1956 All Over Again

 Ever since it first became clear that the MAGA movement would eventually sell out Ukraine to the Kremlin, I've periodically quoted from E.E. Cummings's poem "Thanksgiving (1956)"—written in response to the highly reminiscent episode from that year, when the U.S. government abandoned Hungary to its fate at the hands of a Russian invasion.

The 1956 Soviet invasion of Hungary served as proof, for Cummings, that the West was not actually going to defend the freedom of small countries when it counted—at least not unless it served their naked self-interest to do so. Rather, they would stand idly by as a "monstering horror" swallowed up those countries that had the temerity to protest against authoritarian rule. 

Today, we are learning the same bitter lesson. The revolting display from this administration yesterday—when Trump met with Kremlin officials behind the backs of Ukraine's leadership, then emerged from the talks spewing Russian talking points, blaming Ukraine for getting invaded in the first place, and offering Putin all his war aims on a platter—was 1956 all over again. 

Of course, it was also Munich all over again. It was Neville Chamberlain and the Sudetenland all over again. It was Molotov-Ribbentrop all over again. It was every craven abdication to bullying and authoritarianism and aggression ever made, all over again. One could multiply examples. But let's stick with 1956—since that was the betrayal that Cummings sang about so well. 

With Trump's appeasement of Putin yesterday, U.S. foreign policy has completed the full cynical arc that Cummings lays out in the poem. From: 

the voice-with-a-smile of democracy

announces night & day

"all poor little peoples that want to be free

just trust in the u s a"

To: 

"be quiet little hungary

and do as you are bid

a good kind bear is angary

we fear for the quo pro quid"

Plus, I prefer the comparison to 1956 since the Ukrainian resistance to Putin's aggression bears a great resemblance to the heroism of Hungary's revolt against Soviet control. Cummings wrote at the time that Hungary's cry for freedom was so loud that "all prehuman history" could hear it. And—no matter what happens from here—the same will hold true of Ukraine's struggle as well. 

Even if Trump sells out Ukraine—all of world history and all posterity to come bears witness to the justice of their cause. We know—even if Trump denies it—that they were the innocent party here, and Putin the aggressor. Trump may betray them on the battlefield and in the halls of diplomacy. But he cannot erase the moral truth about their fight for freedom.