When the USSR, the Soviet Union, went out of business on Christmas Day 1991, President George H. W. Bush saw it merely as the United States having one fewer competitor. It never occurred to him that a former competitor ought to become a valued trading partner.
Of all the mistakes that mistake-prone President ever made, that was the biggest.
A truly forward-looking leader would have immediately sent hordes of diplomats winging toward Moscow with instructions to kiss babies and hand out lollipops. Bush didn't do that. He congratulated himself on being the last man standing and let the opportunity pass to make friends with a country that was still a superpower despite having shrunk its territorial borders.
Opportunity, they say, only knocks once. When it did, Bush the elder was busy.
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