To the Editor of The Guardian.
Dear Sir,
If Russia regards the presence of NATO, or European Union, troops in Ukraine as unacceptable conditions for long term peace, I think Europe should concede that. Of course, Russian troops would be similarly excluded.
The situation is very similar to the "Cuban Missile Crisis" of 16-28 October 1962, but with rôles reversed. The resolution achieved on 28th October, involved the Soviets dismantling their offensive weapons in Cuba, subject to United Nations verification, in exchange for a US public declaration and agreement not to invade Cuba again. The US also dismantled their missiles in Turkey.
That crisis showed, de facto, that hostile missiles in Cuba were as unacceptable to the US as missiles in Turkey were to the USSR. It similarly demonstrated that the US did not have the liberty to invade Cuba if the USSR did not have the liberty to protect Cuba. (Thank goodness, the US and the USSR with equal foresight both 'backed down'.)
It is axiomatic that our allies are reasonable and can be trusted, while 'the enemy' is un-reasonable and un-trustworthy; such is the the distorting lens of inevitable prejudice. But we can easily see that our enemy will be liable to the same distortion and see the same asymmetry.
My father, Ranyard West, in his last book ("International Law and Psychology", 1974) described a similar technique, which he called "inversion-substitution". He evolved it as a way of exposing the prejudices that inevitably cloud our judgements. He would take a piece of journalism that defended our actions abroad and attacked our enemy's, but would swap the names of the adversaries and their adjectives and adverbs, so that the value judgements were inverted. For example: "The {Russians} made a {generous} offer which the {cowardly} {Americans} spurned. Etc." The result is revealing – shocking but salutary.
Ian West
Middleton Cheney,
BANBURY
OX17 2NB
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