The Left and the Right War

So, last spring (2006) I wrote a little paper on what I called the 'Left War', looking at the primarily Latin American swing towards the left and it's impact on the US and our international policies.

After pondering it some more, I would say that we are embattled in at least two simultaneous non-traditional war fronts. On the one hand, we have the Left War, battling what we perceive as a socialist revolution that threatens some of our democratic principles. It's clear that the socialist reform is appealing to the public at large -- at least at first. It is unclear how long the legs are on this movement, but as long as it is propped up by petrodollars, I imagine it can have a pretty good run. And Chavez seems to be doing a heck of a job rallying the troops right now, supported by grandpa Fidel and mini-me Evo Morales in Bolivia.

On the other hand we are fighting what I call the 'Right War'. In this case, it's seems to be about who is Right -- in the righteous way. But really it is a battle of the the Extreme Right in which the religious fervor has short circuited common sense and declared that there is only one Right. The Middle East represents the nexus of the battle for us, but you can see the spread around the world and locally.

Africa seems to be off on it's own doing its darndest to itself (well, after the rest of the world mucked with it and then ejected), however, there appears to be a growing strength inside of Africa, but it will take a long time to mature and recover, but there are indications that it can happen. There are many continuing issues, not the least of which is Dakar followed by Somalia and the horn in general. I see the Africa conflicts as related but largely independent of the Left and Right fronts. Certainly you can find connections to both fronts in action, but they appear to be offshoots rather than primary centers.

What's interesting is when these new fronts get together with our old Cold War center -- and you can see this with Chavez meeting with Iran and then going over to the Russia to stock up on weapons, including the latest expectation that he'll buy a few submarines to patrol his oil shipping lanes. So now we have an interesting confluence of the new Left and Right supported by the old guard (Cuba, Russia).

Of course there are a lot of other countries wanting to be in the mix in case we get bored...

Kipp