Capitol Ideas/Badlands Bolshevism
Bethell, Tom
CAPITOL IDEAS BADLANDS BOLSHEVISM by Tom Bethell April 1, 1986: There have been reports in some right-wing news media about the possible arrival of Soviet troops and equipment in North Dakota....
...If the Penta-gon and the Commander in Chief do intemperately 'jump the gun' on this they would only lay us open to the old, damaging charge that we are really no better than the Russians...
...Throughout the Dakota crisis, the New York Times editorials have remained calm and judicious...
...Bill Moyers spoke out forcefully on the issue, while Harper's magazine devoted the twentieth installment of its "Greed in America" series to the North Dakota abuses...
...We have little to fear from Ivan, whether in the Dakotas or the Ukraine...
...General Ustinov should go back home, taking his men with him, at the earliest possible opportunity...
...Fargo farmers who allege they have been turned off the land by 'enemy' troops deserve a skeptical hearing...
...a better deal in the future...
...Then they invited the Soviets (who were of course nearby) to cross the border and "express solidarity with your sisters and brothers suffering under colonial oppression," and to help them "reclaim the land that was rightfully ours before the White man broke his treaties...
...Led by five former secretaries of defense (including Robert McNa-mara, Clark Clifford, and Harold Brown), a bipartisan group has issued a further call for moderation...
...May 10, 1986: It is now widely conceded that the earlier reports of a Soviet incursion into the Dakotas were true in their essentials...
...That is the way we became involved in Vietnam, to our eventual sorrow...
...The Washington Post published a tough editorial, however, laying to rest the oft-heard charge that it is a "liberal" newspaper...
...Meanwhile the federal judge in Bismarck should rule swiftly on the ACLU suit, so that we may be assured of a constitutional response to the Soviet presence...
...The reports of a Soviet invasion of North Dakota are provocative and irresponsible," the paper has noted...
...A few months later there was no panic at all when George McGovern formed a coalition in South Dakota and invited the visi-tors farther south...
...Now the rhetoric and the rumors are increasing...
...It must bring smiles to the faces in the Kremlin, but it only inflames the crisis here...
...He announced the formation of a high level "blue ribbon commission" to study possible responses to the Dakota initia-tive...
...May 20, 1986: The Anti-Christian Litigation Unit (ACLU) has filed suit in Federal Court in Bismarck, sup-porting the Indians' claim and en-joining "local law enforcement officials" and "U.S...
...Meanwhile, Secretary of the Interior James Watt should be silenced once and for all...
...Irvine said he would appeal, but he is given little chance...
...Nearby, on the op-ed page, George Will noted cogently in a column entitled "Collective Will" that "the North Dakotans, properly under-stood, were undertaxed...
...Now is the time for meditation, not confrontation...
...Ever since Prime Minister Pierre Trudeau invited Soviet advisers into Canada two years ago, following the derailment of his economic program, there has been a relentless anti-Soviet campaign in places like the Wall Street Journal editorial page (which still openly supports capitalism...
...These are the very people who have the most to lose from land reform...
...In the end the federal judge ruled on the side of the ACLU, upholding Second Amendment rights wherever they might be threatened...
...In response, Mary MpGrory did her best to restore a sense of balance by writing a hard-hitting column in which she deplored the "ugly sensationalism of the boorish press, who think they can turn the clock back...
...July 1, 1986: The Times has opened a Bismarck bureau, manned by Ray Bonnar, a roving reporter...
...Businessmen crying over spilt milk likewise deserve careful scrutiny...
...Tom Bethell is The American Spec-tator's Washington correspondent...
...His accusation that the Red Squaw Coalition (which extended the ori-ginal invitation to the Soviets) is 'sympathetic to the socialist ideology of the Soviet Union' is intemperate and gross...
...The Soviet leader, let us recall, responded to a legitimate invitation from an indi-genous group...
...Pragmatism and openness to change remain the hallmark of the New York Times...
...It is truly disgraceful that the Red Army imag-ines it can just stroll into this country on the say-so of a bunch of malcon-tents," the paper said in an editorial entitled "The Badlands Crisis...
...Apparently a coalition of radical Indian squaws and local progressive groups banded together to struggle against imperial-ism and monopoly capitalism...
...He further promised that the Soviets were willing to "negotiate the terms for a limited withdrawal whenever the Americans are ready to come to the table...
...To be sure, there are so many charges and counter-charges that it is difficult to know who is telling the truth...
...Pentagon reports can be dismissed as self-serving...
...He will be assisted by Elliot Richard-son and Jimmy Carter, who held a joint press conference yesterday...
...1987 Update: In retrospect, per-haps the most striking thing about the Dakota initiative was the liberal community's steadfast refusal to overreact in the face of what might have turned into a serious crisis...
...The CIA, on the other hand, has gained credibility with its new even-handed approach...
...June 1, 1986: Reaction to the Soviet presence in the wheat belt has on the whole been balanced to date...
...Yesterday, however, the Reader's Digest issued a press release de-scribing its forthcoming article, "Red Army Occupies North Dakota: An Exclusive Report (based on a three-month investigation...
...must recognize that it is a reality...
...Reagan is expected to sign the "Tunlaw Agreements" (the Soviet Embassy is on Tunlaw Road), be-cause, as the New York Times said the other day, "there can be no guarantee that we will get a better deal in the future...
...Soon apparently, there will be an important "Peace and Disarmament Conference" at the Soviet Embassy in Washington...
...Looking for reds under the bed only increases the risk of a superpower confrontation...
...Still, the Digest has offered some convincing details...
...Don't forget," said Carter, making a point that could so easily have been overlooked, "the Soviet Union lost 20 million people in World War II...
...Above all, the Reagan Administration must drop its bellicose rhetoric...
...Also in the news, President Reagan has returned from a vacation in the Santa Barbara mountains, looking tanned and fit...
...But a CIA analyst said these could easily have been taken in Afghanistan...
...South Dako-tans should soon enact a consumption tax, properly understood...
...At the present delicate stage of arms control nego-tiations in Moscow葉he Soviets have agreed to dismantle some of their missiles in Munich if we will do the same in Britain葉his kind of scare-mongering is unhelpful, recalling the worst excesses of the McCarthy Era...
...Reports of the demise of North Dakota are greatly exaggerated," he noted in his first dispatch...
...An ACLU spokesperson called a press conference and reminded press persons that "the Bill of Rights applies to everyone in the U.S., not just citizens...
...We should be cautious about doing any-thing to obstruct that vision...
...We have no right to interfere with the legitimate aspirations of indigenous movements in North Dakota, especially those arising out of decades of oppression and racism (which is a sin...
...In this age of nuclear confron-tation," their statement read, "the two superpowers threaten all hu-manity...
...Old-fashioned ideology and simplistic sloganeering will not resolve this complex problem...
...There have been some jokes in the news columns about "red" Indians, which has helped defuse the tension...
...Reed Irvine, the vigilante press critic with Accuracy in Media, caused an uproar in the press by demanding that Kaiser should "name his source...
...Yuri Andropov, the Soviet leader, will attend, and Reagan is being urged to do likewise...
...This greatly helped to de-escalate the crisis...
...They have understandable and legitimate fears of being surrounded...
...He added: "It is only when unpopular causes are defended that all our rights and freedoms are protected...
...Soviet battalions then responded fraternally to this outcrv...
...He went on to point out that there were shortages and food queues, "but it is widely accepted that the economic hardship some have felt here was mainly caused by fleeing business-men and entrepreneurs, 'who took every nut and bolt and sack of corn with them容verything that wasn't nailed down,' according to one source...
...as long as it avoids any provocative or bellicose response...
...The White House's James Baker should clamp down immediately on all such pro-vocative statements from within the Administration...
...Are they simply looking for more govern-ment handouts...
...The local Food Stamp office is deserted.'' Anthony Lewis had been away on another reporting mission to the "Arc of Stability" (extending from Angola to Mozambique and Moscow), but now he has come home and he has in-terviewed the leaders of the Squaw Coalition...
...For example, yesterday: "Whatever one may think of the Soviet presence in Bismarck預nd we certainly don't condone it here葉he U.S...
...They also obtained aerial shots showing convoys of trucks embla-zoned with red stars rolling south across the Badlands...
...Just as the Soviet economy is strong, so Soviet fighting forces are weak," the agency says...
...Irvine was summarily dragged before the re-cently established Free Press Tri-bunal, denounced for his "repeated use of bully-boy, McCarthy tactics," and "stripped of his First Amend-ment rights...
...Future generations will judge us by the moderation of our response at this critical moment...
...Elliot Richardson said: "We should not overreact...
...The Soviets moved some tanks back into Canada, and our silos in North Da-kota were de-activated...
...A National Enquirer team brazenly traveled to Bismarck and, using gutter press tactics, returned with photos of Soviet troops drinking milkshakes in a downtown drugstore...
...It is a part of the Slavic character...
...Army, Marine, and other military units" from vio-lating the visitors' Second Amend-ment rights葉he right to bear arms...
...June 15, 1986: The Catholic bish-ops have put out a statement re-minding us (and some of us needed reminding) that "Soviet troops are human beings with room for growth and potential for human develop-ment...
...Cyrus Vance, who "in all humility" has agreed to serve as chairman, has promised that the commission's work will be "calm and balanced...
...June 7, 1986: Scooping the compe-tition, Robert Kaiser of the Washing-ton Post has obtained an interview with a "senior Kremlin official," who is reported as saying that "no harm will come to the U.S...
...In the long run, the Soviet army too will no doubt come to see the error of its ways...
...On the bright side, the literacy rate in North Dakota is already rising, apparently, and according to Bonnar, "unemploy-ment claims are down sharply and you don't see hunger and misery on the streets the way you used to...
...Their col-lective will was sapped...
...The greed had to be seen to be believed.' " Fortunately, there has been much criticism in the media of this greed...
...They have a vision," he wrote, "a vision of a new society...
...Both sides must show willingness to accept a careful, pragmatic, nego-tiated settlement which should be crafted by the United Nations...
Vol. 16 • March 1983 • No. 3
