.jpg) |
| Putin, Biden |
Stalinist President of Russia Vladimir Putin has made two major mistakes from which he may not recover without a great deal of help from diplomats and business associates in what used to be called the free world.
Putin has turned Russia east rather than west. Russia is
historically a western rather than an eastern nation and has been so roughly
since the reign of Peter the Great.
In addition, Putin may go down in history as the worst
Russian commander-in-chief of the nation’s military since the murder of Czar
Nicholas II and his family in 1918.
The Institute for the Study of War
(ISW) is reporting that Putin has broken, perhaps irreparably, his own military
chain of command in an attempt to win his terrorist war on Ukraine cheaply and
with a minimum of Russian soldier body bags sent to Moscow. Since the
rubblization of Ukraine began, Putin has attempted to win his war on the cheap
by relying upon bought terrorist groups, the most odious of which is the Wagner
Group, whose leader and inspiration may now be dead.
Russia – by which this writer means the Russian people, not
its warlord oligarchs – is unquestionably western rather than eastern or
oriental. Feodor Dostoyevsky and Anton Chekov are western not eastern writers.
And for much of its history Russia regarded China, and Islamic nations as well,
with a dubious and watchful eye.
Dostoyevsky wrote Notes
from the Underground after having spent four years in a czarist Siberian prison
camp, followed by six years of compulsory military service in exile. Finally
set free, he returned to Petersburg rather than Peking, where he produced thirteen
novels eagerly read by Parisians, Londoners and even semi-literate politicians
in Washington DC. Chekov wrote some of his plays in Crimea, none in Shanghai.
Chekov’s play The
Seagull was shown not too long ago by the Yale School of Drama, and students
in the audience should be forgiven if they thought the leading characters had
more in common with their neighbors than any of the seven members of China’s
Politburo Standing Committee.
China is, in fact, a fascist state. For purposes of foreign
policy, it should be regarded by progressives and leftists as a giant US
monopolistic conglomerate, the sort of fascist beastie they unceasingly revile on
this side of the Atlantic Ocean as insufferable nationalist capitalists at the
beck and call of powerful, Republican Washington DC politicians. It was the
much reviled President Richard Nixon who opened China to the west, reasoning
that western businessmen might temper a communist disposition to hang
capitalists with the rope provided by capitalists.
“The Kremlin’s
chronic disregard for the Russian chain of command,” ISW reports, “is likely
hindering Shoigu and Gerasimov [two prominent Russian generals] in their
attempts to suppress insubordination and establish full control over the
Russian military in Ukraine. Putin consistently bypassed or
ignored the established chain of command in hopes of securing rapid successes
on the battlefield throughout the war, degrading Shoigu’s and Gerasimov’s
authority – especially when military failures on the frontlines also eroded
their reputations.”
In the midst of all this Kremlin disarray, some in the
United States are arguing that now is the time to apply diplomatic balm to
Putin in the hope he will agree to a peace settlement with Ukraine. Diplomacy,
diplomats argue, is war by other means. No one is contemplating the possibility
that a diplomatic break in hostilities will provide Putin with the breathing
space he now needs to avoid a humiliating defeat in the war theatre he has so
clumsily constructed. A diplomatic peace will provide Putin with a future
opportunity to move the borders of Russia to Poland and the Baltic States,
which used to be a part of the once dominant Soviet Union, after he has diplomatically
partitioned Ukraine.
Former President Barack Obama once said concerning Biden’s
gaffe-prone nature, “Don’t underestimate Joe’s ability to f**k things up.” The
same is true concerning Biden’s itch to settle matters diplomatically. But a failed
peace arrangement between Russia and Ukraine certainly will not be President
Joe Biden’s problem, even if he is fortunate enough to win the White House for
another four years. And it will not be President Donald Trump’s problem if he
is fortunate enough win the White House for four more years, concluding a peace
arrangement between Ukraine and Russia hours after he is elected.
No, no… This is a problem that, like inflation and the
national debt, will be passed along to the children and grandchildren who will
inherit from a generation of cowards a failed military and diplomatic defense
of Ukraine.
Comments