And if Putin's course is more than a bad dream?
(Again Merkel greed and background is the main problem!!)
Europe's elites have underestimated the Ukraine crisis in naive and dangerous manner. Our logic is not necessarily the Putin. We should be prepared for worse.
welt.de
The continued aggression of Russia against Ukraine would have long been regarded as to denote what it is: war. Our politicians keep it like something abstract and talk because of an unprecedented violation of European post-war order. Many commentators are of the opinion that we find ourselves at a turning point in European post-war history. However, nobody likes to imagine quite to know where all this could still lead. An error. For whoever is not prepared for the worst, is taken by surprise when it happens.
The historian and columnist Anne Applebaum has in the " Washington Post mentally played out "a few days ago, what would it mean if this moment in European history would look like this (Poland invasions) in 1939, by Nazi Germany. Poland fell after the passivity of the free world against the annexation it had (with) Austria and the occupation of the Sudetenland Adolf Hitler (was) not pacified, but only encouraged to further adventures.
Thus, when Russian President Vladimir Putin just keep making and to play with fire against the Baltic States and Poland tried to he would get to feel either decided Western resistance or NATO would have such exposed as a paper tiger, that the alliance falls apart.
That may seem like to us today as born from an hysteria nightmare . Who would however, claimed ten months ago, Russia would be the Crimea and parts of eastern Ukraine incorporate attempt would have been dismissed as cranks or as an eternal Cold Warrior. This "spinners" are now a reality. What would compel us, is far unfriendlier scenarios to consider as those in which the well-tempered Central Europe used to think in the past 25 years.
Putin relies on political will
Sure, there are some good reasons that speak against a remake of 1939 under different circumstances. Thus, Russia's military today in relation weaker than it was Nazi Germany, and the liberal democracies, united in the EU and NATO are today much more compact together than then. But surely we can be not (be so certain).
Finally, Russia has the ultimate weapon, the atomic bomb, whose horrors potential compensates for its conventional weakness. And Putin relies on political will. He operates under the assumption that they are dealing with a conflict-shy West that recedes rather than (take) the things to extremes. This enables him even to escalate further and further without expecting serious consequences.
As autocrat Putin also needs to take less consideration for its population, (which) was transferred by his propaganda apparatus in patriotic fervor. Apparently a majority of the Russian population is willing to economic cuts to be accepted for Putin's vision of a restoration of the Russian Empire of the 19th and 20th centuries . This gives him more freedom of movement than the politicians in the West whose societies suffer from the ongoing economic crisis.
We keep it in our logic out still not likely that Putin just keep making - too costly, too much risk. But if we have learned anything in the past few months, it is this: Our logic is not necessarily the Putin. We should be prepared for worse.
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