Rasmussen, NATO’s secretary general, described the seizure of the regional government administration building and parliament as “dangerous and irresponsible.”
Wait? Weren’t other government buildings seized by gunman in Kiev, just recently?
Meanwhile:
International Monetary Fund chief Christine Lagarde said Thursday that her organization was ready to respond to a request for assistance from Ukrainian authorities and would send a fact-finding team to Ukraine to assess the situation and begin discussion of reforms the country needs. “We are also discussing with all our international partners — bilateral and multilateral — how best to help Ukraine at this critical moment in its history,” she said.
Reforms, eh? Remind me of the occasions on which IMF reforms have been beneficial to the average citizen of any country?
Then there is this:
A senior U.S. official familiar with the most recent administration assessment told CNN that now that the Russians “have brought troops out of garrison,” they could potentially move “quite quickly” once an order comes.
At that point, the official says, the U.S. assessment is that its “warning time” that Russian forces were on the move might be so short, it would be difficult for the United States to move diplomatically to try to stop it.
I—I, what? If you don’t want them to, the diplomacy is done now, and it involves threats and carrots. But the problem is that Ukraine is in Russia’s sphere of influence. Do you think that the new, IMF funded, Western supported government will be asking for NATO membership? I would be if I were them. Do you think Russia finds that, in any way, acceptable? Have you looked at a map?
The Ukraine in NATO is a strategic threat to Russia. It is of no value to NATO except as a threat to Russia. Russia knows that.
The strategic situation is such that Putin has many reasons to find an excuse and annex both the Crimea and Eastern Ukraine (which contains most of Ukraine’s industry, by the way.) The rest can do whatever they want. And if Europe doesn’t like it, well Gazprom can sell its natural gas to the Chinese and Europe can go dark. As for the US, bluster all they want, they aren’t going to fight a war against Russia for the Ukraine. Russia’s still a real country; it has nukes.
If you enjoyed this article, and want me to write more, please DONATE or SUBSCRIBE.
Bruce Wilder
On the financial question, even these geniuses cannot fail to see that a financial rescue for Ukraine is a financial rescue for Russia.
You think letting Lehman Bros fail was a mistake, try stiffing Russia. Goldman Sachs may pretend it has financial weapons of mass destruction, but Russia has real ones.
The Raven
And how many Ukrainians would die in Russia’s grand plan? At least everyone now in the Maidan—thousands. But it won’t end there. Putin is looking for scapegoats—victims. It has started with the gays of Russia. Should Russia successfully take Ukraine, how many Ukrainians would die to feed Putin’s lust for death and destruction?
Ian Welsh
Your point is? Putin’s never shied from killing people. Very similar, in that, to Obama and George W. Bush, just a lot better at actually winning his wars.
EGrise
I recently heard a quote attributed to a senior Russian officer who described Ukraine as “a dagger aimed at the heart of Russia.” I imagine they’re going to take this very seriously, and no amount of “diplomacy” will change that.
Jason Bonham
The West will back down and simply use this as a distraction from its own sins. In the words of Noam Chomsky:
“My own concern is primarily the terror and violence carried out by my own state, for two reasons. For one thing, because it happens to be the larger component of international violence. But also for a much more important reason than that; namely, I can do something about it. So even if the U.S. was responsible for 2 percent of the violence in the world instead of the majority of it, it would be that 2 percent I would be primarily responsible for. And that is a simple ethical judgment. That is, the ethical value of one’s actions depends on their anticipated and predictable consequences. It is very easy to denounce the atrocities of someone else. That has about as much ethical value as denouncing atrocities that took place in the 18th century.”
markfromireland
@ The Raven February 27, 2014 There is a notion which Western so-called ‘liberals’ and ‘progressives’ find comforting which is that Putin’s homophobic campaigns are a sign of political weakness by a dictator trying to prop himself up/stave off collapse. It’s arrant nonsense. Russia is a deeply deeply homophobic society. Putin’s anti-gay campaigns are the actions of a populist politician who knows what his core supporters want. Contrary to the comforting lies that people like you tell yourselves Putin is wildly popular in Russia.
First because he quite literally saved millions of them from starving and/or freezing to death.
Second because he restored senses amongst the Russian populace that they were the proud denizens of a worthwhile and proud country.
Third because he’s a populist who pays considerable attention to the opinions of his core supporters.
Oh please, go away and think up some new lines will you? Putin uses violence to achieve his political aims. Violence is expensive – it costs money a lot of money. Which is why he only uses violence when he believes he has to.
mfi
markfromireland
@ EGrise February 27, 2014
That was me directly quoting a Russian army officer who is one of the most coldly calculating men I’ve ever met. It’s what makes him an exceptional Staff Officer. His boss – Vladimir Putin, is also a coldly calculating man determined to make Russia great again. So far he’s doing a damned good job of it considering that post-Soviet fall Russia was in a state of such utter collapse that its citizens were dying of hunger.
mfi
markfromireland
@ Ian Better at winning ’em and at much much better at making them pay too.
mfi
markfromireland
The report Ian quotes above is worth reading in its entirety link: Gunmen seize parliament in Ukraine’s Crimea, raise Russian flag – CNN.com there are few points that are worth bearing in mind about these exercises:
1: Russia holds about six such ‘snap exercises’ per year. This one (I’m told) should end next Monday (March 3rd 2014). If it doesn’t or the state of readiness is further heightened you’ll know that the Americans, the Poles, and their NATO confreres miscalculated badly.
2: Such ‘exercises’ are intended to:
i; Prepares the troops and their commanders for forward deployment and operations should those become necessary.
ii; Highlights any logistical weaknesses or CCC problems that need to addressed.
iii: Sends the appropriate diplomatic message – diplomacy being war carried out by other means and vice versa.
Putin is a patriot who is on record as saying that the current Ukranian state is an artificial entity. Time and money are both on his side.
That being said I’m a Tuchmanite – wars take place because somebody somewhere thought they’d get away with it. I remain unpersuaded that policy makers in Washington and Brussels are entirely rational.
mfi
S Brennan
MFI & IAN,
I agree with the points you are making.
Even though my desire to make the USA a long term success, is not a shared value on this board, I would make the following point.
What the USA is repeatingly doing against Russia is foolishly weakening it’s geopolitical position.
At some point, in the not to distant future, there will be a war in the western pacific. China, as all rising world powers are want to, will reassert it’s “traditional” role in Asia. We bring that day closer by insuring that China has on it’s border a “frenemy”. The historic antipathy between Russia and China having been erased by the USA’s “ass wiggling” in the post Cold-War victory period.
We [the USA] are still fighting the last war instead of preparing in such a way as to prevent the next. What we are doing now is the equivalent of bombing Tokyo…in 1959. The elites that rule this country are idiotic fools. I’ll be dead when the bill comes due, but I pity my countrymen when they reap what their unaccountable “leaders” have sown.
Bruce Wilder
That being said I’m a Tuchmanite – wars take place because somebody somewhere thought they’d get away with it. I remain unpersuaded that policy makers in Washington and Brussels are entirely rational.
I think they’re rational enough, but they are also unfathomably stupid. (Neoliberalism was devised as a clever, persuasive, subversive lie, but the original liars are gone, and we’re left with believers in charge — their rationalism loses itself in the labyrinth of their ideology.)
It is a scary day for the West, when John Kerry is likely the smartest guy in any room.
The Raven
Mark, Putin did not have to throw the whole power of the Russian state behind homophobia. In so doing, he is leading Russia headlong into fascism. It will not stop with gays, you may be sure and indeed it is already being expanded. See Afinogenov’s “Russia Under Putin.”
Decades ago, during one of the early anti-gay campaigns in Florida, I heard a story about how it was that group of old Jews came out and opposed the campaign. Now this is one of the least likely groups of opponents one would expect. But these Jews were German refugees and, when asked, they told the press how it was they remembered that the first targets were homosexuals, and they were the next.
I’m sure Putin has reasons. Reasons, there are always reasons. But behind all the reasons there is hatred. When you talk about “coldly calculating men” you are describing sociopaths. When people say Putin saved Russia, there is always the claim that were there no other possible leaders, no other possible ways, and this is ridiculous.
It may be that a third Ukrainian genocide is in the offing. I’ll not put myself on record defending of the people who made it.
Celsius 233
Having been married to a Ukrainian, not born in the U.S., my experience mirrors what mfi knows. Deeply homophobic and they also hate Jews. This has been a fact of life long before Putin. My wife’s (at the time) family emigrated to the U.S. and their social was Poles, Ukrainians, and Russians and their prejudices ran deep and were unabashed to express it openly.
In my experience Americans aren’t so far removed from this either; it’s just politically incorrect to openly speak to those views.
This would appear to be human nature and is true in my present country where prejudice is spoken about openly.
I further agree Putin is playing to his base as a populist; like it or not, it’s reality…
Colin
Not only are we not going to risk war with Russia over Ukraine, there’s a 0% chance we’d go to war with Russia even if it decided to invade Poland. Not that Russia ever would, I’m just making the point that our threats are laughably empty and everyone knows it. The specter of sanctions also doesn’t scare Russia; they have all the resources and trading partners they need, and Europe needs Russia a *lot* more than the other way round.
EGrise
markfromireland:
LOL yes, thanks for reminding me – I could not remember where I’d read that!
Bill H
“Russia’s still a real country; it has nukes.”
Russia would not need its nukes. Its military is reorganized, reequipped and manned mostly by volunteers. It is 750,000 strong and highly capable. There is no force in Europe which can oppose it on the northern Ukranian border, and none will try. It is certain that US forces cannot and will not, and all of our threats and posturing are as empty as a prostitute’s eyes.
Blizzard
It’s always weird to come across true believers in Washington’s latest line of horseshit. So the DC cool kids decided that sodomy was awesome, what, 6 months ago? And now anyone who doesn’t agree is a Nazi. That all sounds very plausible. That is, unless you’re India, which just passed some *actual* anti-gay laws (unlike Russia passing laws against homo propaganda aimed at minors), about which we hear scarcely a peep from the US press. I wonder why …
Ian Welsh
Priorities are always interesting. Putin was involved in systematic torture in Chechnya, as will as systematic mass murder.
David Duff
I’m confused! I know, I know, what’s new? But I only visit this blog to bathe gently in the warm waters of liberal soppiness, you know, ‘power to the people’ and all that sort of thing. Well, it’s so much more comfy than hard Right ‘real-politick’. But what do I find? ‘The People’ of Kiev written off as *armed* gangsters despite the fact that they had been demonstrating peacefully in the city centre for *months* without a shot being fired. Only at the very end, when the police opened fire on them did some of them shoot back.
I don’t disagree with your ‘real-politik’ point that Ukraine is in Putin’s back yard but why should we do him any favours, he doesn’t do any for us, in fact, just the opposite! But in any event, it seems fairly obvious to me that ‘The People’ (dread words!) have spoken and driven from office a man who, whatever else he was, appears to have been an international crook – the Swiss have just opened an investigation into him and his son for bank fraud and money laundering!
Celsius 233
“Priorities are always interesting. Putin was involved in systematic torture in Chechnya, as well as systematic mass murder.”
Indeed, we crossed the Rubicon 50 years ago (probably more than 400 years ago actually) and haven’t gone back.
I doubt Putin ever recognized the existence of “the Rubicon” as relevant to Russian culture.
Culture is a funny thing; until one experiences (deeply) another culture, then that one is ignorant of the differences. The mores and norms contrasted with the familiar can be disconcerting, but very illuminating if one is interested in such things.
It seems there are certain parameters that once crossed, become policy; normal, embedded, cultural. And the longer they remain they become the new normal.
It’s the same psychology that keeps us forever in denial of our true existence; our existence as it actually is from day to day.
Celsius 233
…but why should we do him any favours, he doesn’t do any for us, in fact, just the opposite!
Seriously? He saved Obama’s ass on Syria. You need to expand your understandings of the world outside of the U.S or Britain.
We need Putin more than he needs us and that’s a fact!
Ian Welsh
Putin also allows shipping to Afghanistan, which was a huge favor.
I think the protestors won their revolution, and Yanukovych is a corrupt, thuggish crook. But if they have the right to overthrow a government, surely the Crimea does too.
Besides, really, Yanukovych stole far less money than Obama, Bush and Bernanke gave to bankrupt bankers despite the population being vastly against it.
Corruption? Everyone’s corrupt, and the West is far more corrupt where it matters than anyone else, because we have way more money.
Celsius 233
Corruption? Everyone’s corrupt, and the West is far more corrupt where it matters than anyone else, because we have way more money.
Amen to that. I live in a country acknowledged as one of the most corrupt in the world.
But when one looks at the net result, Ha!
It pales by American standards in both dollar amounts and its effect on humans across the planet.
David Duff
“He saved Obama’s ass”
And that’s a favour?!
ks
“‘The People’ of Kiev written off as *armed* gangsters despite the fact that they had been demonstrating peacefully in the city centre for *months* without a shot being fired. Only at the very end, when the police opened fire on them did some of them shoot back.”
Nice spin. “The People of Kiev” are not being written off as anything but it’s a plain fact that they were and are armed thugs amongst their ranks. In terms of who shot at whom first well the police will tend to shoot you when you are trying to burn them alive with Molotov cocktails but I guess that doesn’t count as being *armed*.
Anyway, such complaints are almost laugable coming from an American? perspective where local cops routinely get away with stuff that would make the Kiev police blush. If that kind of protest took place here, say in DC, and even one cop got so much as a hang nail, they would’ve been lucky to get out alive and half the country would’ve cheered the cops. Look what happened to Occupy and that was positively mild.
Lisa Simeone
Bingo. (Though I think you meant “relatively mild.”)
ks
Yes Lisa, thanks.
rkka
“I don’t disagree with your ‘real-politik’ point that Ukraine is in Putin’s back yard but why should we do him any favours, he doesn’t do any for us, in fact, just the opposite! ”
Um… Duffy? You do remember when the Pakistanis closed Pakistan to the transit of US supplies to Afghanistan in 2011-2012?
Without Russian permission to use Russian railroads and Russian airspace for the transit of NATO troops and supplies, ‘The Troops’ in Afghanistan would have starved to death.
The Stupid is strong with this one…
Celsius 233
The Stupid is strong with this one…
That’s a fact… 😉
David Duff
So, rkka, that nice Mr. Putin helped you (and us) to *stay* in Afghanistan which has since cost us dear in blood and treasure and from which we are now only too grateful to slink away from with our sorry tails between our legs having achieved absolutely nothing! Allow me to repeat myself:
“And that’s a favour”?
Celsius 233
David Duff
March 1, 2014
So, rkka, that nice Mr. Putin helped you (and us) to *stay* in Afghanistan which has since cost us dear in blood and treasure and from which we are now only too grateful to slink away from with our sorry tails between our legs having achieved absolutely nothing! Allow me to repeat myself:
“And that’s a favour”?
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
No, it’s about relationships! What is it about that you don’t get?
Putin is not nice; but he’s a rational realist who gets it.
You, on the other hand, act like a child in an adult world.
Time to wake up or just shut up; you add nothing of value here…