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Lev Navrozov Archive
Thursday, August 12, 2010

Porous borders and President Obama's political base

Lev Navrozov emigrated from the Soviet Union in 1972. His columns are today read in both English and Russian. To learn more about Mr. Navrozov's work with the Center for the Survival of Western Democracies, click here.

Obama is the first U.S. president of a new type. Former U.S. presidents viewed or expected to view their presidency as their chance to make their contribution to the prosperity of the people of the United States and further strengthen the country's defenses during four or eight years they were in office.

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In this overall prosperous and generous country, there are always groups of people, that is, potential voters, who may be unhappy and disgruntled for different reasons: dissatisfaction with local administrative officials, loss of jobs, poor housing conditions, etc.

And those are exactly the groups Obama is after. He promises them to have their problems fixed. And they will reward him by giving him their votes.

Now, yet a bigger reward (close to 11 million votes) may come from those undocumented immigrants residing illegally in the United States if Obama manages to keep them in this country by arranging for them some kind of a legal temporary stay, if not an outright amnesty.

And how come the defense of the U.S. borders became an issue? Isn't it the first priority of the U.S. president to keep his country's borders "under lock and key," as the Soviet saying went in Stalin's times? True, the reasons were different: the Soviet task was to keep their citizens within the country, to prevent them from fleeing to the West. But actually it worked both ways: If the Soviets kept their subjects from escaping the country, the same system kept "foreign spies" from entering it. And that was that. The system worked well, the borders were foolproof.

I remember the time when not a single person could emigrate. And that was when our family devised an escape plan. True, we were young and innocent and did not think about the difficulties we might face or consequences that might follow our aborted escape. We were very wealthy, by official Soviet standards, which would work in our favor, because we thought of buying a bullet-proof, armored vehicle, and planned to go "on vacation" somewhere in the Georgian mountains, sort of close to the border with Turkey. We knew that Turkey was a NATO member and would never betray us by sending us back to the Soviets. We worked out a detailed plan and were almost finished with it when we had a visitor, a friend of ours, to whom we trusted our secret. "Are you out of your minds?" he said. "Your hare-brained plans! I know about the Soviet borders more than you think. I was there. I served there as a military officer, and let me tell you, the borders are impenetrable. First of all, there are two lines of fortification. First, you'll see the barbed wire wall extending all along the border. Then there is a wide space of land packed with dogs, searchlights day and night, checkpoints strategically placed at every possible crossing, radio communication, changing guards at certain intervals, and then another barbed wire wall. Just suppose your armored vehicle would break through the first barbed wire. You will be attacked by dogs and barraged with bullets, and if you survive that, you'll be detained before you reach the second wall of fortification, i.e., you will be trapped between the two walls. It's a cleverly designed trap. Poor, desperate souls, forget about escaping and enjoy your life while you still can." We could not believe we were so innocent and so ignorant. But the friend saved us, because we stopped scheming the ways to escape.

But then something happened. Stalin died. The Soviet system began to be less rigid and more fanciful. And then a miracle: Some Soviet citizens were allowed to emigrate. We also applied, got our visas, and came to these United States.

I am telling all this because I still keep wondering how come this strong, wealthiest, technically well-developed country cannot protect its relatively short border to keep the undocumented aliens away from entering it. Stalin could do it, despite the fact that Soviet borders were infinitely longer than the one we are talking about. True, with rare exceptions, "undocumented aliens" wanted to get out, not into, the Soviet paradise.

I personally believe that all this is a matter of sheer politics. Someone or some interest groups prefer to keep the border open. It's not that the United States cannot or has no means to secure its borders to protect its citizens: It just does not want to do it.

Eleven million undocumented aliens already living in this country, if allowed to stay, will provide a good chunk of votes for Obama, which is why he still keeps the border open. That suits his personal goal: to get their votes and get elected for the second term.

What will happen if the United States is attacked by China? Every day brings more and more evidence of China's arrogance and its aggressive moves toward the United States. Just recall last week's announcement in the Christian Science Monitor: "Are China and America on a Collision Course?" Does it tell you something? Is anyone worried at the prospect of America becoming the Chinese colony, "governed" by their friend Obama?

Is there any way to stop Obama's activity (inactivity?), which will possibly officially be defined as criminal? I want to believe that if the majority in the U.S. Congress changes hands after the November mid-term elections, Obama will be impeached. After all, presidents were impeached for less egregious misdemeanors than Obama's treacherous selling of this country to China.

Now let's see how the People's Republic of China is perceived from Britain. I have received a 12-page Telegraph co.uk account from my London readers: "Hot Political Summer as China Throttles Rare Metal Supply and Claims South China Sea." "One by One, US-Based Processing Plants Owned by German and Japanese Firms Switched Operations to China." "China Is Taking Advantage of WTO Access to Western Markets Without Fully Opening Its Own."

The rest of its survey Telegraph fills with its readers' comments on the subject.

Obama has been treating the People's Republic of China as another friendly gang. But why? Why were Soviet Russia or National Socialist Germany not trusted, while the PRC is being treated as Obama's lifelong friend?

Does it ever occur to Obama that the population of China is one billion 300 million people, while that of the United States is less than a quarter of that number? As for its weaponry, it will not be amiss to remember that China is not a "backward country," nor is it a "big village" as it was once described in the modern West: Newton's discoveries in physics and mathematics had appeared in China before Newton.  


Lev Navrozov can be reached by e-mail at levnavrozov@gmail.com. To learn more about and support his work at the Center for the Survival of Western Democracies, click here. If you intend to make a tax-exempt donation to the non-profit Center, please let us know via e-mail at levnavrozov@gmail.com, and we will send you all relevant information. Thank you.

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