"Every enemy of the United States has been a dictatorship."

What?

Little Turtle of the Eel River Miami would like a word. (As would George III.)

The other day Michael McFaul, formerly President Obama’s Ambassador to Russia, now a professor in International Studies at Stanford, possibly one of best-certified academics on U.S. Russia policy and a leading advocate for a stronger U.S. stance against Putin, tweeted this:

Not every dictatorship has been an enemy of the United States. But every enemy of the United States has been a dictatorship.

To be fair, the tweet went on, “True or false? Or oversimplified? What's your take?” McFaul wasn’t claiming that his assertion is indisputable. He was throwing it out there for discussion, and the ensuing discussion was pretty interesting, both for what came up and for what got left out.

And yet as some of his other tweets make clear, McFaul clearly believes that, at least in broad terms, the U.S. has tended to be especially militant against dictatorship. The familiar implication is that such militancy is fundamental to our national spirit, to who we are, at our best, as Americans. And of course there are some pretty good examples of U.S. enemies who were dictators, including Putin, a current dictator and McFaul’s most immediate concern.

Still, McFaul’s qualifying opening remark is doing, as they say, a lot of work.

“Not every dictatorship has been an enemy of the United States”? Man, is that ever true!