Sikorski: Russia rejects post-WWII, Western 'world of rules'

[HT: AB]  Sikorski, known in Poland for saying controversial things, here blasts several shibboleths of official Moscow. Read on!... 

Europe's Challenge: A 'Twilight Zone' in Russia's Shadow, or a 'World of Rules?'

By Radek Sikorski (Speaker of the Polish Parliament)

November 24, 2014 | The World Post

This comment is excerpted from a speech at Harvard's Center for European Studies late last week.

In Harvard Yard, on 5 June 1947, on the steps of Memorial Church, momentous words were said.

It is logical that the United States should do what it can to assist the return of normal economic health in the world, without which there can be no political stability and no assured peace.

Our policy is not directed against any country, but against hunger, poverty, desperation and chaos.

U.S. Secretary of State George Marshall set in motion the most profitable financial investment in human history: the reconstruction of Western Europe:

The Marshall Plan was part of a wider Western ambition after World War II. To create a World of Rules.

New global institutions were set up, led by U.S. leadership and generosity. 

The United Nations. The World Bank and International Monetary Fund. The International Court of Justice.

Despite harsh Cold War ideological differences, these institutions took root. They grew and flourished.

Why? Because the world -- or at least a part of the world -- had agreed that explicit international military aggression had to stop.

Differences between peoples and nations should be settled by peaceful negotiation.

The first principle of this World of Rules was self-restraint: by cooperating, not fighting, we build a shared interest in success.

Self-restraint -- ruling out the war option -- creates stability. Stability encourages investment. This creates innovation and new wealth.

The European Economic Community was only one of many institutions which flourished under this regime. It grew and grew to become today's European Union, precisely because it was based on this principle of national political self-restraint. Success bred success.

The second principle was that this World of Rules was worth defending from those who didn't accept it.

During the Cold War, this required a comprehensive Western approach, with the North Atlantic Treaty Organization at the heart.

There were programs to share intelligence, especially among the English speaking nations of the West; joint military exercises; exchanges of weapons and military technology.

Institutions such as Radio Free Europe and the BBC pushed back against communist lies and propaganda.

So successful were these economic and security institutions and so attractive to those who didn't enjoy them, that when the Warsaw Pact finally fell apart after 1989, the nations of central Europe made it a national policy imperative to work closely with them, or even apply to join them.

RUSSIA WAS HUMILIATED BY NATO EXPANSION? RIDICULOUS

The events in Crimea and eastern Ukraine are dramatic and dangerous.

They threaten Ukraine's stability. And they pose a new kind of test for the transatlantic alliance set up to protect the West and its rules.

Let me demolish an assertion heard quite often both in Moscow and in Western capitals: that the Ukraine crisis has been "provoked" by Western governments in general, and by NATO in particular.

As few now seem to remember, when the Cold War ended, the transatlantic team of North America and Western Europe welcomed central and eastern European countries into modern democratic society. 

But the impetus for NATO enlargement did not come from a triumphalist Washington. On the contrary, the U.S. initially resisted even the breakup of the Soviet Union.

Since 1990 12 European states have asked to join NATO. They all chose for themselves to belong to this cooperative military alliance.

NATO membership was a key part of "locking in" their turbulent democratic reforms.

NATO programs helped modernize our armed forces, and bring them fully under civilian control.

NATO played a vital role in helping all these countries make a clear break from secret communist-era military intelligence machinations, right at the heart of a supposedly independent state.

While this slow, cautious and -- as I remember well -- in some ways reluctant enlargement did eventually take place, constant efforts were made to reassure Russia.

Russia was welcomed to the Council of Europe, World Trade Organization and given closer relations with the European Union.

No NATO bases were ever placed in the new member states.

Until 2013, no NATO military exercises were ever conducted in Poland, the Baltic states or anywhere else on the eastern flank.

No nuclear installations have been moved to the territory of new member states, even though Russia has them less than 100 kilometers from our border.

A NATO-Russia Council was set up and Russia was promised that as long as it respected borders in Europe, no substantial combat forces would be moved east.

Largely in response to Russian objections, Ukraine and Georgia were in fact denied NATO membership plans in 2008.

In pressing the reset button with Moscow toward Russia, President Obama changed the configuration of the proposed missile defense installation in Poland, then suspended its Phase 4 which Russia disliked.

In short, the assertion that Russia was "humiliated" during this period is ridiculous.

Russia took charge of all the former Soviet nuclear weapons, some transferred from Ukraine in 1994 when Russia recognized Ukraine's borders, including Crimea. Ukraine's territorial integrity was guaranteed in the Budapest Memorandum by Russia, [the] U.S., [the] U.K. and France.

Presidents Clinton and Bush treated their Russian counterparts as fellow "great power" leaders and invited them to join the G-8, even though Russia did not qualify to join this group at that time, either as a large economy or as a stable democracy.

The U.S. spent billions of dollars working with Russia to reduce Cold War nuclear and chemical weapons stocks, and to achieve new, better arms control agreements.

All sorts of smaller but practical projects have been set up with Russia. The NATO-Russia Cooperative Airspace Initiative aims to prevent aircraft hijackings. We have agreed to help destroy dangerous ammunitions stocks in the Kaliningrad exclave.

Russia has benefited from all these programs, and many more.

Freed from decades of self-inflicted communism, it has joined the global economy as a normal country.

It's seen the benefits. Its GDP was a feeble $570 billion in 1990. By 2013 it has grown to $ 2.1 trillion.

So, in the years following the end of the Cold War, did NATO and EU governments show unwavering hostility towards Russia?

Did we cynically "take advantage of Russia's weakness?"

Have we been "humiliating" Russia?

I answer those three questions in three words. No. No. And no.

The record since the Berlin Wall came down shows NATO and the European Union and their individual member states all working hard, and in good faith, to build normal, purposeful relations with Russia.

And it shows that Russia itself benefiting hugely from this support.

PUTIN'S REAL AIM: PROTECTING RUSSIA'S WEALTHY FROM DEMOCRACY

So where has it gone wrong?

The basic problem is that the current leadership in Moscow depends on corrupt business structures and media manipulation to keep power.

The Russian elite is dominated by former KGB officers who, starting in the late 1980s, used Russian state money, sometimes laundered through Western offshore banks, to purchase land, natural resources and property on a vast scale.

To protect this wealth, they must prevent the outbreak of a democratic revolution of the kind that shook central Europe in 1989, or an anti-corruption revolution as took place on Kiev's Maidan square early this year.

Using military invasions of Georgia and now Ukraine, or strong-arm tactics as in Armenia, or corrupt political proxies in Moldova, they seek to stop nations of the former Soviet Union from daring to join the successful institutions of the West -- and from setting an example that Russians might want to follow.

They are playing games with our public opinion through propaganda tricks. Paid Internet "trolls" pollute our newspaper comment pages, and Twitter, Facebook and other sites. They roll out fake "experts" with fake authority.

They try to legitimize extreme political forces of all kinds, paying for far-left anti-American rhetoric on their English-language Russia Today channel, while simultaneously supporting far-right anti-European politicians in Europe.

NIBBLING AWAY AT WESTERN RESOLVE

Not content with all that, they are testing our very military resolve.

Russian planes buzz American, Swedish, Danish, even Canadian planes.

Russian troops have captured an Estonian security officer working on the Estonian side of the border. The Russian navy captured a Lithuanian fishing boat and held it for ransom.

All these obnoxious ploys are intended to nibble away at Western resolve, and our own and wider faith in NATO Article 5. To test the value of our mutual security guarantees. But also, as events this year in Ukraine have shown, to challenge head-on the most basic rule of international law and the World of Rules: that international borders cannot be changed by force.

A RESTRAINED RESPONSE

The international response to Russia's policies has been restrained. It has been designed to raise the cost to Russia of undermining Western institutions.

The policy is working, up to a point.

Russia's president has admitted that the price his country is paying is high. 

In the decade from 2002-2012, Russia's economy grew on average 5 percent per year. Russia, like Poland, was integrating with the global economy, and seeing positive results.

If Russia grows at that same rate from now until 2025, its GDP will be $ 3.7 billion -- from today's $2.1 billion.

If instead Russia grows at only 1 percent over the next decade because of sanctions and global mistrust of its intentions, its GDP in 2025 will be far less -- $2.3 billion. Cumulatively over the decade, Russia will have lost the staggering sum of over $81 billion! Its leaders have decided to gamble with their own citizens' lives and hopes, by looking to the past, not the future.

Some of Russia's citizens are wondering whether this enormous price is worth paying -- and what Russia is getting for it.

NATO MUST AGAIN DEFEND THE WORLD OF RULES

Maybe Russia's leaders too are starting to conclude that this price is not worth paying. I truly hope they do. But we need to be prepared if they don't, at least in the short term. We need to think hard about the health of those institutions we set up a half a century ago.

First and foremost, we need to face a grim reality. Hard, sharp security questions are being posed to us in Europe once again.

The NATO that we have now is not the NATO we need to deal with them.

If we were starting from scratch now, nobody would put NATO troops and equipment where they are now. NATO should shut down unnecessary commands and legacy bases, and get back to its primary mission: deterrence.

NATO is a defensive alliance. But for deterrence to work, our military capability has to look -- and be -- serious.

Second, follow the money.

Have we been complacently turning a blind eye to an uncomfortable truth: that our own tangled, over-complex banking systems have been exploited by international semi-criminal networks, not only from Russia but all over the world?

Simply by firmly enforcing existing money laundering laws and asking hard questions about murky money, we will help ourselves and help others who are trying, against high odds, to join the World of Rules. Peoples around the world would be empowered and kleptocrats would be restrained if only we implemented existing laws!

Third, we need to think hard about how Europe and the U.S. work together in Ukraine and other countries wanting our help. It's demoralizing for them that so much Western money is wasted through duplication and institutional jostling for position.

Swedish technical assistance agencies and Dutch or American technical assistance agencies shouldn't be duplicating or contradicting one another's programs.

Technical expert "advice" works best when supported by pragmatic peer-to-peer consultations.

Ukrainian ministers turn to their Polish counterparts to ask what we think: "You Poles have been through this. What makes sense?"

We do our best to tell them.

A NEW DIVIDING LINE ACROSS EUROPE

Back in 1947 Ukraine, like Poland, was blocked by Stalin from taking part in the generous Marshall Fund programs offered by the U.S..

Let's help Ukraine now, when at last it is free to ask for, and ready to receive, our help.

The principled way out of this crisis is based on all sides returning to the principles that George Marshall articulated at Harvard in 1947.

Teamwork. Cooperation. Russia's return to the World of Rules.

If this happens, sanctions can be lifted. Russia can again participate normally in international financial markets and institutions.

All Russia's grievances concerning Ukraine or anywhere else can be tackled sensibly and fairly through the UN or OSCE or Council of Europe, or other fora created for precisely such problems.

Moscow itself  asked to join all these organizations when it wasn't a founder partner when they were set up.

Moscow itself  has pledged to respect their rules.

Let's be clear.

The alternative to working through these issues normally and peacefully in a spirit of successful partnership is a new dividing line across the European continent. It won't be made of iron but it'll be real enough.

On one side of the line are countries and peoples free to choose their own democratic destiny.

On the other side are countries in a decaying Twilight Zone. A blighted, unhappy and unstable place outside the World of Rules.

If we get this wrong, our shared Western decades-long strategic ambition to create a Europe whole and free will falter.

Vanden Heuvel still ignoring Ukrainians' will, defending Putin, and blaming the U.S.

About one thing vanden Heuvel and her "non-interventionist liberal" ilk always are silent when it comes to Russia's armed aggression in Ukraine: What do Ukrainians want?  

As I've written before, she and others act as if Ukrainians have no agency, no say in the matter, and that Putin never had any choice but to seize Crimea and send troops and weapons into eastern Ukraine.

The key question is: Do most Ukrainians now want to be allied with Europe and the U.S.? And if they do, what gives Russia the right to stop them? 

It's sad to see a self-styled liberal like vanden Heuvel become more cynical and realpolitik than even Henry Kissinger when it comes to Ukraine. And it is simply because her husband Prof. Stephen Cohen is a russophile who shares the anti-Ukrainian chauvanism of many Russia experts and Russian intelligentsia 

Even worse, years ago vanden Heuvels magazine The Nation was critical of Russia's brutal crackdown on Chechen separatists, calling it "Putin's War." Keep in mind though, Chechnya was and is recognized as part of Russia. Now Russia has made real war by seizing a piece of Europe by force, the first time this has happened since WWII, and is setting the stage to take even more territory... and The Nation and vanden Heuvel are not only silent about it, they blame the U.S. for Putin's armed aggression!

I have no patience for such "liberals" who think the only time it's OK to criticize the world's despots is when they oppress their own ethnic or sexual minorities, or throw a sympathetic dissident in jail; it's a safe and cowardly defense of liberal ideals.

Rethinking the cost of Western intervention in Ukraine

By Katrina vanden Heuvel  

November 25, 2014 | Washington Post

URL: http://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/katrina-vanden-heuvel-rethinking-the-cost-of-western-intervention-in-ukraine/2014/11/25/b92f8496-741a-11e4-9c9f-a37e29e80cd5_story.html

Poland preps for war with Russia...without U.S. help

[HT: AS]. There are some very harsh words for President Obama and his administration in here.

How much of it is true about Obama's intention and fortitude isn't as important as the common perception within Poland that Obama is weak and America isn't reliable, that we aren't ready to defend our NATO-Article 5 commitments.

Alas, there are no prominent voices on the American Right who are pushing Obama to honor those commitments. Why? Probably because there's no constituency to be won from it. Americans don't care about Europe. It's much easier to bang and blame Obama for ISIS in the Mideast and Ebola in Africa. Republicans want to scaremonger and Monday-morning quarterback those two "crises" for partisan advantage. 

So there is no foreign policy leadership in either party.

Poland Is Preparing For A Potential Russian Invasion

By John Schindler

October 30, 2014 | Business Insider

URL: http://www.businessinsider.com/poland-is-preparing-for-a-russian-invasion-2014-10

Soros: EU, US must aid the 'new Ukraine' against Russia

I have not much to add to this op-ed by the alleged "evil" billionaire and "Colored Revolution"-maker George Soros, so I'm re-posting it in full, except to say: If there is some dumbbell in the Obama Admin. who is still not sure what to do about Ukraine, this is a good place to start.

The rest of my thoughts are highlighted below.

I will add this though: Americans who want a "strong" U.S. foreign policy had better realize that that requires more than tough words and finger-wagging by our government. In the case of Ukraine, it requires money -- billions, in fact, to lend to Ukraine's government as it tries to rebuild its army and simultaneously deal with economic recession and Russian economic-war tactics via trade sanctions and natural gas prices, not to mention economically crippling eastern Ukraine.

Anybody who says Obama isn't "tough enough" against Russia had better advocate billions of dollars in loan guarantees and aid for Ukraine -- a modern-day Marshall Plan -- or else they are political hacks who might as well be on the same side as Putin.  

Wake Up, Europe

By George Soros

October 23, 2014 | The New York Review of Books

Europe is facing a challenge from Russia to its very existence. Neither the European leaders nor their citizens are fully aware of this challenge or know how best to deal with it. I attribute this mainly to the fact that the European Union in general and the eurozone in particular lost their way after the financial crisis of 2008.

The fiscal rules that currently prevail in Europe have aroused a lot of popular resentment. Anti-Europe parties captured nearly 30 percent of the seats in the latest elections for the European Parliament but they had no realistic alternative to the EU to point to until recently. Now Russia is presenting an alternative that poses a fundamental challenge to the values and principles on which the European Union was originally founded. It is based on the use of force that manifests itself in repression at home and aggression abroad, as opposed to the rule of law. What is shocking is that Vladimir Putin’s Russia has proved to be in some ways superior to the European Union—more flexible and constantly springing surprises. That has given it a tactical advantage, at least in the near term.

Europe and the United States—each for its own reasons—are determined to avoid any direct military confrontation with Russia. Russia is taking advantage of their reluctance. Violating its treaty obligations, Russia has annexed Crimea and established separatist enclaves in eastern Ukraine. In August, when the recently installed government in Kiev threatened to win the low-level war in eastern Ukraine against separatist forces backed by Russia,President Putin invaded Ukraine with regular armed forces in violation of the Russian law that exempts conscripts from foreign service without their consent.

In seventy-two hours these forces destroyed several hundred of Ukraine’s armored vehicles, a substantial portion of its fighting force. According to General Wesley Clark, former NATO Supreme Allied Commander for Europe, the Russians used multiple launch rocket systems armed with cluster munitions and thermobaric warheads (an even more inhumane weapon that ought to be outlawed) with devastating effect.* The local militia from the Ukrainian city of Dnepropetrovsk suffered the brunt of the losses because they were communicating by cell phones and could thus easily be located and targeted by the Russians. President Putin has, so far, abided by a cease-fire agreement he concluded with Ukrainian President Petro Poroshenko on September 5, but Putin retains the choice to continue the cease-fire as long as he finds it advantageous or to resume a full-scale assault.

In September, President Poroshenko visited Washington where he received an enthusiastic welcome from a joint session of Congress. He asked for “both lethal and nonlethal” defensive weapons in his speech. However, President Obama refused his request for Javelin hand-held missiles that could be used against advancing tanks. Poroshenko was given radar, but what use is it without missiles? European countries are equally reluctant to provide military assistance to Ukraine, fearing Russian retaliation. The Washington visit gave President Poroshenko a façade of support with little substance behind it.

Equally disturbing has been the determination of official international leaders to withhold new financial commitments to Ukraine until after the October 26 election there (which will take place just after this issue goes to press). This has led to an avoidable pressure on Ukrainian currency reserves and raised the specter of a full-blown financial crisis in the country.

There is now pressure from donors, whether in Europe or the US, to “bail in” the bondholders of Ukrainian sovereign debt, i.e., for bondholders to take losses on their investments as a precondition for further official assistance to Ukraine that would put more taxpayers’ money at risk. That would be an egregious error. The Ukrainian government strenuously opposes the proposal because it would put Ukraine into a technical default that would make it practically impossible for the private sector to refinance its debt. Bailing in private creditors would save very little money and it would make Ukraine entirely dependent on the official donors.

To complicate matters, Russia is simultaneously dangling carrots and wielding sticks. It is offering—but failing to sign—a deal for gas supplies that would take care of Ukraine’s needs for the winter. At the same time Russia is trying to prevent the delivery of gas that Ukraine secured from the European market through Slovakia. Similarly, Russia is negotiating for the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe to monitor the borders while continuing to attack the Donetsk airport and the port city of Mariupol.

It is easy to foresee what lies ahead. Putin will await the results of the elections on October 26 and then offer Poroshenko the gas and other benefits he has been dangling on condition that he appoint a prime minister acceptable to Putin. That would exclude anybody associated with the victory of the forces that brought down the Viktor Yanukovych government by resisting it for months on the Maidan—Independence Square. I consider it highly unlikely that Poroshenko would accept such an offer. If he did, he would be disowned by the defenders of the Maidan; the resistance forces would then be revived.

Putin may then revert to the smaller victory that would still be within his reach: he could open by force a land route from Russia to Crimea and Transnistria before winter. Alternatively, he could simply sit back and await the economic and financial collapse of Ukraine. I suspect that he may be holding out the prospect of a grand bargain in which Russia would help the United States against ISIS—for instance by not supplying to Syria the S300 missiles it has promised, thus in effect preserving US air domination—and Russia would be allowed to have its way in the “near abroad,” as many of the nations adjoining Russia are called. What is worse, President Obama may accept such a deal.

That would be a tragic mistake, with far-reaching geopolitical consequences. Without underestimating the threat from ISIS, I would argue that preserving the independence of Ukraine should take precedence; without it, even the alliance against ISIS would fall apart. The collapse of Ukraine would be a tremendous loss for NATO, the European Union, and the United States. A victorious Russia would become much more influential within the EU and pose a potent threat to the Baltic states with their large ethnic Russian populations. Instead of supporting Ukraine, NATO would have to defend itself on its own soil. This would expose both the EU and the US to the danger they have been so eager to avoid: a direct military confrontation with Russia. The European Union would become even more divided and ungovernable. Why should the US and other NATO nations allow this to happen?

The argument that has prevailed in both Europe and the United States is that Putin is no Hitler; by giving him everything he can reasonably ask for, he can be prevented from resorting to further use of force. In the meantime, the sanctions against Russia—which include, for example, restrictions on business transactions, finance, and trade—will have their effect and in the long run Russia will have to retreat in order to earn some relief from them.

These are false hopes derived from a false argument with no factual evidence to support it. Putin has repeatedly resorted to force and he is liable to do so again unless he faces strong resistance. Even if it is possible that the hypothesis could turn out to be valid, it is extremely irresponsible not to prepare a Plan B.

There are two counterarguments that are less obvious but even more important. First, Western authorities have ignored the importance of what I call the “new Ukraine” that was born in the successful resistance on the Maidan. Many officials with a history of dealing with Ukraine have difficulty adjusting to the revolutionary change that has taken place there. The recently signed Association Agreement between the EU and Ukraine was originally negotiated with the Yanukovych government. This detailed road map now needs adjustment to a totally different situation. For instance, the road map calls for the gradual replacement and retraining of the judiciary over five years whereas the public is clamoring for immediate and radical renewal. As the new mayor of Kiev, Vitali Klitschko, put it, “If you put fresh cucumbers into a barrel of pickles, they will soon turn into pickles.”

Contrary to some widely circulated accounts, the resistance on the Maidan was led by the cream of civil society: young people, many of whom had studied abroad and refused to join either government or business on their return because they found both of them repugnant. (Nationalists and anti-Semitic extremists made up only a minority of the anti-Yanukovych protesters.) They are the leaders of the new Ukraine and they are adamantly opposed to a return of the “old Ukraine,” with its endemic corruption and ineffective government.

The new Ukraine has to contend with Russian aggression, bureaucratic resistance both at home and abroad, and confusion in the general population. Surprisingly, it has the support of many oligarchs, President Poroshenko foremost among them, and the population at large. There are of course profound differences in history, language, and outlook between the eastern and western parts of the country, but Ukraine is more united and more European-minded than ever before. That unity, however, is extremely fragile.

The new Ukraine has remained largely unrecognized because it took time before it could make its influence felt. It had practically no security forces at its disposal when it was born. The security forces of the old Ukraine were actively engaged in suppressing the Maidan rebellion and they were disoriented this summer when they had to take orders from a government formed by the supporters of the rebellion. No wonder that the new government was at first unable to put up an effective resistance to the establishment of the separatist enclaves in eastern Ukraine. It is all the more remarkable that President Poroshenko was able, within a few months of his election, to mount an attack that threatened to reclaim those enclaves.

To appreciate the merits of the new Ukraine you need to have had some personal experience with it. I can speak from personal experience although I must also confess to a bias in its favor. I established a foundation in Ukraine in 1990 even before the country became independent. Its board and staff are composed entirely of Ukrainians and it has deep roots in civil society. I visited the country often, especially in the early years, but not between 2004 and early 2014, when I returned to witness the birth of the new Ukraine.

I was immediately impressed by the tremendous improvement in maturity and expertise during that time both in my foundation and in civil society at large.Currently, civic and political engagement is probably higher than anywhere else in Europe. People have proven their willingness to sacrifice their lives for their country. These are the hidden strengths of the new Ukraine that have been overlooked by the West.

The other deficiency of the current European attitude toward Ukraine is that it fails to recognize that the Russian attack on Ukraine is indirectly an attack on the European Union and its principles of governance. It ought to be evident that it is inappropriate for a country, or association of countries, at war to pursue a policy of fiscal austerity as the European Union continues to do. All available resources ought to be put to work in the war effort even if that involves running up budget deficits. The fragility of the new Ukraine makes the ambivalence of the West all the more perilous. Not only the survival of the new Ukraine but the future of NATO and the European Union itself is at risk. In the absence of unified resistance it is unrealistic to expect that Putin will stop pushing beyond Ukraine when the division of Europe and its domination by Russia is in sight.

Having identified some of the shortcomings of the current approach, I will try to spell out the course that Europe ought to follow. Sanctions against Russia are necessary but they are a necessary evil. They have a depressive effect not only on Russia but also on the European economies, including Germany. This aggravates the recessionary and deflationary forces that are already at work. By contrast, assisting Ukraine in defending itself against Russian aggression would have a stimulative effect not only on Ukraine but also on Europe. That is the principle that ought to guide European assistance to Ukraine.

Germany, as the main advocate of fiscal austerity, needs to understand the internal contradiction involved. Chancellor Angela Merkel has behaved as a true European with regard to the threat posed by Russia. She has been the foremost advocate of sanctions on Russia, and she has been more willing to defy German public opinion and business interests on this than on any other issue. Only after the Malaysian civilian airliner was shot down in July did German public opinion catch up with her. Yet on fiscal austerity she has recently reaffirmed her allegiance to the orthodoxy of the Bundesbank—probably in response to the electoral inroads made by the Alternative for Germany, the anti-euro party. She does not seem to realize how inconsistent that is. She ought to be even more committed to helping Ukraine than to imposing sanctions on Russia.

The new Ukraine has the political will both to defend Europe against Russian aggression and to engage in radical structural reforms. To preserve and reinforce that will, Ukraine needs to receive adequate assistance from its supporters. Without it, the results will be disappointing and hope will turn into despair. Disenchantment already started to set in after Ukraine suffered a military defeat and did not receive the weapons it needs to defend itself.

It is high time for the members of the European Union to wake up and behave as countries indirectly at war. They are better off helping Ukraine to defend itself than having to fight for themselves. One way or another, the internal contradiction between being at war and remaining committed to fiscal austerity has to be eliminated. Where there is a will, there is a way.

Let me be specific. In its last progress report, issued in early September, the IMF estimated that in a worst-case scenario Ukraine would need additional support of $19 billion. Conditions have deteriorated further since then. After the Ukrainian elections the IMF will need to reassess its baseline forecast in consultation with the Ukrainian government. It should provide an immediate cash injection of at least $20 billion, with a promise of more when needed. Ukraine’s partners should provide additional financing conditional on implementation of the IMF-supported program, at their own risk, in line with standard practice.

The spending of borrowed funds is controlled by the agreement between the IMF and the Ukrainian government. Four billion dollars would go to make up the shortfall in Ukrainian payments to date; $2 billion would be assigned to repairing the coal mines in eastern Ukraine that remain under the control of the central government; and $2 billion would be earmarked for the purchase of additional gas for the winter. The rest would replenish the currency reserves of the central bank.

The new assistance package would include a debt exchange that would transform Ukraine’s hard currency Eurobond debt (which totals almost $18 billion) into long-term, less risky bonds. This would lighten Ukraine’s debt burden and bring down its risk premium. By participating in the exchange, bondholders would agree to accept a lower interest rate and wait longer to get their money back. The exchange would be voluntary and market-based so that it could not be mischaracterized as a default. Bondholders would participate willingly because the new long-term bonds would be guaranteed—but only partially—by the US or Europe, much as the US helped Latin America emerge from its debt crisis in the 1980s with so-called Brady bonds (named for US Treasury Secretary Nicholas Brady).

Such an exchange would have a few important benefits. One is that, over the next two or three critical years, the government could use considerably less of its scarce hard currency reserves to pay off bondholders. The money could be used for other urgent needs.

By trimming Ukraine debt payments in the next few years, the exchange would also reduce the chance of a sovereign default, discouraging capital flight and arresting the incipient run on the banks. This would make it easier to persuade owners of Ukraine’s banks (many of them foreign) to inject urgently needed new capital into them. The banks desperately need bigger capital cushions if Ukraine is to avoid a full-blown banking crisis, but shareholders know that a debt crisis could cause a banking crisis that wipes out their equity.

Finally, Ukraine would keep bondholders engaged rather than watch them cash out at 100 cents on the dollar as existing debt comes due in the next few years. This would make it easier for Ukraine to reenter the international bond markets once the crisis has passed. Under the current conditions it would be more practical and cost-efficient for the US and Europe not to use their own credit directly to guarantee part of Ukraine’s debt, but to employ intermediaries such as the European Bank for Reconstruction and Development or the World Bank and its subsidiaries.

The Ukrainian state-owned company Naftogaz is a black hole in the budget and a major source of corruption. Naftogaz currently sells gas to households for $47 per thousand cubic meters (TCM), for which it pays $380 per TCM. At present people cannot control the temperature in their apartments. A radical restructuring of Naftogaz’s entire system could reduce household consumption at least by half and totally eliminate Ukraine’s dependence on Russia for gas. That would involve charging households the market price for gas. The first step would be to install meters in apartments and the second to distribute a cash subsidy to needy households.

The will to make these reforms is strong both in the new management and in the incoming government but the task is extremely complicated (how do you define who is needy?) and the expertise is inadequate. The World Bank and its subsidiaries could sponsor a project development team that would bring together international and domestic experts to convert the existing political will into bankable projects. The initial cost would exceed $10 billion but it could be financed by project bonds issued by the European Investment Bank and it would produce very high returns.

It is also high time for the European Union to take a critical look at itself. There must be something wrong with the EU if Putin’s Russia can be so successful even in the short term. The bureaucracy of the EU no longer has a monopoly of power and it has little to be proud of. It should learn to be more united, flexible, and efficient. And Europeans themselves need to take a close look at the new Ukraine. That could help them recapture the original spirit that led to the creation of the European Union. The European Union would save itself by saving Ukraine.

Putin using Ukraine to make dictatorship at home (Politico)

This analysis is chilling, sobering reading. The special insights of Poland, thanks to its unique interactions with the Kremlin, are not something you read about often in the Western press. Definitely check this one out!

UPDATE (10.22.2014): Now the speaker of the Polish Parliament Radek Sikorski is backing off his statements to Politico and saying his recollection of Putin's words to Polish PM Donald Tusk about partitioning Ukraine were wrong, and that the meeting that he falsely recalled in Moscow didn't even take place. 

Methinks Sikorski is now remorseful for his candor and wants to take back the truth.

Putin’s Coup: How the Russian leader used the Ukraine crisis to consolidate his dictatorship

By Ben Judah

October 19, 2014 | Politico

URL: http://www.politico.com/magazine/story/2014/10/vladimir-putins-coup-112025.html#ixzz3GjyVncaf

Reuters: The rise & legacy of Vladimir Putin (PANEL VIDEO)

This is worth watching in full, with Gary Gasparov, Masha Gessen (somebody I've re-posted several times), David Remnick, and some Wall Street tool Roger Altman.




NEWSMAKER: The Rise & Legacy of Vladimir Putin
October 14, 2014 | Reuters

URL: http://www.reuters.com/video/2014/10/14/newsmaker-the-rise-legacy-of-vladimir-pu?videoId=346570215

The myth of Russian humiliation and Western triumphalism

I myself have been guilty of giving the "Russia's humiliation" thesis some credence, probably because many ordinary Russians that I have met exhibit signs of an angry (or sometimes morose) inferiority complex to the West.  

(By the way, it's worth noting that, in an odd way, Russia is valuable to the West because all things become clear in opposition: without the bad example of post-Soviet Russia, we might forget what being the West  is really about. Indeed, over the past year the greater part of the West, the European Union, has recognized itself anew through the inspired eyes of Ukrainians who are determined to join the EU in affirmation of their truly "European values.")

Undoubtedly, many Russians feel humiliated to this day simply for losing the Cold War, (despite, as Anne Applebaum notes below, Russia's retaining many of the nukes and diplomatic spoils of the Soviet empire for itself alone). Then most Russians' saw their population size, savings and standard of living fall for over a decade; meanwhile, Russians have seen the rising standards of living in Poland, the Baltics and other Soviet satellites. Russia is a "great" and "civilizational" power with nuclear weapons, they must think, with a 142 million population and territory spanning two continents... yet how can Russia be falling behind its tiny former client states?  

On the flip side, it's worth remarking -- especially to any Russian unacquainted with average Americans -- that there is no counter feeling of triumphalism in the U.S. over winning the Cold War. It just isn't something we talk about much; and when we do, it's usually the older folks exhibiting their great relief, as in, "We are so glad that dangerous time is behind us now." It would be interesting to analyze why we Americans, who are so fond of spiking the ball and doing an endzone dance over any little trifle, refrain from doing so over the Cold War, but that's a discussion for another post.... Anyhow, the most upsetting thing an American can tell a Russian nowadays -- upsetting because it's true -- is that Americans don't think about Russia much at all. It would be better for their bruised egos if we offered them our hatred and fear rather than our naive disregard....

I am not an ordinary American because I do think about Russia. I don't offer Russians my hatred or fear; yet I'm definitely tired of wondering what ordinary Russians are wondering, or trying to commiserate with the good ones. No matter what I feel about individual Russians, the bottom line is that Russia is a problem state. "It has issues," to put it more politely. Russia's internal issues, of course, are hers to deal with. The problem is when Russia's issues spill over into the affairs of its sovereign neighbors, especially Ukraine, which President Putin does not recognize as a real nation or an actual state. Then my lack of sympathy for "humiliated" Russians turns to enmity. Their feelings of humiliation, or need for vindication, even if well-founded, don't give Russia the state the right to start wars with peaceful neighbors. 

I know, I know, ordinary Russian citizens didn't start any war in Ukraine; Russia's president Vladimir Putin did. Yet ordinary Russians' support of Putin -- which jumped after Russia's takeover of Crimea -- gave his military actions in Ukraine a kind of popular mandate ex post facto, while motivating Putin to continue his Ukrainian gambit in Donbas. 

The myth of Russian humiliation

By Anne Applebaum 

October 17, 2014 | Washington Post

Looking back over the past quarter-century, it isn’t easy to name a Western policy that can truly be described as a success. The impact of Western development aid is debatable. Western interventions in the Middle East have been disastrous.

But one Western policy stands out as a phenomenal success, particularly when measured against the low expectations with which it began: the integration of Central Europe and the Baltic States into the European Union and NATO. Thanks to this double project, more than 90 million people have enjoyed relative safety and relative prosperity for more than two decades in a region whose historic instability helped launch two world wars.

These two “expansions,” which were parallel but not identical (some countries are members of one organization but not the other), were transformative because they were not direct leaps, as the word “expansion” implies, but slow negotiations. Before joining NATO, each country had to establish civilian control of its army. Before joining the European Union, each adopted laws on trade, judiciary, human rights. As a result, they became democracies. This was “democracy promotion” working as it never has before or since.

But times change, and the miraculous transformation of a historically unstable region became a humdrum reality. Instead of celebrating this achievement on the 25th anniversary of the fall of the Berlin Wall, it is now fashionable to opine that this expansion, and of NATO in particular, was mistaken. This project is incorrectly “remembered” as the result of American “triumphalism” that somehow humiliated Russia by bringing Western institutions into its rickety neighborhood. This thesis is usually based on revisionist history promoted by the current Russian regime — and it is wrong.

For the record: No treaties prohibiting NATO expansion were ever signed with Russia. No promises were broken. Nor did the impetus for NATO expansion come from a “triumphalist” Washington. On the contrary, Poland’s first efforts to apply in 1992 were rebuffed. I well remember the angry reaction of the U.S. ambassador to Warsaw at the time. But Poland and others persisted, precisely because they were already seeing signs of the Russian revanchism to come.

When the slow, cautious expansion eventually took place, constant efforts were made to reassure Russia. No NATO bases were placed in the new member states, and until 2013 no exercises were conducted there. A Russia-NATO agreement in 1997 promised no movement of nuclear installations. A NATO-Russia Council was set up in 2002. In response to Russian objections, Ukraine and Georgia were, in fact, denied NATO membership plans in 2008.

Meanwhile, not only was Russia not “humiliated” during this era, it was given de facto “great power” status, along with the Soviet seat on the U.N. Security Council and Soviet embassies. Russia also received Soviet nuclear weapons, some transferred from Ukraine in 1994 in exchange for Russian recognition of Ukraine’s borders. Presidents Clinton and Bush both treated their Russian counterparts as fellow “great power” leaders and invited them to join the Group of Eight — although Russia, neither a large economy nor a democracy, did not qualify.

During this period, Russia, unlike Central Europe, never sought to transform itself along European lines. Instead, former KGB officers with a clearly expressed allegiance to the Soviet system took over the state in league with organized crime, seeking to prevent the formation of democratic institutions at home and to undermine them abroad. For the past decade, this kleptocratic clique has also sought to re-create an empire, using everything from cyberattacks on Estonia to military invasions of Georgia and now Ukraine, in open violation of that 1994 agreement — exactly as the Central Europeans feared.

Once we remember what actually happened over the past two decades, as opposed to accepting the Russian regime’s version, our own mistakes look different. In 1991, Russia was no longer a great power in either population or economic terms. So why didn’t we recognize reality, reform the United Nations and give a Security Council seat to India, Japan or others? Russia did not transform itself along European lines. Why did we keep pretending that it had? Eventually, our use of the word “democracy” to describe the Russian political system discredited the word in Russia itself.

The crisis in Ukraine, and the prospect of a further crisis in NATO itself, is not the result of our triumphalism but of our failure to react to Russia’s aggressive rhetoric and its military spending. Why didn’t we move NATO bases eastward a decade ago? Our failure to do so has now led to a terrifying plunge of confidence in Central Europe. Countries once eager to contribute to the alliance are now afraid. A string of Russian provocations unnerve the Baltic region: the buzzing of Swedish airspace, the kidnapping of an Estonian security officer.

Our mistake was not to humiliate Russia but to underrate Russia’s revanchist, revisionist, disruptive potential. If the only real Western achievement of the past quarter-century is now under threat, that’s because we have failed to ensure that NATO continues to do in Europe what it was always meant to do: deter. Deterrence is not an aggressive policy; it is a defensive policy. But in order to work, deterrence has to be real. It requires investment, consolidation and support from all of the West, and especially the United States. I’m happy to blame American triumphalism for many things, but in Europe I wish there had been more of it.

Putin could destroy NATO, and NATO knows it (Forbes)

Gregory's description of Putin's possible next move -- a hybrid war in the Baltics that could fall short of an Article 5 attack, if NATO wants it to -- is frightening to read, even more so knowing that NATO and the West, collectively, would like nothing more than to appease Putin and hope he's happy with his bloody spoils in Crimea, Donbas, not to mention South Ossetia, Abkhazia and Transnistria.

NATO's members surely know that Putin could destroy their alliance -- not physically, but rather by crossing the all-important "red line" of Article 5, the sine qua non of NATO. Once Article 5 is breached, say, in Latvia, without a NATO military reaction then all bets are off and it's every country in Eastern Europe for itself.

But of course... who cares about NATO? We should concentrate on bearded loonies riding around in the desert on captured American hardware, making threats at us on YouTube from 6,000 miles away....

Ukraine Is More of An Existential Threat Than ISIS, Because It Could Destroy NATO

By Paul Roderick Gregory

September 23, 2014 | Forbes

URL: http://www.forbes.com/sites/paulroderickgregory/2014/09/23/ukraine-is-more-of-an-existential-threat-than-isis-because-it-could-destroy-nato/

Gessen: What comes next 'will be bloodier and more frightening'

Here's the meat of Gessen's essay [emphasis mine]:

This narrative [of essentially blaming the Ukraine crisis on Western-NATO expansion into Russia's traditional sphere of influence] is not without merit. The bombing of Yugoslavia enabled an unprecedented rise in nationalist politics in Russia. And NATO expansion confirmed Russians’ worst suspicions about the West. Ukraine’s attempted move westward last year terrified the Kremlin, as did everything that has happened in that country since the protests began in Kiev last November.

But the sleeping-bear story is missing two essential components: the role of Ukraine and its people, who have been fighting to choose their own destiny – indeed, this story tends to ignore the existence of Ukrainians altogether – and, ironically, the fact that Putin has his own agency.

It is tempting to view Putin as merely the embodiment of Russia’s reaction to the actions of Western powers. It creates the illusion that he can be managed, or contained. If all he wants is a buffer zone between Russia and NATO, then the way to prevent a large European war is to give it to him, whatever the people of Ukraine might want. Let him keep Crimea, make Ukraine grant significant autonomy to its eastern regions and promise not to enter into any military alliances – and the Nobel Peace Prize is on its way.

The only problem is that portraying Putin as an unlikable but, essentially, Western politician – one who formulates his strategic objectives in a way Western analysts can understand – misses the point entirely. Russia’s behavior over the past week of a fragile cease-fire in eastern Ukraine has shown this very clearly. Russia kidnapped an Estonian security officer on Estonian territory – the Russians claim he was arrested on Russian soil while spying – and is holding him in Russia. It has re-opened Soviet-era desertion cases against a large number of Lithuanian men. And Russia has ratcheted up its nuclear saber-rattling.

All this points to the possibility that, rather than the beginning of the end of the conflict, the cease-fire is a stepping stone to the next stage of the crisis. That stage may or may not involve Ukraine, but it will definitely involve the use of force and, as it always happens in warfare, it will be bloodier and even more frightening than what came before.

First, brava to Gessen for an important point about the Maidan Revolution and Russia's ensuing military action in Crimea and eastern Ukraine: many analysts and journalists dismiss the role of Ukrainians altogether, and portray them as helpless pawns of either the West or Russia. What do most Ukrainians want their government to do; and what kind of country do they want to live in? These basic questions often get overlooked, because we've become accustomed to thinking of Ukrainians as pawns in outsiders' game.

Second, contrary to what some have argued, Putin did have a choice whether to invade Crimea and destabilize eastern Ukraine with weapons and fighters. His hand was not forced. This is what Gessen meant by "Putin has his own agency."

Third, kudos to Gessen for acknowledging that Putin "isn't like us" in the West. To many Western leaders' recent astonishment, Putin has no compunction telling one lie today, and a contradictory lie tomorrow. Why? Because he is a former KGB agent and homo soveticus; for him lying is like breathing: second nature. (See Russian writer Mikhail Shishkin's excellent essay on this topic.) 

P.S. -- U.S. conservatives keep crowing that "Romney was right!" and Obama was wrong to criticize him when Romney said in March 2012 that Russia was "without question our number one geopolitical foe."  They have some cause to gloat... although I didn't hear their concern back then, or until March 2014, about Russia's intentions. My only clarification here would be that Russia is not Putin. On the world stage, for all intents and purposes, the two are now one in the same. Yet it is not destiny that the West finds itself opposed to Russia, it is because of Putin. 

Let's recall that in March 2012, Putin was Prime Minister and Dmitry Medvedev, his protege, was President. Putin had not yet become President again in May 2012, although many feared he would when Russia amended its constitution in 2008 to extend the president's term to six years. Nor had Putin yet cracked down on Russian media, NGOs, opposition political figures and public events. Prior to 2012, there was some hope among liberal Russians that Putin would let a new generation of modern, pragmatic politicians reform Russia. When Putin didn't, there were the most massive and violent street protests that Russia had seen in many years. 

Even former Kremlin insiders say that, since 2012, Putin has become more insular, impulsive and unpredictable. And it wasn't until 2014 that Putin started describing the "Russian World" and Russia's "right to protect" ethnic Russians and Russian speakers wherever they may be; when he started substituting the word russkiy (ethnic Russian) for rossiskiy (regarding matters of Russian state and national interest). 

Essentially, in Russia we are witnessing the frightening metamorphosis of a young, semi-reformist autocrat into a paranoid, bitter old dictator. Indeed, Putin first came to power in 2000. If we count Putin's term as ministerial "gray cardinal" under Medvedev and his likely re-election in 2018 and 2024, Putin will have been in power almost as long as Josef Stalin, and outlast at least three U.S. Presidents.

Russians love their children, too – but that alone won’t stop a nuclear war

By Masha Gessen

September 15, 2014 | Reuters

URL: http://www.reuters.com/article/idUS219326889120140916

Former UK Defence Sec.: ‘Putin as bad as Stalin'

[HT: AU].  Here's the most relevant bit in my view, as it goes for the U.S. as well as EU and NATO [emphasis mine]:

No sensible person wants, in the face of the many other challenges, to be forced to find money for increased spending on arms. No one wants the economic consequences that extensive sanctions against Russia will have on our own economies, but Putin will not be deterred by resolutions passed at Nato or EU summits.

So unless we want to gamble that this systematic aggression will fizzle out in the face of inactivity, and history tells us that doesn’t happen, we must find effective ways to deter him.

Both Nato and the EU have made a start but the small and reluctant steps taken so far sadly are not likely to be nearly enough.

All Nato countries should commit to reverse the recent decline in defence spending.

At the European level there is an urgent need to develop a strategy to decrease our heavy dependence on Russian energy.

Finally, Europe is realizing that Russia is not a reliable partner, since there is no separation of business and politics in Russia -- where everything is political, and politics is subordinated to one man, Vladimir Putin. Europe cannot abide the whims of one man in the vain hope of ensuring its economic and military security.

‘Putin as bad as Stalin’, claims former Defence Secretary Ainsworth

By Paul Dale

September 15, 2014 | The Chamberlain Files

URL: http://www.thechamberlainfiles.com/putin-as-bad-as-stalin-claims-former-defence-secretary-ainsworth/

'Putin is winning' (Maclean's)

So here is Ukraine's defeat in a nutshell [emphasis mine]:

Putin’s willingness to continually escalate Russia’s intervention in Ukraine presented Poroshenko with a dilemma of his own. [Poroshenko] knew Ukraine’s armed forces could not defeat those of Russia, and NATO wasn’t coming. So he agreed to the ceasefire. The agreement, while providing for prisoner exchanges and amnesty for some fighters, does not outline what an eventual political settlement might look like. It is difficult to imagine one that both sides would accept. Poroshenko has already promised to protect Russian language rights and to decentralize political power. None of this has satisfied the separatist leadership or their patrons in Moscow.

If Poroshenko can take any comfort from the predicament in which he finds himself, it might be that he never really had any good options. The much-ballyhooed rapid reaction force that NATO announced is meant to protect existing members of the alliance. And not only has the West not provided meaningful military aid to Ukraine, it has also failed to mobilize sufficient financial resources to support Kyiv....

Let me underline that: Now that Ukraine's government appears willing to address the grievances given by the rebels and terrorists for starting their "civil war" in eastern Ukraine -- protection of Russian language; and special self-government status -- it's no longer enough for the pro-Russian separatists. This tells me that my instincts, (and the instincts of most Ukrainians), were correct: These issues were a red herring to begin with. Putin is pulling their puppet strings.

Alas, Western support for Ukraine against Russia has been too little, too timid. As former U.S. Ambassador to Ukraine Steven Pifer warned, the real danger of "escalation" may be in Western appeasement that emboldens Putin to go even further. And who will stop Putin if he decides to do so?  

The end of Ukraine?

By Michael Petrou

September 15, 2014 | Maclean's

URL: http://www.macleans.ca/news/world/the-end-of-ukraine/

Have we lost Ukraine already?

Up until the last part of his essay, 'Have we lost already?', Vancraen is sadly accurate in his assessment of Putin's plans for Ukraine, and the West's feeble reaction.

The remainder of his essay, however, containing Vancraen's prescriptions for united US-EU-NATO action, are all strong and good but do not have a chance of being implemented, thanks to Western disunity and fecklessness, amounting to capitulation to Putin. 

Until now Putin has expertly gamed the West. At each peak of the conflict he has employed peace talks and soothing words as a stalling tactic with the EU; meanwhile, he continued pursuing what he has wanted: a "frozen" No Man's Land in eastern Ukraine (Donbas), a la Transnistria in Moldova and Abkhazia in Georgia; and a literally frozen Ukraine this coming winter, after a cutoff of Russian gas, making Ukraine too weak and depleted to oppose Russia further.

Soon Russia will have its revenge for the breakup and ethnic cleansing of Yugoslavia by doing the same to Ukraine, the largest country in Europe.

To my Ukrainian friends I must say, I'm sorry we let you down.  Now you'll have to make the best of it.

Just as you succeeded, miraculously, in a matter of weeks in resuscitating the Ukrainian army from the brink of death, directly with your pocketbooks and blood, so too you must bring the Ukrainian nation back to life. 

In the space that remains to you, liberate yourselves from corrupt thieves and oligarchs! In what remains of Ukraine, make it a real nation of free, united citizens that is hell-bent on joining the EU and exhibiting the European values of democracy, free expression and free assembly, equality before the law, government accountability, tolerance, entrepreneurship and social solidarity.  

If the words of Rev. Martin Luther King, Jr. are true -- "The arc of the moral universe is long, but it bends towards justice" -- then perhaps one day Ukraine will become a shining example to Donbas and Russia itself of what great feats free people can accomplish, and make Ukraine the envy of Europe. Слава Україні -- Героям слава!

Winter, war and refugees are coming

By Luc Vancraen

September 7, 2014 | Kyiv Post

URL: http://www.kyivpost.com/opinion/op-ed/luc-vancraen-winter-war-and-refugees-are-coming-363655.html

Gessen: NATO and the West are in denial about Putin

Yes, Gessen's key point is correct: The West's staggering of diplomatic and economic sanctions against Russia was a strategic error; their blow should have been hard and sudden. Indeed, the West needed to punch Putin in the nose, if not militarily then by other means, to compel the bully to stop fighting. Instead the Western strategy has been "death by 1,000 cuts," with only a few cuts on Russia so far.

Notwithstanding today's ceasefire agreement in Minsk, I am skeptical of any peace efforts in which Putin is involved. Why? Because Russia is the aggressor, and it doesn't seem to me that Russia's aims in Ukraine have yet been achieved.  

So let's hope that the EU and US both continue to impose further sanctions against Russia, despite this apparent olive branch. After all, Putin has continued to lie about his actions and intent in Ukraine; there is no reason to start believing him now.

P.S. -- It's not accidental that I say Putin instead of, or in lieu of, Russia, since there does not seem to be any counterweight to Putin or any advisers who have strong influence on him. Nor can any so-called "insiders" predict his actions. Russia is currently a cult of personality. That's dangerous!

Plans to stop Russia show NATO and the West are in denial

By Masha Gessen

September 4, 2014 | Reuters

For more than six months now, since Russia annexed Crimea, Western politicians and analysts have been asking what can make Vladimir Putin stop or retreat. It’s the wrong question, and the policies that have flowed from the resulting debate have been misguided, because they are based on the fallacy that the West can do something to influence Putin’s actions.

Putin has always been a master of the public lie, both of the bold-faced variety and the mixed-message variety, and for the last six months he has used this skill to keep the West playing catch-up in Ukraine. It’s a game the West is losing.

Western politicians, for their part, have heeded only those of Putin’s statements that they want to hear — or at least ones that make sense in their picture of the world. Leaders have chosen to believe that Russia invaded Ukraine to protect vital strategic interests: the need for a “buffer state” between itself and NATO. They have validated Putin’s avowed concern about the fate of ethnic Russians in Ukraine. And right now, they are going along with a charade Putin is playing out regarding cease-fire negotiations with Ukrainian president Petro Poroshenko – negotiations that Putin’s press secretary managed to disavow minutes after the fateful telephone conversation concluded on Wednesday.

And then there are the statements and actions that Western politicians have chosen to ignore: the threat to use nuclear arms, which Putin has taken to repeating casually; the military exercises intended to menace the Baltic states and, most recently, Kazakhstan; the testing of a nuclear-tipped missile for the first time since such testing was banned by a bilateral U.S.-Russian treaty in 1987.

Putin, his television channels, and his ideological emissaries have explained this saber-rattling in no uncertain terms. It is a clash of civilizations, nothing less than a confrontation with the West over the very values at the core of “the Russian world.” The current view is that international law and all Western alliances are parts of a conspiracy to limit Russia’s ability to protect and spread traditional values. So-called strategic interests and the fate of ethnic Russians are merely pretexts for battles in the new worldwide conflict.

Is there anything that can be done to stop a man driven by the idea of fighting such a conflict? Can we really expect Putin to change his mind about his historic mission because of banking or visa restrictions? No.

There are certain things that simply cannot be changed; the mind of a despot is one such thing.

All human beings at times encounter insurmountable difficulties. We generally deal with them in one of two ways: either we pretend they’re not happening, or we find ways to minimize the damage and remain whole in the face of adversity. The former never works, yet somehow the entire Western political establishment refuses to acknowledge the difficulty with Russia’s leader is insurmountable.

The West hopes its actions can change Putin’s. Negotiating with Putin, trying to second-guess him, validating his bad-faith negotiations, searching for a solution that can mollify him – all of these approaches are willfully based on a false assumption. The very premise of realpolitik in this situation is a lie.

So what would be the right thing to do in the face of this hostile, aggressive, and reckless reality?

First of all, face the facts.

Then, use the entire arsenal of financial and political sanctions at once – the idea behind staggering them is based on the faulty premise that they can influence Putin’s behavior. Staggering the application of sanctions gives him, and the Russian economy, time to adjust. Instead, sanctions should be imposed for the simple reason that it is wrong to enable Putin’s Russia by doing business with it; the right thing to do is to stop.

After that, do what can be done to physically protect those who are being attacked and those who are at risk: Ukraine, the Baltics, and – the most important criterion of all – anyone who asks for protection from this scourge. That probably means arming Ukraine and taking up positions in the Baltics. Yes, this puts the West on the verge of actual military engagement, but it is not only strategically dangerous but also morally corrupting to stand by and watch while Putin pounds unprotected neighbors.

It is likely that none of this stop him. But at least it may keep us from falling into an abyss of lies and helplessness.