Doug's Darkworld

So for the past week Biden (and some of his Nato allies, particularly Britain) have been sounding the alarm about Russian troop movements in Russia, claiming that Russia is about to invade Ukraine, and promising massive economic retaliation when Russia does attack. I’m very alarmed by this development, I think the US is up to something, and a confrontation with Russia of some sort is a very real possibility. There’s a lot to unpack, but the mainstream media’s coverage of this might as well be written by the Pentagon and the White House. So as long as this crisis is unfolding, I’m going to post daily. To help me understand if nothing else, but hopefully I have a few readers left. Head’s up, these won’t be the most polished posts, more like coverage of a live event.

Where to start. The media coverage. It’s terrible, why I call in the FCM, fawning corporate media. They simply are regurgitating Cold War propaganda repurposed for the current situation. It would take a book to write a balanced history of The Cold War, and maybe some posts will touch on that, for today’s launch, I’m just going to cover some salient points. And point one, the media and government are lying. Talk to your friends and relatives who remember Vietnam or Saddam’s WMDs if the gentle reader wasn’t around for those.

OK, is Russia going to invade Ukraine? No. Godot Likely To Arrive Before Russia Invades Ukraine. Russia will defend its own vigorously, but they have no interest in conquest. And no, despite endless western propaganda, Crimea never wanted to be part of Ukraine in the first place: Does Crimea want to become part of Russia? Arguably they were never legally part of Ukraine to begin with. The reason the US and the west were/are so eager to keep Crimea out of Russia is that the loss of Sevastopal as a military base would have crippled the Russian navy.

So if Russia isn’t going to attack, what’s going to happen? Well, possibly Ukraine decides it has a green light to attack its two breakaway eastern provinces: Eastern Ukraine Separatists Warn Kyiv Preparing Offensive in Donbas. What is Donbas? Well, after the US backed anti-Russia coup in Ukraine in 2014, two eastern Ukraine provinces (where the population were majority ethnic Russians) declared autonomy, fully supported by Russia. While there has been sporadic fighting, the situation is mostly stable. If Ukraine decided to settle the situation militarily, like Georgia foolishly tried in Ossetia in 2008, Russia will respond.

Sort of the core of the whole thing is that Russia’s legitimate security concerns have been ignored, and that’s what this is really all about. Russia doesn’t want Nato troops and equipment on Russia’s borders any more than Americans would want Russian first strike weapons deployed in Mexico. Especially if Mexico was claiming California as its own. Here’s a good article: Are Neocons Worried at Pace of US-Russia Talks?

I don’t have any answers. I don’t really know what’s going on, but world geopolitics is a cutthroat business. I do know that “Putin is Hitler and the US and Nato are the hapless good guy victims” is, just, silly. Oh, and while we’re at it, sanctions are war. I hope the gentle reader checks out the links I posted before commenting. I hope the situation resolves itself without a war, but I fear that’s what Biden is up to. We’ll see.

In my personal life, don’t ask. I had a bad fall, face plant, I’m still homeless, but things are looking up. Have a great 2022 everyone, I’ll daily blog if I can. This is far more exciting than Trump vs Biden, it will be fun.

Copyright © 2022 Doug Stych. All rights reserved.

(Image: Found on Facebook, attribution in image, claimed as Fair Use under US copyright law.)