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August 16, 2005
Zimmerman
I finished The Zimmerman Telegram by Barbara Tuchman last weekend. I find real life spy books more interesting than most of the fictional spy stuff that is out there. I read Charlie Wilsons War which is about the CIA's actions in Afganistan in the 1980'a a few years ago and another book about WWII espionage tricks and incidents around the same time and found those to be more interesting than any James Bond movie or Tom Clancy novel. I think this is mainly because people do stuff in real life that is so stupid, dangerous, bold, or crazy that it is hard to believe these actions occurred if you read them in a fictional novel.
The Zimmerman Telegram was interesting because it focused on all of the intrigue that succeeded in getting the US to enter World War I. It is easy to forget that the US had invaded Mexico a few years before the telegram (with the permission of Mexicos government at the time) in pursuit of Pancho Villa who had invaded the US and killed Americans in Mexico so the idea of a Mexican invasion was not far fetched. Also, the Germans and Japanese had made many attempts to purchase ports and other facilities in Mexico. Many Americans were more worried about a possible Red Dawn style Japanese invasion up through Mexico than an invasion by Mexico itself before the telegram appeared.
The most surprising thing about Germany in all of this is that many Germans were not very worried about the US entering the war in spite of our industrial capacity and finances. Also, even after the Germans knew we had gotten the telegram they continued to use the same methods and codes to transmit other confidential messages because they thought the US and British peoples were to stupid to crack their code. This is one of those things that would be hard to believe if it was fiction.
I respect Wilson even less now than before I read this book. Partly because Wilson allowed his racism to influence his decision making in matters of national security and partly because he seemed to have so little desire to work with what was possible and thought too highly of other countries motives. I am sure today he would be a big believer in the UN. No other world leader was interested in peace without victory, but Wilson was willing to risk his own countrys security to chase a goal that can not be achieved. Countries and institutions, like people, can not be perfected. You can improve (not perfect) the situation in the world, but you have to live in the world of the possible if you want to make a difference for the better. Wilson did not learn that lesson until it was too late.
Posted by Pete at August 16, 2005 05:46 PM
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Comments
Haven't read the book you mention, but do think that wars are started for all kinds of reasons. Our current war- who would have thought it possible prior to 911? People just do what they have to do to preserve their societies. All in the society may not approve, however living is better than dying, that being what our enemy approves of. In WWI, a lot of people died before we got into it. In this war, you are termed by some to be racist if you identify our enemy by name: Islam, which btw, may be a religion, surely not a race.
Posted by: Johnny Cakes at August 21, 2005 08:04 PM