Vladimir Putin offers his casus belli for Ukraine attack

Washington Examiner ^ | DECEMBER 21, 2021 | Tom Rogan

[RoosterRedux]

Russian President Vladimir Putin, on Tuesday, delivered three strong signals that he intends to invade Ukraine.

Addressing military commanders and intelligence chiefs at the Defense Ministry, Putin offered a preemptive casus belli to justify invading Ukraine in order to address an existential threat to Russia. The Russian leader warned that the United States "will supply Ukraine with hypersonic weapons," which would reduce the nuclear strike launch-to-target time against Moscow to "five minutes." This, Putin insisted, would pose "the most serious threat" to Russia's security. One that means "we simply have nowhere to retreat further."

Note the explicitly existential nature of Putin's words: facing annihilation, back against the wall. This is not language that offers hope for credible compromise.

Of course, Putin knows full well that the U.S. is not actually going to deploy hypersonic weapons to Ukraine. To do so would be a provocation that would do little to advance U.S. strategic deterrence while giving Russia justification to attack. But what this hypersonic reference does accomplish is to allow Putin to present Ukraine's democratic sovereignty as an existential threat to the Russian people and nation. This hypersonic threat myth, then, is the military partner to Putin's ideological justification of Ukraine as a necessary subsidiary of Russia proper.

The next signal of invasion came from Putin's close friend and defense minister Sergey Shoygu, who invented the threat of an impending American-led chemical weapons attack, claiming 120 U.S. mercenaries had established themselves in civilian buildings along the battle contact line separating Ukrainian and pro-Russian forces in southeastern Ukraine. Shoygu said these Americans are preparing "Ukrainian special operations forces and radical armed groups for active hostilities" and a "provocation" involving "an unidentified chemical component."

[Travis McGee]

impeachment FARCE not face

[Cronos]

Sapwolf (2nd Jan 2022) Putin wants to conquer it is because it is so weak and corrupt and would be an easy fight that Russia could pull off.

People just don’t understand how weak Ukraine is.

Putin thought it was an easy fight too...

he was wrong.