A resurgent Russia…
I’ve heard that phrase from various media pundits. It’s comical. Resurgence is what Godfather Putin would like Sochi to signify, but the only thing resurging in Russia is this narcissist strongman’s egotistical delusion. Russia is spiraling down to insignificance. For nearly a century, it has been ruled by mafiosos whose only interest is to ensure that Russian workers make them rich. In the Soviet era, they hid all this under the cloak of ideology. Now it’s clear that the only ideology is greed and exploitation.
Russian people are worn out and angry, except for those who participate in the corruption, of course. A recent Sixty Minutes episode showed how extensive and lethal this can be, and that’s probably only the tip of the iceberg. Persecution of singing groups and other protestors make the news here, but you can be sure that what goes on behind the scenes is worse. Journalists, industrialists, and opposition leaders who don’t play by Putin’s rules are jailed on trumped-up charges, or simply killed. A Russian gangster, a confident of Putin, bribes and threatens to bring the Olympics to Sochi and then scams the Russian people.
When I lived in South America, the patience and indifference of Latinos there as they tolerated graft, corruption, and exploitation always amazed me. I can say the same about Russians. Centuries of oppression seem to kill the human spirit, that spirit that makes people stand up and say, “Enough!” Sure, there are movements and caudillos who seem promising, but they morph and end up being just as bad as the ones they replace. There are parallels between Kiev and Caracas. The dictatorship of the proletariat was the principle used by the Communists to become even more ruthless than the Czars—Ivan the Terrible was a pauper compared to Joe Stalin. The road to true people power that began in Russia in the nineties has been effectively blocked by Putin and his cronies. Chavez’ legacy in Venezuela is crumbling as we speak. Who will be the next dictators?
Although reduced in size now compared to the old Soviet days, there are plenty of old soviets like Putin who want to return to those old days. There are two things stopping them. The first is international opinion—Putin wants approval and isn’t getting it. The second is the hatred many diverse ethnic groups feel towards the Rodina—Mother Russia is the huge bear in the room that they’d like to be rid of forever. Sochi put both these on display because the Winter Olympics was an international event sandwiched between two regions of unrest. Kiev is now reinforcing the idea that Putin can’t hope to control things without the old Stalin technique of bringing down the hammer and sickle. If he hesitates, he’s lost, because too many factions in the Kremlin and among the military are waiting for the right time to take over. Russian tanks might be rolling into that square in Kiev real soon now.,
Why should we care? After all, in parallel with South America, the world’s peoples have the right to their own self-determination. The difference between Brazil and Russia is the same difference between Afghanistan and Pakistan. Neither Brazil nor Afghanistan has nukes. Both Russia and Pakistan do. Everywhere in the world where there are unrest and nuclear weapons or other WMDs present, that Doomsday Clock creeps relentlessly toward midnight. And the problem doesn’t only reside in the direct combatants in the struggle. In the chaos and confusion, weapons can be lost. Have we heard much more about those chemical weapons in Syria? Are we keeping track of them all, or are some in the back of pickups driven by al Qaeda operatives headed for God knows where.?
The world has always been a dangerous place. War has defined all recorded human history and existed long before any recording of history was done. What makes today’s world so different is that international commerce, so agile in getting Afghan heroin to market, is also agile in moving people and packages around. Walk around any American seaport—Baltimore, for example, or the Port Newark-Elizabeth Marine Terminal here in New Jersey—and you’ll see thousands of shipping containers. Guess how many of those are inspected. I’d venture that we’re lucky if it’s 5%.
During the Soviet era, I incurred the wrath of my teacher for refusing to hide under my desk—a drill to teach us what to do in case of an atomic attack. The latter’s still possible with the “new Russia.” Putin is crazy enough to do some desperate things if he thinks he’s losing control, but firing off missiles is unlikely. That’s more the bumbling North Korean’s gig. But unrest in Russia might put Russian nukes into the hands of people with many axes to grind. The Chechans could put a nuke in Red Square, for example, or in any other Russian city. Russia’s very own Muslim terrorists could put a nuke in Tel Aviv or give one to Chinese Muslims—that Shanghai tower is impressive and can survive a typhoon, but could it survive a nuke?
I’m not saying the unrest in the Ukraine or Dagestan is unjustified. These people deserve to have the Russian bear off their backs. But the thought of just one nuke going off in a major city, anywhere in the world, chills my blood. We made a big mistake with Hiroshima and Nagasaki, but they did show what a terrible thing a nuclear bomb can be in a population center. Our internal politics have shown that reasonable discourse is a scarce commodity even here in the U.S.—no one talks things out anymore; everyone caves in to raw emotions. In Putin’s Russia, reasonable discourse is trumped by one man’s megalomania. In a reasonable world, he would be quarantined in an insane asylum along with other violent murderers. But our world no longer seems reasonable.
And so it goes….
