© 2000-2001 by Ralph Rewes

Underestimation in this case is the habit the leaders of our country have to make too low an estimate of the quantity, degree, or worth of the political and warfare potentials of our enemies before such potentials turn into a bloody war. It might be product of thinking that only the Anglo-Saxon culture is capable of producing a smart government (however, others may say that US Americans make neither very good History writers nor readers). It might be a tendency to look down on other cultures — with a superiority complex — as if other peoples were inferior. Underestimation of Latin America specifically sprouts out of ignoring cultural factors in this continent. In short, underestimating potential enemies results from ignorance and produces catastrophic results.

All the aspects of underestimation have their origin in ignorance (the condition of being uneducated, unaware, or uninformed). US American politicians and leaders have a well deserved reputation of being uneducated, unaware and uninformed about other cultures. Those who lived here thirty or forty years ago can attest that then the USA was a country locked from outside influence — even more than the USSR. It was difficult to get foreign newspapers, and seldom one heard news from other countries. Because of its proximity, the tragic events in Cuba broke the ice. In the collective mind there was an overwhelmingly generalized rule of thumb ruled: everything here in the USA was better than anything elsewhere. This was paradise, and our doors to the outside world were closed — not closed and protected by zealous killing guards as in the Communist nightmare, but by our minds and by a lack of real interest for other peoples’ cultures. Tourists then went to visit funny and backward countries with funny cultures, spent dollars, drank daiquirís, took pictures of natives on donkeys, and shopped mementos, serapes and pottery, and that was all they learned abroad.

That is changing, too fast for an intelligent assimilation or to produce a clear understanding on what is going on abroad. Today’s tourists visit museums, learn about other country’s history and take pictures of churches and beaches. However, frequently they learned distorted images of the places they visit from the wrong sources, since your typical USA citizen, loves to side with "freedom fighters" as enemies of freedom commonly call themselves. But the typical American tends to have reservation on everything they are told, and this is good. Some journalists excepted. On the wrong side, Americans are also bringing home an inferiority complex for things done in the past by previous administrations, and new politicians are now molded by that complex.

As a consequence of a new — and maybe too late — open attitude toward the world around, more knowledgeable tourists, more international flavor in our cities, USA cultural mores are changing. However, instead of clearing out old confusion, more confusion is being piled up. Consequently, old misunderstandings are mixing poorly with newly acquired knowledge. Underestimating is being replaced by overestimating the good intentions of dubious political groups, especially the so called "left."

Left is a confusing term used in the USA by infamous Marxists to hide under the popularity of Liberals to gain respect. One must make perfectly clear that there is no one further from a Liberal than a Marxist who is a street pusher for Totalitarianism. However, these pushers in the USA usually hide behind the media and culture-disseminating centers (movie industry, universities, etc.). With a phony reputation of experts working for large-circulation newspapers, some dubious intellectuals instill in their readers, by ignorance or instigation tactics the concept that Marxists are Liberals.

This way confused, our political leaders again viciously circle back to underestimating the malevolence of Leftist leaders abroad and that of their propaganda spearheads at home. As in the past, when they underestimated a Georgian mukhik, nicknamed Stalin (man of steel) costing the lives to millions of his victims, they underestimate now the destructive potential of messianic leaders. Previous politician underestimated Hitler, although he was crystal clear about his intentions, and they reacted only when such reaction was costly in American lives, victims of Nazism and war victims casualties.

I don’t want to bother you with a long list — but it is a long list. Let us just summon things up. A half-ass policy of underestimating world enemies began to settled at the beginning of this century. And if f thousands of American soldiers died in Viêt Nam, it was because this half-ass political blindness helped Communists in Viêt Nam and all over the world to strengthen North Viêt Nam’s aggression to the south of the country. Communists never cared about human losses, so long as they reached they objective. Consequently, they were willing to sacrifice as many lives as they could. Americans, on the other hand, where respect for his citizens should have been paramount here was losing ground.

A stupid guerrilla war was sustained they way the Vietnamese Communists wanted it.

It killed the youth of our families, creating opposition at home, fired by your local quadres. Fear of the reaction of the Russian bear, however, was used as an excuse not to have had stopped the Viêt Nam war right there and then by blowing the illegitimate Communist regime out of North Viêt Nam. However, it might have been asking too much. In a horrible precedent, when Patton wanted to free the Russian people from oppression, he was stop short, a stupid decision that gave green light to Stalin to go on a massive repression and to murder thousands and thousands of political opponents, and all in vain, because the incompetent and obsolete Marxist view of economy did not work. One ponders: They did it with Germany, why not Russia? Why not Viêt Nam?

Lack of foresight? More certainly, leading the way to other things. Underestimating ruthless leaders in modern times has given us world-babies of the stature of the Ayatollah Khomeini, Sadam Hussein, Mao Zedong and, in America, Fidel Castro. In Iraq, instead of toppling the dictator (because it was morally wrong) our military forces massacred thousands and thousands of young men, who were probably inducted by force (because this seems to be morally right?).

In Cuba, an irresponsible journalism by The New Times created a phony mystique that translated in thousands of murders, prisoners, exiles and drowned people. One can say that this newspapers is responsible for all the crimes occurred and occurring in Castro’s animal farm. Such irresponsible behavior still goes on and it is mimicked by politically confused leaders. In fact, Clinton’s administration has frequently helped Castro repressive organizations because it believes this philosophy while at the same time fears the recklessness of the Tyrant — or its own weakness to react forcibly before a crisis with him.

The big press in the USA ignores on purpose the crimes, not only of Castro, but of the terrorist groups in Peru, Colombia, Argentina and Chile, while systematically attack those who try to bring the truth forward. For them, Augusto Pinochet is a monster while Castro is a revolutionary. Pinochet was in power for 16 years; he called for a plebiscite which was honest, and he stepped out of power when he lost it for a narrow margin, leaving a prosperous country behind. And he is called a dictator, and vociferous thank thinkers spend nights concocting ways to vilify, attack the man who saved Chile of thousands of deaths, the consequence of any Communist regime.

This enraged the viciousness of every Marxist creep in the world and showed the everyone how well organized and how infesting they can be. Castro the revolutionary, on the other hand, has been oppressing, murdering, exiling and jailing Cubans by the thousands, but in the eyes of these creeps, he is a saint. Or, perhaps, he is a simpleton, a crazy Latin, who will some day come to terms. It is this second attitude that makes so many Latin Americans mad and also makes them happy every time this evil yet powerful and paranoidly smart tyrant whips USA’s ass. In the eyes of Latin malcontents, this defiant dictator is a hero. There are documents, proofs, dramatic samples of messianic behavior like the shooting of the rescue plane, but the big "Leftist" press choose to ignore the facts — and they call themselves "objective." They represent la crème de la crème of the those who lack foresight.

The story continues. Venezuelan Chávez hopes the US leaders continue on their blind path of underestimation. From the very beginning, he set forth all his intentions, none of them to promote a real democracy, but the building of a military structure in the region, with clearly expansionist goals. He is been looked down as a crazy Indian who lacks Castro’s charisma. So does Castro, who considers his duty to tell him what to do or he may screw up things, like the other Indian, Daniel Ortega did.

In both cases, the USA leadership and Castro share the same racial prejudice. One must not forget the day Castro called Angolan president Agostino Neto, a "negro de mierda (a shitty nigger)" in front of everybody, not long before Neto’s mysterious death in Moscow, 1979 when the USSR and Castro’s Cuba were in good plotting terms. Underestimation and Lack of Foresight have become part of our international policy. It is a complicated mixture of prejudice, cultural ignorance, superiority complex, and hubris. Living in a bubble we consider perfect, we fail to see how there are many things better in other countries. It surprised me the comment of a friend of mine who accompanied me to a visit to Germany: he could not understand how in Germany there were things even more modern than back here in the States.

We frequently hear that this is the land of the free, but fail to see that there are other countries that enjoy the same or even higher level of freedom. It is only recently that this country has begun to free itself from the religious ignorance of fundamentalist fanaticism. When Hollywood censorship banned the film industry from showing the navel, the world was laughing at this ridiculous attitude. Now that the multiple dividing walls between world cultures are tumbling down, there is hope that some day we neither underestimate nor overestimate reality and by so doing, we will possess a better foresight of things to come.