped envelope.rnChroniclesrnVol.21, No, 11 November 1997rnPrinted in the United St;itei of AmericarnPOLEMICS & EXCHANGESrnOn NATO and EasternrnEuropernThe arguments by Srdja Trifkovic againstrnthe addition of Poland, Hungary, and thernCzech Repubhc to NATO (CulturalrnRevolutions, August) are reminiscent ofrnmy variation of an old Noel Coward ditty:rn”Don’t let’s be beastly to the Russiansrn/ For you can’t deprive a gangster of hisrngun. / Though they’ve been a litde nastyrnto the Czechs and Poles and such. / (ButrnI don’t suppose those people really mindrnit very much.)”rnThe fact is that those people do mindrnit very much. Before the Bolshevik gangsters,rnthere were the Romanov gangsters,rnand if the commissars of Sovietdom werernmurdering swine, so were the ministersrnof the czars. Poland, in particular, wasrnoccupied for nearly 200 years by the Russians;rnand any Polish historian will tellrnyou that Reds and Whites were both enslavingrnsadists of the first magnitude.rnHow, we must ask Trifkovic, did it happenrnthat Russia was the place where thernBolsheviks got to power by indigenousrnforces? Would he claim, a la the BlackrnHundred enthusiasts of Pamyat, that itrnwas all due to some “Jewish conspiracy”?rnThe fact is that Russia was and is anrnideal place for totalitarian rule. Trifkovicrnglories in the wonders of Russian Orthodoxy.rnTell that to someone who is ignorantrnof its history. Russian Orthodoxy isrnone part Constantinople and two partsrnKarakorum. The Patriarch of Moscow,rnyMeksev II, for some years was a rankingrnmember of the KCB, and his predecessorsrnin the czarist years cheerfullyrnapplauded genocide in the Caucasusrnand in Central Asia, pogroms of Jews andrnPoles, and bloody imperial expansionrneverywhere. Recently, the Duma hasrnexcluded both Catholicism and Protestantismrnfrom acceptable religions in thernnew Russia (in the interests of multiculturalism,rnthey permit not only RussianrnOrthodoxy but Islam, Buddhism, andrnJudaism). Yes, there needs to be a cordonrnsanitaire around Russia. Only in this wayrnwill the Russian people have a chance tornlook inward, see what it is that has enslavedrnthem until now, and decidernwhether they arc willing to take a chancernon freedom.rnIn the United States, we have bridges.rncities, and counties named after Kossuth,rnPulaski, and Kosciuszko. I am unawarernof anybody here wanting to name somethingrnafter Suvorov, Romanov, orrnTukhachevsky. Poland, Hungary, andrnthe Czech Republic have been part ofrnthe West for 1,000 years. If they were relegatedrnto Russian occupation for 45 yearsrnfollowing Wodd War II, that only intensifiedrnthe wishes of the people fromrnthese countries to be recognized as whatrnthey have always been: the guardians ofrnthe eastern borders of the West. Thosernwho would deny them their place inrnNATO simply because it is feared thatrnthe Russian bear might be offended arernmore than a little bit despicable. By takingrnthe Poles, Czechs, and Hungariansrninto NATO, we redeem the honor thatrnRussophilie appeasers besmirched atrnYalta.rnThere is this curious thing we have inrnthe West, Mr. Trifkovic, called honor.rnDeal with it.rn—]ames R. ThompsonrnProfessor, Rice UniversityrnHouston, TXrnDr. Trifkovic Replies:rnProfessor Thompson does not disclosernhis academic specialty, but let us hope itrnis not history, lest his students remain inrnthe dark as to how “Russia was the placernwhere the Bolsheviks got to power by indigenousrnforces.” They would not berntold that Marxism itself was a Westernrnimport into Russia’s body-politic, andrnthat it would not have “got to power”rnwithout the aid of nonindigenous forcesrnsuch as the Kaiser’s government, thernbayonets of several hundred thousandrnfreed German and Austrian POWs, andrnthe propaganda and monetary contributionsrnof “progressives” the world over.rnProfessor Thompson’s studentsrnshould be intrigued by his claim thatrnRussia occupied Poland “for nearly 200rnyears.” In fact, Russia acquired majority-rnPolish territories only at the Congress ofrnVienna in 1815, barely 100 years beforernPoland’s rebirth as a sovereign staternin 1918. Russia’s previous annexationsrnhad consisted of lands inhabited overwhelminglyrnby Orthodox Byelorussians,rnUkrainians, and Great Russians, whichrn4/CHRONICLESrnrnrn