Posted on 11/30/2007 12:25:11 PM PST by OldCorps
Our next president will likely face a Russia led by Prime Minister Vladimir Putin, determined to stand up to a West Russians believe played them for fools when they sought to be friends.
We pushed NATO into Moscow's face, bringing six ex-Warsaw Pact nations and three ex-Soviet republics – Lithuania, Latvia and Estonia – into our Cold War alliance and plotted to bring in Ukraine and Georgia.
We pulled out of the Anti-Ballistic Missile treaty over Moscow's objection, then announced plans to plant ABM radars in the Czech Republic and anti-missile missiles in Poland.
Putin has now responded in kind, and who can blame him?
As we abandoned the ABM Treaty, the Duma, in November, voted 418 to 0 to suspend participation in the Conventional Forces in Europe Treaty, which restricts the size of the Russian army west of the Urals.
If we recognize Kosovo as independent, at the expense of Serbia, Putin is now threatening to recognize South Ossetia and Abkhazia, the breakaway republics of Georgia and Transneistria, claimed by Moldova.
It was not NATO that liberated Eastern Europe. Moscow did – by pulling out the Red Army after half a century. Why, then, did we think moving NATO into Eastern Europe was a surer guarantee of their continued independence than the goodwill of Russia?
Many among our foreign policy elite now talk of a Second Cold War. John McCain wants Russia kicked out of the G-8. But do we not have enough enemies already that we should add the largest nation on earth?
(Excerpt) Read more at worldnetdaily.com ...
I guarantee, even if we’d followed Pat’s formula, Putin would still be moving towards an autocracy.
Oh my, if only we had been more sensitive!
Vlad is Pat’s kind of guy. All he needs is a toothbrush mustache and a swastika armband.
Is it me or does this sound like Ron Paul? Change Russia to Islamic radicals and the story line is the same. We did things they didn’t like, we’re wrong, and “who can blame them?”
I don’t really see being held hostage to Russian psycho pathologies is the best way to compartmentalize Europe's crazy man.
Let’m rant and rave about imaginary slights, we’ve got the future to meet.
I agree. We have not treated Russia with due respect after the break up of the USSR. Imagine if Russia had annexed Canada and Mexico into the WARSAW pact. We wouldn’t be very upset about it now would we?
The one that really gets my crawl, is us supporting the Muslim killers in Kosovo. This is certainly not in our national interests nor is it worth pissing Russia off.
This may not be a popular sentiment here, but its a realistic view. I don’t always agree with Pat, but on this one i do.
“It was not NATO that liberated Eastern Europe. Moscow did – by pulling out the Red Army after half a century.”
It was neither, you old fool. It was Ronald Reagan, Maggie Thatcher and Pope John Paul II and a supporting cast of millions of people demanding freedom.
“I guarantee, even if we’d followed Pat’s formula, Putin would still be moving towards an autocracy.”
His internal domestic consolidation of power would certain continue I think, including state takeover of major natural resources, as well as domestic political control He is certainly an autocrat, apparently reviving the RSFSR without the communist ideology but rather a robber-baron state.
How would his posture towards the west be impacted? I think it is unrealistic to say it would make no difference - encirclement and attempted corporate looting of natural resources never makes friends.
Bravo and well said.
Yep, its all our fault, probably because of our jews..
“Why, then, did we think moving NATO into Eastern Europe was a surer guarantee of their continued independence than the goodwill of Russia?”
Umm, maybe the entirety of Russian history suggests otherwise. These new NATO countries had their fill of Russian “goodwill” and bolted when they could. That the west stood for their freedon ia a good thing. Russia is going to be Russia regardless of what “formula” we follow - and that means autocratic.
The Russians have legitimate points about Serbia and drilling in the Arctic.
But they are smoking tainted hash when they whine about ABM systems.
The Russians are also cozy with the same Iranians who are funding the murdering of Russians in Chechnya and Moscow.
As for NATO, the Russians could have been admitted into NATO if only they’d followed Poland’s path instead of swinging their weight around.
The only thing I agree with Pat on here is Kosovo. That was a blunder on our part. We went in on the side of the muzzies, pissed off the Ruskies for no gain of our own, and ended helping to establish an extremist ethnic-cleansing muzzie theocracy.
Good work there, BillyBubba, and good job staying the course there, President Bush.
Russia is not to be trusted, and our policy towards them is DISTRUST. It is a CORRECT POLICY.
Do NOT trust the Russians. They are doing a LOT more in the background that you people know, or understand, and you won’t take the damned time to research it. Buchanan is WRONG
And if you believe that, I got a nice plot of land in Gaza for sale.
....then again Pat probably already has one.
That’s why (some) Russians suffer from the greatest case of geopolitical penis-envy on the face of the planet . . . their vaunted military was chased out of E. Europe by protestors armed with candles.
This could have all been solved in 1945 if we had let Patton do his thing.
I think it's just you. You picked the short straw to post the first knee-jerk Paul reference.
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