Poles honour 'Cold Warrior' Ronald Reagan

Hey Masks --


en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Iraq_Study_Group

I'll have to dig more but Meese was with Reagan. Baker with Bush senior.


What else would a Russian say Masks?? Do you actually think they'd admit that Reagan's policies helped bring them down? LOL, wtf? You don't think that little tricks like the CIA supplying stinger missiles to Afghan warlords to shoot down Russian copters and tanks didn't hamper the Soviet Union, cost them money, prestige at home? That was their Vietnam.

The CIA supplied nearly 500 Stingers (some sources claim 1500-2000) to the Mujahideen guerrillas fighting Soviet forces in Afghanistan during Operation Cyclone, the Soviet war in Afghanistan in the 1980s, where they were used quite successfully.

Things like this were the tip of the iceberg. Reagan's policies weren't the sole cause of the Soviets demise obviously, but they did hasten it. As people on here (who weren't infants at the time) have pointed out to you.

Anybody that "hates" Reagan is a clown.

shopgirl, the legislation you're talking about was passed by congress, vetoed by Reagan, but congress overrode his veto, the first time an American president's foreign policy veto was overridden in the 20th century.


This study came long after the war began, but i'd say that Baker and Meese are irrelevant since they have little say in the current administration, which is dominated by more powerful reaganites.


But what they say makes sense. Like I said, before the regime collapsed, they had planned on using tougher measures against the US, even Nuclear attack, but then suddenly, Gorbachev, a man with a completely different philosophy, accedes to power and predictably, the Soviets change course.

What the Reagan administration did of course, was simply keep the pressure up. The CIA suppling stingers to guerillas in Afghanistan is not very different from the CIA training Russian spies, sending them back to the USSR to commit acts of terrosism against the government during the 40's up to the 60's S Reagan's policy was much of the same old. But yeah, he kept the pressure up, he did this for four years before Gorbachev came to power, Thatcher for Six, but it seems with no success, it seems that the soviets were intent on matching western power until Gorbachev.


Am I supposed to base my like or dislike of Reagan solely on his administration's operations against the soviet regime? That would be unwise, as Reagan extended his reach to the middle east, Africa, and South America, where he can boast an atrocious record of murderous, counter-democratic actions. Anyone responsible for such things are criminals and justly hated as such.

Actually the Soviets were those 'bad' in this case and they tried to extend their destructing influence over whole world using various methods to reach this goal. They armed themselves because they wanted to be stronger than anybody else. Reagan administration did well joining the race, because it helped to bring Soviet regime down faster. Americans could afford this while the Soviets couldn't, so this was a brilliant tactic.


Your image of policy of the Soviet Central Committee under Gorbachev is completely false. You have bought all their propaganda destined to western world, nothing like above really happened. You should read the account of political prisoners whom lived in this country. Where did you read that all of this really happened? This source contained any details of such policies or only such empty slogans?

Also, Soviet apparatchicks are not any reliable source information.


I read about many Russians whom have very positive opinion about Reagan politics. However none of them was a Soviet apparatchick.


This was a very good idea. You don't seems to bother about the Soviets imposing their policies on people whom did not wish this. While American supplies to anti-communist forces are supposed to be wrong.


Since when communists whom always claims to be 'democrats' should be really considered 'democrats'? How could anybody still believe this propaganda?

Excellent comments lesser.

Spot on, Masks. Under Reagan, the division between rich and poor in America increased dramatically, the religious right entered US politics in a big way, ethnic minorities were pressured through the War on Drugs and the world permanently teetered on the brink of nuclear destruction, or at least that was what we were told, while Reagan pushed the ridiculous Star Wars defence programme.

If there were any justice, people whould have spat on him when they saw him in the street.

It just depends on ur position lesser. I, for one, know that the conditions for coal miners were far from ideal in the UK. It's a question of values. Miners were paid a small fortune here in Silesia but peanuts in the UK. Farmers are vice-versa.

If u knew the prevailing conditions that UK miners worked under, u may have contributed too. What's so bad about striking? It's closely tied in with demoncracy, exercising ur right to freedom of expression.

Reagan, like Thatcher, had a very good poor concept of social justice. Strikers seek to redress the balance.

What is the diffrence between 'justice' and 'social justice'?

If this is the same then there is no sense to add word 'social'. If this is not the same, it means that 'social justice' is a code name for 'injustice'.

Ronald Reagan was Great! He kicked Russia's backside without firing a shot. Poland and Eastern Europe are free from Russian occupation and from communism due to him.

All that 'freedom', "occupation" are only bluster that will drown in the historical ocean in a heartbeat (on a scale of history flow). Meanwhile the history has always fetched a circuit and the things you enjoy with right now can be disgusting for the majority tomorrow (depending on what the current power tell to that majority).

Same for the occupation which I bet at the time wasn't considered an occupation by many people and for some especially after WW2 it was liberation.

I believe one should stay away of hasty decisions and be careful with the estimation of what happened long ago always keeping in mind that the current power is interested party...

Sure, that is exactly what I am telling all this time during more then one year being a member of this forum.

Especially for the communist Jews and their ideological brothers of other ethnicities.

Social justice is a more qualified term. Justice is more general.

So, in your opinion what kind of general 'justice' is excluded from the meaning of 'social justice'? If you could provide some example to illustrate your point?

Ordinary, or natural justice focusses more on the rights of the individual relative to existing law and prevailing circumstances/political climate etc.

Social justice is focussed more on the collective. Some say it is innately left-wing but some liberals have championed their various causes.

Justice varies according to social grouping and religious backgrounds etc. You can have all manner of distinctions. Let's call social justice a subset of justice.

My point is that there are different classifications of justice: market justice, criminal justice etc etc. You are right that they all fall under the heading of justice.

Anyway, Reagan...he was a good man in ways and entered into a constructive dialogue with Gorbachev.

This is pretty artificial to make such distinctions. Justice is justice. :)

However above mentioned example concentrate on individual as well.


You know that I'm very harsh speaking about collectivism, source of nearly every totalitarian ideology. This is great intellectual mistake to think in collective categories.

Anyway, if we accept that justice in traditional sense focus on person then something strange appears... Because your understanding suggest that social justice might contradict traditional justice concentrated on person. We must agree that society consist of individuals. One kind of justice for individual and second for the same person who is part of society. This concept is flawed. :)

Sorry, lesser, but major seminars and tutorials have been held on the difference between traditional concepts of justice and social justice. Social justice even has its own treatment in Wikipedia should you care to have a look. I know what you are saying, justice is a catch-all term but there are sub divisions.

The concept is not flawed. People and ethnic groups have different conceptions of justice. For example, let's imagine that you have a group of Saudis who believe that beheading is the just way to dispense with a criminal. Brits would dismiss it as draconian. Or, a Saudi sees a Brit drink alcohol in Saudi Arabia. They threaten to behead him. It goes against our concepts of justice. To us, it'd be a grossly disproportionate response.

What I wanted to say, in simple terms, was that social justice is a branch of justice which naturally encompasses the same terms and notions.

First of all, I recognize superiority of western concept of justice. Thus I claim that concepts of justice created by other civilizations are false duo to their intellectual weakness.

Secondary, take a notice that your concept of social justice might theoretically contradict justice in traditional meaning even among people who belong to the same civilization. So this cannot be branch of justice, otherwise contradiction would be impossible.

Of course there are native westerns who have seriously flawed concept of traditional justice. In their opinion justice must be on their side only, no matter what they would figure out. However those responsible members of the society don't tolerate such views.

Well, justice in the West has been found wanting on MANY occasions. I still have books on my shelf concerning miscarriages of justice, care to read them? Justice wasn't given to blacks for a long time. Is it just to invade other countries, transgressing national boundaries and sovereignty? Internment was just? (detention without trial). That's intellectual strength, is it?

False, lesser? Come on, that's holier-than-thou. 'In what follows I show that on the issue of justice, the ancient Greeks eventually came admirably close to the truth-a truth that was then overturned by the triumph of Christianity, a fact that still haunts us today' theobjectivestandard.com/issues/2007-spring/rise-fall-greek-justice.asp

What I said was that there is some substantive overlap thematically but it's a fairly distinct branch. They have different ends sometimes. You MUST read this, enthralling reading, tsowell.com/spquestc.html

A fantastic expose.

Traditional justice and social justice have different modes of enquiry and tenets. Social justice is more concerned with redressing social iniquities which proponents/exponents of traditional justice may not perceive as unjust or showing injustice.

I agree with the naivety part. Religion, inter alia, can cause this. I'd argue that, ceteris paribus, religion is the driving force which underpins their irrational naivety.

Reagan was a good president I say one of the best ever here.

What is western civilization? Nothing else than Christianized Greek and Roman philosophy. The concept of justice developed steadily and under influence of the Catholic Church reached to its final form. According to Samuel Huntingdon currently we witness collapse of the western civilization, I agree with him. Thus we see many people questioning established concept of justice in some areas. However nearly all of them still stick to this final concept of justice of western civilization in vast majority of issues.

Please take into consideration the fact that those people whom organized this proceeder (slavery) knew very well that their action is totally unjust. Vast majority of ordinary criminals is aware of that as well.


Interesting article. General people should abstain personal revenge in such cases. Criminals did not respect law and this is the state that should punish them. If we allow ordinary people to act like Clytemnestra this decision will lead us to anarchy.

Of course Clytemnestra could not count on objective court, so her behaviour is understandable. While parents of this killed girl behaved like perfect Christian, I understand that criminals apologized and they forgive. This is the state that failed, because those men deserved capital punishment. Something else is personal forgiveness and something else is respect of well written state laws.


Yes, this article perfectly illustrate my point. Nothing to add.

It's a complicated area. Do you think Reagan, as an American, valued traditional justice? I guess so. Did he value social justice? Now that's a different question.

I did not anything detailed about his views, however usually mentioned aside is portrayed as liberal-conservative. So, I guess that he valued traditional justice in opposition to so called social justice. He seemed to be exceptional politician in comparison with the rest of this corrupt and opportunistic crowd. Thus some many in the US and not only have a sentiment to him.

Generally the US was established by rejection of monarchy. People who came to America had good work ethic and were mainly Christian, so they valued personalism and thus traditional concept of justice. They were positive about building their new country.

Something different happened in France. French revolution destroyed this society. They removed monarchy but could not offer anything positive in its place. They created this false concept of social justice, those people whom think that deserve everything for free. It lead them to genocide, while in longer run French national identify was intellectually raped. We see those people striking all the time, their quest for cosmic concept of social justice will never end, because this is utopia. They should stick to these three axiomatic points from article that you provided.

The very notion of cosmic justice, as the name suggests, is hardly rooted in the ground. The reality is that idealists aim for a level playing field through ideas like 'equal pay for equal work', which is hard to quantify anyway. You can apply it to factory production/output but not to many other jobs in an accurate way. However, striving for such standards is important in setting out groundrules by which we abide. Employers have a whole raft of legislation to wade through to ensure compliance with their industrial practices. Social justice is achieved through the relative uniformity of provisions.

What do Americans here think? Did Reagan, as a Republican, value social justice?

I my opinion there was nothing needless about the cold war with Russia my late father was one of the many 'blood-on-the-soil' troops fighting against Soviet sponsored insurgency in Oman and other parts of the world. The insurgency in Oman was fought between 1962 and 1976 though not as well known as perhaps the Viet Nam conflict against communists; its end result was as a total victory for the Western (British) supported Sultanate of Oman over the Soviet communist inspired (and backed) Popular Front for the Liberation of Oman. This war was waged in the province of Dhofar, the British led and supported Sultan's Armed Forces eventually were victorious, though there were serious setbacks early on and a coup that replaced the Sultan. My father also fought against communist backed insurgencies in earlier years in Malaya in 1948 until mid-1950's and again in Aden, Yemen in later years.

Then I bow to your superior wisdom. I just saw the Cold War as unnecessarily dragged out and fought for ulterior motives. However, I was never a part of it in any way so I base it on limited reading.

He isn't known for his commitment to the concept of social justice. He was accused of ignoring AIDS and supplying blacks in the US with crack.

The biggest feather in his cap is the destruction of the Berlin Wall and the uniting of the Germanies but would it have happened anyway and was it left up to chance, ie: he being at the right place at the right time thus swooping up all the glory and credit?

That is funny. Do you think that many blacks would vote on him today if they only could?

Knowing what we know about him now, I don't think anyone would vote for him. People accuse him of being senile during his terms.

Republican votes treat him like a legend. I did not have much contact with Democrats. Anyway, those who blame him for being senile in first place are part of major group of democratic votes. I mean voters that are unable to think in political categories, thus they form their objections on personal feelings.

It seems like you prefer the American right to the Polish right, lesser. Would that be a fair observation?