By Ravi Deka
My phone usually rings insistently only on three occasions – some major riverboat accident in Assam, if Russia or Putin farts, and rarely when I miss a credit card payment. The last two days it has been ringing due to the second factor.
Irrespective of whether they were from my fellow Indians or friends in Russia or elsewhere, the questions asked were all pretty identical: Has Putin gone mad? What is Russia’s objective? Will there be a Third World War? Will Ukraine be annexed like Crimea? What would be the consequences for Russia and so on!!
Well, first a small recap of the happenings of the last few weeks where, barring the fact that Biden has had no (recent) sex scandals and the US elections are still two years away, it was like we were watching a real-life re-enactment of the 90’s movie ‘Wag the Dog’ with the Democrat-controlled US media and their president hysterically ranting about the oncoming Russian invasion of Ukraine. At that time, no one in Ukraine including their President Zelenskiy or most Russians seriously expected a war and probably the same applied to European countries like France and Germany.
Thus, most serious analysts brushed off the possibility of a war as a “propaganda” and an “eyewash to divert people’s attention away from domestic issues”. Because, with all the rhetoric about Ukraine wanting to join NATO and Russia opposing the same, most member countries of the EU are least interested in the politically volatile country with an oligarch-dominated economy, and an extremely corrupt government with a penurious population joining their military or economic alliance. Especially, when a quarter of their population also identifies themselves as ethnic Russian and close to 30% use the language as a mother tongue.
Furthermore, the much-touted military aid provided to Ukraine by western powers, as President Zelenskiy declared on TV, was antiquated non-working junk, written off by their own armies. And though he didn’t name anyone, considering that Ukraine is the fifth largest recipient of US military aid, we have a firm clue as to whom he was talking about. Meanwhile, Germany generously offered to donate Ukraine 5,000 military helmets for their war effort!
Coming back to the questions. Well, considering that I am neither a Wine Waiter nor a Cleaner at Putin’s estate to overhear anything important, and that despite all the cacophonic rhetoric and sabre-rattling on all sides, probably nobody from Biden to our MEA babus or myself, expected an actual invasion, here are my 2 cents worth of introspection:
No, I don’t know Putin’s mental health evaluating doctor, but I am dead sure Putin has not gone mad and is, as always, playing out a meticulously-planned-out strategy.
This leads us straight to second question: Why and what do they want to achieve? Well, in half a day and the cost of a few well-lobbed rockets, they proved to an assertive, jingoistic and indignant Ukraine that they are incapable of defending themselves and that absolutely nobody would come to their defense. They also showed to the world that the US and its NATO minions are nothing but loud hypocrites and bullies capable of only attacking weak and small countries like Iraq, Yugoslavia, Afghanistan and Libya; and thirdly, gave a “up yours” to the global opinion just like the US and Israel had been doing for decades in their military operations, with the added benefit of intimidating some of its more assertive former Soviet satellites into silence or submission.
So, no Third World War as well!
As to the question, will Putin annex Ukraine? No, but there is a 100% probability that Russia will strive to create a fangless vassal state with a faithful local despot tightly integrated militarily and economically with Russia, just like they successfully did with Belarus by trapping the willy Lukashenko into a corner with the Ryan Air fiasco. Here it’s noteworthy to remember that right down from Putin to a large part of the Russian population, they view Ukraine as an artificial state created by the Bolsheviks by carving up the Russian empire, one that can at the most be an autonomous province, or worst come to worst, a vassal state but indigestible as an assertive independent country!
Coming to the fifth question, what would be the consequences for Russia and its citizens? Simple, an Iron Curtain Redox politically, Cold War-3, isolationism, less foreign travel or holidays for its citizens, a Neo-Soviet police state with further erosion of civil liberties, an all pervading Us vs Them mentality, economic stagnation, and reduced living standards. But there will be no opposition or mass protests as their citizens have been mentally conditioned to such an existence for centuries, be it the Czars or the Communists and now Putin and his obedient mob. Silent obedience to rulers and a voluntary resignation to loss of liberty and freedom of speech is an inalienable part of the Russian pathos.
On hindsight, we can also remember the criminal 90’s in Russia, a decade when the country was finally free of the yoke of communist totalitarianism and the people and the society were actually free to choose democracy and freedom.
In my opinion, once this current Russian incursion is over, Europe, despite its condemnation, will still keep buying on oil and gas from Russia and selling them their cars and equipment. The UK will continue accepting the fleeing Russian oligarchs and corrupt and disgraced politicians along with their ill-gotten cash, occasionally yapping and snapping at Russia’s heels in a bid to remain relevant, or on the behest of its stronger overseas cousin.
For the US, it’s been the “evil Russkis” all along, only briefly replaced by their self-created bogeymen like Al Qaeda and the ISIS. China and Russia will continue their marriage of convenience and pretend that absolutely nothing happened, while Taiwan can see a few pointers from the current Ukrainian experience.
Yes, the nationalistic Ukrainians will resign to their fate of again playing a second fiddle to Russians, nursing a simmering but helpless hatred for the “Moskals”, but they had also been doing so for centuries now; the same way the Russians always viewed the “Xaxols” with disdain and suspicion. For the ethnic Russians in Ukraine, it may be an easier transition aligning back with their historic motherland but none of the short-lived Crimean euphoria will be felt anywhere.
And for Putin too, unlike in 2014 when he was still posing as a democratically-elected leader and was seeking to jack up his popularity ratings, this time around he is the absolute strongman surrounded by spineless ‘yes men’ and a compliant and accommodating Duma, and one who sees himself firmly as the rebuilder of the Russian Empire so he is least bothered with such petty western concepts.
Moral of the story, as trite as it may be: Don’t provoke a Bear unless you are a Tiger or a Dragon.
- Main/Featured picture: A structure in Kyiv destroyed by a missile strike/Wikipedia/By Arrikel-Own work, CC BY-SA 4.0, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=115518794
[The views expressed here are the author’s own and The News Porter bears no responsibility for the same.}
A former journalist-turned-tinkerer and an inland water transport specialist, Ravi Deka has been a regular visitor to Russia, is fluent in Russian and is equally at home in Russia as in India but professes loyalty to none but himself and his ideas. And after decades of being considered a Russian-Indian in India and an Indian-Russian in Russia, he decided to become a self-proclaimed Jew to get rid of his identity crisis.
Considering that this piece was penned in half an hour to meet the editorial deadline, a major sting of events which I had omitted to include in the article is the continuous interference of the western powers led by the USA in the domestic politics of Ukraine for planting an anti-Russian government, first with the Orange colour revolution of 2004-2005 which made the pro-western Viktor Yushchenko, the President of the Country and first brought into prominence the various nationalistic and neo-nazi fringe groups. The follow-up was the Maidan protests of 2014 with the direct involvement and moral support of the US to remove Russia leaning President Yanukochich, which ultimately led to Crimea voluntarily seceding to Russia or being annexed by her, depending on whom you ask. And the creation of the so-called Donetsk and Lugansk republics aka Novo Russia, enclaves controlled by Russia backed militias. This led to the direct involvement of western countries in Ukraine with military trainers and a modicum of hardware, the much-touted Javelin anti-tank missiles and open talk of Ukraine joining NATO to safeguard itself from Russian aggression. All of which were considered provocations by Putin and Russia. Coming back to the current times, major misinformation fed to Putin by his military advisors was that the Russian army would be met as liberators in the Russian-speaking parts of the country (we know of someone else who was fed with similar BS in 1939). The facts are proving otherwise and with the mounting losses of lives and military hardware, was the bitter barb sounded by Putin last evening that Kyiv is occupied by Nazis, Banderavtse( Nationalists) and Drug addicts. Frankly, a choice of words more commonly for Lukashenko of Belarus when describing his domestic opposition and not by the typically restrained Putin.
Putin has just put his nuclear forces on “high alert”, I dearly hope that this is all part of his “meticulously planned strategy” and not the act of a man going/gone mad!!