Kevin doesn’t like my answer to his question.
To recap, he brought up as his objection to my column the fiction that countries are sovereign and allowed to make their alliances without regard for the security concerns of their neighbors. I think that’s just nonsense.
When confronted with the rejoinder that responsible hegemons like the United States — however good they may be and deserving they may be — have to take into account how other countries think and act when they want to achieve their outcomes — no matter how awful they are — he gives up the principle entirely for another one: “Right licenses might.” Welcome to the Marvel Universe.
My use of the Cuban missile crisis to demonstrate that countries care about the military alliances their neighbors make offends him. He calls it a moral equivalence. I never brought up justice or moral worth. It’s a strategic analogy. And the crisis was resolved when the U.S. found a way to de-escalate on its side by withdrawing missiles from Turkey. There’s a lesson there for Kevin: Sometimes you parlay with a monster to avoid foreseeable disasters.
Instead, with a great many more words than he needed, Kevin accuses me of siding with the Soviet Union or Putin, or something.
I’ll take that as an amusing admission of defeat on his part.