Burning Retaliatory Bridges
"We don't want to burn bridges, but when someone views our good intentions as indifference or weakness and intends to blow up these bridges in turn, they must know Russia's response will be asymmetrical swift and harsh.""I hope no one will cross the red line in regards to Russia. And where this red line will be drawn, we will decide for ourselves.""The practice of organizing coups and planning political assassinations of top officials [referencing Venezuela and Russian-Ukraine cronies] goes over the top and crosses all boundaries.""Russia has its own interests, which we will defend in line with the international law. If somebody refuses to understand this obvious thing, is reluctant to conduct a dialogue and chooses a selfish and arrogant tone, Russia will always find a way to defend its position."Russian President Vladimir Putin
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| Russian President Vladimir Putin delivered his annual address to the Federal Assembly in Moscow on Wednesday. (Sputnik/Mikhail Metzel/Kremlin/Reuters) |
The international community has been forewarned. Russian President Vladimir Putin is fed up, disgusted, annoyed, irritated and fuming over criticism he knows has no place in good international diplomatic relations. Russia's internal business is its own, and it will no longer tolerate the sanctimonious criticism levelled at Russia and at him personally. No Western democratic countries come to him, cap in hand, to ask whether they should proceed on a certain course of action, as a courtesy, and he will not grovel and ask permission of his critics to act as he does, for it is his prerogative and his alone.
He made it abundantly clear in his annual address that any source from within the international community that seeks to criticize, to threaten Russia "will regret it like they've never regretted anything before". That's fairly definite, and Vladimir Putin is defining the rules of engagement. As soon as he can decide on delineating them. NATO, the United States, the European Union and their acolyte nations be damned!
He has no idea who poisoned Alexei Navalny with a military-grade nerve agent, restricted to military laboratories. Obviously, Mr. Navalny has made many enemies who resent his having criticized the Kremlin and particularly Mr. Putin himself, enemies who may have decided to eliminate his strident voice. Navalny and Company have unsettled the country, they have much to answer for. Now, he is trying to kill himself by refusing food, to elicit sympathy from among Russians who have no use for him whatever.
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| People attend a rally in support of jailed Russian opposition politician Alexei Navalny in Omsk, Russia, on Wednesday. (Alexey Malgavko/Reuters) |
And what do Western critics know of Russian history? Of the fact that Ukraine has always been Russia's geography, the borders to which have simply been misplaced and loyal ethnic Russians living in Ukraine have simply remedied a past error, rounding eastern Ukraine, the Donbass back into Greater Russia, where it belongs. As for the Crimean Peninsula, Russian blood lies there, it is part of the heart of Russia, pleasing no end to Russians to have it restored. Complaints from the West? Who cares, what are they anyway, to think they have a right to criticize!
Sanctions have victimized ordinary Russians. The reason they're now living in straitened circumstances is clear enough; they, as part of Russia, have been penalized, victimized, unfairly and unjustly and without reason. The U.S. abandoned its allies in the Middle East, and Russia has stepped back in to bolster support for the fine regime in Syria battling terrorists. There are such things as domestic terrorists of course, and they simply bear the guise of Syrian Sunnis rebelling against the Assad regime.
A deep-sea naval base and an airbase are trifles, but acceptable in exchange for Russia's devotion to aiding a friend in need with military warplane flyovers and the occasional bomb dropped here and there where hospitals just happen to be inconveniently placed. Who knew? As for the terrorists, they deserve to be bombed for their discrediting of a government trying to reconsolidate its geography so rudely invaded by Islamic State.
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| Manezhnaya Square is blocked by law enforcement officers ahead of Putin's annual address to the Federal Assembly, in central Moscow on Wednesday. (Shamil Zhumatov/Reuters) |
"Some countries have developed a nasty habit of bullying Russia
for any reason or without any reason at all. It has become a new sport." What are they doing so far from home, in Eastern Europe, on our doorstep, interfering with our neighbours, causing panic and concern that would otherwise not arise, destabilizing the entire geography. A military buildup on the border with Ukraine? Who says so! These are military games, practises, to keep our people sharp and in command, given the presence of foreign troops so near at hand, planning god-knows-what interventions where they don't belong... Interfering in our free and open society!
Keep your tiresome, toothless threats of 'consequences' should Russia do this, do that, do the other. It's none of your damn business. Disinvite Russian diplomats, it will be reciprocated. The International Space Station was getting too crowded, Russia will build its own, exclusive to Russia, thank you very much. The EU is excruciatingly short of vaccines? Beg us, and maybe we'll send along some of our highly efficacious Sputnik V. Nostrovia!
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| Police officers detain a man during a protest in support of Navalny in Ulan-Ude, the regional capital of Buryatia, a region near the Russia-Mongolia border, Russia, on Wednesday. (Anna Ogorodnik/Thie Associated Press) |
Labels: Criticism, European Union, Moscow, NATO, Navalny, Russia, Sanctions, Syria, Ukraine, United States, Vladimir Putin
posted by Pieface @ Saturday, April 24, 2021
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