Shot in the Dark

Peace In Our Time?

Joe Doakes, once of Como Park, emails:

Media reports Trump told Zelinsky, “Accept Putins terms or be destroyed.” 

Trump denies he said it.  That’s too bad.  It’s the correct answer and should have been given nine months ago.  End the killing.  Surrender.  Live to fight another day. 

 

Gonna disagree with Joe there.  

It won’t end the killing.  It’ll just defer it ’til Putin, encouraged rather than sated by the western cave-in, decides to go after Estonia, counting on a NATO that’s too weak to do anything about it and too cowed to risk getting nuked.   NATO doesn’t have the conventional force to resist, and the US doesn’t have the ability to move enough troops to Europe in a hurry to be any kind of deterrent in the near term.  

And when, not if, NATO caves on Estonia, then come Latvia, Lithuania, and the other nearly-disarmed NATO countries.   Finland and Poland would be tougher nuts to crack, but neither can really do much to the Russians either.  

Now you might say “not our circus, not our monkeys”.   Maybe you’re right (although I disagree).  But I think it’s wishful thinking that giving up in Ukraine will do more than validate Putin to do more.  

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Mitch Berg

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4 responses to “Peace In Our Time?”

  1. bikebubba Avatar
    bikebubba

    Well said. We need to wake up to the fact that Putin is a guy who started his career in East Germany (the most Stalinist of all the Warsaw Pact countries), never apologized for it, and is now violating national borders with aplomb–just like Jugashvili. He continues the pattern with captive media, nonsense elections, and erecting statues of Lenin and Stalin.

    Long past time for the world to recognize what’s been going on for the past 25 years and start responding like Reagan did. I think we’re likely to find that, just like in 1989, Russia is far more fragile than a lot of people think.

  2. jdm Avatar
    jdm

    There are a lot of good reasons to skedaddle out of the apparent quagmire that is Ukraine, but there are a lot of better reasons to do whatever it takes to let Ukraine keep Russia on the hook of this bloody war that it has not won, indeed, can not win (and moreover, it may well result in the collapse of Russia and Putin as well). Here’s a couple.

    Ukraine is the world leader in drone warfare (Russia is somewhat behind but still ahead of everyone else). Ukraine has literally changed the face of warfare for the future (think the Blitzkrieg or the machine gun) and they are willing to share. For example, UKR has no navy to speak of and dominates the Black Sea where Russia used to have a navy, the remainder of which hides in the far eastern ports away from Ukrainian drones. Don’t think Taiwan and West Taiwan haven’t noticed.

    The western militaries need to be upgraded to this technology and it needs Ukraine consulting and even manufacturing these weapons of the future.

    Second, why would anyone think that Russia can win? It is a paper tiger, paying North Korea for men and artillery shells, Iran for (outdated) drones and China for anything it will give them*. We’re closing in on a four year war in the oh-so powerful Russian army measures its victories in one village at a time – and which Ukraine still shows no signs of surrender (yes, yes, they have suffered mightily during this time). Why don’t we let them decide when to surrender?

    Russia can’t back out and anything other than total victory will be considered a defeat. Also – especially – for Putin.

    If you are interested in learning more about a war that is no longer widely interesting unless it can embarrass or shame Trump, this guy has lots of interesting info. Here’s one.
    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=I_vnZ6oseoE

    * – an interesting balancing act for the Chinese. Most of Russia in and around Vladivostok was taken from the Chinese over 100 years ago. The Chinese haven’t forgotten and a sufficiently weak Russia would not be able to stop the recovery of these lands.

  3. jdm Avatar
    jdm

    YMMV, Ukraine’s Military is Becoming INSANELY Powerful

    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MCZEhOD1CSs

    Ukraine has developed numerous massive breakthroughs in just a few short years. The progress is happening so quickly, that some people still aren’t fully aware of its significance. The reality is that, whatever way this war goes, Ukraine has established themselves as a global power for the next century to come. In this video, I explain why, looking at Russia’s war against Ukraine, and how it has made Ukraine a world leader in drones, AI, robotics, and more.

  4. jdm Avatar
    jdm

    More. You might not be aware of this recent development either.

    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AYEwLQWfAfA

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