Ok.
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Though it also plays into the perhaps apocryphal “Potemkin Villages” of Imperial Russian history. Stand up the show of force to intimidate Ukraine into pre-emptively surrendering, even though maybe there’s no supply lines or other necessary support to maintain Putin’s troop presence if they were to invade.
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I’m wondering about that. Is it in Ukraine’s interest to play that role? “Look those crazy Americans made crazy threats but we sat down with our good friends the Russians and cleared up the misunderstanding”
A face-saving exit requires Putin to back down while claiming he’s not backing down.
Does a public pantomime of locals telling NATO to butt out provide that fig leaf so Putin can claim he stood up to western aggression and showed those dastardly foreigners they can’t push Russia around?
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Can be as simple as that Ukraine isn’t read into the full picture. The big talks have been happening between the US and Russia, other folks have been on the fringes.
Hate to say it, but Ukraine’s a pawn in this chess game, the whole game right now is the biggest threat of mass war in Europe since WWII, of which a full invasion of Ukraine would merely be the first step.
Very good odds that eventually this just goes quiet again, that Putin finds some way to back down without being seen to be backing down. But also tremendous risk when we start having military units in close proximity for accidents and miscalculations that spiral out of control.
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Yes, that too. Thanks for catching that much needed clarification!
Sounds plausible, but we should never underestimate the knee-jerk reactions of an aging tyrant with nowhere to go but into obsolescence.
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All three states probably have more guns than Russia too, just not those big mobile armor plated ones.
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I’ve heard that people in Kiev certainly feel this way. They just want Russia and the US to leave them alone.
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That part would be a bit too naiive and simplistic. It ain’t us threatening their freedom and independence, that’s 100% on russia.
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There is a sense, among some, that the pressure to join NATO is fueled by US arms builders. Not saying it’s accurate, but they don’t see “Joining NATO” as just claiming a spot on the proper team. It’s coming from outside and without regard to what the folks in the streets want. Just a conversation I heard.
And it would be pretty easy to find more russian-friendly folks in Kyiv than elsewhere. That part of the country still speaks more russian than Ukrainian. Get a bit further West, over like Lviv, and you won’t be hearing anything like that.
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Certainly there was a sporadic anti-Communist resistance led by Stepan Bandera and supported by MI6, among others. Also, the number of Ukrainians who died in the 1946-7 famine were well below 7 million.
… the famines that followed in the wake of WWII are part of the reckoning. In February 1946, US President Truman warned of a global famine that “may prove to be the worst in modern times”. One famine cost 100,000 lives in Tokyo in the second half of 1945; another was the Soviet famine of 1946-47. The latter was proportionately most severe in Moldova, where 100,000 or 5% of the population perished, but most costly in numbers of lives in Ukraine (300,000) and elsewhere in the Soviet Union (500,000) …
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Most recently, Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov remarked on Friday that if the U.S. “forces Kyiv to implement the agreements, we will of course be satisfied by that result.”
… … … …
Bullshit front to back. Simply delay until the ground freezes and tanks can roll freely. Putin will not be satisfied until he controls the parts of the former USSR as Mother Russia. Even then his satisfaction will be temporary. Kazakhstan, Belarus, Poland all for the taking. If I were living anywhere near a Russian border I’d be serious about moving elsewhere.
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If their lips are moving, they’re lying.
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It is important to remember though that the energy profile of Germany is a bit more complex. Gas accounts for only around 23% of Germany’s primary energy use. Germany also gets its energy from nuclear, renewables, coal and oil – little of which comes from Russia.
Also, @iamsmall, if Russia ain’t selling gas to Germany, Russia ain’t getting any money from Germany. It’s a lesson that the OPEC nations learned in 1970s.
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For overall energy, yes. But gas is heavily overly situated on the heating side, making it critical during these winter months.
Notable that, from 2014 on, Putin’s always been pulling this crap in the dead of winter.
I’ve been to Ukraine in the dead of winter. He’s not doing it because that’s the nicest time to go for a stroll, but rather that’s when the gas supply has its largest impact.
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That and when the ground is frozen he can move men and equipment.
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Lest we forget… all of this dust up is Putin’s doing. None was on Ukraine or anybody else. It was Putin who had him a hissy fit and sent troops into Crimea, Ukraine didn’t start it…And it’s not like Ukraine can thumb their nose about it and tell Putin to fuck off. However it may make Russian space ventures a tad difficult for a while.
All of this tension is on Putin and his lust for ground. Ukraine grows a shit ton of food and I can see Russia coveting that black earth.
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The GDP doesn’t include Putin’s and the oligarchs’ dark money. It’s just the Russian people’s share of the wealth.
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But it is the nicest time to make money as gas prices are at their highest. This is pretty much why I’m leaning toward “Putin’s Bungled This” as only the authoritarian oligarch of a natural resources-based economy could do.
… Russia’s energy reserves are located in remote hostile climates that can be developed only with huge long term capital investments and Western technology without which Russia’s energy production will decline. The Russian economy desperately needs capital and technology despite the claims of quack economic advisors that Russia can prosper on an autarky model. Even with the best of intentions, international energy concerns cannot risk shareholder funds in such an unstable political environment. Moreover, Russia’s unstable economic and political environment is confirmed by the continued outflow of capital and the most talented people as they flee Russia. In one false move, Russia has risked its reputation as a reliable energy supplier to Europe, which will sooner or later turn to other markets, or worse still, participate in the fracking revolution at home despite the flow of Russian anti-fracking money into the European green movement.
And this^^^ was written seven years ago!
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