Hard Power of the "Realists" : Maginot Line, Singapore , Prince of Wales and Repulse

As long as we have 'realists', we will have bloody long bloody wars

Foreign Affairs 'realists' are men and women who don't give a toss about suffering humanity in general and who claim that humanity's bonds stop at artificially drawn-up national boundaries.

As a result, they say our concerns about our neighbour's difficulties should extend no further than to determining their national status ; if they are one of 'us' , then by all means defend them.

But if these suffering humans are foreigners , then only help them to the extent that it helps our "interests" (inevitably that really means economic interests) in their area - otherwise cast them adrift to their fate.

All the too many nations that remained Neutral or Isolationist as the Nazis did their evil 'thing' were fully and truly Realists, in this sense.

Even the governments that did finally take up arms against Hitler in 1939 were also more realist than idealist in their foreign concerns.

It is accepted that Realists always dominate the academic departments , the think tanks , the military and government offices that involve themselves in diplomacy and foreign affairs full time.

But in fact the realists dominate among ordinary voters as well.

From their comfy armchairs, the realists talk confidently of the supremacy of hard power but their record on this score is decidedly bad.

They felt sure that the French Army - the best in the world they said - along with the Maginot Line, would beat the Boche.

That the big guns of Singapore , along with all those British battleships like the Prince of Wales and the Repulse would beat the little yellow man, who couldn't see clearly in the dark - who feared the jungle and was a poor shot in nighttime naval battles.

That the German army would be victorious  in Moscow in mere weeks.

That Germany would be quickly bombed into surrendering, as the British bomber - and the American Norden bombsight  -would always win through.

Hard power = vapourware.

By contrast, we idealists' belief that all suffering humanity is humanity's concern has a way of not just winning, but holding , a broad geographic array of coalition partners.

I am saying that the record shows that the soft power concern for humanity can be stronger than hard power's unsinkable battleships and unbreakable forts.

Geographic hard power trumps manmade hard power

 And - I contend -  it is geographically broad coalitions - even of the weak - that eventually wear down big aggressive armed forces with better weapons and tactics.

Somewhat surprisingly , the nasty Japanese and German governments of WWII did show a high regard for humanity --- as long as it was within their own national borders.

They could even be temporarily nice (in a limited fashion) to other nations (like Spain and Turkey and Thailand) ... if their economic interests demanded it.

They were thus fully conventional "realists" , right out of the American political science playbook.

But they had no true friends as a result and had to suffer seeing supposed friends (Italy, Finland and Romania) became bitter enemies time and time again.

The Allies - by point of contrast - presented just enough evidence of intermittent concern for their fellow man (soft power par excellence) that their coalition held together and grew gradually over time.

France's evil realism

Here, however , the example of the France empire weakened my case.

One of the two partners of the original 'coalition of the willing' , it broke into two unequal parts during the aftermath of the Battle of France.

Perhaps 95% of the French population at home and overseas decided to make genuine mental peace with the Nazis in June 1940.

Very realistic of them - what interest did France have in the Poles and Jews being murdered daily in far off Poland anyway ?

This 95% never did become idealistic and never did become filled with the milk of human kindness for the rest of suffering humanity.

But over time they felt their short and long term economic interests were not best serving by sticking with the losing ( Nazi) side.

Never having shared the German-centric ideals of the Nazis (merely sharing their 'nation-above-all' self-centeredness) , they found it mentally easy to publicly say that they had always been secretly pro-Allies  -- at just the opportune moment.

Similarly , isolationist cum realist Americans , once America had been attacked by Japan , found it easy enough to get worked up about replying in kind.

But Hitler did not permit us to see if isolationist America was really ready, at long last, to voluntarily come to the armed aid of the suffering foreigners of Europe.

The evidence is that America would not have  - until pushed into it by Hitler.

This happened when, perhaps surprisingly , Hitler met the spirit (and exceeded the legal letter) of his coalition obligations and followed Japan into declaring war on America.

Congress, per FDR's suggestion,  had declared war on one of the three partners of the Axis (Japan) as soon as it could.

But it did not do so to Germany and Italy  --- the other two members of the Axis.

So America did not 'declare war on the Axis'  after Pearl Harbour , as it so often likes to claim - the facts simply do not support this fantasy.

It only played catch-up when Hitler started the ball rolling by declaring war against America.

Realistic America, like realistic France earlier , did not see any point in wasting any lives freeing suffering Eastern Europeans from Hitler.

Not when their realistic pals , the Communists, would do it all for them.

In consequence, we then had the long , bloody (and bloody expensive) Cold War.

Thanks muchly, realists .....