Today, Putin showed just how much the impotent threats of the West to impose some minimal sanctions on a tiny handful of people scared him. He signed paperwork officially annexing the Crimea and the city of Sevastopol and made a speech indicating that Russia is planning to “defend” many more people outside its borders.
Joe Biden is traveling to Eastern Europe to persuade the Poles, the Estonians and the Lithuanians that they, at least, have nothing to fear from Russia. I’m sure he will tell them that the West will protect them from any Russian aggression:
As Putin continues to expand his empire, the Americans will stand by, nodding and repeating, “We are concerned. We are extremely concerned. Just wait some more and you’ll see really scary sanctions.”
In his today’s speech, Putin said that the collapse of the USSR put an end to the stability on the planet. The Cold War meant stability, the end of the Cold War allowed the Americans to run unchecked. They started doing all kinds of wild things, according to Putin, like financing the Arab Spring to impose the values that are culturally alien to the Arabs. The West needs to be checked in its world dominance.
Putin reiterated that there are still millions of Russians in Ukraine that are in need of being protected by him.
Clarissa's Blog 
Do you think it is the responsibility of the USA to support the Ukraine with military force against the Russians?
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No, of course not. Nobody wants any military action in the area. Nobody wants to see people die.
I wanted to see sanctions and I wanted to see them the moment the Russian troops crossed the border with Ukraine. None of that happened and now it’s too late.
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I’m thinking Latvia will be the next big target. Nothing direct (since NATO would supposedly be bound to get involved, though I’m sure they’d find excuses not to) but through the sizeable unassimilated Russian minority without citizenship.
Supposedly there are plans to express give them Russian citizenship since the Latvians won’t. Create general dissatisfaction and turmoil until a pro-Russian leader gets elected who will take them out of NATO and EU and back into the USSR.
It won’t be a fast process but Putin is at least thinking ahead unlike the witless and spineless western leaders who are busy reacting to situations that no longer exist….
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“I’m thinking Latvia will be the next big target.”
– Yes, I agree. Latvian economy is in shambles, so it makes for a good, juicy target.
“It won’t be a fast process but Putin is at least thinking ahead unlike the witless and spineless western leaders who are busy reacting to situations that no longer exist….”
– Exactly. I have a recurring feeling that Obama is not seeing a difference between Putin and Gorbachev. He is using the language of the peace talks with Gorbachev from the 1980s, and that sounds completely bizarre today. Does he not have advisors who can translate for him what the Russian media are saying about the US, the EU, foreign policy? There is no justifiable reason to remain ignorant of the situation. This information is freely available to anybody willing to look.
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Of course, Obama knows all this. One of explanations for his behavior may be thinking that even if Russia gets the territories, it will remain a third world country economically, and not of a crucial interest \ threat to USA. For instance, with Syria going down Russia lost a part of influence in the Middle East, if I understand correctly.
I found cliff’s article about Zilinovsky. He offers Poland (among others) to grab a part of Ukraine. Poland, which was among the first victims of Nazism. Life is ironic.
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In his speech today, Putin thanked China and India for their support. He’s been working hard to align himself with China and India and succeeding. The cumulative population of these countries is far greater than that of the US. Plus all three are nuclear powers. If that’s not a crucial threat, I’m not sure what is.
As for Zhirinovsky, he is a project of Kremlin created to give an outlet to the most marginalized segments of the population. He always votes together with the ruling party.
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I suspect that too (about Latvia). I even thought (before it all started with Ukraine) that Latvia will be the first. Because it is the weakest economically and militarily, has the highest percentage of Russians, and gives the most pretexts to invade itself while justifying it by Russians being discriminated. And this will be not about the juicy economy at all. It will be about showing the world that NATO will fail to protect even the member states. As a result of that NATO would crumble. East Europeans will feel defenseless, they will not trust the US any more, etc. This is much more valuable than Latvia per se.
It is already very easy to get Russian passport in Latvia. And everybody who wanted to get it already has it.
And now, unfortunately, I do not think it will be Latvia alone. It will be either the whole Baltics or no Baltics. Because if you go as far as attacking a NATO country, you do not leave other NATO countries on your flanks intact. As Lithuania does not have enough Russians to “protect”, Russia will not be able to synchronize the unrest in all three countries and make it look believable. So in the unlikely event Russia will do that at all, Russia will do it fast, not slow. They will call the NATO air base one day and give them one hour to leave. And at the same time they will suggest national armies to surrender. And then they will use the “polite green men” tactics. They will fight only those who fight them. They will not repress civilians or send anybody to Siberia. (Of course they will turn a blind eye on some local Russians doing whatever they want to the Latvians in the name of “revenge over the nationalists who discriminated them for all those years”.) But there will be no proof that Russian army per se repressed any civilians. In fact they probably will let everyone who wants to escape to the West.. to escape. Let them be the West’s problem. Russians do not need the disloyal population who turns against them when Russians become weak, they need territory, ports and prestige of defeating NATO.
(Back to normal mode, sociopathic chauvinist simulator mode off.)
Meanwhile in Estonia, the nationalists got kicked out of the ruling coalition, and substituted by social democrats, and ministry of education was offered to an ethnic Russian. The westernized one, he has a lot in common with me, for example…
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“They will call the NATO air base one day and give them one hour to leave. And at the same time they will suggest national armies to surrender. And then they will use the “polite green men” tactics. They will fight only those who fight them. They will not repress civilians or send anybody to Siberia. (Of course they will turn a blind eye on some local Russians doing whatever they want to the Latvians in the name of “revenge over the nationalists who discriminated them for all those years”.) But there will be no proof that Russian army per se repressed any civilians. In fact they probably will let everyone who wants to escape to the West.. to escape. Let them be the West’s problem. Russians do not need the disloyal population who turns against them when Russians become weak, they need territory, ports and prestige of defeating NATO.”
– This is a nightmare scenario but you do have a tendency to be scarily right on the subject of Russian foreign policy. I want to see this as an exaggeration, but in the light of recent events I can’t.
“Meanwhile in Estonia, the nationalists got kicked out of the ruling coalition, and substituted by social democrats, and ministry of education was offered to an ethnic Russian. The westernized one, he has a lot in common with me, for example…”
– Do you think this is motivated by the fear that Estonians now have of being the next in line?
I have to say, I can’t make myself believe that we are sitting here, discussing the annexation of the Crimea and which Baltic state will be next. Ten years ago, such a discussion seemed more ridiculous than discussing an invasion of aliens from another galactic.
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\\ Plus all three are nuclear powers. If that’s not a crucial threat, I’m not sure what is.
What can they do exactly without economic power?
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What do you mean, without economic power? China holds the US’s foreign debt. Russia holds the EU’s energy. India is the world’s leader in technology and innovation. The absolute majority of goods (and many of the services) consumed in the US are produced in China and India.
In the meanwhile, the EU is still suffering in the grip of the economic crisis and the US is losing economic power every day.
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I don’t undersand something very basic. If USA exploits those countries in some way, like in colonists’ times colonies served to enrich Britain f.e., they have full right to demand higher payment for their services. If USA can pay for what it consumes, what is the problem? That those countries want to develop and achieve better life for their citizens? If Africa (not a country, I know) hadn’t been so poor, it would become influential too.
I am sorry for not grasping something basic about how the world works. May be, you could write a post about it?
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For me, it’s a problem because I don’t identify with the ultra-patriarchal, deeply nationalistic values China and Russia promote. I identify completely with the West. I dig it, I think it’s the best in terms of the rights of women and in terms of providing the kind of lifestyle I like and enjoy, promoting human rights. Russia has chosen not to develop this side of its heritage and chose instead to return to the patriarchal, totalitarian side of its identity.
India can still very easily choose to move away from what China and Russia represent these days. I’ve been hoping to see it take a firm position on Ukraine but this hasn’t been the case. India is vastly different from Russia and China and I hope this difference ends up winning in the end.
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Did you hear Putins appell to Germany? He basically said that he graciously let us have our reunion, now we surely understand that he deserves his. I wonder if he would be so understanding we we would try to reunion all those Volga Germans…
Source is in german, can’t find anything in english:
http://www.faz.net/aktuell/politik/rede-im-kreml-putins-wiedervereinigung-12852300.html
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Yes, he actually used the example of Germany being split to say that Germans should know what Russians feel like because it’s the same kind of experience. Absolutely shameless.
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“As Lithuania does not have enough Russians to “protect”, Russia will not be able to synchronize the unrest in all three countries and make it look believable.”
But Lithuana is bullying Kaliningrad by stubbornly existing between it and Mommie Dearest Russia. The ‘need’ to unite Kaliningrad geographically with Russia will be excuse enough.
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Yes, Kaliningrad is a very problematic area in this sense.
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