The ongoing events in Ukraine where Russian President Vladimir Putin this week ordered “special military operation” following his recognition of two territories of Donetsk and Lugansk held by separatist forces since June 2014 as sovereign, demonstrates the continuing tragedy of great-power politics. Russia appears to be paying back the bombast western axis in their own currency.
Western propaganda machine has, for months now been hyping blame, solely on Russia’s alleged aggression, and Putin, with some likening him to Adolf Hitler of Nazi Germany who provoked the Second World War. Interestingly, it was the USSR that played pivotal role in stopping axis powers-Rome, Tokyo and Berlin from consuming the whole of Europe. The current posture is part of an effort to roll back the cumulative collective humiliation the allies suffered recently at the hands of Russia in Crimea, Iraq, Syria, Libya, and Afghanistan where they failed to firmly hold on to those estates, and consequently their diminishing allure in international politics.
US and its European allies that have tormented the world for centuries present themselves as the liberals or benign hegemony who wish everyone well as they continue their aggressive expansion of NATO and EU spheres of influence into Russia’s and China’s backyards. NATO as the military force, EU for economic strangulation, and Orange ‘Democratic’ Movement to encircle Russia and China politically. The US designed war hysteria further seeks to thwart deeper economic integration between Russia and Europe particularly the gas pipeline called Nord Stream 2 because that relegates US relevance.
They have been peeling off Russian orbit and incorporating into US and EU spheres although the conversional wisdom is that it shouldn’t be stated publicly. The key element in this obdurate and deceptive strategy has been to expand NATO and EU eastwards contrary to earlier assurances.
The prevailing mantra is that everyone except the West is stupid, and the US as king in a unipolar world has liberty to do whatever it likes around the world however stupid. For months, the US and allies, small and big, aided by their media, have been undisguised bragging publicly about pouring thousands of tons of arms they describe as “lethal aid” to prop up a belligerent Ukrainian leadership yet somehow expect Russia to just look on. We all know how USSR got broken up and the hostilities Russia and China face including from US minions in their neighbourhoods. It’s well-established that under the Monroe Doctrine the US can’t permit any country let alone China, Russia, or Iran to place military assets within its neighbourhood like Canada or Mexico. The Cuban Crisis of 1959 demonstrated this, yet the US seeks to station weapons in Ukraine.
This encirclement meant to dismember Russia has been ongoing since 1999 when the former Soviet territories were first admitted into NATO and gradually EU. Today, the Republic of Georgia and Ukraine remain the last pieces of prized real estate. The West already bombed out former Yugoslavia and Czechoslovakia into remnant clientele states.
It’s interesting that the US, UK and EU that recognised a fringe politician in Venezuela as the ‘legitimate’ president even though he never stood for presidential elections should be castigating Russia for recognizing sovereignty of Donetsk and Lugansk. The US and UK refuse to leave Guantanamo Bay and Falklands respectively.
It isn’t secret that the cabal runs around the global toppling regimes they don’t like and installing their own puppets as they have tried with limited successes in Iran, Afghanistan, Iraq, Libya, Syria, Yemen, Hong Kong, Taiwan, Venezuela, Nicaragua and parts of Africa, not because they like democracy, otherwise some countries in the Arab world shouldn’t be their allies.
In February 2014 EU foreign ministers flew to Kiev where they were accused of engineering post-election violent demonstrations that forced then Ukrainian president Viktor Yanukovych to flee to Russia where he lives to-date because he had refused a lopsided economic deal with the IMF. Following the Bucharest summit in 2008, the republic of Georgia emboldened by the EU falsely believed it could join them, a strategic mistake it lives to regret because Russia considered it an unacceptable threat leading to war between the two in 2008.
Many analysts believe that pro-Russian forces on their own have capacity to keep territories they have held since 2014. As in Syria and Afghanistan, the latest Russian maneuvers may aim to stretch Ukraine rather than occupy it, and probably hold the conflict for as long as possible.
And having doubled down with arms and hostile propaganda, western allies are trying to play the losing hand, and won’t admit they are wrong. Currently it may be difficult to argue against the axis allies who now punish Russia with aggressive sanctions in the hope it will surrender at some point. Unfortunately, like Afghanistan demonstrated, the balance of resolve appears to be in Russians side, which in 2000 was still weak to resist but not any longer. Putting Putin into a tight corner of despair won’t help in the long run because the West isn’t listening to the rest of the world.
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