Your Eyewitness wondered what he’d be writing about today as he scoured the dailies and the online newsfeeds – like he does every day. It was news about THE war, war, and more war!! If one thing was clear after a week of the Russian invasion of Ukraine, it’s the difference between war in Europe and one in “other places”. You ask, “What other wars?” Dear Readers? And that’s the point, ain’t it? Just in the last three decades – since, say, we had our “free and fair elections – in the Middle East alone, haven’t we had a war in Afghanistan, in Iraq, in Syria, in Lebanon? But the difference, of course, is our TV screens and now our smartphones weren’t flooded 24/7 with graphic images of the carnage and bloodshed!
That there’s an invasion in Europe makes a difference, doesn’t it? Is it because there are more news agencies in Europe? Reporters? Smartphones? Or is it because European lives are more important or because Europe is more important? Does it make a difference? The bottom line is no one’s protesting this overload in information about the European war even though the casualties – measured in deaths, casualties, or refugees – don’t stack up to a typical day’s engagement in Syria!! European lives matter!!
Well, if you can’t beat ‘em you might as well join ‘em. So, your Eyewitness’s gonna be writing again about “the war”. There was some hope on Monday that after the two sides parleyed on Monday there might be a ceasefire. That was a hope that was bound to be dashed from where your Eyewitness stands. While everybody’s been looking at the strategic angle – Russia looking for “strategic depth” in the West and such like – they’ve ignored the most critical variable: Russian national pride!!
Your Eyewitness has never taken lightly Putin’s assertion – in that long essay he wrote last year – that Ukraine was an integral part of the “Russian nation”. People in the West don’t appreciate enough the importance of “nation” – in the sense of “being a people” –- to folks who’ve been kept in the shade for centuries as “second rate”. This yearning comes out of their desire to “be somebody!” as Jesse Jackson shouted back in the sixties in the US on behalf of the Black nation.
But what the Russians don’t appreciate is that their sense of nationalism created an equal and opposite reaction in most of the satellites/Soviets Lenin absorbed after 1922. While some of the Ukrainians in the East – abutting Russia – might agree with Putin and feel close to “Mother Russia”, the majority – especially in Western Ukraine – consider another round of the Russian Bear’s embrace anathema!!
They’re gonna fight to the death!
…tactics and strategies
Some folks have their bucktas (and drawers) all in a knot because Putin lied about “not invading” after massing those 100,000 troops on the Ukraine border. So, let your Eyewitness clue you in about some basics of “International Relations” (IR). Not so incidentally, half of UG takes this subject as a “course”, but Lord knows what they’re taught!! IR, Dear Readers, is all about power and influence and absolutely nothing about morality and ethics.
Putin has convinced his Russian citizens (subjects?) that they’ve been wronged ‘cause all the satellites in the west have joined the EU and NATO. They’ve lost power and influence – and they have to recover these, come what may. So, the Ruskies are in for the long haul…they’re in no hurry. They’re out to right a historical wrong!! And no sacrifice will be too much.
Like the Germans did to them in 1941, the Ruskies will encircle and drive the Ukrainians into pockets.
Then force them into concessions or be killed!
…and blitzkrieg
Some thought the Ruskies were going for a blitzkrieg tactic against the Ukrainians. But how do you use surprise, speed, and superiority in matériel or firepower to disorient the enemy when the attack was no surprise??
