THE CONFUSION, INGRATITUDE AS

WELL AS THE DANGER OF THE

WESTERN LIBERALS AND THE TRUMP
THERAPY.
I have been either closely following or actively involved in
World and African political events for the last 56 years. In those
56 years, I have noticed many happenings, behaviours, etc.
One of the groups that I have observed with interest are the
Western Liberals, Leftists, etc. In particular, I have noticed
the confusion, ingratitude and, therefore, danger of these
groups. Liberals are supposed to be people who are not
conservative and hardliners in economic, political and social
issues. Leftists are supposed to be progressive as far as the
same issues are concerned. In order to keep this piece brief, I
will not go into the history and details of Western Liberalism
and Leftism. That should be for another day.

Suffice it to say that the freedom fighters from Africa, who have
been fighting colonialism, neo-colonialism, slave trade and
marginalization for the last 500 years, would have counted the
Westerns Liberals and Leftists among our automatic allies
because these should be people that should be fighting for
freedom and justice for all peoples, including the formerly
Colonized Peoples.

Instead, we notice confusion, ingratitude and, therefore, danger

from these liberals and leftists. Let us start with the confusion.
During the US campaign, I noticed President Trump using the
words: convergence rather than divergence, while handling
international affairs. That is exactly what the Western Liberals
and Leftists should have been looking for. Instead, we would
spend endless hours arguing with the Western Liberals on
matters on which we cannot have convergence bearing in mind
that our societies were still pre-capitalist and traditional while
theirs have been industrial for centuries now. These are issues
to do with family, forms of democracy, homo-sexuals, central
planning versus economic liberalization, etc., etc. One had to
control irritation to politely get through these meetings. Yet
matters of convergence were there and uncontested: fighting
extremism and terrorism (narrow-mindedness and
indiscriminate use of violence); modern education in natural
sciences and social sciences; the emancipation of women;
trade; democracy; etc. This is what, in brief, I regard as the
confusion of the Western Liberals and Leftists. I do not want to
say much on this because I want to get to the next two points
and space is limited. Nevertheless, by the Western Liberals
trying to impose all their views and values on everybody in the
World, they generate not convergence but divergence and even
conflict.

Owing to the confusion of these actors, it leads them to two

other mistakes: ingratitude and, therefore, a danger to peace in
the World. As colonized Peoples, the Africans were greatly
assisted by two earth-shaking events in the last century: the
October Communist Revolution of 1917 in the Soviet Union
(Russia) and the Victory of the Communists in China in 1949.
You should remember that by 1900, the whole of Africa had
been colonized except for Ethiopia which Musolini would soon
add on the list (in 1935). Colonized by whom? By the Western
Countries (Britain, France, Portugal, Germany and Spain). The
Communists, on the other hand, in both Russia and China, were
totally opposed to Western Imperialism and were for de-
colonization. They opposed Imperialism by word and action
(support for the Liberation Movements)

The greed and flawed logic of the Western Imperialists soon led
to two World Wars (the 1st and the second 191418 and 1939
45). How? In 1453, the Ottoman Turks captured
Constantinople (Istanbul) and, therefore, blocked the overland
trade route opened by Marco-Polo in the years 1272 - 1275. The
trade was mainly in silk and spices very much in demand in
Europe at that time. Now, the Ottoman Turks cut off this route.
The Europeans had, therefore, to look for sea routes either
around the massive African Continent or through the unknown
Western Oceans the Atlantic and the Pacific. Frantic efforts by
Western rulers to go by sea around Africa and over the Western
Oceans, were soon rewarded. In 1492, Christopher Columbus
landed in Cuba, discovering for the Europeans a new continent
occupied by the American Indians. This new continent was
North and South America. In 1498, Vasco Da Gama went
around the Cape of Good Hope and spent the Christmas day at
Natal. These two events should have been very beneficial to
humanity if it was not for two weaknesses: the greed of the
Europeans and the bankruptcy of the African Chiefs as well as
the under-development of the indigenous Peoples of the
Americans. The bankrupt African Chiefs would not organize us
to resist slave trade and colonialism. In fact, many of them
actually assisted both. Especially for Africa, both slave trade
and colonialism would not have been possible, if it was not for
the collaboration and bankruptcy of the African Chiefs. Owing
to the social under-development of the Indigenous Americans
(the American Indians), they were exterminated by the
Christians from Europe, using war and disease. It is an
amazing miracle of God when I go to the UN and see the very
American Indian face of Evo Morales, the President of Bolivia.
So, some American Indians survived in sufficient numbers to
generate a President from among themselves!! How great God
is even in the face of evil!! I have never had a chance to talk to
him. What language do these Indians speak? Do they still
speak their indigenous languages? Therefore, in the four
centuries between Columbus landing in Cuba and 1900, three
most terrible things had happened to the non-European
children of God: the indigenous People of the Americas had
been exterminated and their land had been taken over by the
Christian Europeans; millions of Africans had been up-rooted,
taken into slavery in the Americas or perished in the process;
and the whole of Africa (except for Ethiopia) and much of Asia
had been colonized by European Countries (Britain, France,
Spain, Holland, Portugal, etc.). The Europeans had polluted the
efforts of the explorers that were looking for the sea routes to
the East. Unlike Marco Polo who opened a trade route to the
East for the flow of silk and spices, the Europeans now
unleashed conquest, slave trade and even extermination on the
People of the three continents: Africa, Asia and the Americas.

Nevertheless, the Colonized Peoples, initially betrayed by their

bankrupt chiefs, were beginning to organize themselves. The
ANC of South Africa was, indeed, founded in 1912. I attended
their Centenary celebrations in Bloemfontein in 2012. In the
USA, by around 1905, people like Du Bois, later on joined by
George Padmore, started agitating for Pan-Africanist ideas. It is
this re-invigorated resistance by the African and other colonized
peoples that formed the first pillar of our ability to regain our
freedom. Indeed, Mahtma Ghandi was also in South Africa as a
young lawyer when this awakening was taking place.
It is at this stage that the 2 nd pillar of our freedom took shape:
the sparking of the inter-imperialist war of 1914-1918. What
were these imperialists fighting for? They were fighting over us
we the Colonized Peoples the property of the imperialists.
The Germanic tribes inhabiting the forests of Northern Europe,
had defied the Roman Empire and contributed to its decline and
collapse in 450 AD. By 1870, these tribes were still governed
under 39 Kingdoms, Principalities etc. On account of the
growing Junker pressure in one of the Kingdoms, Prussia, a war
took place between Prussia and France in 1870. France was
defeated by Bismarck and the German Kingdoms were united.
A United Germany now cried foul on account of being
cheated by the other European countries in the enterprise of
having Colonial possessions i.e. us. Germany demanded a
fairer redivision of the World Colonies. That is how Bismark
organized the Congress of Berlin in 1884 85 to solve this
problem the problem of being cheated as far as we the
possessions were concerned. That is how Germany now
joined the League of the Imperialists by being awarded:
Tanganyika, Rwanda, Burundi, Cameroon, Namibia, Togo, etc. It
seems, however, that Germany was not happy with the
redivision. That is how, eventually, the 1st World War broke out
in 1914. The results of the 1st World War did not please
Germany and Germany, now under Hitler, started the 2 nd World
War. The good thing was that the Imperialist Countries had
been so weakened by their criminal wars, that the anti-colonial
movement grew in strength. The Imperialists tried to re-
establish control, but they were defeated in Indonesia, Indo-
China, Kenya etc. This, therefore, was the second pillar that
enabled our emancipation.
The third pillar was the emergence of Communists in the Soviet
Union in 1917 and in China in 1949. These groups were anti-
capitalist but also anti-colonialist. To the advantage of the
Colonized Peoples, a big anti-imperialist camp had emerged by
1950. They opposed imperialism morally and also gave
material support to the liberation Movements. Genuine
freedom fighters in Africa can, therefore, never forget this
history changing solidarity. When Christian countries from
the West were enslaving us, these atheist communists
supported our freedom and they never interfere in our affairs
even today. These communists, especially the Soviet Union, did
not only support our freedom, they also defended, at a great
cost to themselves, the freedom of the imperialist countries
themselves. Although the imperialist countries had intervened
in the Soviet Union so as to defeat the new communist power,
which efforts had failed between 1918 and 1920, by 1938, the
pragmatic Stalin was calling on the West to form an Alliance
with him to oppose German aggression. The Western leaders,
on account of their narrow interests and myopia, refused. Soon
Hitler attacked Poland and overrun it; he had gobbled up
Czechoslovakia in March 1939. He overran the whole of
Western Europe except for Britain and Sweden. Spain, Portugal
and Italy were Hitlers allies. Fortunately for the West and for
us all, Hitler made the mistake of attacking the Soviet Union on
the 22nd of June, 1941. It is the Soviet Union that defeated
Hitler after alot of sacrifices with over 60 millionpeople dead
etc. Hitler, had to deploy 195 Army divisions against the Soviet
Union compared to only 75 divisions in the West against the
Western allies the USA, Britain, Frances De-Gaulle, Canada,
Australia, New-Zealand, South Africa, not forgetting the
hundreds of thousands of African soldiers fighting for the
Colonial Masters. The Western countries only opened the
second front with the landings in Sicily in July 1943. This was
after the defeat of the Germans by the Russians at Moscow
(1941 December), Stalingrad (1942-43) and Kursk (July,
1943).
It is this Soviet Union, that did not only support the freedom of
us, the Colonized Peoples of the World, but saved the whole of
humanity by defeating Hitler, that is ever the target of the
ungrateful, confused and, therefore, dangerous groups in the
West. These groups were against the Soviet Union after the
October Revolution in 1917, throughout the inter-war period
(1918 1939), during the Cold War and even after the Cold
War. It is unfair, it is wrong and it is dangerous for World
Peace. True, the Soviets made their own mistakes. Why did
they occupy Western Europe after the defeat of Hitler? Would
the mighty Red Army not have earned more admiration from
the Peoples of the World if they had withdrawn from Eastern
Europe in 1946 and left those Peoples to shape their own
destinies? They would not have, then, involved themselves in
Hungary in 1956, Czechoslovakia in 1968 and there would have
been no Berlin Wall. Why did Brezhnev invade Afghanistan in
1979? I was part of the massive anti-Soviet demonstration in
Dar-es-salaam in 1968 following their invasion of
Czechoslovakia. However, to me, who is not biased, those
mistakes neither compare with the mistakes of the West, past
and present, nor do they deem the great historic contributions
of both the USSR and China to the cause of humanity in general
and the African Peoples in particular.

The Soviet Union broke up to the wild acclamation of the groups

in the West. They welcomed the break up but did not bother
about the how. You, therefore, had residual and consequent
issues to the break-up. If the old internal borders of the USSR
were now to become the new international borders of Sovereign
Countries that were successors to the old Russian Czarist
Empire and the USSR, was it not necessary to discuss that
phenomenon frankly and fairly? How about the mixed
populations Russian and Non-Russian? How were they to live
thereafter? No, all that was none of the business of the
Western governing circles. What was crucial was that the
enemy was down. Moreover, all the positive contributions
Russia made to global peace or can make now are of no
consequence to these Western circles. Russia must submit to
the dictates of the West. This is where the danger of these
groups comesin. Russia is a very powerful country even after
the break-up of the USSR. It is (17,021,900 km) seventeen
million square kilometers in land area that is like almost
combining the USA and China. The Communists developed
Russian technology and it can develop more. To think that you
can trample on Russia like they have been trampling on other
unfortunate Peoples, is to be very reckless and dangerous to
World peace. Yet there are so many issues on which all of us
(Africa, the West, Russia, China, India, Brazil, etc.) agree:
universal education; improved health; industrialization; freedom
of Peoples; the emancipation of women; anti-terrorism; etc.
Why not take advantage of these convergences? We who were
colonized and brutalized by the Western Countries forgot and
forgave those mistakes. Why cant these countries of the West
have a just and balanced attitude to the countries of the East
that are growing in capability and getting millions of Peoples
out of poverty?

This is where Mr. Trump comes in. He says: Why do we not

examine the possibility of working with Russia against common
threats, such as terrorism? The liberals then shout that Mr.
Trump must be having a secret agenda with Mr. Putin etc. This
is why we could think of looking into the possibility of talking
about the Trump Therapy for strategic myopia and recklessness
in the West.

Gen. (rtd.) Yoweri Kaguta Museveni

PRESIDENT OF THE REPUBLIC OF UGANDA

Date:
Friday, February 17, 2017