Double Standtards

The hypocrisy surrounding the current debates on world politics continues to beggar belief. Heaven only knows what future historians will make of it (if there as a future for humankind, that is). The US Secretary of State (I think it was) sternly orders China not to supply arms to the Russians (on pain of what isn’t clear.) Why on earth shouldn't they? We (ie the US, Nato, the West, the Free World, whatever we like to call ourselves) proudly send arms to the Ukrainians, whom we consider to be, for the time being at any rate, on "our " side. So why shouldn't the Communist Chinese supply arms to their fellow(ish) communist comrades. I am not arguing that I want them to: I certainly don't. I am pointing out the illogicality of the threat. Similarly, Mr Sunak (I think it was), presumably to bolster his belligerence credentials to match those of ex-P.M. Johnson, declares it to be outrageous in our modern age for one country to invade the sovereign territory of another. Quite right too, except that "we" however defined, have been doing that regularly for the past 70+ years. Korea, Vietnam ( to his credit British Prime Minister Harold Wilson kept us out of that one), Iraq, Afghanistan, even poor little Grenada. What’s sauce for the goose. . . There are calls for President Putin to be tried for war crimes, but a succession of US presidents and other western leaders, including our own Tony Blair, remain honoured world statesmen. President Zelenskiy and the Ukrainian army are regarded as heroic freedom fighters defending their territory. Yet when a group of Palestinians fire rockets into Israeli territory in protest the against a group whom they consider to have stolen their land from them, and undoubtedly treats them abominably, they are decried as terrorists. Both President Biden and President Putin are to make speeches today. Both, I suspect, are likely to contain belligerent rhetoric likely to prolong the situation, and maybe take us nearer to nuclear war. I have no idea how we are going to extract ourselves from the present horrendous situation, in which an increasing number of innocent people, mostly young conscripts with little or no choice, are going to lose their lives or be seriously maimed. I earnestly hope that, behind the scenes, diplomats on both sides are searching for the compromises which will bring the slaughter to an end. And when that happens, I hope we shall look to creating a "brave new world" that is somewhat fairer and more even-handed than the post 1945 one has been so far.