Alex, I'm sorry, but ^ he's right.
It sickens me to see what is happening in Ukraine. A lot of the US video I've seen has the hotel my family and I lived in during our stay in Kiev in the background (my fourth grade school was behind that hotel). I said at the outset that we were going to let Putin have all of Ukraine to avoid risking nuclear confrontation with Russia. If anyone thinks Putin isn't batshit crazy enough to launch as a final middle finger to the West then they haven't been paying attention and/or don't understand Soviet thinking. And make no mistake, that's what we're dealing with in the Russian government now - aging Soviets who grew up in a country that no longer exists and whose experiences and education are anchor-less in a world in which there is no CCCP. Things will not get better in Russia until this generation dies and a new generation, born after the end of the Soviet Union takes power. Of course, it could be too late by then.
This is not to suggest that we are entirely blameless here. Declassified documents demonstrate that Gorbachev's claim he was lied to about NATO expansion turns out to be true. That the unindicted war criminal Victoria Nuland was involved with members of the Svoboda Neo-Nazis, I think, is beyond dispute. That Svoboda candidates got less than 2% of the vote in the last election is a fact buried under a tsunami ofSoviet Russian "Anti-Nazi" propaganda. (Aside: this is classic Soviet propaganda: distort a fact and use it as the basis for your outlandish, false claims). Putin's actions in Ukraine are unspeakably barbaric and cannot be dismissed. There is no context in which Putin's actions are understandable, let alone excusable.
None of that really matters. What matters is Ukrainians can look neither West nor East for protection. Not East for obvious reasons. Not West over a not completely unjustified fear of nuclear war.
Not to be glib, but in a Star Trek film Captain Picard said it best when speaking about the Borg, "They invade our space and we fall back. They assimilate entire worlds and we fall back. Not again. The line must be drawn here. This far. No further."
This is the attitude we must have with Russian aggression - even at the risk of nuclear war. For if we can allow the savagery being committed by Russians against Ukrainians for the sake of a little temporary peace, what is the point of "saving" any of us?
I hope your family and friends are safe and survive this horror, Alex. But I fear Macron was right when he said this week, "The worst is yet to come."
This is not to suggest that we are entirely blameless here. Declassified documents demonstrate that Gorbachev's claim he was lied to about NATO expansion turns out to be true. That the unindicted war criminal Victoria Nuland was involved with members of the Svoboda Neo-Nazis, I think, is beyond dispute. That Svoboda candidates got less than 2% of the vote in the last election is a fact buried under a tsunami of
None of that really matters. What matters is Ukrainians can look neither West nor East for protection. Not East for obvious reasons. Not West over a not completely unjustified fear of nuclear war.
Not to be glib, but in a Star Trek film Captain Picard said it best when speaking about the Borg, "They invade our space and we fall back. They assimilate entire worlds and we fall back. Not again. The line must be drawn here. This far. No further."
This is the attitude we must have with Russian aggression - even at the risk of nuclear war. For if we can allow the savagery being committed by Russians against Ukrainians for the sake of a little temporary peace, what is the point of "saving" any of us?
I hope your family and friends are safe and survive this horror, Alex. But I fear Macron was right when he said this week, "The worst is yet to come."
