I suppose everyone has an opinion about the meeting between Presidents Trump and Zelenskyy in the Oval Office. I don't want to be too hard on the arrogant little Ukranian leader; after all, he has been in a brutal war with Russia for the past few years. That's bound to take a toll on anyone's equilibrium.
However, there is a limit to how much bad attitude a person can take. I watched the video of the full 49-minute meeting, not just the few-minute clip of the blow-up that has been running on an endless loop. Trump let quite a bit of Zelenskyy's guff slide by. He was more tolerant than many others would have been. Our president reached his saturation point near the very end, when Zelenskyy, in responding to a chide from VP Vance, issued a veiled threat that "you have nice ocean" but would "you will feel" future consequences.
That lit up President Trump immediately. He admonished the Ukranian president "You don't know that. Don't tell us what we're going to feel...." The ensuing dialogue was brief, direct, and harsh. The wheels flew off and the meeting crash-landed. Good. Since "cards" were also a discussion point, Zelenskyy needs to know he's been dealt a new hand.
But let's back up to that smug comment about our "nice ocean." The implication was that we are completely ignorant of war because of our geography. Yes, we actually have two nice oceans. Neither one has kept Americans from dying by the thousands in wars.
A few questions for the Ukranian president: Did our "nice ocean" protect us from the September 11 terrorist attacks (2,977 dead) and the ensuing wars in Afghanistan (2,459 dead) and Iraq (7,054 dead)?
How many United States service men and women died in World Wars I and II? Added together, the fatal casualties for those two wars approach one-half million American dead. Thousands of our servicemen died in the D-Day invasion operation alone, at the foreign shoreline of our nice ocean. Another 36,000 Americans died in the Korean conflict. And what about the 2,403 US service members dead in the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor? I can't even think about the 58,220 US fatalities in the Vietnam war.
It is true that the US has not suffered from ongoing war inside our homeland since The Civil War, 1861-65. Estimates vary, but between 600,000 and 800,000 Americans died fighting in that conflict. But Atlantic or Pacific, "nice oceans" have been beside the point as protection for our countrymen in wartime. Over the past century, Americans have died in faraway wars by the hundreds of thousands. Most American families in every war were marked by loss and tragedy.
So, Mr. Z., I must agree with President Trump: don't tell us how to feel. And stop interrupting a leader who is trying to pass you an ace.
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| The far side of our "nice ocean" - June 6, 1944 |
