The drama in Ukraine/Crimea, and all along the front line with Europe, has been going forever. But sticking with recent history to keep it simple, Napoleon thought he'd take over with his Grande Armee in 1812..... ooops a daisy. That worked out a bit bad in the tail end of The Little Ice Age when the snow and cold made it bleak around Moscow. The retreat did not go well either.
In more recent times, my great great grandfather up one of my father's lines died from wounds received in Crimea when Great Britain thought it a jolly spiffing idea to show Russia who was boss during the rollicking wars of the 19th century across Europe. A couple of decades later my father's mother as a child was being taken from Alsace to NZ having survived the siege of Paris and whatnot in Adelaide. She arrived with her English mother, a couple of sisters and no French father [dumped in Adelaide] and just a bunch of serious memories.
World War I was serious carnage too, including for Russia. Which was simultaneously going through their Romanov revolution and the start of civil war and decades of carnage maxxed out by Stalin with mass death in Ukraine and elsewhere, including Crimea. Zbigniew's family had a bad time of it too with Stalin's rule. Revenge seems to be a good part of Russia Russia Russia MADness. Russians quite understandably have had enough of the carnage over 200 years and more, and let's keep the Golden Horde in mind because the soldiers facing down the attackers from the so-called 'Free World' came in part from way across east where part of their brief is to give pause to Genghis Khan's descendants. But one defends where the greatest current pressure is so the USA has opened opportunity for Made in China westwards movement in Siberia.
Zbigniew thought he had a great idea to back Osama bin Laden and the mujahideen in Afghanistan against USSR which didn't work out well for USA in the long run, especially those dead in the Twin Towers and a lot more besides. Zbigniew would have been more sensible to back Gorby against Osama. But he wasn't sensible.
Russia took over Crimea very plainly obviously because the revolution instigated in Kiev by Nuland, Obama, Biden, Hunter, Kerry, Clinton and co was going to lead to Russia losing their Sevastopol base and Russians in Ukraine being thrown to the wolves. The Russians in Eastern Ukraine are currently under threat of increased attack from Kievans loaded with weaponry from USA and UK and NATO ready to go. With the main prize being Crimea yet again. USA and co have never given up on retaking Crimea. Russia will go MAD before that happens.
According to Wikipedia, Zbigniew ...... <<On March 3, 2014, between the February 22 ousting of Ukraine President Viktor Yanukovych and the March 16, Crimean referendum, Brzezinski authored an op-ed piece for The Washington Post entitled "What is to be done? Putin's aggression in Ukraine needs a response." [89] He led with a link on Russian aggression; he compared Russian President Vladimir Putin's "thuggish tactics in seizing Crimea" and "thinly camouflaged invasion" to Adolf Hitler's occupation of the Sudetenland in 1938, and characterized Putin as a cartoon Benito Mussolini, but stopped well short of advocating that the U.S. go to war. Rather, he suggested that NATO should be put on high alert and recommended "to avert miscalculations". He explicitly stated that reassurances be given to "Russia that it is not seeking to draw Ukraine into NATO.>> See what I mean about Zbig? Going full Godwin Law. But at least he realized Russians had understandable fear of attack from the West.
I like Russia with Crimea [a southern defence against Islam in general and Turkey in particular]. Make Eastern Ukraine into little independent states. Like Yugoslavia. Start helping Russia defend Siberia. Open the Nordstream pipeline. Maybe invite Russia to join the Euroserfs [I advise them to NOT vote to join - I like Brexit, Grexit, Spexit].
The war in Eastern Ukraine is a very bad idea and it can easily lead to MAD on a plus grande scale. Russia will have to scale up though they'll prefer to keep it local and in defence of Russians in eastern Ukraine .. as Putin carefully laid out in his historical review of several months ago. It would be amusing to hear senile ignorant Biden try to reason with Putin over that historical context. It would be like Lavrov trying to discuss things with Liz Truss the other day.
Plus ca change,
Mqurice |
