We have long discussed the authoritarianism of Vladimir Putin whose history of beating protesters and striping away press freedom was put aside briefly for the Olympic ceremonies. However, Putin appeared to be eager to stop the love fest and turn on Ukraine. For history buffs, however, there is something a bit unnerving in Putin invading a neighboring country to protect Russian-speakers who are welcoming the troops as protectors. In case the Sudetenland does not come to mind, Poland is now mobilizing troops along the border to bring the historical analogy home for the rest of the world. While I believe that this crisis will be contained and Putin is not ready for a wider war, it is no accident that the blind nationalism and authoritarianism would lead to expansionism. Ukraine is not the Sudetenland and Poland is no longer using horses to repel tanks. Putin’s desire for control of this port and Lebensraum may not be as easy to hold as it was to take.
Putin has already secured approval from the Duma to send in troops into Ukraine — notably not just the Crimea but the whole country. (I will note that our own Congress — both Democrats and Republicans alike — showed no more independence in approving the Iraq invasions. Indeed, some like Hillary Clinton are now frontrunners for the next presidency). Hitler cited the close ties to the region of Czechoslovakia and their common language as an excuse for the invasion while German-speakers in the country welcomed the occupation. To make the analogy even more interesting, this is the anniversary of the German invasion of March 1939.
The analogy has not escaped Poland which released the following statement: “History shows – although I don’t want to use too many historical comparisons – that those who appease all the time in order to preserve peace usually only buy a little bit of time.”
Putin’s move is a clear violation of international law. There was no serious unrest and no attack on Russian forces or territory. There was not even a basis for a preemptive attack in anticipation of such violence.
The combination of the invitation for invasion in the Crimea with today’s march in Moscow calling for invasion seems a case of history repeating itself.
Of course, the jitters of the world are not helped by the fact that this is the location of the Crimean War between 1853-56 between Russia and France, Britain, the Ottoman Empire, and Sardinia. Russia lost.
I do not see a major role for the United States at the moment. Our involvement is only likely to trigger even greater insecurities that are so prominent in Russian history over its borders. While people in Congress are screaming to “get tough,” any direct intervention would be a domestic political move and serve no one’s interest in the Ukraine.
None of this history is likely to phase Putin who remains as he once was: a humorless, self-infatuated KGB Lt. Colonel. The one promising fact is the crashing of Russian stock. It will be interesting to watch, in a much more economically connected world, how the likely market pressures will affect Putin’s calculations.
The russian oligarchs were losing so much money they talked Putin into backing off.
The other interesting thing is that Putin has decided to be very up front about it. By putting soldiers right there with the people, it almost has an old west vibe to it. Kind of like demanding respect of all sides. He hasn’t done it Hungary, Czechoslovakis, or Poland style. No air strikes or drones. He had his envoy walking around, talking to soldiers and shaking hands. And that was from our news, which I find odd. Is our media trying to become more responsible now that the situation has escalated?? It’s a very interesting card he is playing.
To look at it even further, maybe from Putin’s perspective, he almost has a no win situation. Stand by and let probable demonstrations start again in the east with loss of life, or maybe try going in there and just getting in the way?? Either way, as was pointed out in this blog, the US is largely responsible for this moment. But, the more time goes by, the more worrisome it becomes for everyone.
My breaking news email this AM was:
Russian President Vladimir Putin today accused the United States and other Western nations of a double standard in criticizing his nation’s incursion into Crimea. He said the U.S. acted in Afghanistan, Iraq and Libya without a U.N. resolution authorizing that action or by “twisting” U.N. resolutions.
Putin also said Russia is not trying to make Crimea a part of Russia. Only people who live in Crimea can determine their future, he said.
If he can actually oversee a replication of the peaceful Czechoslovakia breakup, he will have the moral high ground. What does he have to lose–watch you Ukraine become Iraq, Afghanistan, Egypt, or Libya?? In his backyard yet?
Just trying to be objective.
Elaine,
that is one brave woman.
RT Host Abby Martin Condemns Russian Incursion Into Crimea – On RT
By Glenn Greenwald
4 Mar 2014
https://firstlook.org/theintercept/2014/03/04/rt-host-abby-martin-condemns-russian-incursion-crimea-rt/
Excerpt:
The vast bulk of the commentary issuing from American commentators about the Russian military action in Ukraine involves condemning exactly that which they routinely advocate and which the U.S. itself routinely does. So suffocating is the resulting stench that those who played leading roles in selling the public the attack on Iraq and who are still unrepentant about it, such as David “Axis of Evil/The Right Man” Frum, have actually become the leading media voices condemning Russia on the ground that it is wrong to invade sovereign countries; Frum thus has no trouble saying things like this with an apparently straight face: “If Russia acts the outlaw nation, can it be expected to be treated as anything but an outlaw?”
Enthusiastic supporters of a wide range of other U.S. interventions in sovereign states, both past and present and in and out of government, are equally righteous in their newfound contempt for invasions – when done by Russia. Secretary of State John Kerry – who stood on the Senate floor in 2002 and voted to authorize the invasion of Iraq because “Saddam Hussein [is] sitting in Baghdad with an arsenal of weapons of mass destruction” and there is “little doubt that Saddam Hussein wants to retain his arsenal of weapons of mass destruction” – told Face the Nation on Sunday: “You just don’t in the 21st Century behave in 19th Century fashion by invading another country on completely trumped-up pretext.” The supremely sycophantic Face the Nation host Bob Schieffer – as he demanded to know how Russia would be punished – never once bothered Kerry (or his other Iraq-war-advocating guests, including Defense Secretary Chuck Hagel and Washington Post columnist David Ignatius) by asking about any of that unpleasantness (is it hard at all for you to sermonize against invasions of sovereign countries given, you know, how often you yourself support them?)
American invasions and occupations of nations halfway around the world are perfectly noble, but Russian interference in a part of a country right on its border is the supreme act of lawless, imperial aggression. Few things are worse than watching America’s militarists, invasion-and-occupying-justifiers, regime-change enthusiasts, drone-lovers, and supporters of its various “kinetic military actions” self-righteously wrap themselves in the banner of non-intervention, international law and respect for sovereignty. Does anyone take those denunciations seriously outside of the class of western elites who disseminate them?
American media elites awash in an orgy of feel-good condemnation in particular love to mock Russian media, especially the government-funded English-language outlet RT, as being a source of shameless pro-Putin propaganda, where free expression is strictly barred (in contrast to the Free American Media). That that network has a strong pro-Russian bias is unquestionably true. But one of its leading hosts, Abby Martin, remarkably demonstrated last night what “journalistic independence” means by ending her Breaking the Set program with a clear and unapologetic denunciation of the Russian action in Ukraine:
Els, I am simply explaining the male dynamic. Whether one likes it or not, men still rule the world and own most everything in it. I’m not saying that dynamic of strength is right or wrong. It is simply the reality. Politics isn’t chess, it’s hardball.
I agree with Michael Murry.
One of the main problems Americans have is that they have a very hard time seeing themselves as others see them. If I lived in Country A, and I watched country B invade country C, to set it on fire for a whole decade with entire villages, towns and cities burning with people in them screaming and dying(4 million of them: a phenomenal number), all this for the love of freedom…, one has to understand that as a citizen of Country A, my mind is clear of any bias…this would all seem to me to be selfish, evil, bloodthirsty, satanic. Pure and simple. Many of us subconsciously believe that the simple fact that veterans coming back with some crisis of conscience, smoking weed and listening to the beatles while exercising their freedom of speech to question their “own government” suddenly absolves america from slaughtering a big slice of a nation that had nothing to do with them.
So it only makes sense that when Russia, or China are involved, the examples that pop up have to go all the way back to Nazi Germany…
We think we are waaaaaaayyy too special. How can we understand others? never.
@Michael Murry: I agree with your comment: we don’t have a dog in this fight. Heck, it’s laughable that Americans politicians are yelling about violations of international law. Add to that the fact they’ve been fomenting the unrest against a democratically elected president. That president BTW was hastily replaced by interim president and very important positions in government were handed over to the Neo-Nazi party there. Should you not know, their motto is one nation, one language and one people. And yes, as usual, the Jews need not apply.
Nick Spinelli, your definition of strength is often the one which leads to terrible loss of human life and potential. Your definition sounds like a pissing contest to me. Strength to me is the ability to play a game of chess with cunning and a deliberate cool head . It is a game in which the ‘mine is bigger than yours’ temperament is overcome by shrewd and informed intellect.
Mother Jones and Maddow, the M&M of progressive ideology.
Dredd, It was in August of 2012, 3 months before the election, that Obama drew “the red line” regarding Syria using chemical weapons. It was off the cuff. He was trying to buck up. However, he obviously didn’t realize that was REAL serious. Weakness is feeling you have to be tough and talk tough about “red lines” and not follow through when that line is crossed. He’s being punked by Iran regarding nukes. Men like Putin, Assad, etc. smell weakness and pounce on it. There will be more. I can’t believe I am saying this but I wish Hillary was still @ the State Dept. She’s got more balls than Obama and Kerry combined.
I sure hope that President Big Mouth Obama realizes that without Russia’s Soyuz rockets, our astronauts cannot even make it up to our space station, let alone back again.
I also hope someone tells President Shoot-From-The-Lip Obama that our dwindling number of troops and mercenaries still in Afghanistan cannot get out of the sand-trap shooting gallery without Russia allowing them safe and relatively inexpensive transit through Russian territory. The Pakistanis can close the Khyber pass at any time due to Obama’s drone murdering of their citizens, and they’ve done this already more than once.
And, of course, Russia and China could at any time decide to start providing advanced weaponry to the Taliban — just as we did when the Soviet Union occupied that country — and then watch the U.S. planes, blimps, drones, and helicopters hit the ground. Things could get really ugly really fast for our military forces in Afghanistan if President Obama panics yet again over his visceral fear of Sarah Palin (or any other Republican, for that matter) calling him a pussy.
President Obama really needs to just shut his mouth — and put a sock in John Kerry’s mouth, as well. As for Professor Turley, he should write about something else, since he clearly does not understand how much Europe and the United States both depend on good relations with Russia. And this whole “we have to bomb your village to save your human rights from yourselves” line of propaganda has become so lame in the eyes of the world, that I wonder how any American can stand to utter a word of it with a straight face.
The United States needs to mind its own damn business, because the United States has more unfinished business at home than it has anywhere outside its own borders.
“There is no surer sign of decay in a country than to see the rites of religion held in contempt”
Niccolo Machiavelli
“It’s unsatisfying for many, especially the most aggressive foreign policy hawks in the U.S., to think world events unfold for reasons that have nothing to do with us. But foreign countries really don’t much care whether it’s unsatisfying or not – their geopolitical agendas exist without any real regard for what Americans are going to think about their decisions. ” Maddow blog
And what PaulRevereWear said.
oops …
nick spinelli
… Many leaders surmised Obama was weak, that confirmed any doubters. It is not force, it is the threat of force backed up w/ actions that keep people like Assad, Putin, etc. in line. …
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Nick, please define “weak.”
Is it using the farce rather that the force to keep the world “in line”?
“Chess” is keeping the world standing in line, “marbles” is letting them meander about?
nick spinelli</b?
… Many leaders surmised Obama was weak, that confirmed any doubters. It is not force, it is the threat of force backed up w/ actions that keep people like Assad, Putin, etc. in line. …
=============
Nick, please define “weak.”
Is it using the farce, not the force to keep the world “in line”?
Keep the world standing in line?
Boy next they will declare that Obama is “soft on communism”. Democrats have been in fear of the McCarthites since the fifties. Thatis why we are still in Afghanistan. Except in the Stan countries the Dems are said to be soft on al Qaeda or tallybanders. If we had let the Russians (Soviets in those days) rule Afghanistan which sits in their sphere of influence, we would not be losing lives there now. Would we? The Soviets tried to control and dampen the turban heads. Of course its what one wears.
I would have a crazy Prez that bad people like Putin are afraid of than a weak and feckless one. When you grow up a kid in tough neighborhoods you could pick up on a weak guy and you did not screw w/ the crazy one. It’s preventing these situations that is needed. We agree there are no good options, Obama has put us in this situation.
We are all Georgians! We are all Ukrainains! Bomb bomb bomb, bomb bomb Iran. Can you imagine? Yes he never met a war he didn’t love.
nick, Although Obama has many liabilities, I think we are fortunate that he did beat McCain in 2008. McCain has never met a potential war that he does not want to turn into an actual one.