Let’s have a thought experiment.
Suppose that North Korean leader Kim Jong-un and Cuban president Miguel Mario Díaz-Canel Bermúdez issued a joint announcement stating that North Korea had accepted an invitation to install some of its nuclear missiles in Cuba. The announcement made it clear that although the missiles could reach any American city, they would be entirely for the defense of Cuba, not for the purpose of attacking the United States.
There is no question but that as sovereign and independent countries, North Korea and Cuba have the “right” to enter into a defensive alliance with each other, just as Ukraine has the “right” to enter into an alliance with the United States or with the U.S. government’s Cold War dinosaur NATO.
Moreover, as a sovereign and independent country, Cuba has the “right” to defend itself against aggression, just as Ukraine does. To defend itself or to deter aggression, Cuba also has the “right” to have North Korea install nuclear missiles in Cuba, just as Ukraine has the “right” to invite the U.S. or the U.S. government’s NATO to install nuclear missiles in Ukraine.
However, we know that as an indisputable fact, the Pentagon and the CIA would never permit North Korea to install nuclear missiles in Cuba, even if they are only intended for defense, just as we know that Russia would never permit Ukraine or NATO to install nuclear missiles in Ukraine, even if they are only for defense. Cuba is only 90 miles from American shores while Ukraine is on Russia’s border.
In January of this year, Russian president Vladimir Putin indicated that Russia might send Russian troops to Cuba in response to NATO’s threat to absorb Ukraine. The U.S. response to Putin’s statement was predictable. U.S. National Security Advisor Jake Sullivan stated, “If Russia were to move in that direction, we would deal with it decisively.” (See my article, “Good for Putin for Exposing U.S. Hypocrisy.”)
We all know what Sullivan meant by that statement. He meant that U.S. forces would attack Cuba, just as Russia as attacked Ukraine.
The U.S. response would be even more swift and dramatic if Kim Jong-un (or Putin) announced the installation of defensive nuclear missiles in Cuba. There is no doubt that the Pentagon and the CIA would act quickly and decisively to prevent that from happening by attacking Cuba, just as Russia has done the same thing by attacking Ukraine.
In fact, that was what the Cuban Missile Crisis in 1962 was all about. The position of the Pentagon and the CIA was clear throughout the crisis: If Russian president Nikita Khrushchev didn’t withdraw Soviet nuclear missiles in Cuba and take them home, the U.S. would invade Cuba, just as Russia has invaded Ukraine to prevent U.S. nuclear missiles from being installed in Ukraine.
It’s worth noting that the reason that Soviet missiles were placed in Cuba in 1962 was because the Pentagon and the CIA were hellbent on invading Cuba to effect regime change on the island, even though Cuba had never attacked the U.S. or even threatened to do so. Thus, the Soviets and the Cubans had entered into an alliance to protect Cuba from Pentagon and CIA aggression.
In our thought experiment, suppose the Pentagon and the CIA launched a war against Cuba to prevent North Korean missiles from being installed in Cuba, just as Russia has launched an invasion of Ukraine to prevent U.S. nuclear missiles from being installed in Ukraine.
Question: Who would the U.S. mainstream media support in such a war?
There is no question what the answer is. The U.S. mainstream media would be overwhelmingly supporting the Pentagon and the CIA. Moreover, so would American statists, including those who are overwhelmingly supporting Ukraine in its war with Russia.
Even while waxing eloquent about Ukraine’s “right,” as a sovereign and independent nation, to join NATO, there would be no talk about North Korea and Cuba, as sovereign and independent nations, having the “right” to enter into a defensive alliance with each other.
While reporting heavily on atrocities and war crimes allegedly committed by Russian troops in Ukraine, the reporting in Cuba would orient toward the glorious and heroic achievements of U.S. forces. The mainstream media and American statists would be thanking the troops for their service and for protecting America. American ministers across the land would be exhorting their flocks to pray for U.S. troops, especially those in “harm’s way.”
If North Korea had just not persisted in installing its nuclear missiles in Cuba, the argument would go, the U.S. would not have invaded Cuba. Thus, the war, as well as all the death and destruction U.S. forces inflicted in Cuba, would be blamed solely on North Korea. No one would hold the Pentagon and the CIA responsible for the death and destruction arising from their invasion of Cuba.
How can we be certain of this? Because of what happened in Iraq, a county that never attacked the United States. When the Pentagon and the CIA attacked Iraq and then occupied it for many years, they unleashed massive death, suffering, and damage, no different from the massive death, suffering, and damage being unleashed in Ukraine by Russia.
Yet, in the Iraq invasion, the response of the mainstream media and American statists was entirely different from their response to Russia’s invasion of Ukraine. When it was the Pentagon and the CIA doing the invading, their response was “Thank you for your service” and “Support Operation Iraqi Freedom.” And anyone who dissented from the official line was immediately condemned as a “traitor” or at least as a person who hated America and loved the terrorists.
In my new book An Encounter with Evil: The Abraham Zapruder Story, I have an entire chapter entitled “Deferentials,” in which I describe how public (i.e., government) schooling has inculcated a mindset in so many Americans that is so malleable and conformist that it automatically adopts and mirrors whatever propaganda is being issued by the Pentagon and the CIA.
Thus, as I argue in my new book, if we are to get America back on the right track — toward liberty, peace, prosperity, and harmony — we need less deferentials and more people with independent mindsets and operating consciences, people who are are able and willing to identify and oppose the evil and wrongdoing within our very own government, especially with respect to the deadly and destructive crises that it itself incites in different parts of the world.
This content originally appeared on CounterPunch.org and was authored by Jacob Hornberger.