Superman: I’m here to fight for truth, and justice, and the American way.
Lois Lane [laughs]: You’re gonna end up fighting every elected official in this country!
Superman (1978)
In that one line of dialogue, this impossibly powerful being who was thought to be the lone survivor of the doomed planet Krypton and possessed the power to be an absolute dictator and/or god to rule Earth with impunity showed that he was more in touch with what it means to be human than most of the people inhabiting this planet.
Why is such a corny and hokey character like Superman still one of the most popular superheroes since his debut in Action Comics No 1 in 1938?
It’s because you always knew where you stood with Superman and that he was always going to be on the side of truth and justice and this idealised view of America’s place in the world as a democratic society the rest of the world can aspire to achieve.
Superman was always there to fight on the side of the downtrodden and oppressed who didn’t possess his mighty powers to fight the enemy on their own.
You could always count on Superman to be there whenever he was needed whether it was rescuing a kitten from high in a tree or saving Lois Lane from another of her misadventures caused by her insatiable curiosity as a reporter as well as a bit of thumbing her nose at common sense and self-preservation or saving the Earth against whatever galactic threat came it’s way.
Superman would always be there for us.
Always.
That was how the United States was often viewed by our allies round the world, particularly after the formation of NATO as a mutual defence pact designed to counter the growing influence and domination of Eastern Europe by the Soviet Union.
If you had the support of the United States, you had Superman on your side and that was often enough to convince their adversaries that the negotiating table was far more preferable to trying to match us militarily which was doomed to failure.
It took a few decades and us racking up a massive national debt but we ended up spending the Soviet Union into oblivion right about the time our current Vice President was theoretically figuring out how not to wee and poo in his diapers.
Oh, there were certainly those who would test that resolve such as when Saddam Hussein of Iraq decided to forcibly annex the Kingdom of Kuwait. Two wars later and Saddam Hussein and his even more evil sons are explaining their misdeeds to Allah and Kuwait is still an independent nation.
Then there was this bit of unpleasantness where a then little-known terrorist group called al-Qaeda took two shots at the World Trade Centre in New York (amongst other targets) on a fateful day known by four characters: “9/11”.
Suddenly, our mighty ocean barriers had been breached in a way we’d never known and that brought about a fierce resolve to find and punish those who dared to attack us on our shores and those who would give their leaders shelter and comfort.
For all of George W Bush’s stupidity, this is one thing he got absolutely right. He developed the intelligence and the case against al-Qaeda and Osama bin Laden, Colin Powell presented it to the world at the UN and asked who was with us. We knew who had masterminded the operation, we knew roughly where he was hiding and the Taliban regime of Afghanistan that was giving him sanctuary and gave them a choice…either hand him and his buddies over or face dire consequences.
The Taliban refused and a large coalition of the willing from round the world were with us (including our NATO allies fighting at our side as the only country for whom Article 5 of the North Atlantic Treaty has ever been invoked) as we went into Afghanistan and took the Taliban government down. Osama bin Laden managed to evade capture for quite a while and outlasted a couple of our presidents but he didn’t survive the SEAL team that finally caught up to him in his hideout in Pakistan.
The world could still be sure that we would always be with whoever was on the side of truth and justice and the American way.
But in my opinion, that faith was shaken quite badly when President George W Bush announced the date the United States would leave Iraq which still was in the throes of an insurgency that would eventually give rise to a terrorist caliphate called the Islamic State in Iraq and the Levant (ISIL) who would wait for us to leave and then go on a reign of terror that threatened to destabilise the entire region. President Obama continued this disastrous policy of informing the enemy of when we were leaving (always a bad idea) and we’d have to eventually re-engage in theatre.
Other bad actors decided to capitalise on the United States being distracted from it’s core mission of upholding Superman’s mantra…one Vladimir Putin of Russia comes to mind in his illegal invasion and annexation of the Crimea under the insane and untrue pretext that Ukraine was going to join NATO and launch a war of aggression against Russia in 2014 after the fall of the pro-Kremlin Yanukovich government.
To be fair, there’s not a whole lot President Obama could have done militarily at the time that wouldn’t have led to a shooting war with Russia which no one really wanted. Any moves against the Black Sea Fleet stationed at the massive Soviet-era naval base at Sevastopol would have been casus belli from a Russian government that has never stopped being paranoid about an invasion from the West and Ukraine joining NATO in particular as it would plug the last remaining gap in the NATO wall between Russia and Europe.
The de-facto acceptance of Crimea’s annexation and the utterly disastrous withdrawal from Afghanistan which started with President Trump tossing the legitimate government in Kabul into the bin in favour of a deal with the Taliban to return to power and President Biden’s continuation of that withdrawal policy that led to a shameful panicked abandonment of Kabul certainly made it clear that the United States days of being Superman were definitely on the decline.
Is it any surprise that Vladimir Putin would then be emboldened to engage in a full invasion of Ukraine in 2022 to grab the Russian-majority ethic enclaves of Donetsk and Luhansk with the goal of re-establishing the old Soviet Union that had died 30 years prior? Make no mistake, Vladimir Putin is a creature of the KGB and no matter what they call themselves today or whether Putin is President or Prime Minister, he’s very much an old-school Soviet in thinking and in actions.
Putin ended up frightening previously neutral Sweden and Finland into finally joining NATO and establishing the final pieces to the northern NATO wall. Ukraine is the only chink left in NATO’s armour to the south. It was absolutely right then to support Ukraine against naked aggression from their much larger “neighbour” and it’s even more imperative that they win so that we can finally make Moscow understand once and for all that on their side of that line, they can do what they will with their own empire.
If they’d like to play nice with the rest of the world on trade and other matters of mutual benefit, I’m sure that’d be welcomed with open arms.
But that day absolutely cannot come without the territorial integrity of Ukraine as it then was before the Russian invasions being respected and protected.
That’s what brings me to the utterly shameful episode in the Oval Office where two people who seem utterly beholden to Vladimir Putin engaged in a disgraceful humiliation of the leader of a sovereign nation that’s trying to remain so in spite of vacillating support from Washington.
This man is leading a country that is literally fighting for it’s very survival against an enemy that would be more than happy to put a few bullets into his brains and be done with him, international prohibitions against assassinations of national leaders be damned.
The Ukrainian people have shown such courage in repelling and resisting the Russian invasion for the past three years that most pundits (and honestly, me as well!) would have given them only a few weeks at best. Zelenskyy even joked about that when he mentioned he’d heard Putin had only given Ukraine’s resistance three days before he felt it would crumble.
Trump instigated a round of negotiations about the future status of Ukraine with the United States and Russian delegations in attendance and came out of it with ideas on a cease fire that could have been dictated from Moscow. The Ukrainians weren’t invited even though you’d imagine they would have more than a few thoughts on the subject.
He then tables a “deal” by which Ukraine would give access to $500B of minerals and rare earths and demands that Ukraine accept it to pay off a “debt” for prior assistance that doesn’t exist in reality as President Macron tried to gently tell our President. And if Ukraine does not accept such a “generous deal”, then the United States is “out” and Ukraine can go it alone.
That sounds suspiciously like someone who imagines himself to be a mob boss telling Zelenskyy that he’d better sign that deal because it’d be a shame if something nasty happened to their country.
I can’t blame Zelenskyy for not only feeling utterly betrayed if not humiliated by the completely despicable actions of our so-called “leaders”…and that in public, no less…against all of the rules of diplomacy which means that you save those sorts of shakedowns for private venues.
Zelenskyy was in a no-win situation. There was no way he could blow off the meeting even knowing that it was almost certainly a trap. Had he done so, I’ve no doubt that Trump would have feigned insult. As it was, he did so anyway after allowing his Vice President to attack the leader of a sovereign country that at least up that point had been nominally supported by the United States.
Even though it was probably the worst tactic to employ with this particular administration, I can’t blame Zelenskyy for getting angry and standing up for his people in front of two cowardly bullies who want him to publicly grovel and abase himself for their “support” so that their real master in Moscow can not only score a propaganda coup but also drive a wedge through the NATO alliance that he hopes to shatter in favour of returning to the bad old Soviet Union days.
There’s no way round it…the way Zelenskyy was treated was absolutely deplorable and despicable.
Trump and Vance have sold the honour of this country and it’s standing as the defender of democracy in the world for a few dirty chains of cash and the dubious distinction of making the United States out to be a diplomatic partner that cannot be trusted to act in good faith and defend truth and justice.
They have sacrificed the honour of this country to be feared in other places.
They have sacrificed all that was right and noble about the United States and become craven and cowardly in the face of evil that those wretched blowhards from South Carolina and Georgia thinks we ought to be.
And in so doing, they’ve shown the world that as long as these two infest the White House and are enabled by like-minded stooges in Congress and the courts, the tradition of the United States keeping its word and defending the oppressed and downtrodden of the world can no longer be taken as a statement of absolute fact.
This is going to set our diplomatic efforts back for years and give aid and comfort to those dictators like Putin and Xi and Kim Jong Un who would love nothing more than to see our position of leadership in a free world disintegrate so that they can take full advantage of Superman looking elsewhere.
One can only hope that we can recover from this debacle once these elected fools are banished from power forever.
But for now, Ukraine has been betrayed and I’m sure Superman is probably crying at how lost the American Way seems after just a few weeks.
I can assure Kal-El he’s not the only one despairing at this loss.
For President Zelenskyy, I can only apologise most abjectly for the horrific treatment a guest of this country was subjected to by the President and Vice President on Friday last. God knows those two fools not only do not have the class or temperament to do so but they’ve also got the outsized egos to believe that they’ve nothing to atone for in their part in that sad event.
Because they’re utterly unable to do so themselves, it falls to us who remember the old ways of honour and the kept word to make the heartfelt apologies required of throwing every tenet of hospitality to the four winds.
Those of us who understand Ukraine and it’s fight for freedom as well as the almost super-human courage of the Ukrainian people in the face of the atrocities you’ve endured for the past three years knows that even if our “leaders” cannot be trusted, there are many of this country’s citizens who wish for Ukraine to be free and not be raped by other countries whether it be economically, politically, or culturally.
We will be with Ukraine as steadfastly as Superman would be as long as it takes.
I can only hope that you may forgive us this grave insult to the Ukrainian people and to you personally that was perpetrated on our behalf by those who would profess America’s values but have none of its virtues.
Please don’t lose faith in the American people. Jor-El’s final words to his son who would become Superman is as true about the majority of us in this country who believe in peace and caring for others in need as it was for his son finally discovering who and what he is.
Live as one of them, Kal-El, to discover where your strength and your power are needed. But always hold in your heart the pride of your special heritage. They can be a great people, Kal-El, they wish to be. They only lack the light to show the way. For this reason above all, their capacity for good, I have sent them you… my only son.
Jor-El – “Superman” (1978)
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