It is naïve to assume that the lower depths of the Sovietological inferno – that is, of Western ignorance and ineptitude in the study of totalitarianism – are where they have always been politically. The new strategy of totalitarianism has made havoc of the political spectrum in Western democracies, and the Right today is scarcely less inclined to self-deception than the Left.”

Andrei Navrozov, 1991 [i]

Again and again, we repeat the same mistake. We make unwise bargains with murderous dictators. After all, they changed from bad guys into good guys. They have embraced capitalism and democratic reforms. They are no longer bad. Therefore, we engage with them. We trade with them. We invest in them. We become accessories after the fact, strengthening regimes that routinely murder their own citizens. Eventually, these same regimes point nuclear missiles at us and demand that whole countries be turned over to them.