Posted on 06/06/2007 1:59:20 AM PDT by RusIvan
This Russian risk could yet dwarf our blunder on Iraq
Putin's belligerence is the upshot of inept western diplomacy. Following cold war with cold peace may prove a historic error
Simon Jenkins Wednesday June 6, 2007 The Guardian
Will history tell us we were fools? We worried about the wrong war and made the wrong enemies. In the first decade of the 21st century the leaders of America and Britain allowed themselves to be distracted by a few Islamist bombers and took easy refuge in the politics of fear. They concocted a "war on terror" and went off to fight little nations that offered quick wins. Meanwhile these leaders neglected the great strategic challenge of the aftermath of cold war: the fate of Russia and its mighty arsenals, its soul tormented by military and political collapse, its pride undimmed. They danced on Moscow's grave and hurled abuse at its shortcomings. They drove its leaders to assert a new energy-based hegemony and find new allies to the south and east. The result was a new arms race and, after a Kremlin coup, a new war. Is that the path we are treading?
(Excerpt) Read more at guardian.co.uk ...
And nothing. Next.
ping
More leftist claptrap from the Guardian. DILLIGAS
Too bad those truthful articles are always in left wing ragpapers.
If one wants to assume that Russia will always act like a petulant child, then perhaps this line of reasoning might make some sense. However, it would be nice to be able to assume that it will be among adult nations that don't need such coddling.
Russia does have history that it can be proud of; if it thinks that it is suffering abuse because of its long infatuation with governments that the West views as very sorry lots (for the successes of the Czars and the Soviet governments, yet they were truly most impressive in their oppressiveness to many Western eyes), perhaps it should try to institute better governments rather than try its hand at "energy-based hegemony".
Russia is going to crash and burn economically. Capital flight and a brain drain. It is turning into Zimbabwe on the Volga - and just as Mugabe blames everything on Britain, so (it would appear) Russia's woes are all caused by America. The Guardian needs to change the record, we've heard this one already.
I am very concerned about Russia, and also China. Both are potentially expansionist powers.
Looks like Simon is getting paid by more than the Guardian. Jeez did he pile it on. Poor Russia, poor KGB, Oligarchs, poor Moscow elite drinking real Champaign, driving 6 series Mercedes, only dumb crew cut bodyguards to talk to...and all because of the mean old State Department queers were, sniff..sniff...sob..sob...and NATO...and and...
While bashing the West’s “distraction” with Iraq, the UKG conveniently forgets that removal of Saddam’s regime also removed an undesirable Russian influence from the region. With Russia’s technical support to Saddam’s weapons-building programs, the West was well aware of the invasion’s adverse impact on relations with Putin. But in a strategic sense, the invasion left Russia as a diminished player in the Middle East. Nobody took their eye off the ball.
History will tell us that half of our voters were fools. They put the Democrats in power for long stretches of time, allowing them to over run our country with socialist laws and illegal aliens, destroying our culture and ultimately our country.
Russia has always been a bully of a nation, when it was able to be. After the cold war, it couldn't. But with high energy prices and huge leverage over Western Europe with it's virtual monopoly on NG supplies there, it has a larder and some power and it is starting to act like Russia again.
With it's collapsing population, Russia really isn't much of a long term worry. In the short term, I'm more concerned that Russia supplies countries like Iran, Syria, and other terrorists with weapons than I am that Russia is going to use it's nukes for anything except bullying. In the longer term, Russia is a huge worry because it is going to be Islamic in the West and Chinese in the East as its dying native population is replaced by other, more vigorous, cultures. So there will be all those rotting nukes sitting around for crazies to use.
Russian leaders today may be bullies by nature. But they are cautious and very protective of their power. So they don't use nukes. They just wave them around and yell. Islamists also yell. But are much more likely to use those nukes.
So instead of proving to them that we can be better allies than China, we are telling them that we don't trust them and they will never again roll their tanks into Czechoslovakia. I still don't get it?
Clearly the biggest threat, not only to the West but to Russia also, is from the exponential demographic spread of Islam, and there have been more than a few Islamic bombers. There will be many more.
How long until Russia becomes majority Muslim? I think that Britain could well get there first, but the spread in birthrate and immigration is ticking.
The Guardian is blind. Lots of people are blind.
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